Manmohan Singh

ohan Singh- A weak PM ? Manmohan Singh is the 13th and current Prime minister of the country. But in the past one year he has been heavily criticized and he has ended up facing a lot of flack from the opposition as well as the citizens of the country. But is this enough to say that he is a weak PM? No I don’t think so, while criticizing him we all are forgetting the good work he has done for our country.What a lot of us don’t know is that before becoming the prime minister of the country Manmohan Singh was the finance minister of our country, during the early 90’s, at that time our country was in a lot of debt and it was because of his policies that we were able to come out of such a difficult situation and stand on our own two feet. We must not forget that it was during his time that the policy of LPG- liberalization, globalization and privatization was bought in our country.According to an article in a well known magazine it was quoted that he is one of the lea ders who is loved by and respected by other leader’s, in 2010 he was 18th in Times magazine’s most powerful person’s. And also he has been said to be the best prime minister of the country since Nehru. But there is a famous saying that if you have roses then you have thorn to. Same is the case with Manmohan Singh, with the UPA government facing a lot of flack for the way it has been governing the country for the last couple of years.Specially with the CWG scam, 2G scam and the recent Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazzare incidents his image has been spoiled. He has been called a puppet in the hand of Sonia Gandhi, he ha been accused of not standing up for himself when most needed. People don’t understand the gravity of the situation or what pressure Mr. Singh is and how every move he makes is judged and criticized. Every wrong move by him is noted and the right one not taken note of. So what if Mr.Singh does not make many public appearances or decides to keep mum on certain issues, he is like the background dancer who doesn’t get notice but is one of the biggest reason for a particular dance to be good. Just like many a people might say that he is a puppet in Mrs. Gandhi’s hand but just like the background dancer he works from the behind for the success of his government. That is the reason even with so many scams UPA is in one it’s best reign over the last couple of decade’s.

Black&Decker Corporation Essay

Black & Decker was incorporated in 1910. Begun by Duncan Black and Alonzo Decker, Black & Decker’s first power tool was an electric drill in 1916. They went on to develop and offer the first portable screwdriver, electric hammer, as well as finishing sanders and jigsaws all the way up to the hugely successful dust buster in 1978. Over the next 70 years, the company established itself as dominant name in power tool and accessories, first in the United States and then accros a broad global front but particularly in europe. Growth was achieved by adding to its lineup of power tools and accessories and by increasing its penetration of more and more foreign markets Symptons, Issues and Problems Issues in this case is diversification strategy runned by Black & Decker corporation. As a diversified global manufacturer and marketer of household, commercial, and industrial product, Black & Decker need to develop and choose the right strategy for diversification. This case particularly discuss diversification of Black & Decker corporation during late 1980’s to early 1990’s, where Black & Decker which is established as dominant name in power tools and accessories, began to pursue diversification. It is because the continuing maturity of its core power tools business. During the 1980’s Black and Decker had established themselves as a leader in the power tool industry. However, they were feels that the market for such tools was maturing to the point where expansion within the industry would provide little or no additional revenues so they decided to diversify. Black and Decker began their expansion operation by acquiring General Electric’s housewares business, the leader in the industry, for $300 million in 1984. The success of the GE deal, and the reorganization efforts of their new CEO Nolan Archibald, led Black and Decker to continue on this path of acquisitions and diversification in other areas. Then, various acquisitions and acquisition attemp made by Black & Decker in their strategy to diversified. But the biggest and most noticed was the acquisition of Emrat Corporation, a diversified manufacturer of industrial product, for a $2.8 billion in March 1988. This steps is considered to be very bad decisions made by Black & Decker. Analysis Change in strategy In the mid 1980s, Black & Decker feels that the power tool market had matured to the point where there is no much room for further growth. Black & Decker then decided to change their corporate strategy from single business firm into diversified company. In 1984 they began to diversify. First they tried to get into the small household appliance market. Rather than create their own line, Black & Decker decided to acquire General Electric’s unit of household appliances for $300 million. Although it was a small part of GE’s company, it held more market share than other houseware distributors (25 percent of the market and the leadership position). That acquisition gives an additional $500 million a year in revenue for Black & Decker because it was able to offer products like irons, coffee makers and toasterswhich. This began a trend of acquisitions by Black and Decker expanding into various related and unrelated markets with varying levels of success. This various acquisitions allowed Black & Decker to offer even more new products such as portable woodworking tools and stronger drill bits. After all the new changes, Black & Decker Manufacturing Company also changed its name to Black & Decker Corporation to help market those changes The successful story of GE’s household appliance division acquisition in 1988, has triggered Black & Decker to tried again. Only this time the company of interest was American Standard Inc. American Standard had an impressive $127 million profit in 1987, which towered above the mere $70 million for Black & Decker. But then, the acquisition was unsuccessful. The Emhart acquisitions The failed attempts by Black & Decker in 1988 did not stop Black & Decker moves to acquiring other company. In 1989, Black & Decker acquiring Emhart for the price of $2.8 billion, a price that 33% premium over Emhart’s preannouncement value. This acquisition may not have been the best move for Black & Decker because its stock price dropped 15 points after the announcement of the acquisition. After difficult negotiation of exactly how the acquisition would occur, Black & Decker decided to pay for Emhart for the next 48 years. The deal put over $2 billion in goodwill on Black & Decker’s books and increased debt to over $4 billion just before the credit markets were about to contract severely. With the exception of a few businesses like Price Pfister faucets and Kwikset locks, which represented just $600 million in sales, Emhart made no sense for Black & Decker. Several of its subsidiaries were quickly placed on the block. But then suddenly the economy became sluggish and the market slowed down, Black & Decker stock slumped from a pre-acquisition $25 to $8 per share. Archibald (Black & Decker’s CEO at that time) had to scramble to keep the company solvent. Archibald’s plan was to sell off about $1.8 billion of Emhart assets to pay down debt while merging the company’s line of Kwikset locks and Price Pfister Inc. plumbing fixtures with Black & Decker’s offerings. According to Archibald, the plan would have been successful enough under normal economic conditions. However, he failed to sell the Emhart businesses for the set prices leaving a long term debt of a hefty $3 billon and annual interest payments of more than $300 million. Black & Decker initially sold $1 billion in Emhart assets to reduce the interest costs. It met this demand by selling whole divisions of Emhart and also by selling equipment and other assets. By 1991, Black & Decker reduced the debt acquired by more than 25%. From 1993 to 1996, Black & Decker sold off three segments of Emhart that did not prove to be strategic parts of the acquisition. By 1997, Black & Decker was able to meet its liquidity requirements and management chose to amortize the costs on a straight-line basis for the next 40 years. This shows that the acquisition of Emhart Corporation is a Black & Decker’s bad move. Black & Decker’s decision to acquire a company that was larger than $2.3 billion (revenues) Black & Decker itself, (the Emhart Corporation were $2.7 billion in revenues), was too risky and apparently Archibald didn’t too aware about it. The purchase and acquisition of Emhart had proven a lack in the synergy required to make such purchases profitable. Also the company had not been able to reduce its amount of debt (primarily from the purchase of Emhart) over the subsequent 10 years. Archibald made poor decisions in the Emhart acquisition, which impacted its profit margin, lowered its competitive advantage, and killed any chance of creating above-average returns. There are things that has to be done in order to ascertain whether the acquisition may create value for the shareholders, which is the CEO’s primary responsibility. Effort should have concentrated on three essential tests:  · The attractiveness test. The industries chosen for diversification must be structurally attractive or capable of being made attractive.  · The cost-of-entry test. The cost of entry must not capitalize all the future profits.  · The better-off test. Either the new unit must gain competitive advantage from its link with the corporation or vice-versa. Conceding the point that the purchase provided some benefits, such as increased market share and well-known consumer brands, the cost-ofentry and better-off tests provide evidence that the Emhart purchase was very risky. Black & Decker SWOT Analysis Strengths  · Brand recognition is a strong attribute for Black and Decker. Black and Decker has a reputation for producing electrical engines, power tools and appliances.  · Black and Decker produce a variety of products in its respected industry, and it is involved in constant research and development (e.g., developing cordless appliances and tools, rechargeable batteries that are compatible with both tools and small appliances).  · Black and Decker have penetrated the market causing it to dominate market share in the industry. Weaknesses  · Black and Decker’s reputation for quality tools and appliances has been decreasing. This was likely due to the fact that Black and Decker was busy dealing with its non-strategic businesses. Opportunities  · Opportunities to gain more market share by sponsoring home improvement shows.  · Gain more market share with industrial market, by offering quantity-based deals and advertising the quality of its products. Threats  · Sears is the strongest competitor in the power tools division with 13.4 percent of the US market share.  · Black and Decker needs to be aware of new items that the consumer can use and develop them before their competitors. Conclusion and Recommendation When an industry became mature and not offered enough room for further growth, it is important for a company to change their strategy to keep growing continuously. This is what Black & Decker did, although being a dominant player in power tools and accessories for many years, Black & Decker realized the industry is being mature, so they decided to change their strategy into a diversified company. To be successful, a diversified company should have a portfolio of product with different growth rates and different market shares. The portfolio composition is a function of the balance between cash flows. High-growth product, that important for company to keep growth in the future, need lot of cash inputs. Low-growth product, product that already in maturity growth, should generate cash. How to balance between this two is the most important things in managing multi-business (diversified) company. The Emhart acquisitions is an example of bad acquisitions from Black & Decker in their strategy to diversified. There can be many reasons that an acquisition strategy fails to earn its cost of capital. An acquirer may have no real strategy to begin with and thus pay an unjustified acquisition premium right from the beginning. Or there may be a complete failure in executing a fundamentally sound strategy. One major risk in acquisitions is the failure to close the gap that may exist between the strategic objectives and organizational design of the new organization and those of the old. Issues such as new information systems and channels, management succession, new decision rights, and incentive systems must be planned carefully in light of where competitive performance gains are expected to result. This case is also an example of the problems where mismanaged growth can bring diversification away from core businesses and core competencies rarely creates value for the shareholders. High leveraged acquisitions put the firm at higher financial risks, particularly when the firm’s products depend on business cycles. Shocks to the economy may result in insolvency and possible bankruptcy. The company may have to sell assets at low prices to meet debt obligations. As financial markets become more and more sophisticated, investors may diversify more easily, thereby making corporate diversification less attractive. Firms must continue to strengthen their core competencies and sustain their competitive advantages. In conclusion, the fundamental reason for the failed acquisition is due to lack of long term planning, forecasting and predicting of the return on investment relative to cost. The highly leveraged acquisition of Emhart placed Black & Decker at higher financial risks, primarily when the firm’s products depended on business cycles. As result of the inherited debt and the unanticipated market fluctuations and weak economy may result in collapse or possible bankruptcy of the corporation. Black & Decker Executives’ lack of strategic direction and poor application of funds may lead the corporation to sell of assets at low prices or lay off employee to meet debt obligations. Our recommendation for this case is, Black & Decker should stick with its original vision that includes the consolidation of their portfolio. The company should continue in investing in, and strengthening, its core products within its existing portfolio, so that these products will generate cash flow that will enable the company to embark upon expansion opportunities. In the future, Black & Decker should consider international companies with strong recognition in the countries that they plan on expanding into, considering either acquisition, merger, or creating a joint venture. The affiliation between Black & Decker and these companies must create synergy in order to justify such deliberate moves and expansions. These planned executive decisions and actions will help Black & Decker to obtain competitive advantages which will result in aboveaverage returns, leading to greater investor wealth and value to its employees.

