Organizational Behavior : Part I The Macro Side

1. Organizational Behavior : Part I The Macro Side Professor Jim Lincoln Week 6: Discussion The Body Shop International

2. The Body Shop Agenda: 1. Project Teams 9 and 10 will each make 15 minute presentations on the case 2. The class will critique the presentations by Teams 5 and 6 and complete the analysis

3. Session objectives • Understand the role of strong core values in shaping the strategy, organization, and performance of an international retail business • Examine Anita Roddick’s leadership qualities and style and what made her effective • Was she a “developmental” or “heroic” leader? • Analyze Roddick’s active management of The Body Shop’s culture and examine her goals in doing so • Consider the extent to which strong culture in creating a distinctive Body Shop brand and in marketing that brand. • Discuss the degree to which business organizations can and should be major agents of social change • Consider the idea the idea that the active participation in business by people who are hostile to mainstream business practices and culture can be a source of creativity and innovation in business Source: Appex teaching note

4. What was Anita Roddick like? What motivated her? • Do her style and personality provide any clues about the sincerity of her idealism? • What were her strengths and weaknesses as a leader? • Was there ever more to The Body Shop’s culture than her and Gordon’s personal idealism and energetic pursuit of it?

5. When is it good business strategy to set yourself up as an alternative to or the antithesis of the dominant business model in an industry? • Did the Roddicks’ general naivete about and distaste for the cosmetics industry and business in general prove to be a business advantage?

6. Dissect the culture of The Body Shop • How would you do a “culture audit” of it? • Would a full understand of TBS’ culture require more information than what’s in the case? If so, what?

7. How did the Roddicks’ infuse their products, their shops, and the shopping experience with TBS’ corporate culture

8. What kind of leader was Anita Roddick? • Salty, charismatic, colorful, gutsy, pushy, indefatigable • Loved to travel • High energy

9. What kind of relationship did TBS build with its customers? • To what degree they share TBS’s culture? • Did Anita deliberately manage the socialization of customers in TBS’s culture • Customer participation (suggestion boxes) • Marketing strategy • Treat customers as intelligent • Educate them • Stores as marketing

11. How did the business of The Body Shop benefit from its strong progressive values and activist agenda? • Differentiate the product • Standardize the retail experience • No conventional marketing but aggressive pursuit of publicity • Ben and Jerry’s in the news • Apple always in the news • Also Sony and Honda

12. How was The Body Shop organized and managed? • How difficult is it to maintain a strong culture in a global franchise operation? • Head franchisee in each major market • Regular visits by regional managers • Anita bombarded shops with information • Criticism of cosmetics industry to make them feel special

13. How did Anita work to assure that her employees and her franchisers would share TBS’s values and were generally good fits to its culture? • Franchisee as women without business experience • Women-- concerned with social values. Gender gap in politics. Less inclined to accept the notion that business is just about making money • She constantly managing culture • Reinforce sense of being different • Think frivolously and break rules (except TBS’s rules) • Forced people to stand in meetings • Was she an autocrat

14. How did Anita work to assure that her employees and her franchisers would share TBS’s values and were generally good fits to its culture? • Franchisee as women without business experience • Women-- concerned with social values. Gender gap in politics. Less inclined to accept the notion that business is just about making money • She constantly managing culture • Reinforce sense of being different • Think frivolously and break rules (except TBS’s rules) • Forced people to stand in meetings • How did she fit people into the culture • Socialization-- day care and training • Motivation • Selection

15. d • What was the significance of TBS going public for its culture? • Constrained by analysts’ expectations? • Some private companies-- Levi’s keep strong culture • Historic watershed-- be force for social change, protect environment (use new capitalization) • Were all her cultural activities successful in raising the bottom line?

16. What was the significance of TBS going public for its culture? • Constrained by analysts’ expectations? • Some private companies-- Levi’s keep strong culture • Historic watershed-- be force for social change, protect environment (use new capitalization) • Were all her cultural activities successful in raising the bottom line?

17. Was strong culture a “good fit” (in a congruence sense) to The Body Shop’s global organization and strategy? • Did it help to standardize the shop climate and coordinate across shops and regions? • Advantage of franchise model-- enabled her to focus on visions • No obsession with ‘beauty’ in the conventional cosmetics sense

18. How did The Body Shop do in the U. S. market? • Was there something distinctively “European” about its culture that complicated the transfer to the U. S.?

20. Most businesses focus all the time on profits, profits, profits…I have to say I think that is deeply boring. I want to create an electricity and passion that bonds people to the company. You can educate people by their passions, especially young people You have to find ways to grab their imagination. You want them to feel that they are doing something important.. I’d never get that kind of motivation if we were just selling shampoo and body lotion.

22. What was the significance of TBS going public for its culture? • Constrained by analysts’ expectations? • Some private companies-- Levi’s keep strong culture • Historic watershed-- be force for social change, protect environment (use new capitalization) • Were all her cultural activities successful in raising the bottom line?