Tuesday, August 25, 2020

Understanding The Difference of Living Standards & Standard of Living

The American way of life has been a lot of formed by their economy. Almost all parts of American, and so far as that is concerned the remainder of the world†s, life have been changed by their economy†s here and there, shape or structure. Everything from the beds we rest on, to the food we eat, to the occupations we aquire to make a decent living is persistently formed by the various economies each separate nation has. So what is personal satisfaction at any rate? There are presumably a thousand unique responses to that question, however they all point a similar way. Personal satisfaction implies how glad you are with the way of life you have. Are you despondent in light of the fact that you don†t have the possessions you need, or are you totally cheerful being without them, and put stock in simply appreciating life for what it is. Personal satisfaction is a proportion of your social, monetary and mental prosperity. Way of life is something entirely unexpected from personal satisfaction. In spite of the fact that they sound the equivalent and the implications of the different words are comparative, each expression has it†s own importance. The standard of your living may influence your standard of life however. Way of life implies the material belongings you have. It is the degree you can fulfill your material needs and needs. To start with, to see how the way that the United States is a market economy influences the personal satisfaction there, it encourages for you to know some history regarding the matter. At the point when the United States previously began there was for all intents and purposes no optional industry, this was on the grounds that there hadn†t been a requirement for it before at that point. All the States did was â€Å"harvest† the crude products from the land and sell them back to the homeland. There wasn†t any need to have any optional industry. This all changed when they turned into a different nation. Later on when the British mechanical insurgency was about at it†s midsection the American upset kicked in. this changed the optional business from a cabin based industry to a manufacturing plant based industry with the presentation of machines that could accomplish crafted by a few men. The ranchers began to move out of the nation and in to the large urban commu nities, where all the work was. Eli Whitney can be credited with the large scale manufacturing of tradable parts. Shockingly, this framework made a sentiment of estrangement. The laborers in the factorys were in a very surprising social class than the administrators. This hole alongside the way that they didn†t feel like they were a piece of the coroporation, a company goes about as a solitary fictcios individual, the laborers didn†t feel like they were a piece of this individual. The personal satisfaction of the laborers at these production lines went down. They felt distanced at work, at that point they returned home to poor lodging conditions, unhealthiness and basically no social portability. In spite of the fact that they weren†t about as awful as in Britain. The makers were cheerful however; they were raking in some serious cash and more and preferable items over any other time in recent memory. This prompts the following issue of the relations between the work power and the board. This influences how individuals get the items, and how a few people work, accordingly influencing the personal satisfaction of numerous American residents. Work and the executives regularly have differences on the grounds that the two gatherings have various perspectives on how things should function. The executives needs to keep creation costs at the very least, and along these lines giving specialists a low compensation, while work laborers need high wages and loads of advantages for themselves. At the point when the two gatherings have a contradiction and go into talks they attempt to discover the response to one basic inquiry, â€Å"what ought to be the terms and states of employment?† and relying upon their separate answers, they concur or oppose this idea. These choices decide the relationship of these two gatherings. There are numerous dangers in business, particularly in the event that you are the owner behind an ownership. This sort of business implies you remain to lose or pick up the most. On the off chance that this reality is causing an excess of stress, your personal satisfaction may â€Å"go through the floor.† But on the off chance that you are the sort of individual who esteems cash exceptionally, your personal satisfaction may go up when you have the information that you might have the option to get that much cash-flow. There are consistently approaches to get around the dangers of business; there are exceptions to each standard. There is consistently to lose as well however. Since the incredible despondency, government has had considerably more to do with the economy than it used to. The administration has considerably more to do with the American citizen†s life since the incredible melancholy. This disturbs a few people, yet others like the security of being under the government†s defensive wing. The administration has chosen to apply more controll on the grounds that they need to restrict the vacillations of the business cycle. The administration presently makes laws and guidelines to control the nation. There are additionally a lot increasingly social projects now, which a few people couldn†t live without. These were created in light of the fact that individuals were losing cash and positions over things which they didn†t have authority over, similar to showcase variances. The purchaser has a significant job in the economy, thus in there own way of life, and even in there own personal satisfaction. A few people are just upbeat when they have the material belongings, while others have no need of material things to fulfill them. The individuals who need the assets put a high respect to what the job of an American purchaser is. Things like grumbling when something is inadmissible, and getting educated about which items to purchase. Each nation has a financial framework, and monetary frameworks influence ways of life, nature of lives, and ways of life. An economy can influence life much the manner in which an atmosphere can. Truth be told, an economy is really a sort of atmosphere. An economy can change, vacillate and cause hurt similarly a climate atmosphere can. The US has utilized all degrees of government and private endeavor to guarantee a satisfactory personal satisfaction for all of it†s residents. The market economy is permitted to work by the administration as long as it bolsters the benefit of everyone, or personal satisfaction.