Why do good people suffer Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Why do good people suffer - Research Paper Example Do we then simply have to accept things and tell ourselves, â€Å"The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised† (Job 1:21)? Not exactly, for in every human being, there is a natural curiosity to know why things happen, and especially why bad things happen to good people. We may feel angry and bitter at the suffering that good people experience and at all the injustice around us, but the Book of Job and the Scriptures somehow shed light on the idea that these sufferings, especially those of good people, indeed have a spiritual basis. The reasons why good people suffer are mostly implied in the Book of Job in the Hebrew Bible. One of the essential points that the book is trying to emphasize is that God’s will transcends innocence. In simple terms, it means that God will not spare someone from suffering simply because one claims to be innocent. This further means that despite one’s goodness and obedience to God and to His laws, bad things may still happen to him. Job himself actually claims innocence when he states that he has not committed sins like lust, lies, idolatry and adultery. Job also reiterates that he has not failed to help the needy and the poor and his slaves, and that he has not even treated his enemies in an unfair way (Job 31:1-40, New International Version Holy Bible). Nevertheless, Job experiences extreme suffering. All these imply one thing – that God’s will is above man’s innocence. In fact, because of this, Job assumes that God is cruel, where such assumption is evident in the lines â€Å"I cry out to you, God, but you do not answer† (Job 30:20), and, â€Å"You turn on me ruthlessly; with the might of your hand you attack me† (Job 30:21). Indeed, anyone who does not show compassion to the weak and innocent is viewed as cruel. Nevertheless, God remains above man’s innocence and man’s concept of sparing the innocent from suffering. The concept of innocence is actually one which is mostly misunderstood by the layman. Perhaps one reason for this is that man usually equates moral innocence with legal innocence. It is in this respect that man is mistaken. Good people suffer because â€Å"technically speaking there are no good [or innocent] people† (Slick). The apostle Paul echoes this in his Epistle to the Romans, where he says, â€Å"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God† (Rom. 3:23). This means that no one is spared from sin. Paul even calls himself â€Å"chief of sinners† (1 Tim. 1:15). Moreover, even Jesus Himself says, â€Å"Why do you call Me good?...No one is good except God alone† (Lk. 18:18). Furthermore, Job’s defense of himself by claiming that he has been a good man all along is actually not even plausible for everyone simply is a sinner, regardless of the good or the bad he has done. It is true that in terms of the law of the country or in terms of rules, it is clear who obeys it and who violates it. However, when it comes to the Scriptures, there are really no good people and that bad things just simply happen to them. What then is the effect of this sin? The apostle Paul describes the effects of sin on the Ephesians: â€Å"Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed† (Eph. 4:19). Thus, sin, according to Paul, leads to more sin. Moreover, sin can lead to various physiological problems such as â€Å"liver problems, diabetes, heart disease† as well as emotional problems like â€Å"guilt, low self-esteem [and] loss of self-respect† (Vandermark). Thus, sin leads to both emotional and physical suffering. Lastly, perhaps the worst effect of sin is stated by the apostle Paul in

Aspect-Oriented Software Engineering Research Paper

Aspect-Oriented Software Engineering - Research Paper Example In the majority of huge software applications, it is difficult for the software development teams to understand the relationships between the software components and requirements. In fact, a number of software components can be implemented through a single requirement as well as each software component can have the ingredients of a number of requirements. In other words, the implementation of a change in the requirements can require from the software development team to completely understand and modify a number of other components. On the other hand, a software component is intended to provide some fundamental functionality however it can also contain code that can be used to implement a number of software requirements. In case when the software development team needs to reuse some of the important system components, it can be difficult or costly to reuse such components for the reason that reuse sometimes requires from software developers to make changes to these components in order to eliminate additional code that has no relationship with the key functionality of the software component (Sommerville 566; Nakagawa, Ferrari and Sasaki). In this scenario, AOSE is a very helpful technique for software development that has been developed to deal with this issue in order that it becomes easy for the software development team to maintain and reuse the software components. Basically, the fundamental idea of AOSE is based on the concept of abstractions which are acknowledged as aspects.  Additionally, these aspects are used to apply some of the core system functionality that can be required at various different sections or areas in a software application. In addition, these aspects are used to capture functionality that coexists and overlaps with other functionality that is the part of a system. However, these aspects are utilized in combination with other abstractions for instance methods and objects.

According to the question Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

According to the question - Assignment Example ording to information obtained from (http://christojeanneclaude.net/projects/the-umbrellas#.VBAu-kDuPMw), â€Å"The Umbrellas project was supposed to cover an area of six to eight miles and a total of 3.000 Umbrellas with a height 12 feet and diameter 18 Feet were to be erected. Though the project was supposed to be temporary, it required the efforts of many people who would erect the umbrellas. This was quite an ambitious project given that it was huge and expensive but surprisingly, it was carried over a short period of time. A lot of money was injected in this project. The other fascinating thing about the project is that the umbrellas were meant to illuminate the inland valleys in a bid to establish the nature of relationship that existed between the people and the environment around them. The artists used space in which the umbrellas were exhibited in both countries as a way of trying to show the similarities and differences with regards to land use in different countries. In both countries for instance, the project became an instant hit with tourists since they attracted a lot of visitors from different walks of life. This project revealed that leisure is part of life of different citizens of the two countries where the project was exhibited. The other important element about the place where the project was exhibited is that recreational parks as well as open spaces can be converted for better use such as attracting visitors and this in turn helps to generate revenue. In other words, this project was inspirational in that it created employment for more than one thousand people and it helped to generate a lot of revenue. The other idea behind the project is that the exhibitors wanted to prove to the targeted people that certain pieces of land that are often viewed as idle can be converted for commercial purposes over a very short period of time. The artists were mainly concerned about showing that there is a close relationship between the people and the

