Saudi Arabia: Getting the House in Order(HBS Case 9-702-031)

"Saudi resembles Japan"


Because of huge public debt(exceeding its GDP), Saudi Arabia has been force to change their economy from oil-dependent to non-oil-economy. However, this reform wanted a lot of changes in not only economic system but also social system such as custom of Islam. This is a essay of such “Changing Saudi Arabia”.

This article, because it is HBS Case, characterizes Crown Prince Abdullah―leadership of the reform―is good person, and traditional Muslim―opposite of the reform―are bad. However, this is a view of economics or “Westernize culture”, so in Muslim’s view, the situation may be reverse.

I am Japanese, and Japan sometimes said as“mysterious country” because of its closeness, got same feeling by this case to economic reform of Japan. In Japan, it is easy to design good reform or reasonable system, and there are a lot of wonderful ideas, but it is quite difficult to realize them. Why? No one knows. But I think Japan has original sense of value alike Saudi Arabia, and this disturbs some reforms or changes, and makes “mysterious country”.

(URL:http://www.aii-t.org/j/saudi/files/saudi_japan.gif)

SADAFCO（HBS Case 9-599-021）

"Difference of market and strategy"



“SADAFCO” is an abbreviation of the Saudi and Dairy Foodstuff Company Limited formed in 1990 by combining some food companies. This Case describes the history of SADAFCO or its subsidiary and their strategy to adapting “unique” Islam market.

“Uniqueness”, for instance, woman can not go shopping, can not get driver’s license, every one use not coin but bill, makes business-model or business strategy different. SADAFCO’s business is not strategic but opportunistic, but they can make money because of uniqueness, I believe.

I think theory of strategy varies to each the market. If customer has different custom in a market, the strategy should be different from another. SADAFCO’s business is not seen as strategic, but we can say it is strategic for their market.




(URL:http://www.sadafco.com/revised/mainpage.htm)

Teacher's role

"There is no right answer in strategy."


Today I had second lecture of “International Business: Int. Business Strategy”. Actually, this is first lecture because last one is used for introduction.

Today’s topic is “Cola War”, that is a Case of HBS about competition among Coke and Pepsi and for thinking “globalization”. I got a lot of things from the lecture, that are to definite “industry” is difficult, brand-making becomes high drag for entry, mix of diversify and vertical integration means internationalization…etc.

However, most impressive thing for me is the styles of lecture. Professor doesn’t teach us, but ask us, and organize our opinion for his aim of lecture. In my school, generally, teachers are the people who give us “the right answer”, and I unconsciously have taken that for granted. However, I realized from the class that, especially in strategy or business such as that some situation in real world, there is no right answer and it is much more important to know difference of other people’s thinking than know teacher’s answer.

First lecture

Today is first class of "Trendspotting and Future Thinking".

I worried about registration because I have another class in SSE just before this class. But, course director has accepted me!

My aim for this course is to get future-view about role of agriculture and influence of ecology to business.


Next class is about "Theory". How we can think future? What is important for creativity?

I'm very looking forward about that.

Grant,Robert M(1991)The Resource-Based Theory of Competitive Advantage: Implications for Strategy Formulation

How firms and we should live?


This is so nice article because it has clear object, beautiful structure, and suggestive contention.

The object is relation between resourse and strategies of companies.

The structure is that, starting from where the study is in,or how and why it is valuable, and continuing main point and conclusion.

The contention or main idea is "Understand and exploit our advantage, and seek next one", the idea that strategies of companies should be made not from their environment but from their advantage.


This idea is useful not only for companies but also for people.

“Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning Objectives”

In today’s lecture, I got a paper about learning skill. This is “Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning objectives”, the concept of six levels about learning skills or something in general. This is very useful and interesting, so I will introduce you this in the following:




Level 1: Knowledge;
Description; Memorization of facts, theories and principles
Sample skills; recall, list, name ,state, define, identify, match

Level 2: Comprehension;
Description; show basic understanding
Sample skills; discuss, paraphrase, compute, extrapolate

Level 3: Application;
Description; apply knowledge (ideas or theories or principles) to new situations; application to situations where there is one correct answer
Sample skills; solve demonstrate, apply, interpret, choose, classify, use, calculate, relate

Level 4: Analysis;
Description; decompose a topic into its constituent parts, show relationships among the more basic ideas; solutions where there is not necessarily a specific correct answer
Sample skills; separate, recognize, test, differentiate, solve

Level 5: Synthesis;
Description; put parts of knowledge together, discover relationships among different parts, create new patterns
Sample skills; design, order, develop, create, summarize, combine, propose

Level 6: Evaluation;
Description; make judgments regarding extent to which something satisfies chosen criteria
Sample skills; evaluate, justify, critique, appraise



Generally, we think the skill is from level 1 to 3, but this concept has even more, 4 to 6. From wide viewpoint, 1 to 3 are “inner” skill, such as solving problem, necessary in business situation, and 4 to 5 are “ outer” skill, like abstraction, essential for academic work, and 6 is “total” skill to connect “inner” and “outer”. I will want to get those ability, through this exchange program!

What is "Strategy"?

Today, I had first lecture at SSE, "International Business Strategy: Int. Business Strategy".

The lecture was very interesting and exciting for me because the professor, who has taught at HBS before, was very energetic, students from a lot of country attended, the lecture was well organized, the course was taken in English…so, everything is fresh for me!

I got two impressive words from the class. First is “We live in good time, we can learn history”. This is said when the professor talked about definition of “Globalization”. He say we can’t define the term because “Globalization” is changing. Second is “Try to market not work”. This is his definition of “Strategy”. He said that if market was complete in Capitalism, no one or no company can make profit.

Such a definition is unusual, but is very interesting because this means natural competition of firms makes unnatural situation such as imperfect market. In other words, in economics, people and companies are thought to seek their profits naturally, but these processes are seeking unnatural situation.