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A brand exists through the values it reflects. These can be outlined in a brand character statement (BCS) to provide guidance to the brand’s speech. This article discusses the application of a tool from psychiatry for the development of a BCS. In addition, we present steps for implementing and evaluating a branding strategy consistent with the BCS principles. Concludes that the concept of a “brand” and that of a “product” are diametrically opposed and rewards will go to those who do successfully build a brand.

Discusses and attempts to anticipate the changes in consumer attitudes and behaviors which may result from the growing importance of digital information technology. Based on a survey conducted among early adopters of the technology, the “telecommuters”, finds a high incidence of pet ownership among telecommuters, rejection of some forms of computer shopping, and long working hours interlaced with long breaks, etc. Suggests the need to further investigate ways to capitalize on these future trends for the businesses of: banking, finances, travel, video rental, pet supply, grocery and retail trade.

VoiceStream was a strong brand within the digital wireless communications industry at the time CEO Robert Dodson led the company. It had a loyal following of customers and a strong reputation for value. Despite pushback from senior management, CEO Robert Dotson made the decision to undergo a rebranding strategy during a period of declining revenue and growth. As VoiceStream transitioned to T-Mobile, it had initial success, but faced the challenge of how to position the brand long term.

This case study was written with the historical background of a well-known company and traces key decisions made during the company’s rebranding transition. This case comes complete with insights from then current CEO, Robert Dotson.

This case is suitable for undergraduate and graduate courses in marketing, management or strategy, where students are studying brand management. Additionally, this case will be valuable for courses that include advanced branding strategies such as rebranding. This case could also be used for discussion in positioning and advertising techniques. This case includes, via in-depth interviews, critical strategic insights from CEO Robert Dotson. The case illustrates some of the major opportunities and threats associated with the VoiceStream/T-Mobile rebranding strategy.

LETTER FROM AMERICA Valspar Unit to Acquire Cargill The Valspar Corp. has announced that it has reached an agreement with the Federal Trade Commission that will allow its subsidiary, McWhorter Inc., to acquire Cargill Inc.'s Resin Products Division.

The Equal Pay Act 1970 (which came into operation on 29 December 1975) provides for an “equality clause” to be written into all contracts of employment. S.1(2) (a) of the 1970 Act (which has been amended by the Sex Discrimination Act 1975) provides:

A tax based on land value is in many ways ideal, but many economists dismiss it by assuming it could not raise enough revenue. Standard sources of data omit much of the potential tax base, and undervalue what they do measure. The purpose of this paper is to present more comprehensive and accurate measures of land rents and values, and several modes of raising revenues from them besides the conventional property tax.

The paper identifies 16 elements of land's taxable capacity that received authorities either trivialize or omit. These 16 elements come in four groups.

In Group A, Elements 1‐4 correct for the downward bias in standard sources. In Group B, Elements 5‐10 broaden the concepts of land and rent beyond the conventional narrow perception, while Elements 11‐12 estimate rents to be gained by abating other kinds of taxes. In Group C, Elements 13‐14 explain how using the land tax, since it has no excess burden, uncaps feasible tax rates. In Group D, Elements 15‐16 define some moot possibilities that may warrant further exploration.

This paper shows how previous estimates of rent and land values have been narrowly limited to a fraction of the whole, thus giving a false impression that the tax capacity is low. The paper adds 14 elements to the traditional narrow “single tax” base, plus two moot elements advanced for future consideration. Any one of these 16 elements indicates a much higher land tax base than economists commonly recognize today. Taken together they are overwhelming, and cast an entirely new light on this subject.

Multinational corporations (MNCs) entering into so-called state contracts in developing countries, notably in extracting industries or infrastructures, typically find themselves seeking a long-term commitment from a state whose life expectancy might be shorter than the duration of the contract. To address this uncertainty, MNCs have devised additional legal layers and brought additional parties to state contracts, causing a contractual inflation with contradictory aims. On the one hand, they have sought to blur the notion of third party, so that they could assert their contractual rights vis-à-vis more stakeholders. On the other hand, they have carefully avoided a total disqualification of this very notion to keep the civil society away from the negotiation table. Nowadays, the threat that the host states used to represent has been substantially reduced, but MNCs are now exposed outside of state contracts, for it is precisely the lack of contractual commitment on the part of the civil society that is a potential challenge to their activities. Accordingly, they are now forced to seek the endorsement of the very actor they ostensibly ignored in the past. The purpose of this paper is to describe this sinuous evolution of the state contract and to discuss the challenges it announces.

