Medieval and early modern Essay

The medieval and early modern periods were eras with distinctive issues and ideals. Some of their key themes were very similar, such as the importance of religion and the role it played in everyday life, while other matters were unique to their time, such as the medieval selling of indulgences, or the early modern Reformation of the Church. These examples illustrate clearly the mixture of change and stasis in the two ages, as a subject shared by both periods yielded so great a diversity of issues. The distinction of the eras makes it evident that some change did occur, but as the period of time between them was not very great, the change must be limited. Everyman and Dr Faustus are respectively medieval and early modern drama texts that share common issues. However, the way in which they handle them varies, and allows an exploration of whether the people and culture of the medieval and early modern period differed by slight degree or strict demarcation. The medieval age of English history is epitomised as a strongly religious time, where Christianity provided a strict identity and purpose in life. Belief in Heaven, Hell and Judgement was very real, as was the constant fear of sin and damnation. The Church was able to manipulate the devout faith of its followers by selling fake holy relics and religious indulgences. The laymen believed it was necessary for them to obtain such items in order to purify themselves of sin, and enter Heaven without suffering through Purgatory. Medieval drama did much to reinforce these beliefs, being completely liturgical. Morality plays were first performed at religious holidays, and warned audiences about sin and salvation, with personification of the psychomachia. They all shared a highly similar narrative structure as good and evil battled for the soul of an initially virtuous man who had become caught in vice. This person represented the whole of humanity, and the play would show how, despite temptat ion and with the help of Christian values, he realised his error and won salvation. By the early modern era, neither the faith in Christ nor in Judgement had diminished, but the understanding of them had altered. People became frustrated with the â€Å"ecclesiastical despotism† that was rife in the established Church, and there was widespread dissatisfaction with the papal  organisation which, according to Erasmus, was felt to be dominated by ignorant monks. The subsequent Reformation changed the form and understanding of religion, making it more accessible to the average person by removing the intercessory functions of priests and bishops, and giving ordinary people more control over their spiritual state. This religious change also had political implications. The disestablishment of the Church created a degree of civil unrest among Catholic and Protestant groups, as factions sprang up with each viewing the other as traitorous, either to England or to God. However, this was not the only face of the early modern era. As the beginning of the Renaissance, it was also â€Å"a time of heady intoxication with†¦learning and†¦discovery.† The exploits of the European sailors and the excitement over new civilisations are allegorised by Faustus’ discovery of magic and the power it wields. As a liturgical morality play, Everyman submits itself fully to the pre-Reformation teachings, and absorbs the conventional attitudes. It was written to encourage medieval audiences to avoid material pursuits, and to ensure they involved themselves in good deeds and were prepared for Judgement. Death was a constant escort in medieval England, and could be expected at any time. As such, Everyman does not convey fear of death itself, but rather of how God will judge man after it, as the protagonist proclaims â€Å"Full unready I am such reckoning to give† and begs for more time in which to make his â€Å"counting-book†¦so clear That my reckoning I should not need to fear.† To achieve this salvation, Everyman is advised to turn to the Catholic rites of confession and penance, and to scourge himself to remove his sins. As Cawley highlights in his introduction, morality plays were â€Å"less interested in man’s earthly life than in his spiritual welfare in the l ife to come.† Religion is as prominent in Doctor Faustus, but Marlowe presents a contrasting attitude to that of Everyman. His play provides a mocking critique of religious customs, and particularly ridicules Catholic rituals. Marlowe dresses Mephostophilis in the habit of an old Franciscan friar, as Faustus comments â€Å"That holy shape becomes a devil best,† illustrating an air of contempt for the Catholic clergy. He further associates Catholicism with  evil and devilry as he conjures Mephostophilis by chanting in Latin, the language of the Catholic Church. This mockery of Catholicism may be testament to contemporary social attitudes rather than the personal view of Marlowe himself. In the medieval era, it was highly uncommon for anybody to speak out against the Church, either through fear or because it was all they knew, but the Reformation encouraged writers to criticise the papacy and the earlier Church, often as a form of public entertainment. Writers often allied Catholic characters with themes of idiocy or ineptitude, as Marlowe does in his portrayal of Pope Adrian as â€Å"a humourless megalomaniac, void†¦of commonsense† . Marlowe manipulated the public disdain of Catholicism to criticise established religion in general, challenging many commonly held views, especially regarding forgiveness and salvation. Everyman’s central theme suggests that God’s mercy always allows sinners to repent, regardless of how much wrong they have done. This belief is illustrated when, despite Death telling Everyman to â€Å"Come hence, and not tarry,† Everyman is able to go to Confession and purify himself from sin. Knowledge, Beauty, Strength, Discretion and the Five Wits are sent to accompany him to the grave, helping Everyman to realise God’s compassion. Good Deeds guide Everyman into the grave and beyond, providing protection and support when he needs it. In comparison, Faustus also finds that he is sent good forces to protect him from eternal damnation. Unfortunately, these forces are not strong enough to withstand Mephostophilis. The latter’s evil and cunning defeat nature itself, as he dissolves Faustus’ congealed blood with a chafer of unearthly fire to ensure Faustus bequeaths his soul to Lucifer. A Good Angel and a pious Old Man are also sent to rescue Faustus’ soul, but their efforts are overcome just as quickly, as the devils entice Faustus with hellish delights and overpower his weak soul. The Good Angel urges Faustus to â€Å"leave that execrable art† and turn to repentance, but each time Faustus considers prayer the Bad Angel dispirits him, dramatising the internal battles raging within the protagonist’s soul. Marlowe does not conclude that everyone can find redemption in God, as despite striving to turn to Him in his final moments, Faustus is torn apart by devils and condemned eternally. The playwright provides a cynical view of  salvation, as the Good Angel and the Old Man fail to save Faustus, despite seemingly plotting as much as Mephostophilis to win the protagonist’s soul. Marlowe provides further dubious similarity between the two sides, as in their last scene the angels appear to work almost as one, completing each other’s speeches and reinforcing the same message that it is too late for Faustus to repent. The play appears to be concerned with punishment rather than deliverance and salvation, as Faustus is warned that â€Å"He who loves pleasure must for pleasure fall.† In contrast, Everyman is forgiven for a lifetime of sin in his last few moments. Although both plays treat the same ideas of religion and redemption, they portray divergent views. This may be explained by the contemporary change in religious understanding. Some scholars argued that people’s destinies were predetermined, regardless of their actions, while others claimed there was hope for everybody. As Lester notes in his introduction, medieval writers believed that because of mankind’s fallen state, man relied on the grace and salvation earned by Christ and ministered by the Church. In this respect, the distinction between medieval and early modern seems to be vast. However, the fact that both plays have handled the same issues, albeit in different ways, suggests that the difference is of degree rather than demarcation. As well as the religious elements, Doctor Faustus incorporates Renaissance themes of discovery and knowledge, as Faustus finds a â€Å"world of profit and delight, of power, of honour, of omnipotence† has opened to him. Fundamentally, it is a craving for ultimate knowledge that drives Faustus to necromancy, as he proclaims, â€Å"A sound magician is a demi-god: here tire my brains to gain a deity!† By integrating such humanist ideals into the play, Marlowe creates a dimensional personality for Faustus, which the audience can appreciate and respond to. They witness the development of the character, forcing them to become emotionally involved in the mental turmoil he endures, and keeping them engrossed until the very last line of the play. Professor Bradbrook suggests that Doctor Faustus is primarily an examination of the protagonist’s â€Å"mental development, rather than simply†¦the form of Faustus’ fortunes.† The rationale behind Faustusâ€⠄¢ detailed growth is that it makes him a real person, with whose experiences the audience can sympathise. Everyman’s character is not developed in the way his counterpart’s is. He is generic and seen as part of the wider universe rather than as an individual. The dramatist has been careful to portray Everyman as representative of mankind rather than as a character in his own right. He is not given a personal history nor is any indication provided that might differentiate him from anybody, with the effect of making Everyman relevant to all audience members. He personifies every man and the trials of every person. His example can be applied to anybody, and everybody can see that the salvation he reaches is available to them as well. In this manner, Everyman is as accessible to the audience as Faustus is, although in different ways and with variant purposes fulfilled. There are further similarities between the medieval and early modern plays, some of which have been adopted directly from the former. The use of allegorical and highly functional characters is prevalent in both plays, although it is not as common among other Renaissance texts. In Everyman, each character serves a distinct purpose, showing Everyman how he has misplaced his trust in worldly matters and must turn to Christian teachings for salvation. Fellowship and Kinship tempt Everyman astray by offering to distract him with feasting, drinking and women. Even material Beauty and Knowledge cannot help him, leaving Everyman to seek out Confession, Contrition and Good Deeds. Doctor Faustus is very much in keeping with this medieval attribute. Mephostophilis is the embodiment of temptation, as he distracts Faustus from repentance whenever he feels the protagonist waver, and later admits â€Å"‘Twas I that, when thou wert I’ the way to heaven†¦led thine eye.† The Good Angel and Old Man are personifications of good, devout Christians who try to save Faustus. They too can be seen as tempters, as they try to win his soul. The two plays also share personification of the Seven Deadly Sins. Mephostophilis conjures them as a distraction for Faustus, allowing him to delight in the sins, while in Everyman the sins are allegorised in the behaviour of the protagonist’s dearest people and possessions, suggesting that Everyman has allowed the sins to master him. As well as thematic similarities, there are several production parallels between the medieval and early modern drama. However, these are veiled by  the immense changes that occurred on the stage in the intervening years. Before the Renaissance, plays were performed on and around large wagons, which were carted from one designated area to another. The set was very simple for transportation purposes, but this helped make it apprehendable for the common peasants. The staging was very different for Doctor Faustus, but some of the same ideas regarding spacing and costumes were used. The pageant-wagons had to make use of limited space, and used an upper room to serve as a balcony, heaven, or a distant location. In later theatre the same concept was utilised, with a single spot serving a multitude of functions. Costumes were also sparse, but symbolic props indicated particular roles and characters, another theatrical convention that early modern dramatists relied upon before professional actors were hired in the permanent theatres, and elaborate costumes and sets were made. The new theatres allowed more believable storylines to develop as settings and characters became more realistic, allowing the fiery devils of Doctor Faustus to achieve their optimum effect. However, there is one dramatic convention that is key to Doctor Faustus, which was not common in medieval works. Faustus’ soliloquies provide an insight to his character that cannot be gained in morality plays, and are actually symbolic of tragedies. While Everyman’s genre is made clear by its fully functional characters and its reliance on the protagonist’s generic nature, Marlowe’s play balances medieval aspects with contemporary humanist elements and manages to create a new genre that combines elements of morality and tragedy, creating an increasingly real persona. Faustus is distinguished from his medieval counterpart by his illustration of the psychology and passions that drive him. He concedes to his hubris and allows his ambition and lust for power to destroy him, something Everyman cannot do. The tragedy element is vital to Doctor Faustus as that is what gives it the memorable depth and allows the drama to move away from being a simple morality pla y. In conclusion, it is evident that despite their classification as two separate periods, the medieval and the early modern eras share many themes and issues. Their similarities are not limited to literal points, and  incorporate social and customary ones. The eras do have their differences, as is illustrated by their distinction and by their changing contemporary outlooks. Marlowe’s handling of the plays’ shared subjects differs from that of Everyman’s, as the former had a variant combination of social factors to draw his conclusions from. However, the time lapse between the two periods was not great enough to warrant a complete overhaul of thinking and customs. As Cookson realises, â€Å"the traditions of the Middle Ages still weighed heavily† over the early modern writers. At the point at which Doctor Faustus was composed, the difference between medieval and early modern was still of degree rather than strict demarcation. Bibliography  §Bradbrook,MC Themes and Conventions of Elizabethan Tragedy 2nd Edition (Newcastle: Cambridge University Press, 1990)  §Cawley,AC (ed.) Everyman and Medieval Miracle Plays (London: Everyman’s Library, 1967)  §Cookson,L Doctor Faustus (Hong Kong: Longman Group UK, 1987)  §Davies,T Humanism (New York: Routledge, 1997)  §Henderson,P Christopher Marlowe (London: Longmans, Green & Co, 1966)  §Lester,GA (ed.) Three Late Medieval Morality Plays (London: Ernest Benn, 1981)

