Saturday, August 31, 2019

On the Value of a Degree in the Philippines Essay

The employment chances of a fresh college graduate is only 4 in 10, with only 1 in that 4 attaining work relevant to one’s course. Even in light of the unprecedented growth of 6. 6% in GDP over the last year, the labor sector fails to follow suit in what economists characterize as a â€Å"job-shedding† growth. So where does a college degree place us? With the increased pressures on the youth to attend college, many consider the existence of a higher education bubble. The concept hypothesizes, in part, that movements in factors such as tuition payments and unemployable graduates severely decrease the rate of return to a college degree up to a point where it is rendered useless. In the case of the Philippines, effective capping of tuition fees to relatively affordable rates, spaces us from a bubble as of yet. However, it is to be stressed that with everyone jumping in the college wagon all at once – as is apparent now– we will soon find college degrees as no more useful than scratch, and then the true bubble begins. There are too many college graduates. All college students should be aware that although a degree does open doors it loses much of its value as more and more people achieve this accolade. In 2012, a total of 517,425 college students graduated and entered the labor force. With another half a million expected to graduate in March this year, there is increasing concern on their place in the labor market. The number of graduates increase over the years, however jobs increase terribly less, if they increase at all – 882,000 jobs were reported to have disappeared in 2012. Since too many people compete for the same job, employers can afford to lower wages or increase qualifications as much as possible. This is apparent in the over qualification of some jobs – now supermarket baggers or janitors are expected to have had some years of college or even graduated the same, as opposed to the minimum of high school undergraduate in most other countries. College courses are insufficient or incompatible with jobs offered in the market. The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) holds job and livelihood fairs across the country, recently offering a total of 360,777 job vacancies. But on a nationwide count only 5,101 job applicants were hired on the spot. In another attempt, the government posted in its Phil. JobNet website 230,000 jobs but only 117,000 applied. Apparently, the jobs created by the government are inconsistent with what graduates believe they deserve or were trained for in those four or more years of education. To add, even once employed underemployment lingers – tainting up to about 7. 2 million job matches – with insufficient base pay as main culprit. Nearly everyone believes a college education is essential. In our society, the college degree has been stigmatized as the best and surest – and sometimes only – path to take in preparation for one’s career. This is contestable however as evidenced in European countries where entrepreneurship and technical education are much more popular and profitable paths than college. The Philippines doesn’t necessarily lack these options, (i. e. TESDA) rather we lack awareness and social approval for these said alternatives. Solutions De-emphasize the necessity of a college degree. The higher education system of countries like Germany, remain stable and un-depreciated, since non-professional or non-corporate jobs are highly popular and equally regarded with college education. Removing the stigma of a college degree can relieve pressure on prices and rates of return to higher education. Therefore, introducing and popularizing technical courses – which are actually highly demanded – can solve much of the Philippine labor problem. Redesigning colleges and curriculums to incorporate in-demand jobs. Supply may be easier adjusted to cope with the requirements of demand, rather than the other way around. Close association with firms accompanied by an overhaul of course curriculums to better suit the needs of employers can effectively reduce mismatch. Administrators and faculty should understand the factors at work in how their programs are depreciating since if the market for college degrees becomes over-saturated we will all pay the price of meaningless degrees and poor opportunity for many in the workplace. Many experts and opinions point to the government’s futile efforts at job creation (i. e. demand) as the main antagonist in this story. However, the equally policy-relevant yet rarely focused upon supply side of labour may offer other, more easily interceded directions. Solving the Philippines’ problems on labour is a tall order however attacking from all sides – both demand and supply – can better efforts towards the nationwide goal of inclusive growth. Reference: Higher Education Bubble Will Burst, May 3, 2011 http://www. usnews. com/education/blogs/the-college-solution/2011/05/03/higher-education-bubble-will-burst, Accessed February 11, 2013 The Value of a Degree, May 06, 2011 http://www. popecenter. org/commentaries/article. html? id=2517, Accessed February 11, 2013 Joblessness: How deep, what needs to be done?, February 06, 2013. http://www. bworldonline. com/content. php? section=Opinion&title=Joblessness:-How-deep,-what-needs-to-be-done? &id=65457, Accessed February 11 ,2013 For inclusive growth: Jobs with higher wages, February 9, 2013 http://www. philstar. com/opinion/2013/02/09/906642/inclusive-growth-jobs-higher-wages, Accessed February 11 ,2013 Oversupply of Unemployable Graduates, January 23, 2010 http://planetphilippines. com/migration/a-disastrous-oversupply-of-unemployable-graduates, Accessed February 11 ,2013 Bureau of Labor and Employment Statistics Commission on Higher Education.

Friday, August 30, 2019

Natural Sciences Essay

What is it about theories in natural and human sciences that make them so convincing? During the course of my Biology HL syllabus, I came across the theory of the fluid mosaic model. I instantly considered this theory to be absolute and accurate. This level of certainty was created with the first reading of the theory, and evoked the question as to what makes the theories formulated in natural and human sciences as convincing as they are. Both Natural and Human scientists take pride in the fact that their work is the result of long, precise and experimental research and the fact that their theories are able to overcome the skeptical approach of human nature and produce enough certainty in people to accept their work without further questioning. I will attempt to state and explain the reasons for this creation of such certainty by incorporating three areas of knowledge. Firstly, natural sciences and how they are so convincing despite the lack of certainty. Then I will elaborate on the human sciences and how its theories are debatable and the difference between the two sciences. Lastly I will intrude into the ethical aspect of the knowledge issue, as conflicting emotions and reason are essential in creating the faith and belief in the theories formulated by these explicit and evidence rich areas of knowledge. We as humans are generally skeptical about various sources of information, but this skeptic approach does not apply to science as we consider all scientific information to be true and from a reliable source. This approach reveals the fact that evidence and understanding of the concept is a key factor assisting the reasoning of the mind. While studying Taxation in microeconomics, I realized that theories that are said to produce a certain effect are not realistically proven or implemented in the real world. For example, a theory in taxation states that, if a tax is imposed on a producer with inelastic supply then the entire tax incidence is borne by the producers themselves. But, in reality such a situation does not exist, the producers generally raise prices to higher levels where the revenue is more than sufficient to pay the tax imposed on them, which means that the consumers actually bear the brunt of the new taxation policy. We accept such theories at first as they are said to be formulate by a reliable source and seem to be probable. So why do the theories from these areas of knowledge appear so convincing to us despite the uncertainties that are presented by them? Why are they accepted as the truth even before they are completely evaluated? It is evident that the reason we trust science as a reliable and infallible source of information is because we believe in science. This belief has led to the creation of faith towards science, which has compelled us to accept all that science offers without a doubt of reason. The psychology behind this belief exclaims that we believe in science the same way as we believe that our new car is not going to explode on its first travel. Cars stay safe more often than not and science in the same way has proven itself accurate many more times than it has been proved wrong. The belief and faith induced by scientific theories has been developed over time through constant provision of proof and evidence, which are the basic requirements for human beings to trust in something. While studying and understanding theories regarding sub-atomic particles, which are practically invisible, such as the VSEPR theory or the theory of hybridization, I don’t question the strength of the theory itself as it is a result of extensive research and has overcome the challenges posed by many to prove them wrong. Thus, the efforts to prove the theory wrong and the failure to do so have actually strengthened the belief in science, thus providing a logical and universal explanation justifying the theory formulated. Also, human nature suggests that we need to believe in something, and more often than not people choose the logical, experimental and evidence rich path provided by science. We tend to believe in the ideals a majority believes, be it a country, a city, a community or even our immediate family. For example, if your family believes that the economic crisis will eventually affect your future, even you tend to follow â€Å"convention† and believe in the same thing. Taking the example of the cure for cancer, people at first did not believe that cancer was ever curable due the number of deaths that had amounted. Their belief that the drug developed, actually cured cancer was eventually strengthened as the positive evidences kept increasing. Today if a scientist says that he has developed a new cure for cancer, people would believe in the drug as they know science has accomplished it before, and hence can probably achieve the same feat again. In the natural sciences, research begins with a hypothesis which is followed by experiments and later proof of whether the hypothesis is accurate or is invalid. In contrast to this, we observe that in many experiments conducted, the results vary marginally and hence hamper the certainty of the research, which means that scientists have o rely on various degrees of certainty based on their recorded values to establish the overall certainty of a research project. This implies that many of the theories being applied today are not of absolute certainty, thus the use of such theories can be attributed to our belief and faith in science as a reliable source of information. Shifting the focus to my second area of knowledge which is human sciences, I’d like to state its primary objectives to help understand the formulation of the theories more effectively. The aims of virtually all human sciences are the same: to explain human behavior, formulate theories to predict it, and then develop remedies for the problems identified by those predictions. They use the same scientific method as natural sciences but cannot hypothesize the reactions of the human beings, as each of them respond to the research questions in different ways and depict different and forms of emotion and reasoning depending upon the kind of questions asked. Most research in human sciences begins with intuition which then leads to proof. Here, the scientists believe that a particular stimulus would produce a certain behavioral effect on a person or a community that is being experimented upon and the statistics collected are processed to analyze the change in behavior. These theories regarding human behavior are accurate for a majority of the trials but often there are exceptions which destabilize the foundation of the theory, which again affect the belief people have in the theories in human sciences. Taking an example from economics; the Keynesian and the Monetarist views are contrasting market development methods which argue the role of the government in regulating the market function in the economy. One proposes intense government intervention whereas the other proposes minimal intrusion by it respectively. Till the 2007 global recession the markets followed the monetarist model but the immense financial problems caused and market failures recorded called for a reform which turned the governments towards the Keynesian model. This signifies that more often than not the theories in human sciences stand, but they can be overcome and felled with the inclusion of a strong stimulus. And if the theories prove ineffective there would always be another theory formulated as backup which could be applied and the same expected results could be yielded. The economic example presented here stresses on the fairly large margin for error present in the human sciences, which primarily differentiates it from natural science which are purely dependent on proofs and evidence. Also the common element prevalent in both these sciences is that of research period. Theories of both sciences require a long and strenuous research period to incorporate all the hypothesis, observations, experiments, and data collection, which are required to prove the theory. These similarities and dissimilarities introduce us to the ethical concept of certainty which plays a vital role in balancing out the conflict between emotion and reason. We perceive science to be a reliable and an accurate source of information due to its extensively experimental, research dependent and foolproof nature, i. . we are emotionally inclined towards the sciences as they have the proof to back up their theories. But as we see from the examples, they do not offer complete certainty as there is always an exception to a particular theory and hence by reason, our belief in science should be far less than it actually is. The simple explanation to this would be that reason favors science as it has proven itself more often than not and as we have observed, failure to prove theories wrong increases and strengthens our belief in its relevance and accuracy. Thus we can conclude by answering the primary question staged in the introduction as to what makes theories formulated by the sciences so convincing. The extensive research involved and the proof presented in favor of the theory play a major role in developing the certainty, this is well complimented by the belief and faith science has cultivated in human beings and the strong the emotional and reasonable backing that has been made available by this belief in them.

