In September, the FIA Executive MBA travelled to the USA for a week of classes and company visits. One of the striking observations for our team from Brazil is the high level of labor productivity in so many of the service and manufacturing industries in the USA. With a per capita economic output more than 5 times higher than Brazil´s, the classes and the company visits showed many different approaches and opportunities for accelerating productivity and economic growth in Brazil.
At Jack Daniel´s, we saw a fairly simple production process, making a delicious beverage with high added value. Great marketing, and a lot of high technology presented as very traditional bourbon production methods come together to generate substantial profits and growth for the parent company, Brown-Forman, exporting half of its production as one of the top five premium brands of whiskey worldwide. Nissan automobiles, with a highly automated production system operates one of the most productive auto plants in the World, in Smyrna, Tennessee, where we visited and discussed international quality standards. At the FEDEX global hub, in Memphis, we saw how more than 2 million packages are routed to their final destinations as 120 planes offload then fly again only 3 hours later, to their final destination. An amazingly effective service operation the connects people and businesses all over the world every single day.
How is such productivity achieved? The classes at Vanderbilt on Innovation, Strategy and Decision Making, Managing Risk presented techniques, approaches and methods to create value, while classes on Leading Teams, Coaching and Managing Change brought lessons for our executives on how to get the best results from the most important asset the people who work and manage the corporations.
All this in the beautiful setting of the Vanderbilt campus, where the Owen Graduate School of Management brings together experienced students, great professors, and an opportunity for free exchange of ideas, in one of the most productive research universities of the USA. In all, a very worthwhile experience.
Prof. James Wright
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