Start UP Strategy Thesis

These units aim to find a scalable and repeatable business model in markets where huge demand is predicted (Steve Blank, 2010). In case of not finding such a demand or not being able to supply – these companies burn all capital and close in a long run. Secondly vast majority of start-ups aim to go internationally. Otherwise business model is hardly scalable and it cannot attract capital in the future. Coddle general info Coddle is a data start-up company which owns a product applicative. Com. It is a website which seeks to provide life quality information for citizens.People who seek to know more of their neighborhoods type their address and easily find information such as crime rate, pollution, average income, etc. Also it is really handy for people who search an apartment to rent. Data is linked to a website using free governmental sources. At the current moment company operates in Lithuania, Germany (Berlin), USA (New York, Confiscator, Chicago, LIKE (London). In upcoming o ne year they plan to cover all cities in USA and then go to Europe. One year ago they raised kick ERR capital for a product development.Now they are searching 1 million ERR capital which will be used for marketing and expansion operations. Most investors provide capital for start-ups with well-crafted strategies and business plan. Unfortunately Coddle doesn't have a strategy and doesn't know what factors determine growth of a start-up. Determination of a growth strategy became an important matter which will help to distribute last capital, raise new one and show direction for a company. Bachelor thesis purpose Research problem: how start-up companies should grow in a client base and eased capital.Aim of the thesis: To investigate what determines successful growth of a start-up company in areas of clients base and capital raised. Objectives of the thesis: Analyze internal and external environment of a Coddle start-up Conduct an help to craft a strategy, raise capital and distribute c urrent capital Research methods: Qualitative research using semi formal interviews with industry experts. Secondary data analysis and literature review. Practical value of the thesis: Start-ups with well-crafted strategies manage to grow and raise capital. Coddle has a shortage of capital and no strategy.This thesis will help them to set a right direction for a company, understand focus elements which enables growth and raise capital. Logical sequence of the thesis: 1 . Situational analysis. Internal and external analysis with a secondary data using PESTLE, 5 porter forces, market segmentation and attractiveness, competitors analysis, STOW. Defining crucial factors for company ‘s expansion 2. Qualitative research using semi-formal interviews. Interviewing people from successfully growing start-ups 3. Analysis primary and secondary data. Finding key factors which determine successful growth a start-up company 4.Making conclusions and providing recommendations for the company Si tuational analysis General information about company: I-JAB Coddle launched in 2012 is a start-up company which focus on providing neighborhood information for people worldwide. Concept is simple company has created a website which is like a search engine for addresses. Visitors enter a website, enter an address and click search. After few moments website presents neighborhood information linked to that address. It can be air pollution, crime rate, average real estate prices, near bus-stops and much more. In addition to that company has developed â€Å"Life-Quality† index which takes into account all available data sets and presents it in one numerical value. For example address 139-008 85 Drive, Queens, New York has a life quality index of 66/100. Data to the website is coming from open governmental data sources. Applicative. Com is in a beta phase and operates in cities: London, Berlin, Chicago, San Francisco, and New York. Company has ambitious plans to be present in every city worldwide. In order to reach their ambition company has raised kick euros of capital. Most of that capital went for product development but at the moment website slowly darted building its own visitors base.Company is investing to both: product and marketing. Also they are searching for a second investment which would be somewhere around 1 million euros and used for rapid business growth. Product itself is in introduction product life cycle phase. Figure 1 Organizational structure Of the company At the moment company has zero revenues and they are living out of raised capital. Business model start-up has planned is BIB. There is no way to monotone in BBC since a website is absolutely free. For BIB there are two options: 1 . Sell advertising place in a website for real estate companies relied 2.Sell Life-Quality Index badge as API (application programming interface) integration for real estate websites or customized API with neighborhood data Coddle has worldwide Website was la unched in July and now it has approximately 6200 unique visitors. In upcoming year planned growth is 100 000 unique visitors. Coddle has 2 two BIB clients which have integrated Life-Quality badge to their websites. Badges were given for free in order to test a product and collect feedback. In the end of the year plan is to have at least 30 BIB partners which use our badge for free. In late 201 5 plan s to charge 70$ per month for badge integration.Table 1 Size of the market Chicago New York San Francisco BBC (website visitors) 2,35 million 7,31 million 0,73 million BIB 900 1 500 2400 List of small competitors: 1 . Bootlace. Com 2. Foundation. Com 3. Ravishes. Com The largest competitor is walkover. Com which is launched in 2007 and already for more than 7 years. They are operating in whole United States including cities where we are. They have more than 30,000 BIB clients and 1 , 200,000 site visitors each month. Concept of their business is similar to Coddle. They have a website Wi th address search engine.Visitors and check- p any address in USA and get neighborhood information plus walkabout index which is a summary of various place distances in one number (similar to Life-Quality index). BIB business model they are using is same as we planned – sell API integrations for real estate websites. Management of the company Company s structure is small, communication chain is short and they don't huge product portfolio. Therefore management style CEO uses it quite simple and unstructured. They have weekly meetings to check week ; s performance and set new goals for an upcoming week. Company plans work for no more than 1 month to the future.Sometimes CEO has unstructured individual meetings with employees to discuss on going assignments. Interns are being managed by a full time working person in a marketing field. Interns receive assignments from CEO and marketing person. Company does not use any theoretical methodology such as agile project management, lean or other start-up management techniques. Macro-environmental analysis Political factors. Open data movement which started in USA in 2007. Scientists Of LISA realized that government has collected a lot of various data of the country. Data is being collected simply monitoring governmental sector recesses.This type of a data is a great way to improve overall human knowledge base and help to understand word's complexity. Scientists have encouraged governments to open free data portals where data would be available for everyone (Joel Curing, 2014). In USA it is be data. Gob and even cities have their own data websites like New York mentioned before. EX. as well is establishing large open data infrastructures. Only because of this trend Coddle had a chance to develop such a product. Economic factors. Our BIB product is for real estate industry therefore if industry is growing that means hey have better incentives to innovate current situation.Real estate industry has 13% GAP of total US A GAP and they are steadily growing over the last five years. Even after real estate crisis in 2007 they kept growing. In addition to that key websites in USA real estate sector such as Zillion or Trivial invest several millions each year for neighborhood data. Data is being displayed in their websites and customers have better overview of a property. To compare with European real estate websites there is a big difference. Most of the largest websites in Europe do not display any neighborhood information ND keep simple search engine for a property.Secondly there is quite high competition in LISA real estate websites market and company are willing to invest decent amount of resources for better display of neighborhoods and local areas. Our website visitor has synergy points with real estate sector as well. Most of applicative. Com website visitors are people who are searching to buy/rent a new property. They are actively searching local area information. Growing real estate industry means more renting or purchasing and more people seeking information which our website provides. Social factors.Due to gig rates of obesity (Rulers, 2014) in USA we have new emerging trend – healthy life style. It is already for several years and growing even more. Demand for health friendly or environmental friendly products has increased. We can see examples like a Greek Yogurt since 2010 dominated USA Yogurt market. It is a Yogurt which is considered to be healthier choice. It has less fats and more protein. Other sectors specializing in healthy life style has grown. Technological factors. Current IT technology allows us easily link data from governmental websites to our which makes all start-up possible.Even annuity of a data is high but website can be well optimized and user friendly. Secondly to build a data crawlers (robot which scans websites and extracts data) has become much easier. One IT programmer can do it. Governmental institutions do not provide all data there fore company has to search for a new ways to collect it. Internet has decent amount of in depended catalogues like http://move. Yellowness. Com. Internet crawler can be cost effective solution for data extraction. Scrounging trend which started in 2006 has enabled companies to outsource difficult tasks for crowds.For example such platforms like Amazon Turks can be used for data testing or processing. Also using scrounging methods are great way to collect data. There are even successful companies which us mainly crowd sourced data (data which is voluntarily entered by a user) – Google maps, tomato GAPS maps (Stuart Dredge, 201 1). Environmental factors. In USA media is actively talking about pollution, crime and more topics related to neighborhood lifestyles. People have increased awareness that living environment is reflected in their quality of life. We have articles like â€Å"top 10 cities to live† or â€Å"best neighborhoods of New York†.At the current momen t people have higher interested in their living environment especially demographics young families. Legal factors. Coddle is registered in Lithuanian Republic therefore they are accountable to Lithuania law. So far company has no revenues and they don't need to pay income tax, but in the future they will face 15%. Since they are online business it is way much easier to overcome political barriers and change markets if it is needed. Also they don't need to pay value added tax because all product purchases are made online. Besides that company needs to pay tax for their employees which is 30% from their salaries.Risk analysis Cross-cultural risk. Since Americans are native English speakers there is a quit high risk of miscommunication or misunderstanding. Lithuanian can speak English but to communicate with American is harder. Also it is harder to compete from sales perspective. At the moment start-up tried to find BIB clients via Cold Calls, Linked, emails. It is a challenge to effec tively communicate a message for potential customer. Local company can do it much easier. Also American culture is a entrepreneurial and sales culture and most of business representatives are good in that (The Economist, 2009).Company s odds are getting lower when you need to complete with better business in better ecosystem. Commercial risks. Even the product is new in Europe but is not in ASSAI. They are 5 years ahead in usage of big data, especially in real estate industry. Market itself has some strong players such as walkover for more than 5 years. To outperform locals which already have a strong position makes a threat for Coddle strategic expansion. Financial risks. Every time when start-up sells a badge marginal costs are nearly to zero. Also online business doesn't have a lot of physical assets.USA currency s really Strong and has well establishes finance trading infrastructure with ERR. There are not so many major financial risks besides one – raising a capital. Sin ce Coddle is a start-up purely funded by a venture capital there is a huge risk of not raising a capital. Now company is trying to raise 1 million dollars and it is hard to predict what are the odds without trying. Country risk. No major country risks as well. USA is actively promoting online businesses and open data portals. Competitor analysis Ta able 2 Total Segment A – large real estate websites Medium real estate companies Segment BSegment C- Individual brokers Segment D accommodation websites Total market size (Units and/or dollars) 14 million dollars 20 (0%) 20,000 (10%) 180,00 (90%) 15 (0%) Share Now Sought in Three Years 25% Largest Competitor Today/Future Your Relative Share Walkover Coddle product is in pure introductory stage there they have nearly O market share. Also from the table we can judge that segment A and D might be not relevant but that is not true. Due to product specific these are main segments where company should focus. Reason is simple – eve ry API integration with a large website is linking their visitors to our website.