Dehydration of Methylcyclohexanol Essay

A common Sophomore Organic Chemistry laboratory experiment that has great potential for further research is the acid catalyzed dehydration of simple alcohols. The classic dehydration of 2-methylcyclohexanol experiment that was introduced in Journal of Chemical Education in 1967 Taber(1967)JCE:44,p620. The rather simple procedure of distilling an alcohol with an aqueous acid has spawned several investigations that have resulted in formal journal articles. At the same time, the experiment has retained its popularity in the Sophomore Organic Chemistry laboratory curriculum. In one line of inquiry it has been observed that a mixture of 2-methylcyclohexanol diastereomers gives rise to a mixture of three isomeric alkenes Todd(1994)JCE:71,p440; Feigenbaum(1987) JCE:64, p273; Cawley (1997) JCE:74l, p102. Explaining the presence of the three alkene products requires an intense synthesis of information communicated in a typical SOC textbook. The continued popularity of this experiment is corroborated by the observation that Googling the phrase â€Å"Dehydration of 2-Methylcyclohexanol† on January 13th, 2008 returned no less than 20 hits for online student handouts and/or guides for this SOC laboratory experiment. Moreover, this experiment provides fertile ground for experimentation and innovation that has not yet been fully explored. At Dominican University, the SOC students performed this experiment during the Fall 2007 semester with not only the dehydration of 2-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 153087) but also the 4-methyl (Aldrich 153095) and 3-methyl (Aldrich 139734) positional isomers. The reaction products were submitted to GC-FID analysis. As predicted from the Journal of Chemical Education articles, three methylcyclohexene products were observed. Their relative abundance measured by peak height was 80, 16, and 4%. The alkene products represented by these peaks apparently correspond to 1-methycyclehexene, 3-methycyclehexene, and methylenecyclohexane respectively. [pic] The dehydration of 4-methylcyclohexanol produce two products, that can be distinguished by our current GC column, at 90 and 10% with retention times that match 3-methycyclehexene and 1-methycyclehexene respectively. My current theory is that the retention times 3 and 4-methycyclohexene could not be distinguished with GC column and temperature program. However, there is still the issue of how 1-methycyclehexene is produced from 4-methylcyclohexanol. [pic] The dehydration of 3-methylcyclohexanol yields two products, that can be distinguished by our current GC column, at 80 and 20% with retention times that match 3-methylcyclohexene and 1-methycyclehexene respectively. [pic] Samples of 1-methyl and 3-methyl cyclohexenes purchased from Aldrich chemical confirmed two of compound assignments for the dehydration of 2-methylcyclohexanol. Obviously, it remains to separate the 3 and 4-methylcyclohexene by GC. There are several advantages of studying the dehydration of methylcyclohexanols in the first semester of Organic Chemistry: 1) The experiment involves reactions that are typically studied during first semester: E1, E2, and the 1,2-hydride shift. It is a time-tested protocol that has been run in hundreds of labs by thousands of students. 2) Analysis of the experiment involves the understanding of all three mechanisms mentioned previously and how they may compete with each other. In other words, it is a simple experiment that demands a rather involved interpretation of results. 3) It shows that textbooks â€Å"rules† such as the Zaitzev’s rule in this case, are not necessarily rules as such, but rather astute observations of general trends that can vary experimentally depending on the reactant and the reaction conditions. 4) Analytically, we are observing/measuring the presence of 3 known methylcyclohexene and methylenecyclohexane products that can be separated and detected by Gas Chromatography. I believe that the product mixtures can also be analyzed by NMR. 5) The reaction lends itself to an inquiry format that involves the study different reactants and reaction conditions on the ratio of products. In fact, this experiment, in my opinion, is an ideal candidate for a multi-institution collaborative study that combines and interprets student data. want to pursue point #5 further by first grappling with the current literature concerning the â€Å"Evelyn Effect.† The JCE article by David Todd, â€Å"The Dehydration of 2-Methylcyclohexanol Revisited: The Evelyn Effect† observes a kinetic effect that can be explained by proposing that in a mixture of cis/trans 2-Methylcyclohexanol the cis isomer reacts much faster than the trans isomer to give predominately 1-methylcyclohexene. The formation of 1-methylcyclohexene from cis-2-methylcyclohexanol would involve an â€Å"E2-like† anti-elimination of proton and the protonated alcohol. The dehydration of the trans isomer would go through a E1 mechanism that requires the formation of a carbocation before elimination of a proton. A follow-up study by Cawley and Linder: â€Å"The Acid Catalyzed Dehydration of an Isomeric 2-Methylcyclohexanol Mixture† involves a detailed kinetic study. Students began with a 36.6/63.4 cis/trans mixture of 2-methylcyclohexanol with a cyclohexanol impurity (% impurity was not reported). They performed thy typical reaction+distillation and collected fractions at 4, 8, 16, 24, and 28 minutes. They also collected a 0.1 mL volume of the sample of the reaction mixture at each of these time intervals. These fractions were analyzed by 1H NMR and GC for composition. The cis/trans rate constants for the dehydration of reaction were determined to be 8.4/1.0 – much less than 30/1 ratio reported in 1931 by Vavon and Barbier. An intriguing study! It would be very interesting to have the raw (student) data on this one. Very little is said about the product ratios in the distillate fractions, they just report that they obtained 2.1% methylenecyclohexane and not the 4% previously reported. The dehydration of methylcyclohexanols provides a fecund problem to explore. The key is to develop methods to determine the distribution of alkene products in terms of % total alkenes. There are four possible positional isomers: I. methylenecyclohexane (Aldrich, Acros, 1192-37-6); II. racemic 3-methyl-1-cyclohexene (Acros, 591-48-0); III. 1-methyl-1-cyclohexene (Aldrich, Acros 591-49-1) IV. racemic 4-methyl-1-cyclohexene (Aldrich, Acros 591-47-9). Two of the alkene positional isomers contain an asymmetric carbon. The obvious place to start is by studying how the alcohol structure affects the product distribution of alkenes. There are 5 positional isomers of methylcyclohexanol: I. cyclohexanemethanol (Aldrich 100-49-2); II. 1-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 590-67-0); III. racemic cis&trans 2-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 583-59-5) IV. racemic cis&trans 3-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 591-23-1) V. cis&trans 4-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 589-91-3). Three of the alcohols are present in cis and trans diastereomer pairs: cis 2-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 7445-70-1) trans 2-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 7445-52-9) cis 3-methylcyclohexanol (5454-79-5) trans 3-methylcyclohexanol (7443-55-2) cis 4-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 7731-28-4) trans 4-methylcyclohexanol (Aldrich 7731-28-4). In addition there are 4 entaniomer pairs among the alcohol starting materials. Most of them are commercially available, for a price. [pic] Besides the structure of the alcohol, what other variables may be explored? 1) One variable for this reaction that could be investigated is the nature of the catalytic acid. Aqueous acids, such as the 85% H3PO4 typically used for this experiment, contain some water which is also product of the reaction. I may also add that, the amount of acid is not always in catalytic proportion to the substrate. In my current protocol 0.075 moles of acid is used to dehydrate 0.2 moles of alcohol. Non-aqueous acids may give different results. Acidic resins are an interesting substitute for aqueous acids. For example, John Ludeman and Kurt Field of Bradley University presented a poster at the 2006 ACS Great Lakes Regional Meeting on the use of Dowex 50WX2-100, Amberlite IRC-50S, and Amberlyst 15, for the dehydration of alcohols. 2) Another variable would be the reaction conditions. In the current paradigm, the alkene is distilled away from the reaction mixture. Presumably, it is being distilled away as it is formed. An ad-hoc observation is that students seem to get somewhat different product ratios if they distill is carefully or if they â€Å"crank up the heat† and distill it quicker. What if the reaction mixture was refluxed to equilibrium before distillation? Would we see more thermodynamic products? 3) Reaction conditions could be changed in other ways too. Microwave irradiation is currently being explored as an alternative to heating reactions. Possibly, sonication could also be performed on the alcohol. 4) Another avenue to explore may be different strategies to push the reaction towards the products other than distilling off the alkene. For example, removing water with molecular sieves may be tried. The last installment of this series will explore the logistics of â€Å"dehydration of methylcycohexanols† as a collaborative experiments. The most straightforward collaboration would be to perform the â€Å"dehydration of methylcycohexanols† experiment in the same way and compare the relative yield of alkenes as measured by GC from different starting alcohols. Comparisons could be made with past data or concurrently collected data from different institutions. This may be seem fairly straightforward, but there will most likely be discrepancies that could will need to be explored. One aspect to make note of would be the source and composition of the methylcyclohexanols used a starting materials. Sigma-Aldrich has †¢ 1-methylcyclohexanol #M38214; †¢ 2-methylcyclohexanol #66320, #215295, #178829, #24113, & #153087, †¢ 3-methylcyclohexanol #139734; †¢ 4-methylcyclohexanol #66360, #104183, #104191, & #153095; †¢ as well as just plain methylcyclohexanol #66370. An experimental variable that is hard to control is rate of heating. Students who crank up the hot plate to get done quickly (even though they were told not to) may get different results than those students who go slowly and maintain an even temperature. Different GC columns and methods may also give results that need to be corroborated.

