LINDENWOOD UNIVERSITY

The Conference Board

Juliana Cappa Martins de Oliveira Dr. Hendrix Organizational Behavior January 16, 2013

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The Conference Board 1. Introduction The Conference Board is a not-for-profit global organization that tries to help companies understand and resolve current issues in the business world. From ethical issues, to diversity, globalization, and the rise of social media, The Conference Board has many fields it can study. In this paper an overview of their history, organizational structure, current challenges, and possible solutions to these challenges will be provided, revealing the complexities of this company that has helped build American business history since 1916 (Our History 1). 2. Origin Founded by Magnus Alexander of General Electrics, and Frederick Fish, a Boston attorney who had been president of AT&T, The Conference Board was created to deal with a series of business crisis that had happened in the prior decade. Originally from Boston, it quickly moved to New York, the business capital of the country in 1920, and grew quickly. Doing research for the Government through the two World Wars, it established itself as a credible business intelligence source, becoming one of the, if not the most powerful name in its field. Amongst its credits, The Conference Board generated the first U.S. Cost of Living Index, the A Graphic Guide to Consumer Markets, and the Help-Wanted Advertising Index, which still measures unemployment rates in 52 major cities across the United States. The organization also created the Bureau of Economic Audit and Control, the Ron Brown Award for Corporate Leadership, The Conference Board Commission on Public Trust and Private Enterprise after the business ethics scandals in 2002, and encouraged social responsibility in America as early as in the 1960s. It was also the first private organization to provide economic data in the name of the U.S. Department of State (2006 Annual Report 16-21).

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Having gone through ten presidents in the last 97 years, The Conference Board 3. Nature

4. Growth

5. Challenges

6. Solutions

7. Conclusion

Works Cited jajaja