Hard times by Charles Dickens Essay

The book Hard times, relates to the hard times that people were going through at the time of the industrial revolution, during the 1840’s. the book was published in 1850, so that when Charles wrote the book, he was looking back on the events that occurred 10 years earlier. In his book ‘Hard Times’ Dickens focuses on education and how children used to be taught. Dickens does not agree with the type of teaching that was going on in those times, and by making the characters of the story his object of hate, it makes them prime targets of ridiculing, and does so throughout the book. He describes how the educators insist on teaching fact, and fact alone, nothing but fact. This way he can put forward his views and feelings of this form of teaching, by ridiculing the characters and continually ripping them apart with criticism. The educators insist on teaching fact and pluck all the opinion from the tiny fragile minds that can be so easily moulded into fact filled objects. They scoop out every little fragment of imagination, not leaving the smallest detail to spare and replace it with fact, fact, fact, until they are over spilling with them. As if when filling an empty money box with pennies until it is full to the brim and over flowing, and when you take off the lid they all pour out, one after the other, penny after penny, fact after fact. Facts were ridged and solid, there was no room for interpretation, or another view on the matter, a fact could not be disproved, or argued against, a fact was a fact, and that was what the educators were trying to pour into the innocent little minds, once filled with imagination and opinion. Dickens chooses the names of characters very well. Such as Grad grind, this gives an impression of a strict, hard faced man stuck in his ways. Dickens is very descriptive which gives the reader an image of the characters, and yet at the same time he leaves other aspects to the imagination. The educators were filtering out the opinion and imagination, leaving room for only the facts to get through. This is what Dickens disliked about this form of education, he thought that each child should be independent, and have their own opinion of things and have a free imagination. Dickens himself was a very bright child, yet was denied the right to education, due to the conditions of the time, and the fact that his family were so poor. He left school at the age of 14 and went to work. This is the main reason why Dickens feels so strongly about education and he feels that people should do what they want to do not what they ‘have’ to do, as he had to leave school in order to get a bit more money for his family. In chapter 2 we learn that the teacher Gradgrind has little, if any respect for the children as he refers to them by numbers, also he criticises on of the girls names. He forms the impression of a very narrow minded man with little consideration or respect for children. He is full of fact and stuck in his ways, he believes that because he has been taught facts that every one should be taught pure fact. Dickens doesn’t like this way of learning, and continually ridicules it and the people teaching it. Dickens gets his points across through satire and comic exaggeration, he uses this to achieve humour and also as an extreme way of getting feelings across. During the Victorian times people had a very dim view of education, they did not think it was that essential for children to learn, however in the Victorian times it all came down to your social class. If you were upper class you would have had an education, however if you were lower class you would be considered very lucky if you went to school and even then you would have hat to have left school early to work to get that extra bit of money for the family. I thin these views existed because people had no idea of the importance and it all came down to your social class, also children were ill treated and expected to be seen and not heard. These views of education are very wrong as it is now important especially as we have more rights, and people are respected more.

Discuss the ethical issues in the Monsanto case Essay

Discuss the ethical issues in the Monsanto case - Essay Example Most cases, the company owned up its failures and strived to clean up in its attempt to safeguard its stakeholder interests. In its attempt to balance the stakeholder interests, Monsanto has often disregarded a number of ethical issues mostly in health, environmental and moral issues as the discussion below portrays. The company has a poor reputation owing to the number of scandals arising from the unethical techniques it employs in its operations. The debate around the suitability of genetically modified foods continues to jeopardize the activities of the company and its profitability given the fact that the company prides itself in the sale of such products. Genetically modified foods present a number of advantages to the society. Genetically modified substances mature faster and are resistant to both drought and pests. As such, genetic modification of foods is among the surest ways of enhancing the global food security (Gillam, 2009). Such arguments continue to enhance the profitability of the company since the company presents the answer to some of the world’s greatest concern. Food insecurity in Africa is of a major concern. Through consistent research on genetic modification of agricultural products, the company promises to develop plant and animal species that can help improve food security in the continent. While such beliefs continue to improve investor confidence on the company, Monsanto must continue employing ethical practices in order to safeguard the safety of the substances it develops. The company must address all the major concerns and doubts that people have on the safety and suitability of the genetically modified foods (Fraedrich, Ferrell & Ferrell, 2012). Another equally important ethical concern is environmental degradation. Global warming is a real threat to the safety of the earth. As such, the company must enhance the safety of its operations with the view to protecting the environment from such of the pollutant its produces. In

Microelectronics Writing Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Microelectronics Writing - Assignment Example Its main purpose, in fact, does not differ much from the old cameras that actually use films instead of digital file storage media. The said media can either be a digital memory card or an internal storage that is built-in to the camera. Just like the old cameras, it is meant for capturing moments in pictures. One major innovation that is made possible with the use of microelectronics though, is that a digital camera could also take videos. The old analog ones have a functionality that is limited in taking only still pictures. The first digital camera model that was produced and sold in the market was the Dycam Model 1. It was sold only for a very short period, from 1990 until 1991. (Raskin) In order to retrieve the pictures taken and to print these in black and white, this camera had to be connected to a computer. This was soon followed by a long line of digital camera models from Kodak and Nikon. With the introduction of JPEG and MPEG formats for still pictures and videos respectiv ely, further developments in the digital camera were made. Nowadays, many digital cameras have more powerful lenses and better picture resolutions. More importantly, these have become much easier to operate. As the features and capabilities began to improve, these devices have also become more in demand. Only very few photographers have, in fact, continued to rely on the analog cameras. When a digital camera takes a picture, light is allowed to strike â€Å"a digital sensor array instead of a piece of film† in the case of an analog one. (Digital Darrel) This digital sensor is actually made of pixels, which are arrays of tiny sensor points. The image taken are then stored as millions of dots of lights or megapixels. The resolution of the picture or its sharpness depends on the amount of megapixels that the digital camera is capable of. The bigger the megapixels, the better the quality of the pictures the camera can produce. This goes the same for the videos made through the di gital camera. The images or videos are then recorded in the storage medium. This may be built-in memory chip of the camera or in an external device such as an SD card or an MMC. If the photographer wants to download the pictures to the computer or to have these printed, he may have to use a cable, which usually comes along with the camera when purchased. However, the latest digital camera models already have Bluetooth capabilities. With Bluetooth, the downloading and printing can be done even without the use of cables as long as the printer or the computer is also Bluetooth-enabled. The reason why many photographers find the digital camera a great choice for a gadget is that everything is automatic. A photographer can take more pictures in less time with a digital camera because he does not have to wait for one or a couple of seconds for any film to be ready. Aside from this, the latest models of this device actually have features that would make the photographer take better angles. In fact, these would also immediately adjust the distance without any prompting through its automated zooming system. Another important characteristic is that the digital images can be downloaded to a computer and can be subjected to editing with the use of the photo-editing software such as Photoshop and Corel. As a video recorder, a digital camera is definitely lighter and handier. However, it may have some limitations in taking videos when compared to the digital video

Physician Assistant role in rural health care system Essay

Physician Assistant role in rural health care system - Essay Example The most recent data from the AAPA show that 22 percent of PAs identify themselves as practicing in rural communities. Real numbers of PAs in rural areas has steadily climbed — from 6,700 in 1996 to over 10,000 in 2002.2 A significant proportion of physician assistants provide health care to rural Americans. In addition to supporting the work of physicians who have chosen a rural practice, many PAs are the sole primary care providers in rural communities.   By increasing access to primary care and preventive services, PAs help reduce overall medical costs. It is in the best interest of rural managed care systems to provide cost-effective local health care services.   Sustaining the care provided to rural Americans by PAs not only increases access to primary care, it also promotes continuity of existing care.   When patients are satisfied with their current health care providers, they should be allowed, or even encouraged, to continue to utilize them in a managed care