Thursday, August 29, 2019

How does the Constitution establish and maintain a culture of liberty Essay

How does the Constitution establish and maintain a culture of liberty - Essay Example These rights are generally acknowledged to be beyond the control of the government. Individual liberty is plays a critical part in achieving individual and societal progress. It is important for attainment of the truth and should be defended from any form of tyranny. Individual liberty forms the basis of universal freedom and human rights. The philosophy of individual liberty is the core value that protects individuals’ freedom, and gives them the right to safeguard their rights. Individual liberty imposes responsibility for self-governance and freedom of choice on an individual. In regards to individual liberty contribution to the constitution’s preservation of liberty, the â€Å"self† factors associated with free men come into play: self-respect (spiritual), self-reliance (economic), and self-discipline (political-social). Self-respect results from the realization of an individual that they are of divine creation and that the spiritual is supreme. These facts a re illustrated in the individuals’ effort in maintaining integrity of unalienable rights. Principles of self-respect insist that people should respect other people. Realization of this aspect of liberty translates to equality and mutual respect among members of the society, which is the main objective of the constitution. The self-reliance factor advocates for economic independence of individuals from others and the government. Economic reliance on other individuals is considered the source of evils in the society. An economically independent individual is a free man enjoying liberty. From Alexander Hamilton’s quote, power over a man’s subsistence contributes power over his free will. Economic independence rids the community of social evils that threaten liberty of individuals. Self-discipline of individuals involves their good-will performance of duties assigned to them. Self-discipline advocates for the truth, a principle that states that there is no right apa rt from duty, and no freedom or liberty apart from responsibility. Self-discipline draws the boundary between the rights of individuals and equal rights of others in the society. This means that individuals in the society understand their rights, and the boundary that separates those rights with the equality of other people. Such an understanding in the society will create sound conduct in the general community concerning maintenance and upholding of individuals’ liberty. It highlights the political-social characteristic of free man living among free men surrounded by an environment of freedom. Several founders highlight the importance of individual rights and citizen’s liberty. In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote that one important duty of the government to its citizen was to safeguard the inalienable rights of individuals, which include liberty, life, and pursuit of happiness. The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment safeguards individuals’ li berty, life, and property without due process (Bills of Rights Institute). They secure and safeguard the blessings of individuals’ liberty. Another founder, James Wilson, explained the importance of liberty in laws, saying that law without liberty is meaningless. Individual and religious liberty remains one of the most essential principles of the human freedom. Founded by Ambassador John L. Loeb, it paved way to freedom of warship and free exercising of individual faith to all religious minorities by the Government. It was due to the Ambassador, the founder, that American Experiment became a

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

IMC and Customer Satisfaction Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

IMC and Customer Satisfaction - Assignment Example Thirdly the advertising strategy must align to the marketing goals by ensuring that the advertising spends results in the expected revenue and marketing goals and thus ensuring that the resources spent on advertising are not wasted or spent in markets where little revenue is expected. There are different ways to measure the effectiveness of advertising but these vary from type of advertising that is being looked at and also in their accuracy. There isn’t a really scientific way of accurately measuring advertising per se but there are many ways of looking at the impacts of advertising and from that being able to get a measure of the effectiveness of a particular advertising strategy or campaign. The most important aspects of advertising that are measured include recall, recognition and revenue. Recall essentially measures how well a particular target of an advertising campaign or strategy can recall the messages that were advertised about a particular brand of good or service. Recognition is more to do with how well the targeted consumers are able to relate a particular advertising spot in whatever media it may be with either the product that is being advertised or the good and service that that advertisement is targeting (Olson, n.d). These two measures can both be done through conducting surveys of other scientific procedures such as focus group discussions. The third measurement of how effective an advertising campaign has been is the nature and types of income revenue that have resulted from that particular campaign. The change – increase or decrease – in the sales revenues prior to and after the advertising campaign will be a good indicator of the effectiveness of a particular advertising strategy or campaign. Promotion is essentially a two-way communication that deals directly with the consumer to enhance the marketing strategy and appeal to the consumers. There are nowadays a lot of promotional strategies which can be employed in addi tion to advertising to draw customers to a particular product or service. In addition to the promotional strategies there are also various ways in which these promotion strategies can be implemented, with the latest and the one that is now catching on being promotion through social media and other online contact. Some of the promotional strategies that can be employed include the use of contests with winners receiving various prizes. Such contests, especially those that encourage the purchase of a product or the use of a particular service are also quite effective in ensuring repeat customers and can encourage previously skeptical potential customers to try out a service or a good and if followed up with a clear and targeted advertising, can result in increasing the market pull of a product. Another promotional strategy that can be used is the offer of discounts and special prices to targeted members of the market in order to encourage them to either shift from a competing product o r make

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

Implications to Operations for Chryslers' Introduction of the Fiat Essay

Implications to Operations for Chryslers' Introduction of the Fiat - Essay Example Chrysler’s plants immediately began working on the new Italian models as part of the deal, and the United States treasury loaned the organization 4.7 billion dollars to begin the project. The Canadian government was also included in the contract and controls 10% of the company. Asa result, Fiat was owned up to 35% of its production, and the United Autoworkers Union owned 55%. The introduction of the Fiat 500 into the United States market was not expected to move adequate units and make a considerable effect on the 1.57 million-unit aim. The Fiat label will have its activities carried out in its individual amenities, making its novel subcompact make additional foot travel to contracts. Another implication of the merger on the operations of Chrysler is the introduction of improved models and the come back of the Fiat label in the United States, on top of new merger brands. The company plots on using up 68% more expenses on promotion and marketing the financial year. This develop ment was evident when Chrysler spent millions of dollars to come up with the longest commercial in Super-bowl history (Bennett, 2011). The renewal of Chrysler provides Fiat with a cushion for Italy’s decline and poor reputation caused by its chief executive. Marchionne's revitalization of the corporation has intensified the company’s anguish in the European markets (Bennett, 2011). In the United States, the dominating development and management assets of Chrysler group have left Fiat with old models. The position has made Italy’s biggest car producer become in need of traditionally unpredictable Chrysler profits. Chrysler might also have to report profits made prior to interest, duties and occasional items worth 1.18 billion dollars during the second half of 2011. In comparison with 629 million dollars from Fiat’s long-established activities, earnings from Ferrari and Maserati models were included in accordance with the standard approximations of six comp any analysts. Trading earnings for the United Chrysler group were consistent with Fiat’s findings from June. Such results were expected to arrive at 2.6 billion dollars by the end of the coming year. In 30 April 2009, Chrysler recorded and proclaimed a merger with Fiat, while filing for insolvency. Independently, the proclamation made the Financial Accountings Standards alter the â€Å"mark-to-market† accounting decree to offer commercial banks more discretion in reporting worth of capital. In Brazil alone, the Fiat group automobiles sustained its management status, delivering a sum of 761, 400 passenger cars and light commercial automobiles. These figures and position of the company will stand for a year-on rise of 1.6% of profits. When the market is taken as a whole market, Chrysler group merger with Fiat marketplace is developing 10.6%; FGA accomplished a 22.8% share of the year, which is a negative 1.7% of percentage points in the market share (Bennett, 2011). The revitalization at Chrysler has assisted Marchionne to triumph over financial speculators to his advantage and make a worldwide automobile group rivaling Volkswagen. The shares have decreased by 40% in the past three months. This was recorded as one of the worst performances in the Bloomberg European automobiles guides, behind France’s PSA Peugeot Citroen. The Chrysler group has been managed under three diverse leaders in the past four years,

Monday, August 26, 2019

Appreciative Inquiry of David Cooperrider Essay - 2

Appreciative Inquiry of David Cooperrider - Essay Example The questions asked are affirmative in nature and it focuses on the topic valuable to the people who are involved and directed at topics and issues for the success of the organization. This inquiry identifies â€Å"the area† where the organization needs to change. The change can be of different types which are as follows:   When an organization has to adapt to external factors, it may go through a major strategic change. Strategic organizational changes are usually quite transformative in nature as they include major adjustments and complete upheavals of the present way the organization operates.   People changes can be of large-scale or incremental. Large-scale people changes include replacement of the top executives with new employees in order to change the entire organization’s culture. Smaller-scale or incremental people changes include sending of management workers to team-building workshops and classes. These changes can be planned or unplanned, which may impact the employee’s attitudes towards work, behaviors of the individual and their performances.   Process changes define to be an attempt to improve the overall workflow efficiency and productivity of the organization. Organizations implementing these types of changes are highly successful when the new innovative process is applied to employee groups and the outcome of the new process work (Sharma, 2008).   In Silkeborg Council (Denmark) the problem in every department was absenteeism. The average number of working days that are lost over the first six months of 2001 was 9.25. One of the departments in which absenteeism was very high was the elderly care department. At this stage, the employees and the employers are inquired about the reason for absenteeism and then they are informed about the type of change which should be undertaken by them.   

Sunday, August 25, 2019

Fashion Buying and Merchandising Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Fashion Buying and Merchandising - Essay Example The paper "Fashion Buying and Merchandising" concerns the process of Fashion Buying and Merchandising. The United Colors of Benetton have missed the fashion colors for the spring / summer collection of 2011, specifically because of the colors which aren’t bright or fashion forward. To change this, a capsule can be created to fulfill the gap and change the way in which the approach is taken. The capsule will not only consist of the changes in colors, but will also continue to include the ideal of comfort that the United Colors of Benetton approached toward the season The result will be the ability to combine the current parts of the fashion which was noted to have a better approach with the trends of the season based on colors. The focus for this particular capsule will be to expand on the shapes and key features which have already been introduced by the United Colors of Benetton. While there was a lack of the right coloring, there were some elements which could be considered w ith the clothing, specifically with the styles and shapes that were included in the various pieces of clothing. The capsule created will combine new types of fabric and colors with the shapes and styles which were currently introduced by the United Colors of Benetton for the Spring / Summer collection. These will then upgrade to the competition of other manufacturers who have changed their collections to the high styles that are available for the season while allowing the company to keep the authentic style.

Saturday, August 24, 2019

Twelve Angry Men Movie Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Twelve Angry Men - Movie Review Example This paper explores the film â€Å"Twelve Angry Men† directed by Sidney Lumet. Contrast and conflicts give birth to progression of the plot of a play and the film ‘Twelve Angry Men’ is not an exception in this regard. The film seriously involves and implements the process of consensus-building. Along with it, the difficulty implicated in developing these phenomena is explicitly dealt in the film. The difficulties in reaching a common point in between twelve men who ranges from varied personalities enhance the intensity and seriousness of the conflict of reaching into a common platform. The content of the film is made poignant to the extent that even the names of the characters are presented in a subvert manner in the film. Only the names of the two jurors appear before the audience while they swap their names while going out from the courthouse. The film â€Å"The Twelve Angry Men† can be perceived as lesson in conflicts. The men do not know each other, not even the audience know anything about them individually. Yet their personality, philosophy towards life and their ideologies all become pertinent through their conflicts expressed and resolved throughout the film. The exposition of the conflict captivates the film from opening to its denouement and persists till its ending. The exposure of the conflict within the plot is slow but it is steady and indicates an exercise of divergent leadership style within the same platform. The conflict presented in the film launches its audience into a plane where there is no resolution of the conflict.

