Walmart digital
168196560
Organizers Increase Sophistication With Digital Communications
OUR Walmart, an independent workers' rights organization, is trying to persuade Walmart workers to download a new Android app called WorkIt. The app gives users advice and information on Walmart personnel policies as well as the opportunity to participate in conversations with other Walmart workers who have similar questions or concerns. The advisors on the app explaining the company's policies as well as labor laws are exclusively other current or former Walmart employees.
Alfred T DeMaria
20462354
The inevitable application of big data to health care.
THE AMOUNT OF DATA BEING DIGITALLY COLLECTED AND stored is vast and expanding rapidly. As a result, the science of data management and analysis is also advancing to enable organizations to convert this vast resource into information and knowledge that helps them achieve their objectives. Computer scientists have invented the term big data to describe this evolving technology. Big data has been successfully used in astronomy (eg, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey of telescopic information) retail sales (eg, Walmart's expansive number of transactions) search engines (eg, Google's customization of individual searches based on previous web data) and politics (eg, a campaign's focus of political advertisements on people most likely to support their candidate based on web searches) In this Viewpoint, we discuss the application of big data to health care, using an economic framework to highlight the opportunities it will offer and the roadblocks to implementation. We suggest that leveraging the collection of patient and practitioner data could be an important way to improve quality and efficiency of health care delivery. Widespread uptake of electronic health records (EHRs) has generated massive data sets. A survey by the American Hospital Association showed that adoption of EHRs has doubled from 2009 to 2011, partly a result of funding provided by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act of 2009. Most EHRs now contain quantitative data (eg, laboratory values) qualitative data (eg, text based documents and demographics) and transactional data (eg, a record of medication delivery) However, much of this rich data set is currently perceived as a byproduct of health care delivery, rather than a central asset to improve its efficiency. The transition of data from refuse to riches has been key in the big data revolution of other industries. Advances in analytic techniques in the computer sciences, especially in machine learning, have been a major catalyst for dealing with these large information sets. These analytic techniques are in contrast to traditional statistical methods (derived from the social and physical sciences) which are largely not useful for analysis of unstructured data such as text based documents that do not fit into relational tables. One estimate suggests that 80% of business related data exist in an unstructured format. The same could probably be said for health care data, a large proportion of which is text based. In contrast to most consumer service industries, medicine adopted a practice of generating evidence from experimental (randomized trials) and quasi experimental studies to inform patients and clinicians. The evidence based movement is founded on the belief that scientific inquiry is superior to expert opinion and testimonials. In this way, medicine was ahead of many other industries in terms of recognizing the value of data and information guiding rational decision making. However, health care has lagged in uptake of newer techniques to leverage the rich information contained in EHRs. There are 4 ways big data may advance the economic mission of health care delivery by improving quality and efficiency. First, big data may greatly expand the capacity to generate new knowledge. The cost of answering many clinical questions prospectively, and even retrospectively, by collecting structured data is prohibitive. Analyzing the unstructured data contained within EHRs using computational techniques (eg, natural language processing to extract medical concepts from free text documents) permits finer data acquisition in an automated fashion. For instance, automated identification within EHRs using natural language processing was superior in detecting postoperative complications compared with patient safety indicators based on discharge coding. Big data offers the potential to create an observational evidence base for clinical questions that would otherwise not be possible and may be especially helpful with issues of generalizability. The latter issue limits the application of conclusions derived from randomized trials performed on a narrow spectrum of participants to patients who exhibit very different characteristics. Second, big data may help with knowledge dissemination. Most physicians struggle to stay current with the latest evidence guiding clinical practice. The digitization of medical literature has greatly improved access; however, the sheer
JAMA
Travis B Murdoch Allan S Detsky
144222770
Framing the Contested History of Digital Culture
Nothing is so remote from us as the thing which is not old enough to be history and not new enough to be news," Gilbert Keith Chesterton pointed out in 1923.1 Yet today historians are more and more taking this transitional period as their subject of study. Consider Thomas J. Sugrue on Barack Obama and the legacy of the civil rights movement, Bethany Moreton on WalMart as an example of Christian free enterprise, or the Journal of American History publishing a special issue on the 9/11 terror attacks in September 2002, only a year after the tragedy.2 This issue of Radical History Review (RHR) explores this transitional, recent period of history as it relates to digital culture at the beginning of the twentyfirst century, a period characterized by a post9/11 growth in the use of electronic surveillance by states and governments, a surge in the use of social media by social movements, rising online activism, or "hacktivism," and charged debates about the impact of digital research tools and digital information on the nature and practice of scholarly research. In a rapidly changing digital information and communication world, we believe that radical scholars from all fields, including history, must take seriously the challenge of documenting, examining and analyzing, historicizing, and, where necessary, contesting the political, cultural, and historical trajectories that are presently unfolding. Some historians have cautioned against a "presentism" within history scholarship, where contemporary concerns shape investigations of past eras.3 Too old to be news, but too young to be the object of conventional historical scholarship, the
Lyell Davies Elena Razlogova
113447322
The Effects Of Digital Printers And Cutters On The Value Stream Of United States, Textile Based, Manufacturing.