Self-Reflection Component Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Self-Reflection Component - Essay Example I put forth great level of effort toward completion of the project, as I am a very devoted kind of a student who believes in the attainment of objectives through resolution and perseverance. Working in a group was a totally new and fresh experience for me. I really liked working in the group, as I was able to share my ideas and perspectives with all the compromising and appreciative members of the group. All of us helped each other out, and gave positive feedback and constructive criticism to each other, and hence, although a sense of competition was there but it was very encouraging and fruitful for all of us. We communicated with each other about the goals and objectives of the project, set deadlines, and met those deadlines through willpower. I hope to work on more business related projects in future, as I have gained a lot of knowledge through this project and wish to gain more through group

How ares of contract law, specifically pre-marital agreements are Essay

How ares of contract law, specifically pre-marital agreements are affected from a feminist perspective Discuss in light of Radm - Essay Example Some legal feminists push for the equal application of laws to both men and women. Others believe that the law and the courts must take extra steps to favour women over men considering that women are, by definition and in reality, placed at a lower stratum than men in society. This clash of perspectives may even be more pronounced in the days to come with the recent Supreme Court decision in Radmacher v Granatino,1 an English premarital agreement case. This case does not only reverse previous decisions of courts in prenuptial agreements by conferring a rebuttable presumption on such agreements but it breaks the stereotypical image of wealthy men enforcing premarital agreements against economically vulnerable women spouses. The implication of the sweeping application of the legal dictum of Radmacher in future cases is to deprive women spouses, generally perceived to be the less economically viable partner, of court intervention and assistance in prenuptial agreements where such agreem ents contain provisions disadvantageous to women. The Feminist Legal Theory The feminist legal theory emerged in the 1970s and, as with any other feminist movement, was driven by the perception that men dominate and shape society, which itself subordinates women to men. Feminists bewailed that legal systems render decisions with underlying assumptions about gender, therefore, justifying and further institutionalising gender inequality. Such gender assumptions, according to them, can be gleaned in decisions that take into account and were influenced by essentially gender-related factors. It had been argued by some feminist movements that it was not nature that subordinates women in a sphere of domesticity, but culture aided by the courts with the latter’s restrictive decisions against women such as prohibiting married women to own or dispose property.2 Feminist legal movements, however, approaches their battle from diverse perspectives, some of which are complementary, whilst others are plainly conflicting. Nonetheless, all feminist legal models blame the legal and judicial systems in perpetuating gender hierarchy. The liberal equality model insisted that men and women should be treated alike in all respects. This model insists on the â€Å"sameness† between men and women in arriving at rational choices and seeks to dispute the perception that women are inferior to men, and should therefore, be accorded the same legal treatment as men. This means that even favour accorded to women because of their sex violates equality because it results in the differentiation of women and men.3 This model was, however, eventually assailed as weak because of its failure to take into account real and actual differences between the sexes such as pregnancy in the employment area. On the other hand, the radical feminist model emphasises the differences between the sexes and rallies the legal system to give special treatment to women. Contrary to the liberal equality m odel, the radical feminist model compels the law to highlight such differences and accord relief to women to bridge the gap of inequality that separates them from men. Radical feminists believe that women are subjugated to the state and to men all of the time and are therefore, disempowered. Radical feminist legalists subscribe to the ideas of Catherine MacKinnon, Sylvia Law and Nan Hunter: MacKinnon regarded women’s sexual submission to men as false consciousness of individuals who are inherently oppressed, and; Law

Opportunity cost Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Opportunity cost - Essay Example Different perspectives however exist for definition of opportunity cost but they revolve around the cost that can be derived from the next best alternative. Ferguson, an economist, for example, defines opportunity cost in terms of resources and as mount of resources for producing the next best alternative, which is forgone in order to produce a subject commodity. This establishes cost of the two commodities as a common measure for determining sacrificed cost for a production. Henderson offers a definition that is closer to cost measure by defining opportunity cost as the â€Å"value of the highest-valued alternative† for which resources in a production could have been used (Hussain, 2010, P. 158). Leftwich’s definition of opportunity cost as the value of foregone option for production in which resources would have been used is also consistent with the focus on cost of resources in production of a commodity (Hussain, 2010). It is however important to note that opportunit y cost is not market price of an alternative commodity or market price of materials that could have been used in the alternative. Commodities that are produced from a similar material may have a relationship between opportunity cost and market cost but this is not always the case because of the subjective nature of opportunity cost (Baumol & Blinder, 2011). Opportunity cost is therefore the value, and not necessarily market price, of resources use in a production, which could have been used in production of the next best alternative production. Opportunity cost can be either implicit or explicit and existence of reward for involved sacrifice establishes the distinction. Explicit costs in opportunity cost are those costs that are incurred for payments, in monetary or otherwise terms, to stakeholders that sacrifice their resources for production of a commodity.

Letter of Complaint Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Letter of Complaint - Assignment Example I was put on hold for more than ten minutes. I waited patiently listening to boring adverts while the attendant at the airport looked on. When a Ms. Ann picked the phone eventually, she sounded disinterested and kept shouting at me to repeat myself. We did not have any constructive communication and I heard her curse rudely as she banged the receiver. I had to make other arrangements in order to book the flight. I have been a customer of the bank for the past seven years and I have never witnessed such inefficiencies. Money is important and any delays such as the one I experienced results in the loss of business. Kindly act on my concern in order to prevent similar occurrences in future. I could be voicing the concerns of several other customers who may not have the time and resources to communicate with you. Among the features of your customer service that I want you to address include the fact that you call system is clumsy making customers wait for as long as twenty minutes or more. Kindly note that money and related transactions are important issues that influence the lives of your customers directly. Five minutes or less is adequate for someone to lose his money to swindlers. It therefore surprised me when I had to wait for close to fifteen minutes just for someone to pick the phone. The other issue is the attitude of your customer relation officers especially those working on the call centers. This was a portrayal of poor attitude and disregard to work ethics because I do not believe that a call center agent can ever behave as she did.

Observational Learning Essay Example for Free

Observational Learning Essay During this course we studied that behaviors can be learned through our own experiences or observing others. Learning is the knowledge obtained in life through education, interacting with people, experiences and practice. There are three types of learning: Classical Conditioning, operant conditioning, and observational learning. There are many topics that grabbed my interest during this course, but observational learning made me think about my personal life and reminded me of many experiences that I went through in life. Observational learning means that we learn through watching others and then imitating them, this can happen through observing our family, neighbors, friends or TV. I remember when I was a child, I used to watch my mother cooking and then I go back to my room and pretend that am cooking as well. Even though, I grew up and became a very bad cooker. Albert Bandura suggested in his theory The social learning theory that children tend to imitated adults by observing them. He supported his theory in his famous experiment Bobo doll, which shows an adult acting aggressively toward a Bobo doll, and after that when they allowed the children to play with the doll they acted in the same aggressive way. I remember last year I was with my aunt and her 7 years old son in the car going to a restaurant. My aunt is a smoker, so she took out a cigarette and started smoking. After sometimes, her son told her: When I grow up I will smoke cigarettes, she told him: No, you are not allowed to smoke its bad for health, he replayed: But you smoke, I want to be cool like you and when we reached to the restaurant, her son took a straw and started acting as if he is smoking. In addition, Banduaras study showed that people also learn through imitating others who receive punishments and rewards. It means that when a child sees his older siblings getting punished for doing something wrong, the child is more likely to avoid doing it so he/she wont get punished. On the other hand, if a child noticed that one of his siblings are rewarded for behaving in a certain way or doing something good, the child will do the same to get a reward. When I was 9 years old, my parents bought a new toy for my older brother because he got a full mark on one of his subjects at school, I was very jealous that day and decided to study hard to get a full mark so my parents can get me a gift. Learning can be either positive or negative. Positive observational learning is when a person learn a good behavior from someone. When I was young, every time we go to a mall there were these small charity cabinets were you can donate money. I used to see my mother donating money like every time we go to a mall, and now I do the same thing. In contrast, negative observational learning is when a person learn a bad behavior from someone else. It is true that people can learn negative behavior from their siblings, family, friends or neighbors, however; I believe that TV and media content is more dangerous and have more powerful impact on people. For example, my small cousin began to act violently since he started watching WWE (a wrestling show) and he even memorized all the wrestle moves. Everyone in the family and school is complaining that he beats other children so hard. For him, he finds it cool and believe that in this way more people will like him as they like these wrestlers. Finally, I believe that observational learning is an effective way. Children have the right to explore their own world and determine the wrong action from the right one. Of course, parents should act in a proper way in front of their children and be careful of what they are watching, and advice them to do the right thing when the make a mistake.

