B-School Bulletin: 4 Reasons To Hire Veterans

Why Hiring Veterans Makes Good Business Sense

News from Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management 

“With nearly 1.3 million active-duty troops, and another 865,000 in armed forces reserves, the United States boasts one the largest military forces on the planet. That fighting force, however, makes up less than 0.5 percent of the American population.

“The challenge is awareness, since much of the population is not routinely exposed to the military, Friend says. Because of this gap between the military and the citizens they serve, common perceptions of military service are often distorted—especially when those perceptions are often formed through portrayals of service members in movies or on the news.”

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News from University of Cambridge Judge Business School

“Chinese firms are becoming more global as they debate whether to become public companies, says Professor David De Cremer of Cambridge Judge Business School.

“Companies that go public in the US can create plenty of attention, with the CEO ringing the opening bell on the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq. The same has been true in China, where internet giant Tencent went public in 2004 and e-commerce company Alibaba followed suit a decade later.

“Yet some other highly publicised IPOs in China have turned into duds, so Chinese companies are now realising that going public may not be the ‘holy grail’ after all, according to a recent article On the joy of not being a listed company, by Professor David De Cremer of Cambridge Judge Business School in the World Financial Review.”

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News from London Business School

“We love change — as long as the change is made by others and we don’t have to change ourselves.

“Ask an audience the following questions: ‘Who believes change is inevitable?’ and ‘Should people see change as something positive?’ and most of them will likely raise their hands to affirm both questions.

“But ask them, ‘Who is comfortable about changing their own way of doing things? Who has their preferred side of the bed but is okay to change sides at times? Who is fine about changing plans after they’ve made them?’ and you’ll get a different reaction. Most likely, the audience will go quiet and you will see only a few hands go up.”

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You Probably Have A Bias For Making Bad Decisions. Here’s Why.

News from Harvard Business School

“Until the last year or so, the term ‘recency bias’ was rarely a topic of cocktail conversation — unless it was a gathering of behavioral scientists letting their hair down. But then a news item surfaced about certain White House staffers who angle to get the final audience of the day with the president, believing the last idea he hears is the one most likely to be chosen.

“If true, the president is no better or worse than most of us in allowing cognitive biases to cloud our thinking. We are, for example, more likely to seek information that aligns with our existing beliefs (confirmation bias), to give ourselves too much credit or not enough blame (self-serving bias), or to place more value on losing $100 than making $100 (loss aversion).

“In business, a bias-clouded decision can have disastrous consequences, so researchers at Harvard Business School invest much time in understanding how all this works. Here’s a look at stories on some of those research areas and what they mean for becoming a better decision maker.”

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A Polsky Center survey finds a majority of Americans are looking to research universities to be the foremost drivers of innovation. Photo by Jean Lachat

Most Americans Look To Research Universities For Innovation Leadership

News from University of Chicago Booth School of Business

“An overwhelming majority of Americans are looking to research universities to be the foremost drivers of innovation at a time of anxiety over global competition, according to a new Innovation Indicator survey from the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the University of Chicago.

“The Polsky Innovation Indicator found that 71 percent of Americans believe research universities are a ‘major force’ in driving U.S. innovation, considerably more than the number who said that of large corporations, startup businesses or government. The survey also points to real challenges for global competitiveness, with just one in four people viewing America as the global leader in innovation. That suggests a growing need for universities to provide leadership through field-defining research and applying new knowledge to benefit society.”

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