Friday, August 23, 2019

LOVE Individual privacy vs. national security Essay

LOVE Individual privacy vs. national security - Essay Example The project will therefore utilize findings from the country to establish the severity of the issues on a global scale. Due to its scope and importance, the project will be conducted using primary sources such as journals, reports from various agencies and newspaper articles. Scholarly articles required in this project will be obtained from the library while relevant reports will be obtained from the concerned agencies. Compromise of individual privacy in pursuit of national security existed before the September 11, attacks. At the heights of World War II, nearly 12,000 Japanese Americans were forced into concentration camps for reasons related to national security (ACLU, 2001). According to Avery (2004), the public feels that issues of national security compromise their privacy. Previous research findings on the issue have proved that intensification of surveillance by security agencies hamper formation of close relationships among people (Emanuel, 2004). To enhance security, the government has authorized all telecom operators in the country to install systems that enable government agencies to access private communications. These preliminary findings will direct the research project. Gross, E. (2004). The struggle of a democracy against terrorism—Protection of human rights: The right to privacy versus the national interest—The proper balance, Cornell International Law Journal 37 (1),

Thursday, August 22, 2019

Essay on Correction Techniques Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

On Correction Techniques - Essay Example Probation, pardon and parole are some kind of the most common corrective measures implemented by criminal justice system to test the behaviour of the criminals who are sentenced. These mechanisms are normally performed to evaluate the success of the correction measures. This paper evaluates the differences between parole and probation and the extent to which probation is successful in correcting a criminal. Hertfordshire printer Frederic Rainer, a volunteer with the Church of England Temperence Society (CETS), writes to the society of his concern about the lack of help for those who come before the courts. He sends a donation of five shillings (25p) towards a fund for practical rescue work in the police courts. The CETS responds by appointing two "missionaries" to Southwark court with the initial aim of "reclaiming drunkards". This forms the basis of the London Police Courts Mission (LPCM), whose missionaries worked with magistrates to develop a system of releasing offenders on the c ondition that they kept in touch with the missionary and accepted guidance (Timeline: A history of probation) The history of probation started from England as explained above. Probation conditions have been changed or modified periodically based on the feedbacks received from the experiences. Many people do not have awareness about the differences between probation and parole. ... On the other hand, a criminal on probation may have less supervision from the probation officers. Parole and probation are granted based on the Pre-Sentence Investigation report (PSI) prepared by a probation officer. The practice of preparing PSI has started in 1920. â€Å"Its original purpose was to provide information to the court on the defendant’s personal history and criminal conduct in order to promote individualized sentencing† (The History of the Pre-sentence Investigation Report, p.1). This report normally contains the background information of the criminal such as his crime history, crime tendency, family history, juvenile adjudications, description of the crime, the defendant's work history, marital status, financial status, length of residence in the community, educational background, medical history, substance abuse history, etc. Based on these information probation officers decide about the corrective measures needed for the criminal. For example, a crimin al who has the history of series of criminal activities may normally get parole whereas first time criminals may normally get probation. Probation is the most liberal corrective mechanism. A judge can decide about the probation of the criminal after reviewing the nature of the crime and the character of the criminal. Fresh criminals may get probation in most of the cases. â€Å"A violation of probation gives rise to a hearing on whether or not probation should be revoked† (Kaman). If a criminal violates the conditions of probation, the judge or the probation officer has the right to withdraw the probation. In such cases, the criminal may get sentencing. On the other hand, parole is granted at the end of a prison term or in between the

Legal Requirements for Employee Benefits Essay Example for Free

Legal Requirements for Employee Benefits Essay As we discussed earlier in this chapter, some benefits are required by law. This requirement adds to the cost of compensating employees. Organizations looking for ways to control staffing costs may look for ways to structure the workforce so as to minimize the expense of benefits. They may require overtime rather than adding new employee, hire part-time rather than full-time workers(because part-time employees generally receive much smaller benefits packages),and use independent contractors rather than hire employees. Some of these choices are limited by legal equirements, however. For example ,the Fair Labor Standards Act requires overtime pay for nonexempt workers, as discussed in chapter 11. Also,the Internal Revenue Service strictly limits the definition of independent contractors,â€Å" so that employees cannot avoid legal obligations by classifying workers as self-employed when the organization receives the benefits of a permanent employee . Other legal requirements involve tax treatment of benefits ,antidiscrimination laws, and accounting for benefits. Tax treatment of benefits A modern, flexible benefit plan provides a number of potential tax advantages to employees and employers. Employees A flexible benefit plan allows employees to choose to swap some of their existing benefits or purchase benefits from a menu of options. Payments in excess of the employees spending allowance are normally collected via a gross salary adjustment. If employees exchange salary for tax exempt benefits (pensions, life cover, childcare vouchers, mobile phones, etc. ), they do not pay tax or National Insurance on the amount exchanged. This gives a basic rate tax payer earning less than the National Insurance (NI) Upper Earnings Limit (UEL) a saving of 33% compared to receiving the money as salary. For example, an employee that exchanges ? 200 per month of their salary for childcare vouchers and additional pension payments will save ? 792 in tax and NI compared to taking the money as salary. Even if the benefits are not tax exempt, employees can still exchange salary for employer provided benefits and, whilst they will be charged income tax, they save NI as their salaries have been reduced by the value of the benefit. This gives employees earning under the UEL an 11% saving. Employers Employers participating in a flexible benefit plan do not pay employers NI on payments on payments to exempt benefits. If these payments have been exchanged from salary by employees then the employer will save 12. 8% employers NI on the amounts. For example, an employee that exchanges ? 200 per month of their salary for childcare vouchers and additional pension payments will deliver an annual NI saving to the employer of ? 307. Antidiscrimination Laws  Legal treatment of men and woman includes equal access to benefits, so the organization may not use the employee’s gender as the basic for providing more limited benefits. That is the rationale for the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, which requires that employers treat pregnancy or childbirth, the employee needs time off for conditions related to pregnancy or childbirth, the employee would receive whatever disability benefits the organization offers to employees who take disability leave for other reasons. Another area of concern in the treatment of male and female employees is pension benefits. On average, woman live longer than men, so on average, pension benefits for female employees are more expensive (because the organization pays the pension longer), other things being equal. Some organizations have used this difference as a basis for requiring that female employees contribute more than male employees as a basis for requiring that female employees contribute more than male employees to defined benefit plans. The Supreme Court in 1978 determined that such a requirement is illegal. According to the Supreme Court, the law is intended to protect individuals, and when women are considered on an individual basis ( not as averages ), not every woman outlives every man. Age discrimination is also relevant to benefits policies. Two major issues have received attention under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and amendments. First, employers must take care not to discriminate against workers over age 40 in providing pay or benefits. For example, employers may not set an age at which retirement benefits stop growing as a way to pressure older workers to retire. Also, early retirement incentive programs need to meet certain standards. The programs may not coerce employees to retire, they must provide accurate information about the options available, and they must give employees enough time to make a decision. In effect, employees must really have a choice about whether they retire. When employers offer early retirement, they often ask employees to sign waivers saying they will not pursue claims under the ADEA. The Older Workers Benefit Protection Act of 1990 set guidelines for using these waivers. The waivers must be voluntary and understandable to the employee and employer , and they must spell out the employees rights under the ADEA. Also , in exchange for signing the waiver, the employee must receive â€Å"compensation† that is , greater benefits than he or she would otherwise receive upon retirement. The employer inform employee that they may consult a lawyer before signing, and employee must have time to make a decision about signing-21 days before signing plus 7 days afterward in which they can revoke the agreement. The Americans with Disabilities Act imposes requirements related to health insurance. Under the ADA, employees with disabilities must have equal access to whatever health insurance coverage the employer provides other employees. Even so, the terms and conditions of health insurance may be based on risk factors -as long as the employer does not use this basis as a way to escape offering health insurance to someone with a disability. From the standpoint of avoiding legal challenges, an employer who has risk-based insurance and then hires an employee with a disability is in a stronger position than an employer who switches to a risk-based policy after hiring a disabled employee. Accounting Requirements Companies financial statement must meet the many requirements of the Financial Accounting standards Board ( FASB) . These accounting requirements are intended to ensure that financial statements are a true picture of the companys financial status and that outsiders, including potential lenders and investors , can understand and compare financial statements . Under FASB standards, employers must set aside the funds they expect to need for benefits to be paid after retirement, rather than funding those benefits on a pay-as-you-go basis. On financial statement, those funds must appear as future cost obligations. For companies with substantial retirement benefits, reporting those benefits as future cost obligations greatly lowers income each year. Along with rising benefits costs. This reporting requirement has encouraged many companies to scale benefits to retirees. Summarize the regulation affecting how employers design and administer benefits program. Employers must provide the benefits that are required by law, and they may not improperly classify employees as independent contractors to avoid paying benefits. Tax treatment of qualified plans is favorable, so organizations need to learn the requirements for setting up benefits as qualified plans-for example, ensuring that pension plans do not discriminate in favor of the organizations highly compensated employees. Employers may not use employees gender as the basis for discriminating against anyone, as in pension benefits on the basis that women as a group may live longer. Nor may employers discriminate against workers over age 40 in providing pay or benefits, such as pressuring older workers to retire by limiting retirement benefits When employers offer early retirement, they must meet the requirements of the Older Workers Benefit Protection Act of 1990. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, employers must give disabled employees equal access to health insurance. To meet the requirements of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, employers must set aside the funds they expect to need for retirement benefits ahead of time, rather than funding the benefits on a pay-as-you-go basis