How To Build And Maintain Stakeholder Relationships Management Essay

How To Build And Maintain Stakeholder Relationships Management Essay Organizations change constantly, a projects stakeholder set will change as stakeholder change roles within the organization, move into different roles or leave the organization to take up roles in other organizations. For whatever reason, the ability of individual stakeholder to influence the project may increase or decrease. Most project management methodologies define ways to identify project stakeholder, and then base their entire communications strategies on this initial, and only, identification. Many projects fail because stakeholders do not continue to support the vision or objectives of the project. In many cases this is because the team does not recognize changes in the relative power or position of key stakeholder and fails to make appropriate adjustments in their stakeholder management activities. This study reported upon in this paper is focused on support for project managers in building and maintaining relationships with project stakeholder. This is accomplished through using a practical methodology that allows the project team to identify and priorities the projects stakeholder and then stakeholders needs of the project to develop an appropriate relationship management strategy. The underlying assumption for this research is the stakeholder management is extremely difficult, the project manager and his/her project team members must identify, engage and sustain relationships with a diverse set of groups and individuals (including themselves) who can impact the project in many ways. HOW TO BUILD AND MAINTAIN STAKEHOLDER RELATIONSHIPS GOTTA QUIRK (1999 2012): Communication and trust is the main source for creating a lasting relationship between stakeholders. Through effective communications and building trusting relationships, organizations should be committed to ensure that all stakeholders are involved in shaping the decisions of organizations in a meaningful manner. The commitment to actively build and maintain long-term relationships with stakeholders is based on two fundamental guiding principles communication and trust.   These two principles shape the development of stakeholder relations philosophy which includes: ENMAX Corporation (2012): Encouraging stakeholder participation in the decision-making process Providing timely information Open, and honest communication Listening to stakeholder concerns Respecting diverse opinions Seeking mutually beneficial solutions Learning from each other Moreover, stakeholder relationships that are unmanaged or mismanaged have a number of less than favorable consequences for companies. These include unnecessary expenses, and a lack of buy-in to processes and initiatives aimed at transforming the company. However, stakeholder management is a difficult undertaking for organizations because it requires investment and commitment to a long term structured process. While there are a number of efficient information management tools available through marketing, it is important to start with the big picture who are we going to be speaking to and how? BY IDENTIFYING THE STAKEHOLDERS Particularly in larger organizations, this process is a critical one because the network of stakeholders with an investment or interest in a business is broader than we would originally have imagined. Consider that likely stakeholders include the board, management, other employees, customers, suppliers and the community within which we operate. It is important when making this list that we gather and collate as much information as possible about the individuals and groups on it. This will enable us to start thinking through appropriate and targeted communication with them. BY PRIORITIZING THE STAKEHOLDER However noble our intentions regarding stakeholder relationship management are, there unfortunately have to be some individuals and group whos needs are more important and who require prioritization if we intend maintaining their support. While this sucks for the interns, the chairman of organizational board will be pleased to know that you have his best interests at heart. Prioritizing begins with segmenting a list into groups and then listing them in order of importance. This process needs to be completed with the organizational goals and the level of stakeholder information in mind. Ultimately, this will ensure personalization and consistency across communication channels at a later point in the process. BY UNDERSTANDING THEIR NEEDS Stakeholders require consistent and regular communication and service. However, their individual distinctiveness requires that this communication be personalized and targeted. This is difficult enough in the corner store but is universally impossible across larger organizations; the number of individuals is just too great. The next thing is to understand each group. A key part of this is to know what information they have, how accurate it is, how it aligns with the organizational goals and what information they need. This should align with the process of prioritization, with the groups at the bottom needing the least amount of information and the groups at the top needing the most. BY BUILDING TRUSTIN RELATIONSHIPS Collaborative partnerships depend on trust. Partners must communicate effectively and resolve conflicts, especially about sensitive issues like distribution of rewards and the involvement of host organizations the in laws. As in any relationship, attention must be given to renewing the relationship and sustaining the commitment of the partners by building and maintaining support of the parent organization, evaluating progress and celebrating success. BY ENCOURAGING THE STAKEHOLDERS This is the act of giving someone support, confidence, or hope that it is well even though they do not see it. When we encourage our stakeholders, it makes them feel the company do have plans for them and that would make them hold on. BY SATISFYING THE STAKEHOLDERS Satisfaction is important in maintaining a good relationship because when one is not satisfied, they would always look for a place where they would be satisfied. Even the study of economics makes us to understand that man is insatiable. So as a company, lets look for a way to satisfy the stakeholders needs. BY ENGAGING WITH THE STAKEHOLDERS Now the easy part is over and you actually have to find an innovative and efficient manner in which to communicate with these stakeholders. Whatever tactics you use, it is helpful to have a communication plan in place so that the process runs smoothly without negatively impacting on productivity. Using a collaborative software package could be the answer, particularly if you want to keep a specific group up to date about a specific project. Regular status reports are useful and email newsletters are very effective for those individuals who are not privy to sensitive information. Going one step further, these can be divided into an internal and an external newsletter; the first being only for staff and the second for clients and interested parties. For small groups and occasionally large ones, meetings are a good way to get a message across and invite buy in and feedback. Remember that in order to be effective, this engagement should be two-way. Stakeholders need a forum to air concer ns and grievances while having the comfort of knowing they will get a response. Neglecting this element of communication is bound to undermine the ultimate goals of your organization. Regardless of tactics though, the important part of this aspect of the process is to understand and manage stakeholder expectations. The stakeholders need to know when to expect communication and what sort of communication to expect. MONITORING THE ENGAGEMENT EFFORTS There is little point in engagement with the stakeholders if it is perceived to be token or ineffectual. While its admirable that you are trying, this lack of efficacy is not going to encourage buy-in and may undermine your company, particularly if the negativity spreads. It is thus important to track and monitor your efforts and gauge the response to them. Speak to individuals directly, encourage feedback and through email tracking assess whether people are reading the information that are been disseminated. Tweak your efforts accordingly. Part of this is keeping a finger on the pulse of the companys reputation which is also important. Conduct surveys if necessary and establish who thinks what and why. Knowing what the perception is will go a long way toward finding the necessary means to turn it around. ISSUES THAT MAY AFFECT STAKEHOLDER RELATIONSHIPS AND THE POSSIBLE AREAS OF CONFLICT CIM (1998): The issues that may affect relationships are likewise the same as the areas of conflict, and this is certainly the opposite of the factors that builds relationship. For example, when a stakeholders interest in an organization is different from that of other stakeholders group, this may affect the relationship between stakeholders or cause conflict to an extent. Another example is trust, when there is no trust in an organization; it could also affect a relationship or cause conflict. Also consider when there is no: Control mutuality (think mutual control) the degree to which parties agree on who has the rightful power to influence one another. Trust one partys level of confidence in and willingness to open ones self to the other party. Commitment The extent to which each party believes and feels that the relationship is worth spending energy to maintain and promote. Satisfaction The extent to which each party feels favorably toward the other because positive expectations about the relationship are reinforced. Exchange relationships In an exchange relationship, one party gives benefits to the other only because the other has provided benefits in the past or is expected to do so in the future. Communal relationships In a communal relationship, both parties provide benefits to the other because they are concerned for the welfare of the other even if they get nothing in return. STRENGTHENING AND RESOLVING CONFLICT IN RELATIONSHIPS ASSESS THE STRENGTH OF THE RELATIONSHIP The first thing is to survey the stakeholder group using some variant of the questionnaire, this will reveal how weak or strong the relationship is and where it is weak or strong. For example, in one project I did, we learned the organization had excellent scores with all stakeholder groups on all but one of these six factors. So improving stakeholder relationships in that case was a matter of focusing on that one factor. BUILD STAKEHOLDERS TRUST IN THE ORGANIZATION Consistently treat stakeholders fairly. Whenever the organization makes important decisions take stakeholder opinions into account and otherwise demonstrate concern for stakeholders. Keep organizational promises. Demonstrate competence by doing what was proposed.   PAY ATTENTION AND RESPOND TO WHAT STAKEHOLDERS SAY AND DO Demonstrate the belief that stakeholder opinions are legitimate by responding to them. Give stakeholders a say in the organizations decision-making process, especially in those areas that affect the stakeholder group. DEMONSTRATE COMMITMENT TO STAKEHOLDERS Show stakeholders that the organization wants to maintain a long-term relationship with them. Engage stakeholders to build loyalty to the organization. SATISFY STAKEHOLDERS Identify and enhance the ways stakeholders benefit from their association with the organization. Make interacting with the organization a delightful experience. Make stakeholders feel they are important to the organization. MOVE BEYOND AN EXCHANGE RELATIONSHIP TO A COMMUNAL RELATIONSHIP As noted above, exchange relationships are those in which two parties in a relationship expect a benefit in return for a benefit tit for tat. These relationships are the basis of most for-profit businesses. That is, a customer expects a certain quality product in exchange for the money he/she spends, and the organization expects the money in return for the product. Employees expect pay, benefits and a sense of fulfillment and organizations expect work and engagement.   A communal relationship goes beyond that. One party in the relationship believes the other will give benefits with no expectation of a return. An example of this is corporate social responsibility programs, such as when a bank goes beyond the basic business exchange to give back to the community by supporting programs that benefit neighborhoods.  Some argue that this corporate giving is not really selfless in that the organization expects good will in return for the benefit it bestows on the community. And this may be. Nevertheless, when a stakeholder believes an organization helps people without expecting anything in return, the relationship is at a different level than if the stakeholder believes the organization only trades benefit for benefit. THE IMPORTANCE OF MONITORING AND REVIEWING DIY Committee Guide (2012) Both research and common sense support the notion that we need to monitor the performance of stakeholder on an ongoing basis. If we are ever to know how we are doing, the management committee should use reports against its annual operational plans to review progress towards meeting the strategic aims and objectives. Therefore, they must ensure that whoever is doing the work is keeping appropriate records so that progress can be assessed. This will involve, at the implementation stage of the plan, being clear what systems and structures are required. The things you decide to measure will give an indication of how well youre doing, hence, the name indication or performance measures. Before completing your plan, you need to agree how and when it will be monitored and reviewed and what information the Management Committee needs to receive in order to review progress. When reviewing progress towards achieving the strategic aims and objectives, the Management Committee should: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ensure that activities are kept within the parameters of the agreed strategic aims and objectives; à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ensure that activities are consistent with organizations vision, mission and values; and à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢keep under review internal and external changes which may require changes to the organizations strategy or affect their ability to achieve their objectives. GETTING FEEDBACKS The quality of a partnership can be analyzed by getting feedback from the stakeholders through questionnaires or interviews CONCLUSION In closing, Id like to re-emphasize the importance of assessing the strength of the relationship at the outset. That there are six factors to manage when building relationships is a great insight. But to manage we must be able to measure. This tells us not only where to focus our efforts but also whether we have succeeded.