Information Technology Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Information Technology - Assignment Example They are only sent by the agent to the manager entity. It is also in the unconfirmed class whereby operations are not acknowledged (Mauro, 2005). 3. It does not have a presentation layer (Goshima, 2011). Machine architecture simply means modes by which data and information is stored and represented in computers, circuits and the CPU. Bits, which are binary digit, are the basic unit for storage and presentation of information in the machine. They operate in two ways, either false or true, which are in the form of 0s or 1s. Characters and integers representation in computers are all represented by a sequence of binary digits. The presentation layer is used to compress, translate, and encrypt data to the required form, so it is responsible for data displaying and managing how data is presented to the application level from the lower levels. In the internet, data sources through the application layer, are represented by unique numeric number called internet protocol addresses. Each machine or computer connected to the internet, is assigned its own IP address to use in a computer network, therefore, forming a sharing ability of available resources and information. When one of the computer s needs to access some information, the user will enter the documents name, but the machine will automatically convert it into an address that will enable the machine to identify the document. This way of representing data creates web pages, location of files and authentic sources, sending of emails and proxy availability (lammle, 2011). 4. Lastname::=OCTET STRING {weight, 277} Weight::= INTEGER {lastname, â€Å"greg†} 3 2 2 2 g e r g 4 4 Combining the two, weight and name, we will establish a set that has both the integer and the IA5string. Set is a collection of one or more types and is represented by a â€Å"31 14† in the encoding rules. G r e g 04 71 82 69 71 In BER encoding using hexadecimal like in the word

Ethical leadership that relates to the book three cup of tea Essay

Ethical leadership that relates to the book three cup of tea - Essay Example Tens of thousands of children in Afghanistan and Pakistan have seen the light of the day through his organization. Educate a child, you have educated a generation. Educate a generation, you have educated a country! Revolution through the pen is mightier than the revolution through the gun. The former will come to stay and enrich the society. The later, in the ultimate analysis, will destroy the humanity. Many failed revolutions, bear testimony to this fact and pages of history are daubed in the resultant bloodshed on account of such mindless revolutions. Mortenson was out to conquer K2, the world’s second tallest mountain. That failed, was a personal disaster, he was rather terminally ill caught in a very difficult situation. Residents of a small village in Pakistan, Korphe came to his rescue. He recouped his health with a determination that resulted in a precedent-shattering silent revolution in the field of education. One man’s determination and will had fructified to benefit countless impoverished children. A small project has since grown up into the Central Asia Institute that has demanded attention of all right thinking people across the world. He achieved the impossible in an impossible region. Mortenson recalls his initial experience in the land of so-called Muslim extremists. â€Å"Mortenson was unsure how the mullah felt about having an infidel in the village, an infidel who proposed to educate Korphe’s girls. Sher Takhi smiled at Mortenson and led him to a prayer mat.†(p.142) Humanity had triumphed over religious bigotry! I entirely agree with the viewpoint of Mortenson that America or any other country for that matter must fight Islamic fundamentalism, through collaborative efforts by fighting poverty and providing access to education, including educating the girl-child. This is the only option to permanent peace and to terminate mindless military adventures. I find a very interesting observation about the mind-set and cul ture of the people in the backward mountain area where Mortenson was operating. â€Å"If you want to thrive in Baltistan, you must respect our ways,† Haji Ali said, blowing on his bowl. â€Å"The first time you share tea with a Balti, you are a stranger. The second time, you are an honored guest. The third time you become family.†(p.150) This is the significance of Three Cups, which is a great cultural decoction, that blends people of diverse origin, diverse beliefs and diverse religious affiliations, together. Philosophy and spirituality are not about the scriptures and lengthy text books alone. That which is not practical cannot be spiritual either! Every spiritual idea must stand the test of practicability. To speak about good ideas is good; but to go good work is the best option for humanity. Oratory is not experiencing. Mortenson has shown to the world that a school in a village is more beneficial to the humankind than, lengthy research papers on education read in the air-conditioned auditoriums. The best revolution is silent. The first chapter of the book titled â€Å"Failure† is the foundation stone for the â€Å"educational empire† that Mortenson was to build during the next twelve years, in the region that perhaps gave him his second life. He was spearheading his campaign of education in a region where the literacy rate was 3%. Children wrote on dirt with sticks. The very interesting part of the book is, according to me is the transformation of Mortenson to a

Bloom's Taxonomy of Education and its use in Nursing Education Research Paper

Bloom's Taxonomy of Education and its use in Nursing Education - Research Paper Example Krau has declared Bloom’s taxonomy as the keystone for achieving this target as it provides a framework for classification of objectives. This has increased the nurses understanding of the patient situation and has lead to a decrease in patient complications. Developed in 1956 and last revised in 2001, Bloom’s taxonomy remains one of the most universally applied models (C. Clark). For decades it has been used primarily for classifying learning outcomes. Originally it consisted of only cognitive domain, but subsequent revisions in 1972 and 1973 added the psychomotor and affective domains respectively. Cognitive domain is associated with knowledge and the development of intellectual skills (C. Clark). This domain can be divided into simpler and difficult behavioral objective categories. Each category denotes a degree of difficulty and the whole domain is structured like a ladder, each and every step needs to be bested before moving on. C. Clark indicates six categories of this domain. These are Remembering, Understanding, Applying, Analyzing, Evaluating and Creating. Affective domain centers on a nurse’s ability to handle different situations. According to D. Clark the domain deals with the targets feelings, values, appreciation, enthusiasm and attitudes. C. Clark also classifies this domain into five categories. Receiving phenomena, Responding to phenomena, Valuing, Organizing values and Internalizing values. Finally the Psychomotor domain involves physical movement, coordination and use of motor skills (C. Clark). Practice makes these skills better which can be assessed by precision and execution of the technique. D. Clark mentions seven categories ranging from simple to complex behavior. These are Perception, Readiness to act, Guided response, Mechanism, Complex to over response, Adaptation and Origination. All the skills from any of the above domains can be applied to nursing

Leadership and Sustainability in Business Essay

Leadership and Sustainability in Business - Essay Example On the other hand, leadership is the process by which an individual influences another individual or a group of individuals to support and collectively reach the objective. Apart from the aforementioned definition, leadership can also be defined as the process of systematizing and categorizing a group of individuals in order to achieve the objective. Therefore, from the above statements, sustainability and leadership are two terms of different context. However, when collated, they provide a different meaning altogether. Sustainable leadership is referred to as a type of leadership which benefits the organizations in the long run by influencing the people positively, exhibiting the values of the society, and initiating change. An effective sustainable leadership consists of 3 components, namely moral values, creativity, and influence. Moral values are the level at which an individual identifies and supports the values of civilization. The value that portrays the mutual care of mankind depicts the moral values. Influence is the capability to modify one’s behavior. Creativity is the ability to portray innovative ideas and the enthusiasm to undertake risk. In the context of this project, Oman Air will be chosen as the organization by the example of which the aforementioned terms of leadership and sustainability will be portrayed. The report will also shed light on ‘women as leaders’. This will emphasize on the acceptance of female leaders in the society. The report will highlight the leadership theories as well as the changing leadership styles. Apart from that, leadership in youth and characteristics of a good leader will be illustrated. However, the topics that will be covered will relate to Oman Air. Therefore, to continue with the project, a brief overview of Oman Air is presented below. A Brief Overview of Oman Air Oman Air is an airline company presently headquartered at Muscat, Oman. The company was established in the year 1993 (Oman Air, n.d.). It is also the national air carrier of Oman. It was founded by the sultanate of Oman’s Civil Aviation. The company provides services for domestic as well as international customers. Regional Taxi and Charter Flights services are also offered by the company. Oman Air operates with around 300 flights a week. It has a network of 36 destinations spread over 19 countries of the world. Apart from this, the company offers a lot of valuable services to its customers (Flightpedia, n.d.). Recently the company became the sole air carrier to offer Wi-Fi services as well as mobile services. During the date of its incorporation, Oman Air remained thoroughly professional. It has added many feathers to the cap; the company has recently won Airline of the Year award at France’s Laurier d’Or du Voyage d’Affaires. In the early 2011, the company was promoted to a 4 stars air carrier while its business class was acknowledged as 5 stars and went on to win the Best Airl ine Seat award from Skytrax. With the modernization of technology, air transport is becoming a complex venture; however, in the past, the Oman Air has successfully identified its areas of strength and accordingly transformed itself. A team of dedicated workforce, skilled pilots, and niche operating routes has highly contributed to achieving competency. However, in context of leadership and

Our Experience as Teachers of ILEC Essay Example for Free

Our Experience as Teachers of ILEC Essay We are Mauricio Munoz (a teacher) and Adela Perez del Viso (a lawyer and trainee teacher), the two Legal English teachers at the Colegio de Abogados de San Luis, the San Luis (Argentina) Bar Association. My idea of teaching Legal English started in 1998 when I took a course at an Academy (located on Huntingdon Road, Cambridge, U. K. ). My teacher was, by then, Mr. Brian Catlow. The organizers made us visit different courtrooms in Cambridge and in London. It was fascinating. Afterwards, I got to know about the ILEC exam, which was a huge academic improvement: now we had a purpose for these studies, a method, a set of contents, a book (and now more than a book), etc. I sat for the Ilec exam in 2009, after two complete years of hard study. Now we organize these courses at the Bar Association, and we know that only some students will come and stay: those who have a very good command of the language, and at the same time those who are keen on the legal field. During this year we organized two â€Å"modules†: the first one, based on General Principles and Contracts. with all the units related to Contracts); the second module, devoted to Company Law (3 units) plus Labour/Employment Law. The decision to divide the whole course in 3 or 4 modules have allowed us to set some goals which seem to be not so far in time; at the same time, it allows other students (who have not started with the original group) to join us, for instance, at the 2nd module. We organize every class with the material presented by the Ilec book, along with videos taken from the internet, movies, trailers (in this sense, John Grisham? books, movies and trailers are quite good), some University classes that can be retrieved from the internet (for instance, some classes from American universities, related to Contracts), etc. Only when time presses, we work on the ILEC book alone, which is quite complete. Next year we are planning to acquire the new edition of the ILEC/ TRANSLEGAL/ C. U. P. book, with the hope that it will present new material to practice with our students. One thing that is quite important, as always when training for any international exam, is to teach strategies to cope with the requirements of the different papers. We explain every one of the papers, and rehearse them with the students, so as they do not feel out of place whenever they sit for the final exam, in the future. Our students are quite committed, even though most of them are lawyers and have a lot of work to do. One of our students comes every time from a place located 140 km from our centre. They have felt quite encouraged with the contents of the course, and some of them are dreaming to travel abroad, or perhaps to get any kind of scholarship and study a course in an English-speaking country. The only thing that our students sometimes ask us is to provide some information as regards criminal law. We sometimes take some elements from the other book related to Legal English, called Introduction to International legal E. and from â€Å"Profesional English in Use†. But we explain to them that these contents are not required for the ILEC exam so far. We think that the ILEC course, and the ILEC exam have really fulfilled the aim of setting an outstanding goal to Legal English students; establishing a future goal to those who like to study English hard, and to combine the experience with their own legal expertise.