In the first part, the authors analyze the legal bubble that has prospered throughout the past decades, resulting in a dilution of the state as a party to the contract. In the second part, they describe the emergence by default of the civil society that this phenomenon has triggered. They discuss their findings and conclude in the third part.

In the past decades, state contracts have consistently progressed in the direction of an increased weakening of the state vis-à-vis its private contractors. For MNCs, this decline is far less favorable than it seems, for it enables the civil society to fill the gap and to claim a role that as disturbing as it is disproportionate, considering its uncertain legal nature.

Despite its evanescent content and contours, it is probably this civil society itself that will draw the new frontier of the state contract. What it will be is yet to be determined however.

MNCs lack the legal power to turn the civil society or some of its emanations into a legal person, let alone compel it to actually “sign” state contracts. But for their bargaining power vis-à-vis host states remains as strong as ever, they may ultimately force their sovereign interlocutors to do so.

The civil society has been extensively studied, but never as the legal person MNCs would like it to be.

This study aims to investigate the representation of human rights issues within photographs in the 2015 corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports of Fortune 70 companies.

Content analysis is used to examine human rights photos in CSR reports by Fortune 70 global corporations for the year 2015. Based on impression management theory and Roland Barthes’ work on visual rhetoric, a total of 744 photos are analysed.

The findings of this study reflect the main feature of the omnipresence of the linguistic in photographic human rights disclosure. Denotation and connotation in the photographs are inextricably intermingled; the linguistic message has the “anchoring” function that guides the interpretations of the symbolic message of the photos. The authors conclude what the proliferation of photos and associated text achieves, or attempts to achieve, is not only to provide information, but also carry visual rhetoric and impression management.

International accounting standard organisations, such as GRI, might provide guidance on the utilisation of photos in CSR reports to improve the realism of the reports. The principle of balance applicable to reported information should be extended to photos as much as possible. This may help ensure that the CSR reports reflect the reality of human rights issues within the organisations, rather than the construction of idealised images.

The findings have potential for global reporting institutions.

This study contributes to the impression management literature by analysing how companies present human rights issues and by demonstrating the way the photos are used to construct images of happiness, safety, diversity and mutual support.

This chapter examines the green face of the world’s one hundred largest firms from developed economies by linking degrees of internationalization to (pro)activity on environmental reporting. A bargaining approach, emphasizing intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, is applied to understand why the most international firms show the greenest face. Bargaining relations within the home country appear to be most important. Country characteristics explored include size, openness and the nature of business-society relationships.

The manufacturing sector has been observing various benefits by the implementation of lean manufacturing practices. However, the manufacturing sector has neglected the significance of health and safety management system implementation. The purpose of this research is to propose and validate an occupational health and safety management systems (OHSMS) framework based on critical success factors and their relationships in the lean manufacturing organizations.

A critical literature review was conducted to identify the success factors of OHSMS. Subsequently, a questionnaire survey and semi-structured interviews were conducted with experts from process industries to consolidate the critical success factors. After consolidating the critical success factors, relationships among critical success factors were established with the help of interpretive structural modelling using a team of 12 experts from industry and academia. These established relationships helped in proposing the hierarchical implementation framework. Finally, the validation of the proposed implementation framework was carried out using structural equation modelling (SEM).

This study has identified nine broader critical success factors for implementation of OHSMS in lean manufacturing organizations, especially the process industry. Subsequently, this study has proposed an OHSMS framework with nine broader critical success factors to implement in lean manufacturing organizations. Finally, the proposed framework has been validated using SEM with an appropriate sample size.

This study is helpful to the organizations to implement OHSMS without losing the essence of lean manufacturing strategy. This study has proposed a framework for implementation of OHSMS in the lean manufacturing organizations, especially process industry sector. This study also provided confidence to the organization through the validation of proposed framework in the process industry.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is first of its kind in this field of OHSMS in lean manufacturing organizations, especially the process industry. This study has involved both academicians and industry experts to bring more robust outcomes. This study proposed a unique framework to implement OHSMS in lean manufacturing organizations. This study has considered a comprehensive literature to develop a framework for OHSMS in lean manufacturing organizations. An implementation framework was proposed by considering both the academicians’ and industry professionals’ opinions. The proposed framework was statistically validated. This will be helpful in effective implementation of OHSMS strategy in lean manufacturing organizations, especially process industry sector.