Depravity and Destruction in Blood Meridian Essay -- Blood Meridian Es

Depravity and Destruction in Blood Meridian Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian is a passionate, lyrical, and ugly novel of depravity and destruction of life in the Old West. It is a story of a hellish journey where violence and corruption are currency in a life of murder and treachery. Contrasting scenes of scenic beauty, poetically described by McCarthy, are negated by his gruesome accounts of despicable scenes of human cruelty in the examination of evil. Like all of McCarthy's earlier novels, Blood Meridian (1985) had a lukewarm arrival to the literary world in the sense of sales and publicity, in part due to McCarthy's own aversion to self-promotion (Woodward 28). Yet critics and scholars were captivated by the mindless violence of the story and its tale of deceit, genocide, and gruesome realities set around the US-Mexico border in the 1840's (James 31). Blood Meridian, McCarthy's fifth book, was received with a variety of reactions from critics. Terence Moran, though finding McCarthy's writing to be "evocative," believed the author "failed in Blood Meridian to retell a simple Western in his haunting, original voice" (37). Conversely, Steven Shaviro wrote, "Cormac McCarthy, the solitary poet of his exultation, is our greatest living author...[this novel] manifests a sublime visionary power that is matched only by a still more ferocious irony" (144). This novel, due to its candid narration of barbarous events, prevails as one of a few books which challenge traditional molds of literature. Not a story of the redeemable antagonist or the helpless victim, Blood Meridian blurs the lines of sanctity and depravity in this lawless and demoralized land. This examination of the most unimaginable e... ...stence in a world of depravity that seems foreign to the reader, but is all too normal in the world created in the book (147). As the novel tells of the kid's appalling journey, much of the action seen is centered around Judge Holden. The mysterious, malignant man varies in interpretation from godlike to child-like. Many critics have commented on Holden's manipulative power, ability to remain unchanged by years, and his appearance in several places at what seems the same time. Many lines are drawn between Judge Holden and the devil (Wallach 125). Though not a literary success in terms of book sales and overall recognition, Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian tells and intriguing story in a light in which the Old West is rarely seen. Conscienceless violence, devil-like characters, and breathtaking scenery fill this novel uninhibited by morality or rectitude.

The Black Cat Essay -- essays research papers

The Black Cat   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The Black Cat, by Edgar Allen Poe, is a story about a man whose love for animals is overcome by an extreme hatred toward the creatures. What goes around comes around is a saying that would most effectively convey the message of this story because Poe implies that people will inevitably suffer the consequences of their actions. Through the careful construction of plot, the ongoing use of irony, and the rapid development of character, Poe captures the reader’s undivided attention and evokes a wide variety of emotions through this short story   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  This story is a confession of an atrocious sin told by an old man on his deathbed. The plot begins to unfold as the main character reflects back on his childhood. He recalls having been an animal lover all of his life. A conflict first arises between himself and Pluto, his cat. He becomes angered when the cat rejects him out of fear. However, he quickly resolves this problem by killing the cat. Throughout the story he seems to be having an 2 inner conflict as well. He realizes how horrible and atrocious his sins are but is unable to feel remorse. While he seems to be an intelligent and virtuous man, he cannot seem to control his violent fits of drunken rage. He also deals with conflict on a more spiritual level. The cat that he has killed is haunting him. He tries to shrug it off as coincidence, but every time he comes up with an explanation for an unsettling even...

Competition Vs. Monopoly Essay -- essays research papers

1. Analyze the fast food industry from the point of view of perfect competition. Include the concepts of elasticity, utility, costs, and market structure to explain the prices charged by fast food retailers. Firms within the fast food industry fall under the market structure of perfect competition. Market structure is a classification system for the key traits of a market. The characteristics of perfect competition include: large number of buyers and sellers, easy entry to and exit from the market, homogeneous products, and the firm is the price taker. Many fast food franchises fit all or most of these characteristics. Competition within the industry as well as market supply and demand conditions set the price of products sold. For example, when Wendy’s introduced its $.99 value menu, several other companies implemented the same type of changes to their menu. The demand for items on Wendy’s value menu was so high because they were offering the same products as always, but at a discounted price. This change in market demand basically forced Wendy’s competition to lower prices of items on their menu, in order to maintain their share of the market. The previous example illustrates the elasticity of the fast food industry. Supply and demand set the equilibrium price for goods offered by franchises within the industry. Competitors of Wendy’s must accept the prices established by the consumer demand for the value menu. If consumers didn’t respond so positively to Wendy...

Building a Data Warehouse Essay

Starbucks is a company that is specialized in offering a range of products including coffee, handcrafted beverages, merchandise, and fresh food. As an enterprise, they require a proper data management to enable them serve their customers efficiently. Data on sales, customer views, customer information, market analytics, products, and production needs a proper storage and retrieval system hence the use of data warehousing. To make informed decisions, the management at all the levels within the company requires data analysis to make those decisions. The Coffee Company has a website for buying their coffee products, as well as gifts, and explores the coffee world by learning more about its origin. The data warehouse stores are built using SQL Server 2000 that stores information about the occurrences on the website. Business Desk reports enable processing of data imported from the website. Several steps are involved in exporting these data. The first step is reporting that is provided through Business Desk. These data includes weblog data, user profile information, campaign information, catalog information and transaction data (Microsoft, 2000). Data cubes are prepared by running the report processing tasks. The Business Desk is secured and can only be accessed by Starbucks Corporate networks and allows only Secure Socket connections. Reports that resides on the data warehouse server can be accessed and viewed through from the business application. To plan the data warehouse at Starbucks, three aspects of the site must be taken into consideration. The storage, processing, and bandwidth requirements are the elements needed to deploy the data warehouse. The storage requirements consider the amount of space required for web log files. The number of servers, web log file sizes per server per day and total log file sizes must be known in advance for the data warehouse planning. After sometime, these accumulated preferably three months, archiving should be done on old data to ensure that the business users will be able to view and run historical data. Since the data is imported from the website, processing time is of great importance to the success of the warehouse. Therefore, time to import web log files and processing time of web log files into analysis cubes is necessary for planning purposes. Lastly, consideration of bandwidth requirements is done before deploying the data warehouse. For example, the data bandwidth used will be f or moving the web log files. Also considered is the bandwidth required for actual running of the reports.The process of creating a data warehouse is procedural. It begins by building a business model followed by definition of the requirements of each model. Identification of data sources is carried out after business modeling. The process of building the data warehouse is done after the selection of data warehouse tools (Vincent, 2007). Data collection through asking the question about the performance of the company will help identify data to appear on the data warehouse. Reports from time reporting system, accounting packages, and customer relationship management application are other important sources. Designers of the data warehouse have to find a way of harmonizing these data with the knowledge of how people process information within the company. In making the decisions, the data within the system are retrieved for analysis. This process is known as extraction. It is defined as the process of retrieving data from a source for use in the data warehouse environment. The extracted data can then be transformed and finally loaded into storage. The primary internal data sources for a data warehouse in Starbucks is the transaction processing application. Data extraction methods are of two types that include full logical and physical extraction method and depend on the business requirements, performance and source system. In logical extraction method, there are two subdivisions, complete extraction, and incremental extraction. Full removal is where the data is completely extracted from the system source files. No additional information is necessary on the site. The second data extraction method is the physical extraction method. Physical extraction is of two types, online and offline extraction. Online mining, extraction is directly from the source files. The process of extraction can directly connect either source tables’ or the intermediate data store. The latter, offline extraction, is where data is sourced outside the source files. Conclusion For a leading international company like Starbucks, planning, building and maintenance of a data warehouse are very critical and requires technical expertise. The building process requires cooperation from IT and business people in order to come up with a successful data warehouse. For implementation purposes, it requires coordination by all stakeholders to highlight all the requirements, needs, and tasks. Breaking down of the data collected enables incorporation of all the requirement to appear on the data warehouse. References BIBLIOGRAPHY l 1033 Microsoft. (2000). Starbucks technical deployment guide. Microsoft. Vincent. (2007). Building a Data Warehouse. Apress. Source document

