HACIÉNDOME EL SUECO

"So you fail, so what... Now, bounce back!" was the title of one of my favorite articles in the 90s. It tells the story of Sergio Zyman, marketing Director of Coca Cola who introduced New Coke. Do you remember? The cover story in Fortune Magazine  from May 1, 1995 starts with "if ever there were a failure destined to kill a career, New Coke was it." Sergio was then the marketing man behind one of the most disastrous product launches in the 20th century. After leading successfully the introduction of diet Coke, he proposed to replace the classic Coke with a better-tasting cola, label it "New Coke," and, probably his greatest error,  not leave the old Coke on the market. Alter this project, he left the company.   Nevertheless, seven years later he came back with a promotion.  Goizueta, Coca Cola´s CEO at the time, argued that: "We became uncompetitive by not being tolerant of mistakes." The article mentions other...

Managers of International Mobility Programs face a great complexity  when dealing with  their  Expatriates.  No  worldwide harmonized  legislation exists in the different subjects related to international assignments:  immigration, taxes, social security and occupational safety . The complexity is multiplied by the number of countries , and increases with factors such as : the disparity of social security agreements and applicable tax treaties . the existence of different tax periods in the countries of origin and destination , for example , Australia ( July-June ) or UK ( April to April ) whose fiscal year does not coincide with the calendar year pressure from business leaders to obtain residence and work permits in record time In Addition , HR teams  face other management challenges around the Mobility Programs : cultural change , negotiating each case , international...

The current economic crisis has hit all European countries. Given my Swedish origins, I am asked about how Sweden is doing in this context. The response is... surprisingly well. At the beginning of the 90s, Sweden experienced a  similar downturn to the current Spanish one: financial collapse, end of housing boom, government budget deficit and general economic recession. The way Sweden confronted the depression has become a reference as the Washington Post stressed in  The Swedish Recovery . The lessons learnt explain why the swedes have overcome the current climate better than the rest of the European neighbors. Another good article on this is  Why Sweden had a good crisis that  highlights some success factors : Reacted promptly, efficiently and with wide support from the electorate Kept fiscal house in order when times were good, to have more room to maneuver when things turned around Benefited from t...