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

De-jobbing

De-jobbing INTRODUCTION In ever changing modern world successful job candidates should know and do more than their job descriptions require. That is what global companies require from their employees these days. In other words by ‘reducing of workforce or ‘mass layoff global companies want to reduce their workforce. This however, has led to de-jobbing in many companies. De-jobbing refers to the fact that jobs often change every day and cannot be specifically described in the traditional ways. Definition of de-jobbing cannot be found in many publications but according to ‘answers.com de-jobbing represents the gradual reverse of the process that created an employment driven economy now becoming obsolete as a result of globalisation and technological advancement which makes it unnecessary for every business unit to reinvent the wheel. ( http://wiki.answers.com ) Nowadays knowledge is available in push of a button for everyone, for that reason organisations are looking for multi skilled employees in a flatter organisation. This paper will discuss and debate if de-jobbing is ultimately a product of the rapid changes taking place in business today or not. So why are companies and organisations trying to use de-jobbing more and more, what is the real reason behind it? To answer these questions the real world examples needed, some global and local organisations will be shown as examples to have better understanding of de-jobbing, to be more specific journal articles and newspaper publications about de-jobbing will be revealed. Job Before making first steps towards de-jobbing process, what is the understanding of a ‘Job in our society? Business Dictionary describes it as a group of homogenous tasks related by similarity of functions. When performed by an employee in an exchange for pay, a job consists of duties, responsibilities, and tasks that are defined and specific, and can be accomplished, measured and rated. ( businessdictionary ) In other words it s the activity which individuals do to earn money. Endless economic crises, bankrupted companies, unsuccessful businesses have taught both the employee and employer one very important lesson. For the employer to hire people who work well, who will add something to the organisation and for job seekers to look for that kind of job which will give them perfect career and good wages in return. At the end of the day everyone gets paid for what they do and how they do it. Here is the important bit for companies who want to cut their labour costs but end up firing wrong people or by not organizing the downsizing accordingly. De-jobbing As continued from the ‘Job section of this paper it is important that organisations hire and fire right people. In many organisations today, jobs are becoming more nebulous or shapeless and more difficult to define and understand, meaning one thing, the trend is towards de-jobbing. It is a broadening the tasks of the company jobs, and encouraging workers not to limit themselves to whats on their job descriptions is a result of the changes taking place in modern workplaces. In other words one person does more than what they should normally do in the workplace, or doing many different things which were not even mentioned in job description. Companies need to tackle with ever changing trends such as technological change, competition with rivals, deregulation, political instability, social changes, and the shift in economy. Companies do these things to be more competitive, and responsive, and generally more flexible. In other words, the organisational methods managers use to complete this have helped weaken the meaning of job as well as a well defined and clearly described set of responsibilities. Something dramatic is going on in our world, to be specific we are witnessing the disappearance of jobs. Not some particular jobs in certain that are disappearing but the very thing itself, â€Å"the job† that is fading away. It is not a joke or something like that but it is what happening these days, ‘Yes. Take for example farmers many jobs within that industry disappeared because of computerization or machinery. Robots do it for us, thus leaving people to look for something else to do. Very good example can be the services we use nowadays, in the banks when paying money in and out in many banks we cannot see cashiers anymore, computers can do it for you. There are many examples of such situations but those will be discussed in latter pages of this paper. After few decades, modern world will marvel that we couldnt see more clearly what was happening. And then again looking 50 years back who would have imagined the world of today? We people will observe how fixated we were on the continuing rounds of layoffs, the growing use of temps, and the occurrence of outsourcing. The time will come when the job itself wont be good enough to accomplish a given task. There are and were predictions that there would be labour shortages in some parts of the world, and that there would be so many jobs that it would be workers market not the job givers, but that has not happened, and there are many reasons for that. One of the biggest reasons remains to be advancement in technology, or rapid advancement in technology, so fast that no one could predict it. And then there is constant migration of people, perfect example can be United Kingdom itself. When European Union expanded towards Eastern Europe many people from those countries moved to west Europe t o work. Many companies benefited from this migration in many ways. All these have again proved specialists and so called experts wrong in their future predictions. The point is that there will always be people to do the jobs, but will those be the right people for those positions or slots. There is a change coming to our understanding of jobs and the way we do them. People are afraid of change, for some it is difficulties, difficulty to learn something new to stay in his/her position, but for some that change is opportunity; opportunity for those who know how to turn change, to their advantage. Furthermore it will be opportunity for people who believe in themselves and how they will take their chances. Even if jobs or businesses of those people are not innovation minded in those conditions, they will need to deal with that sooner or later, because that will be the defining moment for future of their jobs or businesses. The change which we are talking here is ‘de-jobbing which is already happening. There are many examples of modern institutions which have taken big steps towards de-jobbing their jobs. How should businesses respond to these new realities? Good answer will be to teach and educate employees about what company is trying to attain, and show them where their piece of work stands in the bigger picture. However, this may take time and outcomes might be disappointing. Management would say that employees just dont get the idea of what we are trying to do, but better answer is to address the issue straight that people holding on to their jobs. But in reality what management fails to see is that, management themselves directing people and showing them what to do, how to do it and then paying them for that. Nowadays we can see many people getting paid for their innovations, technology and computing sector leading the way. Those people manage themselves; there are no supervisors or managers checking their performance and work rate. And the interesting thing about is that they work for companies not themselves and still get paid much better. That is not what we used to mean when describing a job, but there are people who do those kinds of jobs. So what are the chances that in future many people will do that kind of jobs? Throughout centuries we were looking for faster production, faster distribution, faster service and what makes that possible? Special minds, innovative minds gives us such advantage, it was and will be like that for decades to come. The jobs are vanishing as a result of these things, this is where de-jobbing happens. One person does multiple tasks on its own, and in some cases does it much better than two or group of people of course by help of machinery, robots, and computers and so on. For that reason organisations right to give their employees multiple tasks, because in some organisations there are many small things need to be done that management cannot just go and hire someone else to do that job for them. There are organisations which are cutting their expenses by taking such actions which are profitable for them. Or some of them are reducing management levels, there are many companies which have taken such actions and succeeded with it. Lets look at some types of organisations where such things can be done. The Boundary less Organisation: In ‘Boundary less organisation the widespread use of teams and cross-functional task forces reduces and makes more permeable the boundaries that typically separate departments such as customer services and sales, and hierarchical ranks. In such organisations foster responsiveness by cheering employees to liberate themselves of ‘it is not my job attitude which naturally create walls between one employee and another. Instead the focus is on concentrating on project or task at hand in terms of the overall best interests of the organisation, thereby further reducing the thought of a job as a clearly defined set of duties. Reengineering Re-engineering is the fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of the business processes to achieve dramatic improvements in critical contemporary measures of performance, such as cost, quality, service, and speed. ( http://www.citeman.com ) The old ideas and rules of the company should change fundamentally, at the same time beliefs which shaped the main structure and management of business for many years like divided work groups or divisions within the organisation should be retired. Jobs can be reengineered in many ways, for example one way is to assign group of people for few relatively enlarged and enriched jobs. This makes whole group responsible for the result rather than one person. It will give more responsibility to the group, results can be judged by the performance of that group. By doing so team will become more responsible and there will be mutual respect within the individuals. Downsizing It is the way of life in many organisations these days. If organisation loses money, or is not performing well, downsizing comes to mind. Many managers think that by downsizing company can improve its overall performance and that it will make huge profits by doing so. But in experience it is not really effective, results are not encouraging enough to say that by downsizing business will do better. It is intended to show positive results, but it does more harm than good to some businesses and their workforce. Downsizing is reduction in size of workforce as all staffing levels, to survive a downturn, improve efficiencies, or become a more attractive candidate for acquisition or merger. ( businessdictionary ) Main reasons behind the downsizing are to reduce expenses and costs, reduce the management hierarchy to fasten the decision making in management level, sharpen focus on core competencies, satisfy the shareholders and increase the productivity. While organisation might or might not benefit from downsizing is yet to be seen, but it surely leaves some effects within the organisation and externally as well. One of the big sufferers of downsizing is workers within the organisation. Downsizing can bring stress and motivation disruptions in the workplace. Workers will be in constant stress of being the next person to leave the company. This can increase the anger and fear among workers. Employees will have low commitment to work due to constant fear, such things might negatively impact on customer service department and can leave negative impact on productivity and the quality of the job done. While, survivors of such actions might experience more stress of long hour shifts and more responsibility added to their work, and anxiety about future downsizings. Downsizing plays big part in de-jobbing process, and many companies have no choice but downsize first and do de-jobbing afterwards. Experts say downsizing is not good for the overall performance of the company, but then again organisations do downsize no matter what experts say. The results are yet to be seen as world goes through one of the biggest crisiss of all time, and many companies downsizing, the real effect of downsizing will be seen in 2 or 3 years time. Why? Because ‘Credit Crunch era many companies applied downsizing and that there will be more cases after this crisis to discuss rather than now. Examples Here are some examples from worlds global and local businesses on how they have experienced the de-jobbing process and have they succeeded with their actions or not: Prezzo PLC there were numerous changes in many sections of the company, notably in restaurants of the company. The management decided that everyone must do more than what their job responsibilities are. Such as waiters doing the jobs of assistant managers and chefs must order the stock. Workers of course wouldnt get payed more money for their efforts