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Proposal for Annotated Bibliography on Business Ethics

Title: Annotated Bibliography for Proposed Project on Business Ethics Proposal There are a wide range of conclusions in todays world about the need and significance of executing a business morals pledge for all who wish to work in the corporate world. Society would enormously profit by the usage of a business morals promise being depended on everybody who moves on from business college. Corporate insatiability would begin to decrease and there would be a lot progressively good and moral pioneers in todays corporations.A business morals vow would help start corporate culture inside todays driving organizations which can help keep an enterprise moral as well as help them to succeed monetarily and with their manageability. Commented on Bibliography Gini, Al. â€Å"Business, Ethics, And Leadership In A Post Enron Era. † Journal Of Leadership and Organizational Studies (Baker College) 11. 1 (2004): 9-15. Business Source Complete. Web. 18 Oct. 2012. In this article, Al Gini depicts how the morals f administration influence the morals of the working environment and assists with framing the moral decisions and choices of the laborers in the workplace.Gini proceeds to clarify that the focal issue of morals in business today Schweiger 2 is the nonattendance of positive good authority and the dismissed advancement of an ethical culture inside the partnership. He credits these issues for the ascent in corporate ravenousness and exploitative conduct that happens in todays society and economy. Gini portrays how in todays world the accessibility and chance to communicate corporate avarice has become widely because of the absence of good administration and a moral corporate culture. Wayne, Leslie. â€Å"A Promise to be Ethical in an Era of Immortality. The New York Times (2009). In this article, Leslie Wayne presents that todays ages totally different from yesterdays. Today understudies are increasingly worried about how companies influence the network, the lives of it s laborers, and the earth. They are as yet worried about creation cash simply like some other businesspeople, however not to the detriment of others and not dishonestly. Wayne tells in this article how a few schools have just made a business morals vow required for all understudies, and how a few understudies at different schools are taking the vow by choice.Wayne furnishes great contentions and supports them with proof for why business morals promises ought to be constitutionalized and taken by all entering the corporate world. Sims, Brinkham, Johannes. â€Å"Enron Enthics: Culture Matters more than Codes. † Journal of Business Ethics, Jul 2003. Vol. 45, Iss. 3; Pg 243. In this article, by Ronald R. Sims, Brinkmann, and Johannes, the topical issue is the Enron Scandal that happens in 2001. The creators give various perspectives of the outrage and point out that according to the official directors of Enron, their activities where totally moral and legal.In truth, before 2001, Enron was really commended for being a brilliant corporate resident and for getting an exclusive requirement of business morals. Sims, Brinkmann, and Johannes propose that a few organizations look moral to the general population yet in actuality submit numerous infringement of what is today called regular business morals. Heller, Nathan A. , and Victor L. Heller. â€Å"Business Ethics Education: Are Business Schools Teaching To The AACSB Ethics Education Task Force Recommendations?. Universal Journal Of Business and Social Science 2. 20 (2011): 30-38. Business Source Complete. Web. 18 Oct. 2012. In this article, Nathan A. Heller, and Victor L. Heller distinguish their mutual perspectives on the disappointment of business colleges to give graduates the moral abilities they should be a dependable and instructed pioneer. Heller and Heller characterize business morals as how people, at all degrees of the association, settle on choices and live their lives as per a standard of good and bad behavior.They watch the way that business colleges invest heavily and showcase accomplishment of their alumni, however neglect to assume liability, for their moral disappointments. Heller and Heller accept that business colleges have urged their understudies to concentrate a lot on diagnostic abilities so as to augment benefits no matter what without thought of the moral ramifications of their activities. Carroll, Archie B. â€Å"Reflections On The Business Ethics Field And Business Ethics Quarterly. † Business Ethics Quarterly 20. 4 (2010): 715-717. Business Source Complete. Web. 18 Oct. 012. In this article, Norman Bowie, previous leader of the Society for Business Ethics (SBE), creates purposes behind the reoccurring absence of business morals in todays society. Bowie credits for the most part the way that when business is blasting, that business morals appear to disintegrate and businesspeople don’t appear to mind trampling others. He likewise distinguishes th at absence of business morals, especially inside the top level administrators, to be the significant defeat of the most recent decade bringing about occasions like the Enron Era and the Wall Street Financial Scandal of 2008.This is and fascinating article which recognizes the difficult territories and absence of business morals and can be incredibly developed. Brenkert, George G. â€Å"The Limits And Prospects Of Business Ethics. † Business Ethics Quarterly 20. 4 (2010): 703-709. Business Source Complete. Web. 18 Oct. 2012. In this article, George G. Brenkert communicates his convictions that schools of business must assume an increasingly dynamic job in guiding the considering future supervisors to progressively moral business behavior.He proceeds to state that as opposed to concentrating on benefit expansion, organizations should concentrate on making significant work for representatives. Brenkert recognizes the way that numerous organizations despite everything have not ac knowledged good obligation regarding the Wall Street emergency of 2008, advertisement some even go with respect to accuse the central bank and the administration as opposed to glancing in the mirror. He accepts that organizations must cultivate a more elevated level of moral conduct so as to abstain from rehashing this equivalent money related emergency what's to come.