Peace Project Essay Example for Free

Peace Project Essay Writing is more than speech written down. Because of its permanence and its one-way nature, writing is more elaborate and orderly than speech. We can write more carefully and more accurately than we can speak. This is why educating children with writing is very vital so that they will trained to pen down their thoughts clearly. Through WordWeavers project, children are taught to write on a wide variety of topics and explore many different writing styles. They are also encouraged to comment on the writing of other participants and write about the writing process itself, telling about what type of writing they enjoy most, how they get their ideas, what they do when they are having trouble, etc. Although WordWeavers is a simple project, children will be basically trained in the process of writing itself where they will be exposed to weaving their own ideas to words and putting it all in paper. Peace Project (Serenity Quest) http://kidspace. kidlink. org/kidspace/start. cfm? HoldNode=8131HoldNav=614 Currently, as the world changes its order, many nations are still at war. One example of this is what happened in Israel and Lebanon. As reflective, competent, and concerned citizens of the 21st century, we are constantly confronted with questions about war and peace. In answering, citizens will be forced to balance immediate national interests with those of the world as a whole. With the Peace Project, students will be enjoined to comment about issues of violence, race, war and peace. Irrespective of their curriculum and the country, all educators will develop problem solving and communication skills for the children to live successfully in the Digital Age. This project directly focuses on these skills as the children discuss the social problems of violence in the neighborhood. They are also encouraged to develop strategies to cope with violence and to identify methods of inducing peace in their neighborhoods. After this, they will be motivated to read and write for themselves their own realizations about the issues tackled. Peace Project is subtle initial step for children to spark peace within their surrounding and this will make them realize that how better would the world become if everyone will try to respect and understand each other. e-Pals Safe Browser http://safebrowser. epals. com/en/ As the Internet becomes more and more becoming a vital source of information, it is essential that children learn to use it. However, dangers about pornography and inappropriate information could be derived from it. This is why the ePALS Classroom Exchange, Inc. , a school-safe email and eMentoring technology for K-12, has come up unique child-safe web browser project to surf safe and educational websites only. The ePALS Safe Browser allows parents and teachers to pre-determine the websites that their child or students are allowed to visit, creating a fully contained and protected environment. The ePALS Safe Browser offers a level of protection and does not allow linkage to outside websites: Parents and school administrators create a totally safe and controlled online environment. This project is helpful so that children would be able to experience how to use the Internet. They would be able to read only useful and helpful information that will target to increase their knowledge. Square of Life http://www. k12science. org/curriculum/squareproj/index. htm Learning about the environment is helpful for children to understand the concepts about conservation and preservation of nature. One exemplary project is called the Square of Life: Studies in Local and Global Environments Project. This is an Internet-based collaborative project in which students will investigate their local environment and share that information with other students from around the country and the world. In this project, the participants will identify living and non-living things in their school yards, share their findings with other participating classes, look for similarities and differences in the reported data and prepare a their own final report or presentation based on their findings. The fun part of this project will be the field trips where children will be able to explore biology and nature with their own eyes. The experience derived will be the basis for their thoughts and discussions.