Exchange Risks Essay

The challenging issues in international business within the 20th and 21st century are currency and exchange rate risks. In the late 20th century, for instances, it has been clear that exchange rate risks considerations are critical for business survival. The economics crisis in the U. S. and most of European countries has displayed how the value of currencies in international business settings could alter the faith of millions of people, brought some to welfare and others to poverty. Concerning the business strategy into Brazilian market, the plan to strengthen market in the country is greatly influenced by economical factors such as the inflation figure of Brazil and the global economics crisis. The inflation figure is important since it influence the purchasing power of Brazilian. The global economic crisis also influences the country’s exchange rate of Brazilian currency that further influence the pricing of Bimbo bread products. In the light of this involvement, companies need to perform foreign currency risks assessments regarding the business activities. Most companies generally apply some of the financial tools that would protect them from foreign currency risk exposure, like futures, forward contract, etc. Recommendation The first analysis that Bimbo may take in expanding into foreign market is the country risk analysis. This is important factor for Bimbo since retail industry is low concentrated industry in which many local bread providers. In addition, country risk analysis also helps Bimbo in assessing whether a country has a set of policy that benefits business or vice versa. The figure 1 suggests that the more attractive a country is in terms of FDI index, the more likely that Bimbo must immediately presents in the country. Based on the FDI Index, we assess that Bimbo has performed suitable investment in Brazil. Since a country risk is only one factor in deciding a foreign direct investment, Bimbo must perform the next step that is to define marketing objectives to guide the company in assessing their productivity in foreign market. Figure 1 Top 25 Countries in term of FDI Confidence Index Source: A. T. Kearney Challenges of Grupo Bimbo in the U. S Choose the Suitable Entry Strategy In terms of market entry, there are many ways of entering a foreign market; each has its own economic and legal implications. Some entry strategies that multinational companies usually take are joint venture and foreign direct investment. Joint venture is a type of foreign market penetration strategy has a considerably large investment risk but this method consists of an opportunity to learn and create a greater presence in the targeted markets. Companies prefer to perform this type of market entry strategy when dealing with countries whose government put considerable restrictions on foreign ownership (Quick MBA, 2007). In case of Bimbo, the company may conduct joint marketing, for example, with local retailer named Lojas Americanas, a Brazil leading department store chain. This method provides Bimbo with the capability to learn the Brazilian retail market since at that time Customers’ Preferences Other risks in conducting international expansion are cultural issues. This factor then accumulates into becoming customers’ preferences. According to various studies in the field, culture is often an underestimated factor in managing corporate businesses. These studies also revealed that those companies that failed to place culture as an important business consideration often find themselves in a disappointing circumstance. Business investments that cost millions of US dollars could go down the drain due to such failure (Kwintessential, 2007). For instances, the Brazilian and U. S. customers consider the quality of product as the most important factor when deciding to buy merchandises. The other factors are price, value added and packaging. Today, however, realizing the global environment we are living in, companies are becoming increasingly cultural sensitive. There are various examples of corporations that hired people from various backgrounds and discover a synergy within their cooperation. In terms of Bimbo, in order to cope with cultural issues, the company also makes some cultural adjustment such as the use of advertisement media. If in the U. S. , the company spends many television advertising, in the Brazil, Bimbo takes many radio advertisings since many Brazilian housewives listen to the radio more often then watching television. Reference: Ball, Donald A. et al. (2002). International Business the Challenge of Global Competition. McGraw Hill Holt, David H and Wigginton, Karen W. (2002). International Management. Thomson Kotler, Philip. (2000). Marketing Management. New Jersey: Prentice Hall Inc Kwintessential. (2007). Cultural Sensitivity in Business. Retrieved October 10, 2008 from http://www. kwintessential. co. uk/cultural-services/articles/cultural-sensitivity. html Quick MBA. (2007). Foreign Market Entry Modes. Retrieved October 10, 2008 from http://www. quickmba. com/strategy/global/marketentry/.

Derek Walcott Uses Poetry to Explore Themes of Ethnicity Essay

I agree with the fact that Walcott uses poetry to explore themes of ethnicity, cultural chauvinism and political inequality. However, these aren’t the only themes we find in his poetry. He also makes use of themes such as life and death and religion. Sea Canes is one of the poems which includes the themes mentioned above. In Sea Canes the poet is found observing a landscape in which he can see sea canes and animals, all of this in a miserable atmosphere; â€Å"Half of my friends are dead.† Here he also mentions religion and disagrees with it by stating that religion is not necessary to respect the dead. He prefers to remember them exactly how they were, instead of see dead people as something supernatural and much nobler than the living. As he looks to the other side of the sea canes he views a boundary between the world of the living and the world of the dead. He metaphorically says that the owls represent us humans leaving the world of the living to enter the mystical world of the dead. In The Hawk we can locate clear examples of ethnicity, cultural chauvinism and the clash between western and Caribbean culture. Here he mentions the carnival in Trinidad, and says that the only ones that should attend it are the locals. Later in the poem, Walcott mentions the ethnicity and the races of the people at the carnival. â€Å"The negroes, bastards, mestizos, proud of their Spanish blood†, all the people with mixed ancestry who are proud of their Spanish blood, not their native blood. Here Walcott is referring to the colonial powers and their endless control over the Caribbean population. He also compares the Yucatan peninsula with Trinidad. He states that Yucatan has a magnificent landscape while Trinidad has been destroyed during colonialism. Walcott describes the natives as toothless tigers, once powerful and strong but now nothing more than a big defenseless cat â€Å"Caribs, like toothless tigers†. Here we can appreciate cultural chauvinism, throughout The Hawk he criticizes colonialism by describing its consequences and shows an enormous patriotism for the Caribbean islands. Extract J contains also contains themes of cultural chauvinism and life and death. He starts the poem by describing his house in Saint Lucia. He describes the beautiful landscape, nature and the surrounding found in the Caribbean. He subliminally compares the western landscape with the one in the Caribbean, exaggerating the beauty of the tropical islands compared with Europe. He unexpectedly makes a radical change and commences to talk about his dead friend Gregorias. He describes him very passionately and compares him with famous painters from the renaissance â€Å"brown cherubs of Giotto and Masaccio†, which makes us assume he was a first-class painter. He feels tremendous affection for him and his death, as he tells us, has dramatically changed Walcott’s life. The Walk is another poem which describes Walcott’s agony due to the loss of friends. Here he talks about his first wife. He used to walk with her up the hills, until the day she fell ill â€Å"You were weak and lame, So you never came†. She then had other interests and finally when she died, Walcott felt completely alone. He repeatedly expresses his grief of having lost his beloved wife and declares that now that she’s dead, these walks are very different for him. The Bright Field is a further illustration of cultural patriotism and the inconformity of the European culture. The poem begins in London introducing us to a man â€Å"steeled against the power of London.† Probably the man is Walcott himself, criticizing the citizens and the city. He says that the city is depressing and most of the time people are found in cemeteries or in the underground. In the second paragraph he talks about the British Empire, the empire that â€Å"their sun that would not set was going down† the largest empire in history was now diminishing and weak. This poem is again about Walcott’s cultural past and the former colonial powers that once inhabited his islands. I agree that Derek Walcott uses his poetry to explore ethnicity, cultural chauvinism and political inequality, he also talks a lot about the colonial influence of the British and the French had on the West Indies. Death appears frequently too reminding us that his personal life also plays an important role in his poetry.