Sunday, August 2, 2020

How to Create High-Value Content with MindMeister and Your Kindle

How to Create High-Value Content with MindMeister and Your Kindle With so many blogs out there competing for  thought leadership, it can be hard to create one that stands out. By using MindMeister and your Kindle or a similar e-book reader, you can put together high-value content thats sure to be heard through the web noise. It all starts with finding the relevant sources you need and mapping out your content  in a digital, visual way. Inspired by a  great article about content marketing on the FINN PR blog, weve put together a quick guide  that will enable you to efficiently create  quality content for your blog. 1. Find the Sources You Need for Your Research Writing a high-value content  all begins with good research. You want to look for  studies, surveys, academic papers and e-books that can provide you with unique insights and accurate  data. You can simply start by searching on Amazonâ€"with one of the largest selections of e-books on the Internet, youll almost certainly find a number of books that cover your content there. If youre looking into  a slightly more niche topic, a good place to look for sources is Google Scholar, Googles free search engine that indexes full text or metadata of scholarly literature. Be sure to check out their search tips to get the best results. Alternatively, you can browse the  databases of universities, which often publish their own research papers, or use online libraries such as the Internet Archive or online journals such as PLOS ONE or JSTOR  to search for material. Note that some of these services arent free, so if youre on a budget, a good way to save money is to become a member at a library that subscribes to these  databases. Youll usually be able to visit the library website from your own home andâ€"using your login credentialsâ€"access thousands of papers for very little money. 2. Collect Material on Your Kindle and  Highlight Key Ideas After youve collected a nice selection of sources, its best to gather them all in one place. Your e-book reader  is the perfect platform to do so because you can simply take the whole library with you and dig into the research whenever you have some timeâ€"in bed, on your commute to the office or in the doctors waiting room. Using the Kindles highlighting feature  you can mark  important information in the text that you want to reference or quote in your article. Thoughts, questions or ideas that pop into your head while reading can also be saved, using the Note feature. All in all,  your e-book reader just  makes it incredibly easy to stay  organized and sift through loads of information in an efficient way. 3. Transfer  Books onto Your Kindle If youve bought e-books on Amazon, youll be able to download them wirelessly  onto your Kindle.  To transfer  PDFs or Kindle files youve acquired elsewhere, connect your Kindle to your computer via USB  and use your file browser to drag and drop the PDF onto the device. 4. View  Your Highlights and Notes There are three ways to view your Kindle notes and highlights: 1) To view the highlights and notes of a specific book directly on your Kindle, just open the book and tap on Go to in the header. In the dialog that opens, select the Notes register. 2) A collection of all your highlights and notes from all your e-books can be viewed on the Your Highlights page online. Note however that highlights you made in your  PDFs are not included in this collection. 3) You can connect your Kindle to your computer via USB and copy the whole My Clippings.txt file onto your hard drive. This method seems to export highlights from PDFs as well, and you can open and read this plain text file without any special tools. Please note that some publishers create a clipping limit for their books which is oftentimes in the range of 10-20% of the whole text. This doesnt limit the number of highlights you can make in the e-book itself, but it does limit  the amount of highlights you can view  on your highlights page online or export in the text file. 5. Export Kindle Highlights to MindMeister Mind Maps The more you read about your subject the harder it is  to remember all the different opinions, facts, pros and cons you want to include in your article. If you sit down and try to get started on the text  right away, youll have a hard time turning all the different bits and pieces of information into a coherent text thats both  logical and keeps the reader engaged. Thats why its so important not to jump head over heels into the writing process. Before you even open your Word document,  you need to get a good overview of all arguments, ideas and quotes group related pieces of information identify  connections, holes and possible contradictions in your arguments outline  a coherent structure A mind map is the ideal format for this workflow because it allows you to visualize all arguments  on a two-dimensional canvas, draw connections between them and freely move them around until youve created the perfect structure. There are a number of different tools you can use to extract your highlights, such as Bookcision (free; downloads all highlights from an e-book), Sumnotes (free; extracts highlights from PDF files), and  Clippings.io (€1.49 per month for the Chrome extension; import, organize and export all your highlights). These are all fantastic tools and you should definitely look into them if you want to organize  your entire highlight library and make it searchable. If your goal is to prepare a specific article and quickly get only a limited number of  highlights into a mind map, we find that the easiest method is this: Step 1: Copy your My Clippings.txt file onto your computer as outlined above. Step 2: Create a new MindMeister mind map and write the title of your blog post in the center. Step 3: Open the text file and copy-paste the highlights into the mind map, turning each individual highlight into a new topic (bubble).  Paste the source of the highlight into the Notes section of the topic. This way youll keep the canvas nice and clean, but youll still be able to come back and check each arguments source. Step 4: Add other sources to your mind map, such as YouTube videos or arguments from online articles. You can simply paste the URLs of online sources onto the topics to create clickable links. Step 5: Move topics around to group related ideas. Use numbered icons to indicate the order of arguments. When youre done, your mind map could look something like this: 6. Write  Your Article Now its time to convert  your visual outline  to a piece of high-value content blog post. There are two ways to do this. 1.  Keep the mind map open on the left side of your desktop and open a new text document next to it. This way youll be able to keep an eye on the map at all times while you write the article. 2. Right-click on the center topic in the map and select Tools Copy as Text from the menu. This will open a little dialog where you can copy all map contents and paste them into your text document, where you can then expand on each argument further. By taking advantage of your Kindle and the mind mapping technique  youll be able to efficiently  create high-value content for your blogâ€"without getting lost in the research. This approach will keep you organized, and lead you to well-thought-out articles that keep audiences engaged. Get started with mind mapping Sign up for MindMeister Sign up for MindMeister