Company Profiling Food In Processing Marketing Essay

Company Profiling Food In Processing Marketing Essay Food processing is the methods and techniques used to turn raw ingredients into food for human consumption by food processing industry. Food processing takes clean, slaughtered or harvested ingredients and uses them to produce marketable food products. 1.1 Company Profile Sunkist is also a firm in the food processing industry. Fresh Sunkist oranges from California and Arizona are available year-round. The naturally orange color is due to their growing climate. Sunkist harvest fruit as the raw ingredients and transform it to fresh fruit juice. In 1978, General Cinema Corporation, a large theater operator and soft drink bottler created the orange soda we enjoy today and licensed the use of the Sunkist trademark for their delicious orange soft drink. In 1979, Sunkist soda was launched and became the number 1 orange soda in the market. Sunkist is a not-for-profit corporation, with all profits from the exchange returned to growers. In America, Sunkist is the oldest continually operating citrus cooperatives. Sunkist is also the largest marketing cooperative in the world that produces fruit and vegetable. The Sunkist name is assurance of premium quality and taste satisfaction. People have trusted generations of Sunkist growers to deliver the essential goodness of Mother Natures best citrus since 1893. Consumers know they can depend on the quality of fruit bearing the Sunkist brand sticker or any packaged product bearing the Sunkist name. Produce buyers and retailers everywhere know the selling value of that quality. Sunkist control the quality of its product by written rules and regulations to which all Sunkist affiliated packinghouse and manufacturers. Sunkist staffs need to make sure that the regulations are followed. Every day the Staff inspectors will make a visit to packinghouses. Sunkist staffs often visit the manufacturers producing Sunkist packaged products and all employ standardized quality control programs.  [i]  The price of Sunkist are affordable to consumer, it is not too expensive. Sunkist is now produced by Dr Pepper Snapple Group in USA. Sunkist is still the most popular orange product in United States.  [ii]   1.2 Vision, Mission, Slogan and Goals Vision (1) Global strategies for a stronger presence in the international marketplace (2) Make the brand more distinctive with premium quality fruit Mission To maximizing returns for quality Sunkist growers Slogan Feel All Orange Inside (2007-present) Goals Sunkists goal is to respond not only to the demand of their buyers for year round supplies of fruit items, especially citrus, but also to provide a strong marketing and promotional service to other fruit producers who have the same quality standards maintained by Sunkists traditional cooperative suppliers.  [iii]   Stage 2- Strategic analysis 2.0 Input Oranges is the primary ingredients for orange juice. Fresh Sunkist oranges from California and Arizona are available year-round. Their nature orange color is due to their growing climate. The color of the orange are never dyed. The Sunkist label or sticker on the orange is a guarantee that you are buying citrus of the highest quality. 2.1 Process At Sunkist Growers, the process combines natural, environmentally-conscious, wisdom with the benefits of technology. Sunkist citrus is grown on over 300,000 acres of fertile soil in California and Arizona. Pickers use special designed clippers for the different citrus varieties when they pick citrus. The pickers placed the fruit that they picked into a bag that hangs over their shoulder. After that, the fruit will be transported to the packinghouse. It is sent to the pre-grade area once the fruit reached the packinghouse. Before passed through the initial grading station, the fruit is pre-washed. After the computers grade the color and blemish of the fruit, the conveyor will carry the fruit to storage bins where the place held for packing. The fruit will be dumped out of the storage bins when it is ready for packing. The fruit is then re-washed, waxed and dried. After that the fruit is carried down the line where is it sized and stamped or stickered. The next process is the final grading before packing. The fruit is sorted by grade and carried down the line for packing. They pack the fruit depending on customer need. The most common are the cartons. The fruit is either bagged by machine or by hand. The counts and weight is measure by the bagging machines automatically. After that the bags will put into the cartons for shipment and carried to the accumulator area where they are put onto pallets. The cartons will be wraps tightly by the automatic palletizer so that they will not shift during transportation. The pallets are transported to the pre-cooler where they are held for shipment. Once the truck arrives to transport the fruit, the truck is loaded and the fruit moves on to its final destination.  [iv]   The main distribution points for Sunkist are restaurants, supermarkets, and convenience stores. It is distributed in all over the world. And also, the oranges are distributed to the manufacturer which processes the orange juice.  [v]   2.2 Steps of processing orange juice 1. Clean and grade the orange. Microbes and dirt is removed. Orange is rinsed and dried. Quality pieces will automatically separated by size prior to extraction. 2. Extraction Optimize the efficiency of the juice production process. Bitter resins must be carefully separated to avoid tainting the sweeter juice. The extracted juice is filtered through a stainless still screen. 3. Concentration Concentrated the juice and reduces the juice temperature to about 13 ° C. After that, stored in the refrigerated stainless steel bulk tanks. To achieve a high quality juice, the proper blending of juice concentrate and other flavor fractions is necessary. 4. Pasteurization To avoid spoilage. Use hot pasteurized juice to preheat the incoming unpasteurized juice. Preheated juice is heated with steam or hot water to the pasteurization temperature at about 85-94 ° C for around 30 seconds to reduce the microbe count. 5. Packaging Fill in the pasteurized juice while still hot to ensure sterility. Must be filling in sterile environment. Fruit juice packaged in this process has a shelf life of 2-4months at room temperature. 2.3 SWOT Analysis of Sunkist SWOT analysis refers to strength, weakness, opportunities and threats. Strengths and weaknesses refer to the organizations internal environment over which the firm has control. Strengths are areas where the organization excels in comparison with its competitors, while weaknesses are areas where the organization may be at a comparative advantage. Opportunities and threats refer to the organizations external environment, over which it has much less control. SWOT may appear in both the general and the competitive environment. However, the unpredictable nature of events in the general environment tends to make the use of SWOT analysis more problematic.  [vi]   Strengths The Sunkist brand is known for its high quality product and its customer service, and the Sunkist goal is to respond not only to the demands of our buyers for year round supplies of fruit items, especially citrus. Sunkist provides promotional service and also strong marketing to others fruit producer that have the same quality standards maintained by the Sunkist traditional cooperative suppliers. Sunkist is available in many flavors including orange, diet orange, lemonade; strawberry, pineapple, peach and fruit punch which appeals to the teen demographic. Weakness Consumer lack brand loyalty is one of the weaknesses. Maintaining consumers brand loyalty is not easy. There are a lot of other brand that can replace Sunkist, example, Tropicana, Freshers and Nestle. Sunkist is Contending with heavy advertising by other food manufacturers. Opportunities The teen demographic has been shown to be very influential when it comes to their parents purchase decision. Likewise, teens are having more of their own discretionary income, which tend to spend on food and entertainment. While Baby Boomers and Gen X-ers both have large discretionary incomes, both demographics have been largely ignored by other brands. Threats Due to diabetes and obesity, there is currently a trend in the world of consumers being more health conscious. Because of this, consumers are consuming fewer sweet and coloring beverages. With the recent recession, it expected that sales of major brands would drop while private labels increase in sales. 2.4 PEST Analysis Political The political factors are the arena in which organizations competitive for attention, resources, and regulations guiding the interactions among nations.  [vii]  The effects of global influence governmental policies on a firms competitive position increase the importance of forming an effective political strategy.  [viii]  So, Independent growers had to be licensed to carry Sunkist Trademark. Economic The economic environment refers to the nature and direction of the economy in which a firm competes or may compete.  [ix]  Economy strong due to industrial job needed to fuel war. Citrus exports for 1966-67 seasons have reached all-time high. In order to remain competitive, manufacturers exporting abroad will need to make efficiency gains and innovate so that they can offset the unfavorable exchange rate with a reduction in price or increase in quantity.  [x]   Social/Cultural The social / cultural factor is concerned with a societys attitudes and cultural values. Recently, many consumers are emphasis to healthier lifestyles. Consumers from ages of 37 to 55 increasingly concerned with nutrition. There is a large population of the age range known as the baby boomers. Since many are reaching an older age in life they are becoming more concerned with increasing their longevity. This will continue to affect the non-alcoholic beverage industry by increasing the demand overall and in the healthier beverages. Technological The technological factor includes the institutions and activities involved with creating new knowledge and translating that knowledge into new outputs, products, processes, and materials.  [xi]  Introduction of plastic bottles has increased sales for Sunkist as there are easier to carry and consumers can bin them once they are used. As the technology is getting advanced there has been introduction of new machines all the time. Due to introduction of this machineries the production of Sunkist Company has increased tremendously then it was few years ago. Executives must verify that their firm is continuously scanning the external environment to identify potential substitutes for technologies that are in current use, as well as to spot newly emerging technologies from which their firm could derive competitive advantages.  [xii]   Stage 3: Strategy Formulation 3.0 Porter Five Forces The Bargaining Power of Buyers Buyers can affect an industry through their ability to force down prices, bargain for higher quality or more services, and to play competitors off against each other.  [xiii]   The main buyers of Sunkist are individual consumers and restaurants. Fortunately, Wal-Mart is still a small company in that era. And also Sunkist is the major power holder. Even though, restaurants consumption increases, they are not organized, most of the purchased made by individual consumers. Sunkist has favorable condition for buyer power. The Bargaining Power of Suppliers Suppliers can exert bargaining power over participants in an industry by raising prices or reducing the quality of purchased goods and services. The factors that increase supplier power are the mirror image of those that increase buyer power.  [xiv]   Sunkist suppliers are mainly small producers. Sunkist is the merging power of those small producers, farmers. They have very strong relationship and each individual supplier does not have any power over Sunkist. It is favorable condition for Sunkist. Rivalry Competitive rivalry intensifies when a firm is challenged by a competitors actions or when a company recognizes an opportunity to improve its market position.  [xv]   Rivalry among competing firms is usually the most powerful of the five competitive forces. The food industry is becoming highly competitive. The difference between one Food Company and another is usually not that great. As a result, food industry has become more like a commodity an area in which the food company with the low cost structure, greater efficiency and better customer service will beat out competitors. Although Sunkist is the biggest player in the market, Florida growers, global competition and bottled orange juice producers are heating rivalry. Rivalry of Sunkist is still neutral. The threat of substitute Substitute products are goods or services from outside a given industry that perform similar or the same functions as a product that the industry produces. There are plenty of substitutes in the food industry. Most large food companies offer similar suites of services. The threats of substitute product of Sunkist are very high. Fresh orange market has very strong substitutes, and the biggest them all is bottled lemon juice. Even, some consumers think it is easier to use bottled orange juice instead of fresh orange. Some more there are concentrate orange juices, artificial flavoring, frozen orange, already flavored products. Overall threat of substitutes is unfavorable for Sunkist. The Threat of New Entrants The threat of new entrants is the extent to which new competitors may decide to enter an industry and reduce the level of profits being earned by incumbent firms. The threat of entry will depend on the existence of barriers to entry and the reaction of existing competitors.  [xvi]   Sunkist has a very strong brand name in the market. Consumers relate Sunkist brand name with the quality of it. These conditions is making barrier to entry very favorable for Sunkist. However, it is still not easy to differentiate fresh lemon form each other and Sunkist has very low marketing budget to increase awareness of its product. Moreover, fresh lemon consumers are mostly clustered on the east cost of United States and Florida producer has geographical advantages in terms of transportation cost. There is not any significant cost should be incurred to enter market and that open ways for international competitors to enter in US market and if somehow new entrant fails to succeed in the market they can always sell its product to processing firms. 3.1 Resources 3.1.1 Tangible resources Tangible resources are the assets that can be seen and quantified. Production equipment, manufacturing plants, and formal reporting structures are examples of tangible resources.  [xvii]  Sunkist is one of the 10 largest marketing cooperatives in the U.S. They handle sales of fresh oranges, grapefruit, lemons and limes. Sunkist manufactures 1600 citrus juice and peel products. There were 73 new Sunkist-branded products introduced in 2009 and 28 products reformulated in response to health and wellness trends. They have about 50,000 experienced staff in the operational centers, focused on customer service and daily transactions. 3.1.2 Intangible resources Intangible resources include assets that typically are rooted deeply in the firms history and have accumulated over time. The history of Sunkist has more than 100 year and they developed in order to foster and maintain stable markets for fruit growers, gain best possible return for produce and provide consumers around the world with quality citrus products at affordable prices. Sunkist develop a worldwide market, promote a brand name, access a global transportation system, develop comprehensive research capabilities, and gain governmental access to overseas markets.  [xviii]   3.2 Core Competency of Sunkist The realignment of Sunkists sales operations proved its effectiveness in 2009. The new centralized sales opera ­tion customizes practices to compete better and win in todays markets. The Sunkist brand was built over generations by deliver ­ing consistent supply and quality products. People trust Sunkist and that trust stood them in good stead during the difficult times in the world economy. As a category manager, Sunkist must have the right product, at the right price, at the right time. Today, Sunkist does. Sunkists global sourcing program allows it to manage the competition that is in the market anyway to the benefit of both its customers and growers.  [xix]   With an aggressive marketing strategy and attractive packaging, Sunkists organics program has been steadily growing. Today three Sunkist-affiliated packinghouses are certified to pack a number of varieties of organic citrus including lemons, Navel, Valencia and Cara Cara oranges, and Satsuma and W. Murcott Mandarins. Their customers are pleased that Sunkist has a year-round or ­ganics program and want them to increase their involvement.  [xx]   3.4 How Sunkist sustaining competitive advantages Sunkist has sustained competitive advantages in terms of Organization reputation, brand name, experience, and location. Sunkist is 100 years old company. It is well known and very strong brand name. Geographically Sunkist producers has very longer suitable climate to produce lemons. Sunkist has temporary competitive advantages for Supply chain access and cash flow. They have knowledge to move fresh product from one place to another. Sunkist can generate cash flow from their member. Sunkist understands of these markets and its ability to accurately analyze them drove revenue generation to new heights. Sunkist analysts used that information flow to assess and create market opportunities and to be more competitive, not just in the United States, but in all its markets.  [xxi]   3.5 Define Value Chain Firm Infrastructure Vision : Mission : Goal : Global strategies for a stronger presence in the international marketplace . To maximizing returns for quality Sunkist growers To provide a strong marketing and promotional service to other fruit producers Human Resource Training for staff Recruitment Technologies Development Grading Technology Sizing Technology Packing Technology Labeling Technology Procurement Machinery, Transportation, Staff Inbound Logistics Operations Outbound Logistics Marketing Sales Services Collect fresh fruits from California and Arizona Clean and grade the orange Concentration Pasteurization Packaging Finished goods will send it to restaurant, supermarket and convenience store. Advertising Promotion Customer Service Discount Value Chain refers to the process whereby a firm determines the costs associated with organizational activities from purchasing raw materials to manufacturing products to marketing those products. 3.6 SWOT Analysis (TOW Matrix) SWOT Analysis (TOW Matrix) Strengths- S -Represent a large market of citrus growers in California and Arizona -Producing in CA gives them longer to produce because of warm weather -Provide various services (processing, marketing, research procurement) to its member growers -Strong production in recent years and belief that this would continue -Research regarding breakdown of users is very thorough. Weakness- W -Contending with heavy advertising by other food manufacturers -Concentrated predominately in womens magazines -Consumers lack Sunkist brand loyalty Opportunities- O -Our findings indicate that possible demographic. -Changes of heavy lemon users can be used as an advantage. -Increased awareness of lemons may improve usage of lemons. SO Strategies -Sunkist should increase their exportation -Increase the quality of the product to meet customer satisfaction WO Strategies Make a strong distribution system to cater to avail the full benefit of the growing market. Seek more business from other country. -Promote the product by using effective ads. Threats- T -Fresh lemon consumption in the U.S. may continue to steadily decline -Increased competition with Florida growers -Forecasted increase in production during winter months -Concerns about retailers views of fresh lemons and its prepackaging ST Strategies -Advertise more products about Sunkist that are declining -Offer discount on the products to attract customer to buy Use high technology machinery to increase quality. WT Strategies -Decrease the price of declining product -Enter new market to get more customers. 3.7 Diagnosing Strategic Capabilities 3.7.1 BCG Matrix Star (Growth) Question Marks (Introduction) Cash Cows (Maturity) Dogs (Decline) Stars Stars are characterized by high growth and high market share. Stars is the organizations best long-run opportunities for growth and profitability. Sunkist orange juice is the product that gave a lot of opportunities and profit to Sunkist. Over the long run opportunities in stars will pay dividends as their large market share will enable them to generate cash as the market cows and they become cash cows. Cash Cows In Cash Cows stage, the products have a high relative market share position but compete in a low-growth industry. It called cash cow because they generate cash in excess of their needs. Apple juice is the cash cows. Sunkist has takes measure in apple juice to make the product in to stars. Question Marks Question marks are also known as problem child. The products at this stage have a low relative market share position, yet they compete in a high-growth industry. Sunkist cash needs are high and their cash generation is low. A high-quality grapefruit crop that moved well and com ­manded strong FOBs helped make 2008-09 one of the better years for grapefruit growers. Dogs The products have a low relative market share position and compete in a slow or no market growth industry. The dogs are lemon juice. It reduced economic activity in the foodservice industry resulted in the largest negative restaurant growth in 40 years. 3.8 Product Life Cycle Product Development Orange Apple Lemon Grapefruit Introduction Growth Maturity Decline Product Life cycle has 4 stages that consist of introduction, growth, maturity, and decline. Above is the product life cycle for Sunkist. The introduction stage of product life cycle is characterized by slow growth in sales and high costs as a result of limited production. Grapefruit is in the Introduction stage. Sunkist invests in research and development to produce new products. These command a premium price and confer upon the organisation a first mover advantage (Lieberman and Montgomery, 1988)  [xxii]  . Apple juice is in the growth stage. In this stage, sales increase rapidly as the market grows. It allows firms to reap the benefits of economies of scale. The increase in product sales brings greater profits which in turn attracts new entrants to the market. The maturity stage of the life cycle sees a slowing in sales growth and profits as the market becomes saturated. Orange juice is in the maturity stage. In this stage, low cost competition with other brand based on efficient production and technically proficient processes becomes more important. During the maturity stage of the life cycle it is conceivable that a product may benefit from innovation or finding new consumer markets. Lemon juice is in the decline stage. In the decline stage firms experience a fall in sales and profitability. Consumer loyalty shifts to new products.  [xxiii]   3.9 Promotion tools Sunkists has been steadily growing with an aggressive marketing strategy and attractive packaging. Sunkist uses few promotion tools to promote their product and services. Traditional newspaper and magazine advertisements are supplemented with grove tours and educational seminars for the media and chefs. Public relations campaigns such as the Worlds Largest Lemonade and the Worlds Largest Citrus Display attract wide media coverage, and targeted citrus information from Sunkist finds its way to consum ­er blogs and in-store promotions. Sunkists entry into the world of social networking is a cost-effective way to directly reach consumers. Sunkist is building a substantial following on Twitter and Facebook. They promote it in these two website because a lot people are playing with it recently. In addition, well over 100,000 subscribers receive our monthly online publication highlighting information, promotions, recipes and entertaining tips. Stage 4- Strategy Implementation 4.1 Sunkist international Strategy With over 7,000 Sunkist juice and juice drink dispensers in the US and Canada, had an ­other strong year, generating more Sunkist branding in restaurants, bars, schools, hotels and hospitals. Through Vitality, Sunkist is now one of the main beverage brands in the military. An effective international strategy begins with developing a standardized product that can be produced and sold the same way in multiple countries.  [xxiv]  Kenichi Ohmae  [xxv]  argues that delivering value to customers worldwide is the overriding goal, while other observes stress achieving strategic flexibility.  [xxvi]  Sunkist managers build strong worldwide distribution system and use profits from successful products and markets to subsidize the development of other products and markets.  [xxvii]   Jelly Belly successfully introduced a line of Sunkist Citrus Jelly Beans in 2009. In 2010 distribution will expand in the US and Canada. The existing line of Sunkist Fruit Gems and other products now boast a higher level of juice and new packaging. General Mills Sunkist Straw- berry Fruit Snacks became the third most popular product in the fruit snack category. Maverick Brands (Sunkist Natural juice and smoothies) and Old World Industries (Sunkist jarred fruit) enjoyed increased distribution and growth. Sales by a new licensee, Taylor Farms, formerly Sunkist Taylor, LLC (Sunkist packaged cut fruit), grew strongly in both retail outlets and schools. Sales of Sunkist-branded beverages in Asia continued to strengthen. Morinaga Milk (Japan) and Haitai Bever ­ages (Korea) led the way in innovation with a host of new products and flavors. Country House (Taiwan), tradi ­tionally a foodservice licensee, moved into retail with a line of new, high-quality juice drinks; and Fraser Neave (Singapore and Malaysia) continued their strong performance with Sunkist juice. RFM (the Philippines) successfully introduced newly packaged juice drinks and a new line of Sunkist fruit-flavored teas. The new line of Sunkist Premium 100% juice from A.S. Watson (Hong Kong and China) enjoyed good sales. Business in Europe and the Middle East, while currently small, is growing. Sunkist diversifies into foreign markets because it can generate sales profit opportunities that cannot be matched at home country. Internalization can also extend the marketable life of products or services that have reached their maturity in the home country. Sunkist has an extremely well-balanced export and domestic marketing program. They have a very strong sales and marketing team of seasoned veterans. They have excellent partnerships with ke