Running Water’s Effect on Roman Society

One of the greatest civilizations of all time was Ancient Rome. They conquered most of the known world, which influenced most of the ancient and modern cultures. Their achievements in architecture rendered modern observers speechless, and brought great wealth to the Roman Empire. By far the greatest achievement in Roman history came in the form of running water. The three part system, which was developed by early Etruscans, kept diseases away and saved time. This system included the entrance, use, and exit of ancient Roman water. According to numerous historical texts, ancient Romans relied upon the water from the Tiber River, small springs, and shallow wells. Said water had to be carried in buckets to the city in many grueling passages. Over time, the water became insufficient for the growing population of Rome, and to rectify this problem, aqueducts were built. Most of the information on the aqueducts in ancient Rome comes from Sextus Julius Frontius, the water commissioner in the 1st century A. D. He described in proud detail the sources, length, and function of each of Rome's aqueducts, and he believed that the Roman achievements in water management were more important than anything else. â€Å". . . With such an array of indispensable structures carrying so many waters, compare if you will, the idle Pyramids or the useless, though famous works of the Greek† (Frontius, trans. By Bennet, 1961). Here, Frontius shows he cares little about the beauty of a monument, for his appreciation lies with the function it is created for: to carry potable water to the cities of the Empire, especially in the case of Frontius, to ancient Rome. The aqueduct system began at the source: a spring or river that looked to be suitable for the citizens of Rome, and ran at a slight decrease in altitude to the walls of the city. For example, the Aqua Appia, constructed by Appius Cladius Caesus in the year 312 B. C. , was 16,445 meters in length, but it only dropped 10 meters in altitude from the source to its level in Rome (Lanciani, 1897). Modern engineers marvel at the miniscule percent error of Appius Cladius Caesus’ famous aqueduct. The way the Romans built these lines so perfectly was very simple. If the workers came to a valley that interrupted the flow of gravity, they would build a tiered viaduct to keep the elevation in the same style; if they came upon a depression that was deemed impractical to build a viaduct, they would build an inverted siphon to move the water to and from its original height; and, lastly, if the workers fell upon a mountain or hill that obstructed the flow of the water, they would tunnel through the earth to ensure that the water reached its destination (Smith, 1978). I thought that Aqueducts only consisted of the two tiered bridges; sadly Norman Smith has proved me wrong. The popular but inaccurate image is that Roman aqueducts were elevated throughout their entire length on lines of arches†¦ The system of aqueducts serving Rome had only 5 percent of its total distance supported by viaducts or bridges† (Smith, 1978). This shows that modern archaeologists have deceived many people. Their findings only include the wondrous two tiered bridge s that are deceivably named, Aqueducts, whereas these structures are called viaducts, and Aqueducts are a name for the system that brings water from the source to the city. After the water arrived in the city, it served a purpose depending on its quality. â€Å"Roman water quality standards were remedial, taking into consideration only such factors as taste, temperature, smell, and appearance. Since the quality of water from the nine aqueducts varied, the worst waters were used for artificial lakes and irrigation, and the best for drinking. The aqueducts carrying water to Rome were covered to prevent the water from being contaminated by dust, dirt, and other impurities and from being heated by the sun. The best quality waters came from the valley of the Anio River† (Hansen, 1983). This quote shows that the quality of the water brought into the city determined the purpose it served, such as, water for fountains, drinking, latrines, public baths, cleaning the streets, for putting out fires, and, occasionally, for mock naval battles. Latrines in ancient Rome consisted of large, circular or square rooms. The seating was that of a short marble countertop with a circular hole on top and a square hole cut from the edge. At the feet of the user was a trench, and running water flowed through the trench. Every Roman had their own sponge on a stick; they would dip their sponge in the fresh water, and use it to clean themselves accordingly. This was a huge step in public sanitation. It cut down the spread of nasty diseases, which were running amok in the ancient times. Even today, though we do not clean ourselves with sponges, there is still a square slot cut, similar to the one in ancient Rome, in most modern toilets. Public baths served not only for bathing, but for every social interaction in Roman culture. People went to the baths practically all day to play games, discuss politics, exercise, read, lecture, listen to musical performances, and engage in prostitution. Waters of these baths were changed several times daily and used massive amounts of water. Mock naval battles, such as the one on lake Naumachia were the most entertaining of all spectacles put on by the ancient Romans. â€Å"Another popular form of entertainment was the sham naval battle on arti[fi]cial lakes (Naumachia). These not-so-sham battles were the most elaborate of all spectacles offered at Roman celebrations. The contestants butchered one another until one side or the other was eliminated; the victors, if they fought bravely, were occasionally given their freedom. The Emperor Domitian had the arena of the Coliseum flooded and reproduced an historic naval battle. Special piping was installed under the floor for flooding. The arena, however, proved to be too small. Roman historians report that Domitian staged sham naval battles with almost regular fleets, having dug an artificial lake near the Tiber River and surrounded it with seats†¦ Generally the aqueduct with poorest quality water was used to fill the naumachia† (Hansen, 1983) Emperor Domitian used the Coliseum, the Flavian Amphitheater, to stage mock naval battles as well, but it was too small, so he returned to filling Lake Naumachia. These quotes show that the ancient Roman people depended greatly on the aqueducts or Rome. The range of water delivered by the aqueducts varies from a low of 322,000 cubic meters per day (Herschel, 1913) to a high of 1,010,623 (Ashby, 1935). Roman water management was highly impressive, although the rich and influential received a much greater amount than the lowly citizens’ share. Good portions of this water were dumped into the street; this helped for the destruction of diseases because it kept the streets clean, by moving these hazards into the sewer system and out from under the feet of passerby. Virtually all water that entered the city of ancient Rome left via the Cloaca Maxima, and its main outlet was the Tiber River (Hansen, 1983). Several years before the birth of Christ, engineers built the Cloaca Maxima, which was the drainage and wastewater collection system in the ancient city of Rome. It still exists, and is used today, sparingly. Not everyone used the Cloaca Maxima, for it was highly taxed. The lazy, the misers, the poor, and the invalids had to resort to chamber pots. These would be emptied into the sewer nearby or dumped directly into the street, causing a passerby to receive an â€Å"unwanted gift† (Hansen, 1983). â€Å"From every towering roof the rubbish falls, striking the head, and injuries grow rank. See how pots strike and dint the sturdy pavement There's death from every window where you move. You'd be a fool to venture out to dine, Oblivious of what goes on above, Without you having penned the dotted line Of your last testament, You can but hope they spill a [chamber pot]. † (Juvenal, trans. Jerome Mazzaro,1965) One can see the irritation that jumps from the quote of Juvenal, and it shows that this practice was highly frowned upon in ancient Roman society. If a free man was struck by one of these projectiles, in addition to medical fees and other expenses, he could be paid in a similarity to Workman’s Compensation from the guilty party (Carcopino, 1940). This poem adds emphasis to the unorthodox disposal of waste, in addition to the orthodox methods of the Cloaca Maxima. Water entered ancient Rome mainly through aqueducts, which made the entrance grand, profitable, and allowed for even lowly citizens to have fresh water; this water was used by the citizens in numerous ways, including latrines, public baths, and fake naval battles; and said water exited ancient Rome into the Tiber River through the Cloaca Maxima, which was the sewer system in ancient Rome, and the chamber pot. These wondrous events greatly influenced the culture of ancient Roman cities, which consisted of mostly the entire known world. Consequently, this influence allowed for other civilizations to build upon the ideas of the ancient Romans, thus improving the architecture for societies to come. 1,549 Words For this paper I used numerous quotes from the text of Roger D. Hansen, WATER AND WASTEWATER SYSTEMS IN IMPERIAL ROME, this paper was the basis for all of my citations because all of the citations are used for his cited support as well as mine. I did have a great understanding for the information that was given here, but I had trouble finding sources for the information I gained in Western Civilization class, because it was my knowledge. That was a problem until I found this essay, but all references to his text are cited according to Hansen, and the references that he used in his paper are cited according to the works he used for support. Works Cited Ashby, Th. , 1935. The Aqueducts of Ancient Rome (ed. I. Richmond), Oxford. Carcopino, Jerome, 1947 (first published in 1940). Daily Life in Ancient Rome. Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut. Frontinus, Sextus Julius (trans. Charles Bennett), 1961. Stratagems and the Aqueducts of Rome. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Hansen, Roger D. 1983, WATER AND WASTEWATER SYSTEMS IN IMPERIAL ROME. Web. 5 Nov. 2010. . Herschel, Clemens, 1913. Frontinus and the Water Supply of Rome. Longman, Green and Company, New York. Juvenal, Decimus Julius (trans. Jerome Mazzaro), 1965. Satire. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor. Lanciani, Rodolfo, 1967 (first published in 1897). The Ruins of Ancient Rome. Benjamin Blom, New York. Smith, Norman, 1978. Roman Hydraulic Technology. Scientific American 238:154-161. Quotes: Ashby, 1935: â€Å" A high of 1,010,623 cubic meters of water delivered daily to ancient Romans† Carcopino, 1940: When in consequence of the fall of one of these projectiles from a house, the body of a free man shall have suffered injury, the judge shall award to the victim in addition to medical fees and other expenses incurred in his treatment and necessary to his recovery, the total of the wages of which he has been or shall in the future be deprived by the inability to work which has ensued. † Frontius, 1961: â€Å". . . With such an array of indispensable structures carrying so many waters, compare if you will, the idle Pyramids or the useless, though famous works of the Greek† Hansen, 1983: â€Å"Romans without indoor facilities were forced into one of two options. For a relatively small charge they could enter one of the city's public latrines or they could use chamber pots†¦Rome's elaborate latrines were not a haven for the lazy, the misers, the poor, or the invalids. These latter groups had to resort to chamber pots. These were emptied into vats placed under the stairwells or, if vats were not provided, jars could be emptied into a nearby cesspool or an opening into the central sewer. There were many who found their stairs too steep, the distances to cesspools or sewers too far, and who found it more energy efficient to empty the contents of their chamber pots from windows onto the streets below† â€Å"The Roman sewer system probably carried off at least as much water as the aqueducts provided†¦The flow of the Tiber River was greatly increased by discharges from Rome's sewers† â€Å"Another popular form of entertainment was the sham naval battle on arti[fi]cial lakes (Naumachia). These not-so-sham battles were the most elaborate of all spectacles offered at Roman celebrations. The contestants butchered one another until one side or the other was eliminated; the victors, if they fought bravely, were occasionally given their freedom. The Emperor Domitian had the arena of the Coliseum flooded and reproduced an historic naval battle. Special piping was installed under the floor for flooding. The arena, however, proved to be too small. Roman historians report that Domitian staged sham naval battles with almost regular fleets, having dug an artificial lake near the Tiber River and surrounded it with seats†¦ Generally the aqueduct with poorest quality water was used to fill the naumachia† â€Å"Roman water quality standards were remedial, taking into consideration only such factors as taste, temperature, smell, and appearance. Since the quality of water from the nine aqueducts varied, the worst waters were used for artificial lakes and irrigation, and the best for drinking. The aqueducts carrying water to Rome were covered to prevent the water from being contaminated by dust, dirt, and other impurities and from being heated by the sun. The best quality waters came from the valley of the Anio River† Herschel, 1913: â€Å"As low as 322,000 cubic meters per day delivered by aqueducts†