Saturday, May 23, 2020

7 Ethics Case Studies Students Should Use to Gain Inspiration from

Writing a paper or essay on an ethical matter is quite interesting, and many students choose papers on ethics to prove a point and bring more value to their written words. However, finding trusted sources to back up your paper can be challenging. The best are cases studies on ethics because they’re usually based on actual research and real statistical analyses. Check out these 7 ethics case studies; they should help you write a qualitative essay or paper that will surely wow your professors. 1. Copyright Concerns by Clare Barlett â€Å"Copyright Concerns† is an excellent case study that lays out the importance of copyright in the tech industry. The paper discusses how a computer start-up company is on the verge of violating copyright laws if it chooses to re-use a code that belongs to another company. 2. Freedom of   Speech, Facebook Teens Worldwide by Irina Raicu Should Facebook permit teens under 13 to open an account? Should the social media giant set different rules and regulations for the under-aged? This case study caters to such questions, and it rises up some pretty intriguing points. It will definitely bring more value into your ethical college paper. 3. Using the â€Å"Holocaust† Metaphor by Jill Hamilton PETA’s 2003 campaign, â€Å"Holocaust on Your Plate† compares animal slaughtering with the infamous Holocaust event that led to the death of nearly 6 million Jews. Is the analogy right or wrong? Is it ethical to use such a metaphor or not? If you’re writing a paper on animals’ rights, then this case study is a great source to get inspired from. 4.  The Drinking Age: The Ethics Behind Change by Logan Peterson The legal drinking age in the US is 21. In other countries, it’s 18. Should the United States lower the number, or not? There are certain risks associated with under-aged drinking, although many students don’t care about any of them. This ethics case study highlights some clear points on alcohol consumption by the youth. It should definitely inspire you to write an amazing paper. 5.  Browsing or Cyberstalking by Akshay Vyas Should checking up on your ex or even close friends on social media be considered stalking? This ethical case study focuses on the pros and cons of this idea, and the arguments are quite plausible. Some say there’s a line that people often cross, especially since Facebook doesn’t let its users see who checked their profile or how many times their profile was viewed by someone. 6.  Placing Unreasonable Expectations on a Student by CCAB Many students are pressured to perform an unreasonable amount of work when they get a new job, in spite of their lack of experience. This case study talks about the difference between constructive and destructive feedback at the work place, so it should definitely be useful when writing an ethics essay, term paper or thesis. 7. We’ve Got You Covered by Pat Wolfe and Others This ethics study focuses on a registered nurse’s incompetent behavior and inability to care for his patients. If you’re writing a paper in the medical field, tackling this subject and mentioning this case study will definitely improve the value of your paper. There lots of interesting ethics case studies out there to gain inspiration from. It all depends on your paper’s main subject. Check out the ones we’ve mentioned and take your college paper on to the next level.