Singapore Casino :: essays research papers

Casino gambling has been legalised in Singapore. Give economic arguments for and against legalisation. There has been much debate in Singapore both amongst the politicians, religious leaders, senior people in the community, and the lay people at large. It is a hot topic. But, the decision has finally been made, the casino will be built. There are many arguments both for and against building a casino. The government, which is for, cites the economic advantages and everyone who is against cites the social impact the casino will have. Arguments FOR the casino The government’s main argument for the casino is increased revenue leading to a boost in the economy. Currently, Singapore’s revenue comes from high tech electronics manufacturing, pharmaceuticals and finance. These industries are starting to slow. According to Reuters Singapore employment in the manufacturing sector has dropped 9% since 1990. In 2004, 14 per 1,000 were laid off in the manufacturing sector and 8.5 per 1,000 in the services sector. The government’s alternative has been to reverse a 4 decade ban on casino’s to help the Singapore economy. The majority of the focus in the long term is from tourism and the flow on effects of tourism such as hospitality, food, retail, taxi, conventions and aviation. The government fears that a steady decline in tourism is already happening. The Prime Minister in his ministerial statement on April 18 2005 said: â€Å"First, we are losing ground in tourism. Tourism in Asia is growing phenomenally, especially the traffic from China and India. Singapore’s tourist numbers are up too, but we see warning signs of problems ahead. Our market share is declining (from 8% in the Asia Pacific region in 1998 to 6% in 2002). Tourists are spending less time in Singapore. They used to stay an average of about 4 days in 1991, but now they stay only for 3 days. In contrast, on average, they are staying for about 4 days in Hong Kong, 5 days in London and almost a week in New York City. We are losing attractiveness as a tourist destination†. In 2004, Singapore earned US$6 billion from 8.3 million tourists. Tourism currently accounts for 3% of Singapore’s GDP, it needs to be at 7% if it is to be a real growth driver. By 2015, Singapore is aiming at 17 million tourists which alone will bring in US$18 billion. It is predicted that by 2010, Asians will spend $23 billion on gambling, and Singapore wants it share.

Microscopic Boundary Examination :: essays research papers

MICROSCOPIC EXAMINATION OF METALS In this experiment, our aim is examining the microstructure of metals. By studying microscopic structures of metals, we determine which material fits best to a given application. We used the most common method, optical technique, to examine the microstructure. We used a small specimen cut from the metal to be examined. To be able to see the structure clearly, we first cleaned and polished the specimen. First we start polishing with emery paper no: 1 and some finer grades. One should be careful about the coarse abrasive particles and striations from them. Cleaning and rotating the specimen 90Â ° during the transfer can prevent these. The next step is polishing, yet washing the sample before polishing gives a more successful result. Finally, we polished the specimen on a rotating cloth covered with an effective abrasive like Al2O3-Water suspension. We kept polishing until we obtained a mirror like face. After we finished polishing, the crystalline structure of the specimen, any cracks, seams, non-metallic inclusions and inhomogenities, could be revealed. Before start etching we first applied mounting process. In this step we used a matched die set. We placed our sample into the die set in the way that the rough face of the specimen was the lower surface and the polished face looked upward. We filled the die cavity with Bakelite and then we transferred our die to a mounpress. Mounting not only protects our sample but also by making its base flat and stable helps us while we are examining the sample under the microscope. In etching process, depending upon chemical composition, energy content and grain orientation, we determine the grain boundaries and the presence of chemically different phases. To reveal these micro structural details of the polished mount we used an etchant like 1% Nital.

Leukemia and Its Treatment Essay -- Cancel Health Medical

Leukemia is something that we hear about a lot. I believe that people do not understand exactly what leukemia is and how dangerous it can be, I chose this topic to try to help them understand. In this paper I will explain what leukemia is and what treatments you can choose from to treat the cancer. Leukemia is a type of cancer. Cancer is a group of more than 100 diseases that have two or more important things in common. One is that certain cells in the body become abnormal. Another is that the body keeps producing large numbers of these abnormal cells. Leukemia is cancer of the blood ce3lls. When leukemia develops the body produces large numbers of abnormal blood cells. In most types of leukemia, the abnormal blood cells and they do not function properly.(Cancer compass 10)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  There are two major groups of leukemia they are grouped based on how fast they spread. Acute leukemia is a cancer that starts in the organs that makes blood, namely the bone marrow and the lymph system. Acute leukemia spreads very quickly. Chronic leukemia is when many white blood cells are made in the bone marrow. Depending on the type of white blood cell that is involved chronic leukemia can be classified as chronic lymphocytic leukemia or chronic myeloid leukemia. Chronic leukemia spreads slowly.( Longe,186)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  There are many different types of treatment for leukemia the one that you receive depends on what stage the cancer is in and what kind of leukemia you have. Chemotherapy is one form of...