but there were arguments within the staff that ‘this is your job and that is yours kind situation, which creates disorder in working place. Lloyds TSB Bank the bank announced that it will cut 5000 jobs in order to cut its expenses and be more competitive against their rivals. The remaining staff would replace the ones who left. ( The Guardian, 2009 ) BBC the BBC is to cut 2050 jobs aimed at saving hundreds of millions pounds a year. Cuts will include 420 in news, 66 in sport, 150 in drama, 735 in the regions, 58 in new media and 424 in factual and learning. That will follow the previous 1730 job cuts. Director general said that there were risks in undertaking change on such a large scale. But underlined they have staff in place to replace them. ( Evening Standard, 2009 ) Versace is to slash one quarter of its workforce which is 350 jobs worldwide by the middle of the next year. In a statement, group said that it was preparing a comprehensive corporate reorganisation designed to increase efficiency, return the group to profitability in 2011 and ensure its future growth prospects. ( The Times, 2009 ) Ericsson is to axe up to 700 jobs, more than 17 percent of its UK workforce. Company announced that this move is part of Ericssons ongoing global cost reduction activities and is subject to consultations with trade unions and employee forums. ( The Times, 2009 ) Fujitsu Company announced plans to cut 1200 jobs in UK. The company said today that the cuts will come at its services business, saying that action is necessary to ensure that the company remains competitive in the difficult global economic climate and is in a solid position for future growth when the economy starts to recover. ( The Telegraph, 2009) Rolce Royce the defence and aerospace group, plans to cut 140 jobs in the UK as part of a move to axe 2000 jobs globally. Company statement says that they are determined to maintain their focus on cost reduction and competitiveness as the world economy enters a challenging period. However, it was too early to determine the precise effects of the global economic downturn. ( The Telegraph, 2008 ) Scania the Swedish heavy vehicle and engine manufacturer plans to dismiss 70 employees from its factory in Brazil. Company spokesman described the situation by stating they had an excess of workers and that they had to reduce. ( nordicbusinessreport ) British Airways is to cut 1700 cabin crew jobs and freeze pay as it continues to slash costs. The change will cut the number of cabin crew jobs by 1700 reducing the current total of 14000. And also airline confirmed that it was planning two year pay freeze on the basic pay. All of which company says are efforts to change the overall structure of Airlines business strategy. ( the Independent, 2009 ). Midwest Airlines announced its plans to reduce its workforce by about 1200 employees, or 40percent of staffing levels. The reductions will take the form of furloughs or position eliminations, depending on job function. Company also informed that reductions are spread throughout the airlines flight operations and in-flight operations. This action is taken to reduce the costs and improve the competitiveness of the company. ( Journal of Transportation, 2008 ) Compaq the personal computer group blamed the sharp slowdown in Europe would lead to an additional 1500 job cuts. Company statement said that economic slowdown is spreading overseas, and that company will move more swiftly and go even deeper in their structural cost reduction programmes, by doing which company aims to achieve maximum competitiveness in such situations. ( The Independent, 2009 ) BT revealed to axe up to 15000 posts in the coming year. BT said it was aiming to cut the jobs through natural wastage, non replacement and voluntary redundancy. And that BT would do all it could to protect the jobs of its permanent staff, pledging that some workers would be redeployed and retrained. Company also announced that there will also be more flexible work patters introduced, including call centre staff based at home rather than in an office. ( The Journal, 2009 ) Novastar a residential mortgage lender and portfolio investor today announced a reduction in workforce to align its organisation with changing conditions in the mortgage market. It will affect about 17% of the company. The actions focus on the companys wholesale loan origination group and related functions, including employees in its headquarters. This particular action focuses on new rules company will implement in market. ( Business wire, 2007 ) AOL The American internet service provider plans to shed 5000 employees, almost quarter of its workforce, as it goes through a radical restructuring intended to reinvent the business in the face of falling subscribers. This restructuring will see many people doing de-jobbing in the face of these changes. ( The Guardian, 2006 ) Barclays Banking giant is to axe 188 jobs at call centres in Liverpool as it moves to an automated system for issuing ISA accounts. The bank said staff previously carried out the work are no longer needed and the job losses will affect call centres in Liverpool city centre. ( ITN , 2009) EMI music giant is to axe up to 2000 jobs as part of a drive to save future of the company. The cuts will be focused on the groups recorded music division, and that company was struggling for challenges posed by digital media. ( Yorkshire Post, 2008 ) Sainsburys were expected to axe 350 of its top managers this week. Those losses will be from London head office and will unusually include 80 senior executives as the group attempts to sweep away bureaucracy generated by its top heavy management. ( The Birmingham Post, 1999 ) Vodafone is all set to part company with 450 employees from its operations in the UK. Vodafone is to dismiss a fifth of its senior head office managers even as the firm would be recruiting about 500 sales and retail staff. Vodafone tells that they want to shift the emphasis from administration to sales. ( PTI, 2008 ) NTL were to axe 600 jobs from its workforce by the end of 2007. The cable giant said it would be outsourcing a significant number of jobs as well as cutting posts as part of its integration strategy following the merger with Telewest in March. ( The Guardian, 2006 ) Shell oil giant yesterday announced that it plans to axe almost a fifth of its offshore workforce, sparking industry fears about the safety of North Sea platforms. Company said job losses on 16 platforms in the Northern and Central North Sea would lead to improvements in safety, production and efficiency and that only a small proportion of the cuts would be maintenance related. ( The Scotsman, 2003 ) De la rue in 2004 despite making significant profit, worlds biggest banknotes and chequebooks producing company said that it will axe 350 jobs. De La Rue said it planned to return the expected 8 million a year savings to investors through a combination of progressive dividends. ( Evening News Scotland, 2004 ) Glaxo Smith Kline Britains biggest pharmaceuticals company, plans to axe 6000 jobs around the world as it faces up to the growing challenges in the industry. Competition from generic manufacturers and doubts about companys pipelines are posing a serious threat to the sector. ( PTI, 2009 ) Scottish Water in 2003 wanted to cut 900 jobs, the company had struggled with high costs arising from Scotlands Victorian drainage system and has been told by the regulator that it needs to make cost cuts. Spokesman for Labour Party in Scotland described situation as company trying to become more efficientand remain in public sector. ( The Telegraph, 2003 ) Conclusion All in all, de-jobbing is what we are facing these days. And if we want to be successful we as individuals must be alert for all the changes taking place around us. The world is on the brink of something big, in terms of change. Yes! Change important but can we keep up with the change which is happening around us or not that is the important point. As it was discussed in de-jobbing part of this paper, jobs as we know them are disappearing or vanishing. Who knows after a century there wont even be a word called job. De-jobbing is the word most companies like and would like to apply in their companies, because it allows organisations to get more than one thing from its employee. The style and the way we do our jobs are changing rapidly and it wont be a surprise to see one person doing multiple tasks a century from now. REFERENCES * (Cited December 12th, 2009) http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_definition_of_Dejobbing * â€Å"Fujitsu to axe 1200 UK jobs†, The Telegraph, (26/08/09), http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/6093262/Fujitsu-to-axe-1200-UK-jobs.html * (Cited December 9th, 2009) http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/downsizing.html * â€Å"Versace axes 350 jobs as recession hits wealthy†, The Times, (28/10/09), http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/retailing/article6893820.ece * (Cited December 16th, 2009) http://www.citeman.com/2255-dejobbing/ * â€Å"Ericsson axes 700 staff and shuts Coventry site†, The Times, (10/10/09), http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/telecoms/article6911224.ece * (Cited December 14th, 2009) http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/job.html * â€Å"Lloyds to cut further 5000 jobs†, The Guardian, (10/11.09) http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/nov/10/lloyds-cuts-more-jobs * â€Å"BBC to axe 2000 more jobs†, Evening Standard, (London 18/12/09) http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-17403105-bbc-to-axe-2000-more-jobs.do * â€Å"Barclays to axe 188 Liverpool obs†, ITN, (23rd june, 2009), HighBeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-202432171.html * â€Å"Rolce Royce plans to cut UK 140 jobs†, The Telegraph, (20/10/08), http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/recession/3488013/Rolls-Royce-plans-to-cut-UK-140-jobs.html * â€Å"Glaxo Smith Kline to axe 600 workers†, Press Trust of India, (1st February, 2009), Highbeam research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-192930031.html * â€Å"Scottish Water cuts a fifth of workforce†, The Telegraph, (23rd April, 2003), http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/2849805/Scottish-Water-cuts-a-fifth-of-workforce.html * â€Å"Scania plans workforce reductions in Brazil†, Nordic Business Report, (17th july 2002), HighBeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-89143559.html * â€Å"Midwest Airlines Announces Significant Reduction in Workforce†, Journal of Transportation, (28th july, 2008), HighBeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-182842074.html * â€Å"De la rue wields axe despite notable profit†, Evening news Scotland, (3rd December, 2004), HighBeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-12875930.html * â€Å"NovaStar Financial, Announces Reduction in workforceâ€Å", Business Wire, (16th, march 2007), HighBeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-161457262.html * â€Å"AOL plans 5000 job cuts as it stops charging for services†, The Guardian, (4th August, 2006), http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2006/aug/04/newmedia.media. * BT plans to slash workforce by 10%†, The Journal, ( 15th May, 2009, Newcastle), HighBeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-199820256.html * â€Å"BA to cut 1700 jobs and freeze pay†, the Independent, (6th, October, 2009), http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/ba-to-cut-1700-jobs-and-freeze-pay-1798466.html * â€Å"Compaq lays off another 1500 as Europe slows down†, The Independent, (12th July, 2001), http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/compaq-lays-off-another-1500-as-europe-slows-down-677369.html * â€Å"EMI to axe 2000 jobs†, Yorkshire Post, (15th January, 2008), Highbeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-15104972.html * â€Å"Sainsburys axe falls in bid to stop city critics†, The Birmingham Post, (12th, April), Highbeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-60538271.html * â€Å"Vodafone to axe 450 employees from UK operations†, The press Trust of India, (19th march, 2008), Highbeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-176887256.html * â€Å"NTL confirms plans to axe 600 jobs†, The Guardian, (9th May, 2006), http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2006/may/09/broadcasting.citynews * †hell to axe 350 North Sea Jobs†, The Scotsman, (18th March, 2003), Highbeam Research, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-13014060.html Bibliography * â€Å"Aircraft firm slashes jobs†, Evening Standard, (London 15/12/09), http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-16623111-aircraft-firm-slashes-jobs.do * â€Å"Japan Airlines faces multiple job losses and suspended routes†, The Guardian, (Tokyo, 16/09/09), http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/sep/16/japan-airlines-job-losses * http://www.economist.com/ * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=dejobbinggo=Go * http://www.nytimes.com/ * http://www.bbc.co.uk/ * www.hrmguide.co.uk/introduction_to_hrm * www.hrmasia.com/ * http://managementhelp.org/hr_mgmnt/hr_mgmnt.htm * http://www.strath.ac.uk/hrm/ * http://books.google.co.uk/books