MICK, CARLY ELIZABETH. The Effects of Digital Printers and Cutters on the Value Stream of United States, Textile Based, Manufacturing. (Under the direction of Dr. West and Dr. Little) In January 2013, Walmart announced it would buy an additional $50 billion in U.S. products over the next 10 years in an effort to grow U.S. manufacturing and encourage the creation of U.S. jobs. The focus of this paper is to look at the current manufacturing process of a Walmart supplier who makes a textile based, mass customizable product in the United States and the ways in which digital cutting and printing technology could influence this process. This research creates an improved understanding of how a supplier could utilize technology to benefit from Walmart's U.S. manufacturing initiative. The use of value stream mapping gives a clear and simple framework by which to consider the viability of converting to a domestic, technology based manufacturing process. By comparing the value stream of the current production system with that of a hypothetical future state, this research found that employing a digital printing and cutting operation would have a significant effect on the inventory requirements of this manufacturer. The print on demand capability of the digital printer would allow for a huge virtual inventory of designs without the need for increased fabric storage and create a more flexible production system. Waste associated with transportation would also decrease significantly; and an opportunity for brand expansion into 'Made in America' markets would be created. Given the size of inventory and associated opportunity costs, the manufacturer observed in this study is a good candidate for the
Carly Elizabeth Mick
28793763
Overview of business innovations and research opportunities in blockchain and introduction to the special issue
Blockchain has become a new frontier of venture capitals that has attracted the attention of banks, governments, and other business corporations. The recent blockchain related attempts included legal blockchains by Fadada.com and Microsoft and pork tracking blockchains by Walmart and IBM. Blockchain is poised to become the most exciting invention after the Internet; while the latter connects the world to enable new business models based on online business processes, the former will help resolve the trust issue more efficiently via network computing. In this paper, we give an overview on blockchain research and development as well as introduce the papers in this special issue. We show that while blockchain has enabled Bitcoin, the most successful digital currency, its widespread adoption in finance and other business sectors will lead to many business innovations as well as many research opportunities.
J Leon Zhao Shaokun Fan Jiaqi Yan
169423090
Low Cost Versus Frugal Innovation Building Blocks the Fundamentals of Jugaad Business Modeling (Podstawy innowacji niskokosztowych w porownaniu z innowacjami oszczednosciowymi oraz fundamenty tworzenia modeli biznesowych typu jugaad)
In this paper, we seek to present the first holistic and frugal business model ever designed to bridge the digital divide in Greenfield Africa. Based on an extensive implication in the Connecting Africa and OLPC Projects, Airtel Telecom Group (a Canadian company) partners decided to go one step further in their quest to revamp state owned telcos and postal service providers who were on the brink of collapse. Unlike low cost models developed by well known heavyweights like SFR, Ryanair, Blue Jet, Easyjet, Walmart, etc. a frugal and sustainable business model like the one discussed in this paper has a lot more to do with Jugaad Innovation frameworks which led to many affordable and responsible breakthroughs in healthcare, education, housing, broadband, transportation, alternative energies, etc. therefore, our main goal is to (a) distinguish between frugal and costkilling models, (b) explain the characteristics of jugaad based framework and philosophy versus revenue driven business models, (c) explain the importance of sustainable and organic business models in developing markets versus imported plug play recipes. At last, we will describe the fundamental building blocks of juggad innovation business models and their impact on growth perspectives for MNCs and entrepreneurs willing to break into greenfield markets.
