Discussion Questions

Rustamov Qudratbek MMT85i

Answers for discussion question of the Life’s Good case study

Discussion Questions
1. As the top managers of their company, what types of issues might Bert and John have to
deal with? Be as specific as possible. Which management functions might be most important?
to them? Why?
2. Using descriptions from the case, describe Bert and John’s managerial style. Would this
approach works for other organizations? Why or why not?
3. How do you think the company’s motto “Do what you like. Like what you do” might affect
how managers manage? Be specific.
4. What managerial challenges might there be in having friends work for your business? How
could these challenges be kept inconsequential?
5. Would you want to work for a company like this? Why or why not?
6. In what ways would the Life is good managers (corporate and retail store) have to deal with the
challenges of customer service, innovation, and sustainability? Be specific in your description.

1. 
   As their project is a startup project, I think the first problem they faced in the beginning of their project was the shortage of money. As said in the case, despite selling enough number of shirts on their daily basis, they still need to live an ordinary life. If they had enough money to do so, they wouldn’t sell the products advertising it door to door. In such situations, the most important management function must be planning and organizing. Planning how to sell correctly the products and organizing the production with the least amount of money spent during it. This two functions are much more important than the others in the beginning of any successful company, during its startup days.
   

2. 
   As we can see from the case, we can clearly see the difference from other managers in the work ethic of Bert and John. In the beginning they divided the workforce by half, which then led to the selling of products rise significantly. As the designing the new Jake and Rocket slogans done by John, most of the jobs from ads to selling was done by Bert which made John just to look after the pictures and new designs. I think this type of ethic can work for new projects connected to designing, but for other spheres this managerial style can be problematic.
   

3. 
   This is a very strong motto, causing some unintended debates among others managers. This is a great way to a diplomatic style of leadership. So here, every manager is responsible for his way of managing, while company giving him all the freedom starting from planning to the end of product distribution.
   

4. 
   The work distribution can not be perfect. You always think that your friend backs you up in difficult situation, which can lead to someone’s lack of responsibility over the given work. But, most of the world’s global companies in the beginning started with just an idea of two or three friends working or studying together (such as Facebook, and Google).
   

5. 
   I would definitely work for this company and of course will try to benefit the overall profit. The idea and managerial style perfectly fits my personality. I mostly like freedom over the job I’ve been doing. I don’t want when someone is standing over my position giving orders to my work. And this can really decrease the work productivity.
   

6. 
   As the democratic style involves mostly opportunities that can be helpful to collaborate closely with all the team member and in most cases, need to hear their perspective ideas. Not only from the ideas of their employee, even in some situations, they have to be responsible for their customer’s new ideas or complaints over their projects. This trend mostly depends on the retail store managers and even mostly implementing new ideas about t-shirts from respected customers.
   

The fashion industry is very fast-changing. Even in some situations, before selling one product, the demand can drastically decrease. This can lead to the loss of most of the produced goods. In these cases, the managers should do the fast fashion changing industry. They should be more specific and even need to evolve some ways to rid of the fast passed fashion change. Seasonal clothes can also be a big issue because you can’t wear t-shirts every day of the year. In some cases, this can lead to issuing new products such as hoodies and other hot clothes.