Citation
(2009), "What’s on the web", Strategic Direction, Vol. 25 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/sd.2009.05625gag.001
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2009, Emerald Group Publishing Limited
What’s on the web
Article Type: What’s on the web From: Strategic Direction, Volume 25, Issue 7
Quick, but is it useful?
This is an online knowledge resource for business administration (not a quick way to a qualification). It has a large selection of topics, presented as frameworks or summaries including accounting, law, management, economics, marketing, finance, strategy and many others. Judging by the language, most of the material comes from the USA.
The site is super fast but we are not sure of the content quality. A summary marketing report for example seemed both complex and simplistic (excuse the contradiction).
Have a look for yourselves; some topics are clearly better resourced than others.
No change?
We are not quite sure what to make of this. It is the web site of the Change Management Learning Center, sponsored by Prosci. The home page, however, has the feel of an internal page and does not invite you in – it is rather hard work.
Prosci is an independent research company in the field. Their change management methodology has, they claim, become one of the most widely used approaches for managing the people side of change in corporations and government. They also maintain that they are the world leader in change management research.
Without joining and paying out lots of dollars it is hard to judge the quality and usefulness of the research. For example their Best Practices in Change Management a report with input from business leaders and change professionals from 426 organizations from 59 countries who “share lessons learned in leading change” costs $249.
Food for thought
Now this site is a much better “shop window”. It is a selling vehicle for De Bono and Heller’s business ideas and as such, does exactly what it says on the tin. It piques the curiosity, offers dramatic business improvement, name checks some key thinkers (quite apart from the authors) and gives a useful taster in the form of a Letter to Thinking Managers that claims to “provide solutions to hundreds of common management problems.”
It uses tried and tested direct mail techniques, e.g. “Try it, at no risk, over the next two months,” and leads the reader to a course of action.
It could be improved – it does have a slightly old-fashioned feel – but we suspect it is very successful and, as they say, “If it ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it.”
Good for business
With a nice “international” feel to it, the site of Business.com offers the leading business search engine and directory and pay-per-click advertising network. It claims (probably accurately) to serve more than 40 million unique business users and thousands of advertisers every month. Using the portal business decision makers can quickly find what they need to manage and grow their businesses, and it also enables advertisers to reach these users, wherever they are across the business internet, through partners such as Forbes, Hoovers, the Financial Times and Internet.com.
The home page is nice and clear, the links are fast and the amount of content staggering. A slightly more refined search facility might be useful but that is a very small cavil at a very large (and good) web site.
The right stuff
www.ethicalleadershipgroup.com
The Ethical Leadership Group was formed in 1993 with a straightforward mission – to help companies promote cultures of integrity.
Their web is as uncomplicated as you would expect with a clear statement of values. They emphasise a culture of integrity – based on the reality that no matter what kind of ethics or compliance program a company has, in the end culture wins. They also cite Enron as a company that had written rules but no ethical culture.
Sections on values, compliance and corporate responsibility are supported by an up-to date section on articles and an interesting regular blog.
The site is also fast, nicely designed and clearly laid out. Well worth a visit.
And finally
Thought for the day: “If you can’t be a good example then you’ll have to be a horrible warning” (Caroline Aird).
Best of all
For a particularly interesting and useful site you could always try the Emerald one!
If you have any favorite (or otherwise) sites that you would like us to review on these pages, or wish us to consider your own site, please drop us an e-mail and we will ask our reviewers to check them out.