Tuesday, August 20, 2019

Properties Of Distributed Systems Information Technology Essay

Properties Of Distributed Systems Information Technology Essay A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal. A computer program that runs in a distributed system is called a distributed program, and distributed programming is the process of writing such programs. Distributed computing also refers to the use of distributed systems to solve computational problems. In distributed computing, a problem is divided into many tasks, each of which is solved by one computer The word distributed in terms such as distributed system, distributed programming, and distributed algorithm originally referred to computer networks where individual computers were physically distributed within some geographical area. The terms are nowadays used in a much wider sense, even referring to autonomous processes that run on the same physical computer and interact with each other by message passing. While there is no single definition of a distributed system, the following defining properties are commonly used: There are several autonomous computational entities, each of which has its own local memory. The entities communicate with each other by message passing. A distributed system may have a common goal, such as solving a large computational problem. Alternatively, each computer may have its own user with individual needs, and the purpose of the distributed system is to coordinate the use of shared resources or provide communication services to the users. Other typical properties of distributed systems include: The system has to tolerate failures in individual computers. The structure of the system (network topology, network latency, number of computers) is not known in advance, the system may consist of different kinds of computers and network links, and the system may change during the execution of a distributed program. Each computer has only a limited, incomplete view of the system. Each computer may know only one part of the input. PROPERTIES OF DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS So far the focus has been on designing a distributed system that solves a given problem. A complementary research problem is studying the properties of a given distributed system. The halting problem is an analogous example from the field of centralised computation: we are given a computer program and the task is to decide whether it halts or runs forever. The halting problem is undecidable in the general case, and naturally understanding the behaviour of a computer network is at least as hard as understanding the behaviour of one computer. However, there are many interesting special cases that are decidable. In particular, it is possible to reason about the behaviour of a network of finite-state machines. One example is telling whether a given network of interacting (asynchronous and non-deterministic) finite-state machines can reach a deadlock. This problem is PSPACE-complete,[39] i.e., it is decidable, but it is not likely that there is an efficient (centralised, parallel or distributed) algorithm that solves the problem in the case of large networks. SECURITY ISSUES IN ADAPTIVE DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS In the contemporary society, distributed systems have a significant impact on how communication between social, industrial and governmental institutions is achieved. Dealing with the complexity, heterogeneity and dynamics of distributed systems is absolutely among the main concerns of the software industry. In the Internet era, the distribution of information and services on different sites is a common and dominant scenario. Hence, accessing information and services on remote sites requires high-level of system quality: acceptable response time (at least à ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€¦Ã¢â‚¬Å"near real-timeà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ã‚ ); and security mechanisms. These aspects require inherent adaptation of the system to changes in the environment. In the case of ADSs, the challenge to maintain system quality is even greater. In general, security issues in distributed information systems, whether adaptive or not, is already a serious concern. There are many types of threats, among them those occurring during communication and those in the form of unauthorized attempts to access stored information. Solutions proposed to address these problems in distributed systems may contribute to the implementation of security mechanisms in ADSs. On the other hand, if a token ring is used to achieve mutual exclusion in data communication, then a loss of token might be a result of unauthorized monitoring of the token, which is a direct consequence of the distributed system being adaptive and having monitoring component. Moreover, data resubmission might be requested by authorized parties that couldnà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢t receive the data. Such a request might also come from malicious intruders that are requesting resubmission of data to get a copy. The kind of environmental changes that can be monitored in ADSs include, but are not limited to, processor and link failures, changes in communication patterns and frequency, changes in failure rates, and changed application requirements. Security metrics indicate the degree to which security goals such as data confidentiality are being met, they propose actions that should be taken to improve the overall security program, and identify the level of risks in not taking a given action and hence provide guidance in prioritizing the actions. They also indicate the effectiveness of various components of a security program. Developing effective security metrics programs has proven to be very challenging. A number of factors have contributed to this collecting the necessary data is difficult and there are no well-established and standardized guidelines. Swanson et al. (2003) identified elements that must be considered in defining effective security metrics, metrics must yield quantifiable information, supporting data must be readily obtainable, only repeatable processes should be considered for measurement, and metrics must enable tracking of performance. Voas et al. (1996) propose a security assessment methodology, called a daptive vulnerability analysis (AVA), which provides a relative measure of software security. The methodology is based on measurement of security weaknesses in terms of predetermined set of threats that are frequently encountered. The resulting metrics may vary with different set of threats and hence the methodology is called adaptive. Its major advantages include, among others, its ability to be customized to application-specific classes of intrusions and the fact that it measures dynamic run-time information. The fact that it is based on a predetermined set of threats is among the major limitations of AVA. Payne (2001) proposes a guideline that should be closely followed in the development a security metrics program. The guideline consists of several steps: clear definition of security goals and objective, decision about what metrics to generate and strategies for generating them; create action plan, and establish a formal program review cycle. Following this guidance enables us to clarify the why, what and how of developing security metrics. In the sequel, we focus on the metrics that should be generated to quantify the level of security threats that could be caused due to monitoring of a target system to achieve the level of adaptation necessary to maintain quality of services. ADAPTIVE DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS Distributed systems that can evolve their behaviors based on changes in their environments are known as Adaptive Distributed Systems (ADSs). Adaptation usually takes place on different sites in a distributed system and needs to be coordinated. Adaptive systems monitor and evaluate their environments and can adapt their own behaviors when there is a change in the environment. On the other hand, adaptive behavior is the field of science where the underlying mechanisms of adaptive behavior of animals, software agents, robots and other adaptive systems are investigated into. The results from adaptive behavior research are exploited for building artificially intelligent adaptive systems. In this case, we envision distributed systems within the context of artificially intelligent adaptive systems and we therefore believe that the research progress in adaptive behavior will affect the research in ADSs. That is, monitoring, change detection and behavior adaptation components of an adaptive distributed system will become more intelligent in time. An ADS better knows what is happening in its environment by detecting and evaluating the changes in the environments and adjusting their actions to the changes more intelligently. However, the more intelligent and adaptive a distributed system becomes through its monitoring and other components, the more risky it becomes that the intruders act more severely in a distributed environment if the monitoring component is overtaken by them. In the following paragraphs, we are giving a brief survey on ADSs. Leonhardt et al. (1998) indicate that security is an issue that appears where activity is being tracked, namely by the monitoring system they have proposed. For that reason, in this work, we look into the levels of knowledge a monitoring system might eventually have about its environment while becoming more adaptive, and whether the level of knowledge and the properties of the knowledge being monitored would cause any security issues compared to the distributed systems which are not adaptive. Russello et al. (2005) described how adaptation is done for dynamical replication for managing availability in a shared data space. The idea is that if replication is require d, the middleware should offer mechanisms that would allow the application developer to select from different replication policies that can be subsequently enforced at runtime. There is an adaptation subsystem where the environment conditions are monitored. It is detected when to switch to another replication policy automatically. The execution environment conditions which are monitored are cost of communication latency and bandwidth, especially when external monitoring subsystem is used. Silva et al. (2002) developed a generic framework for the construction of ADSs. The model is composed of three main packages. In the monitoring package, system specific parameters, such as processor utilization, in the various hosts of the distributed system are monitored. This package informs the event detection and notification package whenever values of such parameters change significantly. In addition to this, interceptors as used in the CORBA distributed system standards are inserted into the object invocation path. Each time a client invokes a method of an object, the message corresponding to this invocation is intercepted and later re-dispatched to the target object . Using interceptors, the system can extract useful information from each method invocation storing it in a log file for analysis by the event detection and notification package. On the other hand, dynamic configuration package, depending on the type of the event, executes the appropriate algorithm that defines actions that should be taken in order to adapt the application to the new environment condition. As stated in (Al-Shaer 1998), monitoring system can be used to detect and report security violations such as illegal logins or attempts of unauthorized access to files. On the contrary, we argue that if the monitoring subsystem is overtaken by an intruder, the monitoring system can also be used for causing security violations once an intruder has knowledge about login information and file authorizations to be able to report illegal logins and attempts of unauthorized access to resources.

Monday, August 19, 2019

my interest in psychology Essay -- Graduate Admissions Essays

my interest in psychology    I have always been intrigued by the mental processes of humans and animals. As a young child and into adolescence, as a student and teacher and as a caregiver, I have always been interested in psychology in one form or another. This essay will reflect not only the development of my interest in psychology, but the development of myself as a person.    I was born into a family with Native American heritage that practiced a strict protestant religion. As a child, I would often wonder why people's attitudes, behaviors and beliefs could be so different from one another. I wondered why some people believed in things with great zeal, yet other people believed the contrary just as vehemently.    As an adolescent, I was enrolled in an accelerated high school program from which I graduated at age 14. I was then faced with the decision at a very young age of what direction my adult life would take. During this time, I also began researching my Native American heritage and began to form my own outlook on individuality, life, spirituality and relationships. My beliefs eventually evolved, and became very contrary to the belief system which was prevalent in my childhood environment.    It was also during this time that I first learned about the field of psychology. I felt it was very natural for me to gravitate towards a field that investigated the affect, behavior, and cognition of humans and animals, since I had always shown an interest in this area.    During my initial years as an undergraduate student, I found myself very interested in the psychological issues that I was learning about. I also found how difficult attending college and working full time could be. Duri... ... expression of cognitive abilities and disabilities. Within this thesis, I investigated common research paradigms, such as twin and adoption studies. Additionally, I examined assumptions used within the methodologies, common data analyses (i.e. concordance rates and heritability measures) and methodological strengths and flaws of different experimental designs. In addition to assisting in research and performing a literature review (first author) in the area of behavioral genetics, I am a member of several behavioral genetic societies in order to remain updated on the research in the field of genetic inheritance and behavior.    Currently I am in the process of furthering my research in these areas by completing my pre-dissertation on interaction of GABA genes in occurrence of Autistic Disorder and an independent project on depression and mental retardation.

Sunday, August 18, 2019

The Teachings of Mathematics Education in America Essay -- miscellaneo

The Teachings of Mathematics Education in America Math educators in the United States should stress the understanding of the learners and teach them to process certain understanding to succeed in mathematics. The connection between math understanding and the reading of math problems should be raised in smaller grade levels so students have a better understand of math at younger ages. Yet it is not all the students’ part in learning the math, but also the educators’ part to teach the subject in an understanding manner using the curriculum and proper textbook. The rankings of mathematics in the United States are just barely above average compared to the world standards, and the preliminary studies show that the twelfth grade level tests are even lower and politics has to be blamed for this (Math and Learning). â€Å"As teacher-educators and lifelong mathematics enthusiasts, we think that America’s problems with math are not new news; they predate both the No Child Left Behind Act and the reform-math movement. To us, the story here is less about test scores and more about the nation’s attitudes toward math. Simply put, America is math-phobic—to an extent that profoundly influences our country’s policies, teaching practices, and, ultimately, the performance of our students.† (ERIC) The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) want to emphasis the basic skills taught in math classes as per their standards made in 2000. The old standards, made in the 1990’s, stressed importance on new ideas, and integrated technology use to solve complex equations. Ms. Lappan, the president of NCTM said, "That became, in some places and for some teachers, the goal. They missed the main goal: that children become highly skilled in using mathematics; We've tried to be very clear [in the revised standards] that mathematics is the goal.† The proposals of the 1990 standards and the 1998 needing revisions said the same: â€Å"Mathematics teachers need to reach all children by offering a variety of instructional strategies that encourage students to learn the concepts that lie under the algorithms they are learning; The changes, however, are unlikely to satisfy critics who find fault with the 1989 standards themselves, not just the way teachers and policymakers have implemented them. And they may also confuse and frustrate educators who have radically changed the way they teach... ...e poor teaching in the country. â€Å"The Third International Mathematics and Science Study warn unequivocally: United States students need to work toward a better, deeper understanding of mathematics--the "how" and "why" behind the equations. Without a clear, consistent vision for teaching math, there is little chance for any of our children to ever meet these standards. And this vision must start with the people whose job it is to impart knowledge to them: the teachers (ERIC).† â€Å"Political leaders of both parties have certainly recognized the need to address this crisis. America 2000, initiated by President Bush and adopted in somewhat different form as the Goals 2000 Act signed by President Clinton, calls for national standards in every educational discipline (Math and Learning).† The teachings of math in this country affect students in many ways such as teachers that teach math, the government that doesn’t support better funds for teaching math, the curriculum reform, and many more. Most of these things are not as visible in society yet it still occurs. The students ranking so low in the world in math is not good at all, and there needs to be something done about the matter.