Finance and Accounting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Finance and Accounting - Essay Example As the study presents derivative securities are financial instruments that have their value from the underlying assets. Such derivatives have different degrees of risks and therefore the certainty equivalent of cash flows can be computed by use simple multiple and based model where the cost of capital is used in finding both the current uncertain values of future uncertain cash flows. The research highlights both techniques are used in evaluation and estimation of the firms/company’s value. Additionally, both techniques use cash flows from the assets in their respective evaluations to find out the intrinsic value of the firm. Conversely, in discounted cash flow valuation, the purpose is to discover the value of assets, given their respective cash flows, growth rates and risk distinctiveness. In relative valuation, the purpose is to value assets, based upon how comparable assets are presently priced in the market. Private equity has been facing difficulties in valuing the private equity value as there have been different definitions of the fair value and inadequate/limited guidance in application of generally accepted accounting principles. Additionally, issues like financial crisis compel problems in valuation of private equity as the markets become unsteady hence triggering liquidity and placing stress on particular assets. Ineffective policies and procedu res used by managers regarding valuation of private equity bring about another problem in valuation.

Law Essay - Criminal Law Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

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Malcolm X Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

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Financial Statement Analysis and Report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Financial Statement Analysis and Report - Essay Example Although the sales of Grand Company increased from BD7450 in year 5 to BD10660, there was a subsequent increase in the purchases and cost of sales leading to a fall in the gross profit margin. The operating profit margin also fell from 10% in year 5 to 5% in year 6. Grand Company earned a better gross profit of BD3500 in year 6 as compared to the gross profit of BD2915 in year 5. However, this was not sufficient in improving the operating margin of Grand Company as expenses increased drastically from year 5 to year 6. This drastic increase was due to the addition of interest expense on the bank loan taken by Grand Company to inject more funds into the business. Return on capital employed is a measure of assessing how much return a company is generating on the capital that is employed in the business. Grand Company took a bank loan in year 6 and hence had more capital as compared to year 5. However, the additional capital was not used efficiently and this is why the return on capital fell drastically from 12% in year 5 to 6% in year 6. Overall, the profitability of Grand Company deteriorated from the year 5 to the year 6. Grand Company should take measures to increase their revenue and reduce their costs in order to stay profitable and sustain their existence in the business. The liquidity of Grand Company remained stable from the year 5 to year 6. There was not much fluctuation in the current and acid test ratio. The efficiency of Grand Company improved in year 6. The cash conversion cycle improved indicating that Grand Company’s ability to earn cash improved in year 6. Grand Company took a bank loan to inject liquidity into the business which lead to the interest coverage ratio in the year 6. The EPS of Grand Company fell drastically from year 5 to year 6 due to the fall in the net income in year 6. Users of Financial Statements: Objective of Financial Statements is to produce information that is as useful as possible for many different types of users o f financial statements. Users of financial statements include: Investors: a potential investor uses the financial statements to find out if the investment is suitable or not in the prospective company. Analysts: An analyst uses the financial statements and recommends. Shareholders: Shareholders Regulatory authorities: Tax authorities may use financial statements of company to find out if the taxes are calculated in an appropriate manner. Financial institutions: banks and other lending companies assess the financial statements of a company before giving out loans to assess whether the company will be able to honor its obligations Trade Creditors: Trade creditors and vendors who supply goods on credit also use financial statements to assess the ability of a company to repay its short term debts. Owners and managers: they use the financial decision to make important strategic decisions that help the company to grow and

Discuss s 51(xx) of the Australian Constitution - the Corporation Essay

Discuss s 51(xx) of the Australian Constitution - the Corporation Power - Essay Example tection of property from Federal acquisitions, freedom of interstate trade and the power of the Federal government to enter into external treaties etc. The Australian Constitution also provides for the existence of a Federal Parliament or the representative of the Queen, the Senate and a House of Representatives, whose members are chosen by the people of the Commonwealth in proportion to their numbers in various States. The Constitution provides that the Federal Parliament will have powers to make laws in relation to peace, order and good government of the Commonwealth with respect to matters related to trade, taxation, marriage, divorce, borrowing and much more. Section 51(xx) of Constitution, which is also known as the Corporations Power, grants the Federal Parliament the right to legislate in respect to foreign corporations and trading or financial corporations formed within the limits of the Commonwealth. The extent of the activities that can be regulated is unclear, but it has b een suggested that both acts of corporations related to trade and external activities are covered. This essay takes a look at this section of the Australian Constitution which has been used to bring into force The Trade Practices Act 1974, Corporations Act 2001, Foreign Acquisitions and Takeover Act 1975 as well as the Competition Policy Reform Act 1995 etc. The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Australia was framed in 1900 after the debates in the Australasian Federation Conference of 1890 and the Australasian Federal Conventions of 1891 and 1897-8. Those who attended these conferences were all sitting politicians who had been chosen by their respective colonial parliaments. The framers of the Australian Commonwealth Constitution had inherited principles of responsible government from the British Constitution and had adapted these principles to a Federation in the Australian context. The Constitution of Australia in an essence defines the structure of the Australian government,

Laptops in Lectures Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Laptops in Lectures - Essay Example According to Fields, laptops use during lectures is the biggest distraction to listening of a student during lectures. This is because, when using the machine, so many catchy items may come along as in the internet, there is usually breaking news on celebrities which is an area of interest to most of the students in class. Fields further believes most of the addictives come with the use of internet which causes very big distractions like playing new games (Fields 1). I would like to disagree with this idea, as the use of computers in lectures can be used to establish the rate and level of attentiveness of a student while in class. Most of the students that are allowed to use these machines at lectures have the highest rate of concentration level. This is attributed to the fact that most of these students have to pay attention to any idea that a lecturer puts across and record it as well. This means that laptops increase the level of concentration and also allows the students to multi task.   According to Fields, there is heavy reliance on the internet for any source of information currently. Most of the students allowed to use laptops during lectures tend to rely on the internet for any new information which does not allow the students to use their brains to think even the most basics ideas. Most students have become so reliant on this technological gadget and even the most reliable sources of information that is found in books are currently not being paid attention to.