Jamal Boukouray
216988021
Competing in today's challenging retail environment
We are witnessing that the physical retail industry is changed by digital retail and the pervasiveness of smartphones, being under the pressure of integrating physical and digital, of bringing continuously in store innovation, of investing in CX and Omni channel efforts. Retailers must give more attention to the entire shopper journey, adequately matching their customers' expectations across key areas, considering the newest solutions while looking at preferences and shopping habits, learning from Walmart's ecommerce moves, having a customer centric approach and innovating accordingly, and the last but not the least gaining and strengthening the necessary organizational commitment.
Theodor Purcarea Purcarea
168892220
Competing, Connecting, and Winning in Todays Distribution and Merchandising
While being in a hurry to complete tasks, both customers and customer professionals are valuing when things are done better and quicker. The necessary data science skills of the customer professionals have become a must have, their operations and future strategies being guided through the application of analytics on these data, the challenge remaining to translate customer insights into business operations. Retailers are seeing how the less distinct line between online and brick and mortar is becoming more and more evident, and how Amazon is putting more pressure on traditional retail than ever, while Walmart is working on the way of bringing the physical store directly into consumers homes. And facing the continuous challenge of building brand loyalty and advocacy retailers are also focusing on improving their stores value proposition and their stores merchandising, on enhancing Omni channel customer experience by defining accordingly their digital supply chain vision, without forgetting to successfully managing collaborative initiatives to improve shared supply chain processes that benefit all members. They really need to struggle to prevent friction in their customers journey, to identify where breaks are in this journey and to make consumers seen the benefit in having a personal link with a brand, what involves, among other aspects, to know the most critical brand equities and touchpoints for that battleground called the moment of purchase, making distinction between the initial consideration and the final consideration, having actionable data (pre store, in store, and post store)
Theodor Purcarea Purcarea
46789958
Digitization and Disciplined Autonomy
T he increasing digitization of the economy presents both opportunities and challenges for firms. On one hand, digitization can enable more degrees of freedom and sophisticated strategies that target each customer segment or even each customer individually with efficiency. For example, firms can now create rich and customized advertisements with almost laser precision without sacrificing tremendous reach. In addition, many firms are devising their digital strategies such that they not only directly sell to customers through their linear value chain or pipeline (as with Walmart) but also facilitate interactions among their consumers and complementors/ suppliers (for example, Amazon Marketplace or Google's Android platform).1 Think of Walmart acquiring Jet.com or Amazon acquiring Whole Foods as exemplars of digital strategies that encompass elements of pipelines as well as platforms. On the other hand, digitization requires firms to become more nimble and innovate with high quality and velocity. Tech firms such as Apple, Google, and Amazon constantly introduce novel, high quality products and services that meet or even create customer demands. These firms often appear to follow strategies that defy conventional guidelines emphasizing the pursuit of binary "either or" strategies, such as either efficiency or innovation and either exploitation of current resources or exploring and embracing new opportunities. However, pursuing dual strategies, especially those that deliver on both efficiency and innovation, is not easy, as firms such as 3M have discovered.2 Therefore, it is worth considering how managerial and IT practices can contribute to the success of dualfocused and ambidextrous strategies. Based on our research and observations, we argue that successful firms often deploy and demonstrate what we call disciplined autonomy to more fully leverage opportunities presented by digitization. We also suggest how executives and IT professionals can foster disciplined autonomy.
Robert Henry Smith
168576877
Predictive Analytics in 'Unified Commerce' A Brief Insight
Globally, "Retailing" has been always on a high octane mode from the inception of Walmart in the 1960s to the launch Amazon in 90s. But, as we ushered into the digital landscape with new knowledge on customer data, pertaining to its behavior the timeline of decision makings and executions has been drastically shortened. The arrival of "Unified Commerce" armed with "Predictive Analytics" support system is acting as a catalyst for the further growth of retail in multiple channels and formats. But, how it is going to work?
Rahul Guhathakurta