Saturday, August 17, 2019

Optical Fiber Corp Case Analysis

Case Analysis: Optical Fiber Corporation Introduction Optical Fiber Corporation (OFC) is a financially successful, albeit relatively small manufacturer of multimode optical fibers. The company was founded in 1990. The founders were able to enter the market largely on the basis of acquiring patent licenses from larger optical fiber firms. These licenses restricted competition between the entities and provided OFC with instant access to optical fiber technology. In return, OFC’s customer base is limited by the license agreements and royalties of 7% on sales of licensed products (recently renegotiated to 9%) are paid to the licensors.Despite these handicaps the firm has grown in size and profitability. OFC makes several types of multimode optical fiber including specialty niche products they have developed outside of any license agreements. All customers are cable manufacturers that convert the fibers to optical fiber cable. Three such firms account for over 70% of OFC’s r evenues. Focusing on customer service, quality and product design and process improvements has proved a winning business model to date. OFC now faces a variety of challenges including the expiration of many of the patents that afford most of its profits.This raises the real possibility of new competitors in the market. Further, while in the past multimode and single mode optical fibers have generally been used for data communications and telecommunications respectively and as such were not in direct competition with each other, the advent of cheaper manufacturing processes for single mode fibers coupled with their inherent ability to transmit data more efficiently over longer distances may make them a more appealing choice for some of the uses that historically have favored multimode fibers.OFC is at now at a crossroads where they must decide if they are to stay in the multimode fiber business only, begin producing single mode fibers as well, or even enter the cabling business with a forward integration strategy. Competition in the Optical Fiber Industry The optical fiber industry is perhaps best considered as two industries that are closely related, the multimode fiber and the single mode fiber industries. The multimode industry in which OFC specializes is very competitive. The United States’ 2001 total optical fiber market was approximately 3. 5 million kilometers only 330 thousand of which was multimode.The value of the multimode market was $65 million that year, only a fifth that of the single mode market. Within the multimode market and a number of fiber manufacturers. The main rivals for OFC are the two licensors to whom they pay royalties. These firms are considerably larger and have greater resources with which to compete. Further, they have a competitive advantage in that they are the recipients of royalty payments rather than the firm making those payments. Also they are in a position to control the extent of OFC’s market penetration at least with respect to their licensed products.OFC has responded by creating high quality products and providing exceptional customer service. In addition, OFC has made improvements to the basic design of some of the licensed fibers making them, in a real sense new products. The R and D department at OFC has also been successful at developing new and less expensive manufacturing processes, which has helped to offset the added overhead of the royalty payments. Finally, OFC has developed specialty fibers with medical, aircraft, aerospace and extreme environment applications.These new fibers will not be subject to royalty payments, competition from new entrants until patents expire years in the future, and generally afford higher profit margins than other optical fiber products. New entrants to the market are a threat to OFC and all other fiber producers. New firms must contend with the high capitalization costs of this technologically demanding and exacting industry. One of the costs of optical fiber production is the R and D required to bring successful products to market. Between 1999 and 2007 the patents for many of the basic fibers produced by OFC and its licensors will expire.New firms entering the market will be free to produce the products once protected under those patents without having incurred any R and D costs. These firms will also be free from royalty payments to licensors or any restrictive covenants such as those under which OFC operates. The industry in general, and OFC in particular, must contend with the purchasing power of its buyers. Optical fiber is converted into optical fiber cable. In the United States there are twenty companies that perform this function. OFC sells over 70% of their fiber to just three.The loss of any of these accounts could be devastating for OFC and places them in a weak position when negotiating prices, at least when the products are those which are readily available from other multimode fiber producers. It is doubtf ul that switching costs would be high for buyers. Favoring OFC and the optical fiber market are the projections for increased demand for multimode optical fibers at least through the mid 2000’s. Sources of increased demand for multimode fiber are anticipated to include: cable TV, undersea cables, local area networks (LAN) as well as general data communications growth such as computer uses.As noted the single mode optical fiber market is much larger than the multimode market. It too, is expected to see significant growth over the next several years. Single mode fibers have the advantage of efficiently transmitting data over long distances, faster transmission rates and other desirable optical properties but until recently have been more expensive to produce. The advent of cheaper production methods will allow single mode fibers to enter markets that were once dominated by multimode fibers.Production of these fibers requires expensive specialized manufacturing equipment and a s ignificant commitment to R and D. The industry includes one of the OFC licensors. Substitute products for single mode fibers include microwaves, and satellites for telecommunications. Impact seems limited. Copper wire can be used as a substitute for the fiber-to-home and fiber-to-curb applications of either multimode or single mode fibers but by the mid 2000’s the lowered cost of production of single mode fibers will likely make this the preferred choice for these functions.Finally, it should be noted that suppliers are unlikely to exert competitive forces on the fiber optics markets. The materials used in the production of fibers are commodities of low value such as glass, certain gases and oxide particles. OFC Strengths OFC has many strengths. The firm is financially strong with record sales and earnings for the last year as well as increased manufacturing capacity. Furthermore, there was a $20 million backlog for optical fibers in the last year and orders are increasing. T here was net income of $6. 1million on revenue of $48. million in 2002. The Quick Ratio, a measure of a firm’s ability to meet short-term debt obligations (Current Assets – Inventories)/Current Liabilities = ($31. 0m – $6. 6m)/$12. 5 = 2. 0 is very solid. Return on equity (Net Income/Equity) = $6. 1m/$44. 0m = 13. 9% is also very impressive. OFC has developed new specialty products for medical, military, commercial aircraft, aerospace and severe environment uses. These are likely to receive patents and will not require royalty payments and will be protected from competitors for years to come.The firm has a variety of options to confront the challenges of the changing market place. OFC has patent licenses to produce optical cables that would allow for forward integration if they chose to move in that direction. Engineers at OFC have been able to find new ways to produce old products more efficiently reducing production costs. They have also developed adaptations of existing products to create new and unique demands for those products. OFC is in an industry that is expected to enjoy strong growth for at least the next several years.That demand will come from a variety of industries adding stability to the market. The equipment needed to produce optical fiber is expensive and the expertise demanding creating, a relative barrier to entry. Copper wire as a substitute is relatively expensive and as technological advances decrease the cost of optical fibers copper will become a non-entity. Perhaps most importantly, OFC has a strong reputation for quality, service and competitive pricing. OFC Weaknesses OFC is a small company. They were only able to enter the market by virtue of other firms’ products and license agreements.Those licenses have protected OFC from competition but have also limited the scope of its customer base and added significant fixed costs in royalty payments. Royalties will now increase to 9% (after paying a one time $3 million fee) on 85% of sales. Furthermore, while OFC is paying royalties to use these patents new entrants may soon be competing as patents expire. These firms will have essentially no R and D expense and of course no royalty payments potentially allowing them to produce at costs below those of OFC.OFC must also contend with a limited number of buyers. Over 70% of sales are to just three cable producers. The ability of OFC to increase prices to these large purchasers is doubtful. If even one of these customers were lost to an alternative fiber optic producer the effect on OFC could be dramatic. OFC operates in a competitive industry that will become more so with time. Copper wire manufacturers will turn to optical cable production to stay relevant. Overseas producers, already sources of competition to OFC, are likely to play a larger role in the future.Finally, OFC’s success has been built on quality, service and innovation. One or more competitor can potentially offer all of these. OFC’s Core Competencies OFC manufactures multimode, high quality optical fiber for cabling companies that convert that fiber into cable for a variety of data communications uses. The firm has a reputation for low prices and excellent customer service. Much of their success can be attributed to their R and D program, which has developed cost saving production technologies as well as product innovations.More recently, OFC has shown itself to be an innovator, developing entirely new multimode optical fiber products that fill a variety of unique niche functions. To continue producing and selling multimode optical fiber successfully, OFC needs to prepare for increased competition as patent protections expire. As new entrants begin producing many of the higher volume OFC products, likely at lower cost given their lack of R and D and royalty expenses, OFC will need to spend additional resources on developing decreased costs of production if they are to continue selling those products profitably.They will need to maintain their focus on quality and customer service. In part that will require continued product testing. They may wish to explore, however, if testing 100% of products as is current policy is necessary or if testing samples from each batch would serve as well and save money. OFC will need to continue to support R and D to develop new products and patentable improvements on existing ones. Options Available for Growth Pursuit of Niche Markets OFC has already demonstrated an ability to develop marketable niche multimode fibers. Previously created are fibers able to withstand high radiation nvironments for nuclear reactor and military applications, a fiber that can tolerate deep underwater submersion and a third tolerant of high heat conditions. They have also successfully experimented with a fiber capable of transmitting UV light and another with unique medical and scientific uses. To continue their development program for specialty fibers will require annual R and D spending increases of $400,000 and an additional annual expenditure for three new staff totaling $325,000. Outside firms can be hired to handle sales for 10% commissions.When sales volumes are adequate, salaried OFC employees can be used instead. The calculation as to when this makes financial sense for the firm is simple; when 10% of sales exceed the salary and benefit expenses of the needed in-house sales force then sales should become an OFC operation. The advantage of niche products is the lack of competition and relatively higher margins. Develop Single Mode Fiber Capacity OFC could choose to enter the much larger single mode fiber market. It is estimated that this will require a capital investment of $4 million for new plant and equipment.It will take a year for the new facilities to be operational. There will also be a reported one time R and D expense of $2. 5 million. This is a first year expense so it cannot be capitalized. It can reasonably be assum ed that there will be additional R and D expenses going forward although presumably these would be considerably lower than the initial expense. Entering the single mode market places OFC in competition with larger firms than it currently faces with greater resources to sell products with thinner margins and would divert OFC resources from their core business functions.Forward Integration A third option for OFC is to produce optical cable. The required patent licenses are available. Two options for this forward integration strategy exist. OFC can commit $5 million in capital investments and plan on spending an additional $500,000 annually for R and D or they can simply purchase a cabling company for an estimated $10 – 15 million in capital expenditure. There is currently an excess supply of cable and cabling firms and several are in danger of bankruptcy and so an acquisition should be feasible. Forward integration raises several concerns.Regardless of the approach taken, enter ing the fiber optic cable business will be expensive for OFC. This is a market that is already experiencing an excess of capacity so it can be assumed that at least for some time to come profits in the cabling industry will be squeezed. This is not a core business function of OFC but to pursue cable production will be so expensive as to necessarily draw resources away from some of the firm’s core activities, activities that are likely to be more profitable and entail less financial risk. Finally, one needs to consider that all of OFC’s customers are cable producers.If OFC enters this market they will become a competitor of their customers. It seems highly probable that at least some of these optical fiber buyers will respond in a retaliatory manner and switch to alternate suppliers. Most of OFC’s products are not unique and can be supplied by their licensors. The three large buyers would seem in a particularly strong position to adversely respond to any entry in to the cabling market by OFC. OFC Policy Statement In choosing a direction for the future growth of OFC several considerations should be kept in mind. First, OFC has been successful in large part because of its focus on quality.Any efforts at growth should not come at the expense of producing high quality products. Second, the firm must continue to provide a high level of customer service. This should include responsiveness to customers’ needs for new products and product features when those offerings are commensurate with the firm’s vision, available or attainable expertise and when economically viable. Finally, the firm should continue to fund R and D efforts to allow for a continuous pipeline of new products and improvements to existing ones in an effort to maintain a unique competitive position in the market.OFC has been successful in competing against larger firms by avoiding head to head competition. Initially this was accomplished through license agreements alon e. Later, the firm was able to create unique improvements to existing products and processes that gave it an advantage. Most recently OFC has created unique patentable products. These represent three different ways of avoiding direct competition. Despite their growth, OFC remains a relatively small firm in the optical fiber space and should continue to eschew direct competition when possible, realizing that the market is dominated by larger and better-funded firms.Recommendations OFC should stay out of the cable producing business. This market is the least profitable, most expensive to enter and likely to have the lowest return on investment. It is also likely to result in retaliation by current customers and reduced sales. The single mode market is much larger than the multimode market but as a consequence will bring OFC in contact with larger firms that already have the equipment and knowledge base to produce these products. A small firm with limited resources should not leave its core competencies behind to take on firms that are already in place.OFC needs to continue to make niche products whether they are improvements on old multimode fibers or new fibers with unique properties and functions. This firm will never be a big player in the highly competitive optical fiber industry, they arrived too late and don’t have the capital to displace the dominant firms. Given that projections are for most of the increased demand for optical fibers to occur through the mid to late 2000’s OFC may want to watch for an opportune time to sell to one of these larger entities, perhaps a single mode fiber producer to whom the OFC product line would prove complimentary.