Paul Krugman,The Conscious of a Liberal

In this book â€Å"The conscious of a Liberal† Paul Krugman talks about the â€Å"long gilded age† that started from the 1870's until the big depression in the 1930's. He shoes that there was a period of a huge inequality in prosperity and in power, where a supposedly a democratic political system didn't succeeded to show the economic interests of the majority. He said that the big power of America was all utilized to defend belongings interests and there had been an unsuspecting approval and acceptance of a conservative beliefs that any effort to help the people who have fewer fortune would guide to an economic disaster.He talked about the distribution of incomes in the 1920's, where if the capital gains were excluded we would have that the highest 10% in income was receiving 43. 6% from the final income, while the highest 1% in the income was receiving the 17. 3 %. The strange thing is that in 2005, the income allocations facts were so similar to those of the 1920's.H e also mentioned that the â€Å"great Depression† destroyed the gilded age, and he talked about the reforms of â€Å"Franklin Roosevelt†, where the most rich of the 0.1% possessed more than 20% of the state's richness in the 1929, however only 10% in the middle of the 1950's. Krugman talked about the new deal that taxed away the biggest part of their revenues and earnings adding that the blue collar employees benefits the most from this. Paul Krugman talked also about the new division of richens called â€Å"The Great Compression† that picked up a big number of Americans from the urban slum and from the rural deficiency into owning houses and extraordinary comfort.When Roosevelt took the power, the postwar of the middle class culture and society has arose in a small period of time. The â€Å"New Deal† of Roosevelt was accepted by the republican Eisenhower but the rejection during this period of presidency was by some republicans that didn't accept the lib eralism of Eisenhower. Krugman described in his book that when Eisenhower was advocating on the virtues of the toned- down up to date â€Å"Republicanism†, there was a latest type of conservative that started to appear. They captured themselves as some strangers facing organizations and institutions.He added that in the 1964, a union of conservative protestors held control of the â€Å"Republican National Convention† and selected Barry Goldwater for presidency. The presidency of the NIXON was from the point of view of Krugman an evolution period instead of a victory for the new conservatism. As mentioned in the book, in the 1980's, there was a big victory for the New Conservatives, and economics were victories by the new conservatives. These principles maintained without proof that tax cuts would pay for themselves.Krugman wrote that in the execution of the conservative political authority, the economists started to document a slight increase in inequality but most of the Americans noticed just a little or none of the economic growth. He add that, if growth in productivity had been consistently common across the work force, then the usual worker's income should be 35% superior now than what it used to be in the beginning of the 70's. Krugman sum up announcing that for those who they call themselves liberals are in real sense conservatives, whereas those who consider themselves conservatives are mostly in deep radicals.Finally, he said that liberals wish and desire to return to the middle- class society where he grew up in and for those who call themselves conservative, they desire to go back to the gilded age ruining a century of history. From my point of view, I would like to support Krugman in some major points that what brought the US to here is mostly two big puzzles: the first one is an economic puzzle of why it is that we've come to an intra second gilded age, and how is that the inequality has increased as much as it has?; and the second p uzzle is a political one where the political system has been largely responsible for the creation of the second gilded age and where people were heart and the most powerful one had benefit on the less powerful.Also, the thing that made me support mostly Krugman's point of view was that statistics and numbers showed that typical families aren't better off now than what they was in the early 1970's. It's true that the inflation is now higher a little bit than before but it's mainly because of the working spouses and because how much people are working harder now.And from another hand, it was easier in the 1973 to feel that children's were getting a decent education and the inequality in schools has increased greatly. The economy in the 1973 was very good while there was no computers, no internet, no fax machines etc. so what I want to prove is that now, USA is normally in a more productive and more rich than before but we are not sure the typical family has gained anything.The reason is that all or  nearly all of the gain got to the small group of people who are in the top. Some said that this is all because of education, it is true that people with good education did better than people without but if you think from another side, that all teachers and high class managers have mainly the same type of degrees (minimum masters degrees) but at the end one of the high class managers could have a salary of a bunch of teachers you can understand more the point of view mentioned above.So mainly, what I would adopt is that the middle class society was a political creation that didn't just happened gradually and was achieved politically by the â€Å"new deal† Last but not least, most of people would tell you that from another hand that disasters of the economy could increase the inequality, but the post war generation had in fact the best 25 years of the US of any economy could ever had and even though all the different advanced countries that faced globalization and technological development, Uniquely Americans faced a second gilded age, so this assure one thing in my opinion and it's that the gilded age is due to a political creation and system.

Ibm- Overcome the Stress of Can’t Take Off

How might IBM go about improving its flexible vacation policy to help alleviate some of the stress experience by employees who feel like they can’t take time off? The flexible vacation policy is aim to give employees the option to take limitless days off creates a better work environment. Employees have the autonomy to manage their own workload and take vacation, sick or personal days whenever they need to and for as long as they need. There is no unused time at the end of the year, there is no carry forward into the next year, and there is no payout of accrued days when the employment relationship ends.Flexible vacation policy can increase the productivity since the employee can choose the where the location they doing their job and when they are doing, these can lead employees more willing to contribute to the organization if they felt their working environment is comfortable. Otherwise, the traditional vacation policy allocates a specific number of vacation, sickness, and p ersonal days to each employee depending on length of time at the company. Sometimes employees are able to carry over a certain portion of unused vacation time into a new year or they can sell back their unused days to the company.To tracking these days off using costly and time consuming accounting and administration methods. Now there are many companies using flexible vacation policy, such as Netflix, IBM, or Morningstar. Since 2003, IBM had flexible vacation time for every employee. People who work for the company simply give their supervisors a heads up, but otherwise, take time off when they want it. Instead of tracking the hours of employees work, the electronics company has implemented what it calls a â€Å"results only work environment,† where workers are measured on achievement alone.Although flexibility vacation policy can be benefits to the organization, supervisor and employee, flexible work arrangements but it also pose a series of challenges and disadvantages. Th e stresses experienced by employees who feel like they can’t take time off mostly due to the ongoing project which in on hand, and many colleague taking time off all the same time. These are the two reasons always caused discontented happened in an organization. To deal with these problems IBM trying out a new vacation policy, in which fixed vacation rules are replaced by informal agreements between employees and their immediate supervisor.The guiding principle is that the work must get done. As long as this is the case, employees can take as much vacation as they want, even on short notice. Avoid ruining the beautiful vacation by being call back during the vacation it is better to hand over or replace the job to someone or make sure the task is fully completed before the holiday tune is on. To make this policy going on effectively that is needed the cooperation of all employees because supervisor concerns about equity.Supervisors worry about being fair to employees when they know everyone can’t have flexibility. The key is making sure that the process is the same that every employee’s request is fairly considered, even though the outcome may vary. The present of technology in flexible vacation policy may help IBM to overcome the problem of having many colleagues taking vacation at the same time. IBM can create a page for all IBM’s workers-the management information system, to update the newest information and the vacation date employees wanted or planning to take off.Management of information system is any organized of people, hardware, software, communication networks, data resources and policies and procedures that store, retrieves, transforms and disseminates information in an organization. The system can reduce the chance of error occur, such as forgot to inform their head or supervisor, clash date with colleagues vacation date and so on. To manage this page is needed a person to in charge, to allocate employees leave or vacati on based on the system data which updated by employees. Even there is flexible vacation policy but still need some workforce to carry on the organization activities.Besides that, the communications between organization, supervisor and employee also can reduce the imbalance emotion of the workforce because of they can’t take time off. Annual or semi-annually meeting or a gathering for all workers should be maintain even because of the technology’s reach can provide non specific location for workers to contact with their supervisor or head via computer or cell phone by using video conference, e-mail, mms and so on, but a face-to-face meeting can brings a lot of advantages sometimes. It can avoid conflict happened by using text conversation, it can shows the sincerity and so on.No matter how flexible the vacation policy is, the contraction between all stages of workforce should be maintain and fix in a time. Example, a general meeting of every department in held on every second week of the month, it is the chance for each department head to meet their workforce and share the newest information in between them. Other than that, company should organize two or more person work in a team so that if one of the member who take day off, there is another person who will replace the position, it can reduce the cases of calling back the worker who is on vacation.Synergy always can make task to be more efficiency and done with more effectively. If use this way, it brings a lot of advantages. First of all, colleague of the member who is on vacation can response on the continuing job which can save more time and money. Second, it can increase the satisfaction of workers inside the company because they can get their happiness vacation without the obstruction of the job. Grouping work can also increase the effectiveness and efficiency. †¢ Resisting change.Whether it’s the labor shortage, or labor mismatch, the brain drain, the traffic, the new demograp hics, or technology, there are many profound and reasonable reasons to change the way we work. Being proactive in the face of change is much better than being reactive in this fast-paced business environment. Fears of abuse. There are some employees who may take advantage of their work situation, no matter what the policy. As one supervisor put it, â€Å"There are always a few bad apples. They have to be dealt with.It’s much better to manage for the good apples. † If employees are well managed, abuses will be kept to a minimum whether the employee works on a flexible arrangement or not. †¢ Skeletons in the closet. Just because flexibility was tried with one employee in the past and didn’t work doesn’t mean that the same outcome is inevitable if it is tried again—especially if the individual is well matched with the flexible arrangement. Mistakes can be used as important tools in making improvements. It takes more time to manage. Interviews wit h managers at JPMorgan Chase who supervise employees using some flexible work arrangement reveal far fewer problems than managers anticipated: 95 percent of managers say it does not require more time to manage people on flexible arrangements; 88 percent of managers who are managing employees on flexible work arrangements report no negative impact on their ability to supervise; and 66 percent say managing flexible work arrangements enhanced their management skills.