-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: HBR -- Janice White
Date: Mon, 17 Dec 2001 08:21:21 -0600
From: "Skwor, Jeanette" <skworj@uwgb.edu>

***I've been to Harvard Publishing's website and had shaken my head over
the mission statement posted there; thank you to David Goodman for
thinking to share it here.  I am in total agreement with Janice White, and
I felt that HBR may not have been aware of the policies of their
fulfillment house, so I wrote directly to them.

***See my letter to them, and their response (in reverse order) below:
-----------------------------
Dear J. Skwor:

Thank you for your valuable comments and feedback. A one-term subscription
to Harvard Business Review was to be 10 issues effective with new orders
beginning in January 2001.  The invitations to subscribe along with the
insert cards in our magazine state the amount of issues a customer is due
to receive in the offer, along with the term and price of the
subscription.

You have ordered your subscription is via Faxon/Rowecom, a subscription
agency.  If you do have a missing issue claim within the term of your
subscription (Nov/Dec 2000 to September 2001)please contact them at
1-800-999-5594. They are due to represent you with missing issues,
inquries and subscription orders for Harvard Business Review.

Our customer service office has placed your subscription order correctly.
We apologize if the subscription agency did not make the terms of your
subscription apparent.

Sincerely,

Liz Sottile
Circulation Coordinator
Harvard Business Review
60 Harvard Way 300NB
Boston, MA 02163

ph: (617) 783-7410
fax: (617) 783-7494
esottile@hbsp.harvard.edu

-----Original Message-----
From: cem@hbsp.harvard.edu [mailto:cem@hbsp.harvard.edu]
Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2001 3:21 PM
To: esottile@hbsp.harvard.edu
Subject: DT20011213_0000000377 Feedback <skworj@uwgb.edu>

> Feedback from user@143.200.208.50
>
> Name:  J. Skwor
>
> E-mail:  skworj@uwgb.edu
>
> Subject:  Suggestions and Feedback
>
> Topic:  General feedback
>
> Order ID:
>
> Message:
>
> I am the serials librarian at Cofrin Library, University of WI - Green
> Bay.    I am having a disagreement with your fulfillment house.
>
> Cofrin Library has not been receiving all the issues of Harvard Business
> Review in a given year, and I am told by Neodata that is because at the
> time we paid, HBR was publishing (#) of issues, and that's all we paid
> for, so that's all we will get.
>
> They cashed our vendor's check for 2001 on Oct. 26, 2000, and ended our
> subscription with the Sept. 2001 issue because, I am told, in 2000, only
> 10 issues were published and therefore that's all we paid for, and all we
> have coming.
>
> I had sent in subscription corrections twice during the year, and last
> week went around and around with a customer rep at the "Orders, Inquiries
> and address changes" number given in the magazine.
>
> I also sent a letter describing the problem to a library serials listserv
> I am on, and copied hbursubs@neodata.com.  I received the automatic reply,
> saying I would receive a response in 2 -3 business days, but nothing
> since.
>
> My letter to the serials list started quite a conversation, with several
> libraries hopping on my bandwagon, and others being told issues as current
> as Sept. are out of print (in response to claims.)
>
> I think you need to know how these matters are being handled.  If you want
> to sell HBR by the issue, I would suggest you change your "Rates per year"
> to "Rates per issue".
>
> Yours truly,
>
> J. Skwor
> Cofrin Library Serials Dept.
> Univ. of WI - Green Bay
> 2420 Nicolet Dr.
> Green Bay, WI 54311

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: HBR -- David Goodman
Date: Fri, 14 Dec 2001 09:21:42 -0500
From: "Janice White" <janice.white@fct-cf.gc.ca>

Ok now I know I should let this go but after reading these mission
statements and policies, I couldn't let it go without a comment.  I
speak my mind when I see things that are unjust and wrong.

I am sorry but they have negated their claims to work at improving the
practice of management by creating such a huge disaster with their
customers and their subscriptions.  If this is an improvement, I would
hate to see how they run their offices.

Publisher of choice for those experts with important management ideas?
Is there a new management idea out there that I am not aware of?  I
always thought management should accommodate and encourage feedback from
their clients and employees?  I see the total opposite.  I wonder if
they have a management directive on communication skills?

I wonder if the latest thinking in management involves not thinking at
all.  I have not seen 1 thing that they have done that has been forward
thinking, in fact it seems we have gone back to the dark ages of
communication, where it takes months to resolve problems.  For all our
technology, we seem to have lost a key factor, courtesy, effective
communication and plain old thinking..

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: HBR
Date: Thu, 13 Dec 2001 22:37:45 -0500
From: David Goodman <dgoodman@phoenix.princeton.edu>

>>From  the HBR web site,
http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu/inside/about.html
I quote:

"The mission of Harvard Business School Publishing is to improve the
practice of management and its impact on a changing world.
[...]
We strive to be the publisher of choice for those ...
experts with important management ideas and a desire to improve the
practice of management worldwide.
[...]
As a result of our
association with Harvard Business School, we have
access to the latest thinking in management."

David Goodman, Princeton University Biology Library
dgoodman@princeton.edu            609-258-3235