Monday, May 11, 2020

Young Adults And The Depiction Of Violent War Entertainment

Young Adults and the Depiction of Violent War Entertainment The American Academy of Family Physicians Organization states children and adolescents in the U.S. spend an average of about seven and a half hours a day using various forms of entertainment such as television, video games, and the Internet. Does entertainment involving war have an influence on young adult’s attitudes toward violent behavior in society? If so, the understanding of violence itself must be clear. Violence, as stated in the Webster Dictionary, is behavior involving physical force intended to hurt, damage, or kill someone or something. With those associated, the increase in broadcasted violent war entertainment results in the higher aggression, violence, and social†¦show more content†¦Gaming consoles, along with films and descriptive war stories have given the youth direct and virtual involvement in the war action. The film industry in Hollywood also recognizes the demand for the action packed war entertainment. Since the early seventies and eighties, television has become an essential part of people’s lives. The different films and shows television offer have given rise to the media culture that has a major significance in young adult lives. The difference between war movies and regular movies is that wars give its audience certainty. This certainty described is the definite attention derived from the war film. For young adults, the presence of war grabs their attention in any circumstance, even if it isn’t accepted. Author Robert Flynn, in Growing Up a Sullen Baptist, states â€Å"Then came Vietnam. War in our living rooms. Television gave us death in living color, with the screen a stage for the most outrageous and attention-getting soundbite† (Flynn 107). For young adults and children, scenes of murder grasp their minds to acquire an irresistible curiosity the details o f war. The obscurities of combat appeal to younger adults from their lack of knowledge of war-time events. Flynn also states seeing â€Å"†¦professional soldiers playing the beast and the clown to grab ten seconds of the nation’s attention that was focused on the screen† (Flynn 107). These ten seconds described are what grab the attention of the youth,Show MoreRelatedThe Effects Of Media On Children And Young People1498 Words   |  6 PagesDecember 14, 2012- 20-year old Adam Lanza fatally shoots 20 children and 6 adult staff members of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, later shooting himself, making this incident the deadliest mass shooting at a high school or grade school in U.S. history. It may seem ridiculous to think that this was derived from video games. The Daily News reported that Lanza had many video games in his house promoting mass murder, school shootings, and gun violence, which police believed helpedRead MoreNegative Effect on Media Sex and Violence3139 Words   |  13 PagesIt is literally known on media entertainment that sex and violence were there. Whereas people who enjoyed it will release their tensions and aggression . Highly sexual TV shows and intensely violent Web sites and video games may be affecting teenagers behavior, according to three studies published in  Pediatrics. Sex on TV and teen pregnancy.  A total of 2,003 teens (ages 12 to 17 years) were asked how often they watched 23 popular TV shows that portrayed passionate kissing, sexual talk, and sexualRead More Research on The Anime Invasion Essay4419 Words   |  18 Pagesenter mainstream American film entertainment, resulting in the backlash on violence, gender issues, and sexuality. I. Overview A.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Motivator B.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Definition of anime 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Examples of anime 2.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Anime and its consumers C.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Definition of manga 1. Popular American examples of manga a.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ranma  ½ b.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Akira c.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Fushigi Yugi: The Mysterious Play 2. Manga bestsellers D.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Anime appeal to Americans 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  American popular entertainment reference a. Silence of the Lamb Read MoreMedia Violence Effects on Society1930 Words   |  8 Pageswas a lot more fun to kill their friends.† (Easterbrook) This is what teens, adults and society in general find interesting. The Los Angeles Times described it as bravura, provocative send-up. This is not the TV of the baby boomers any more, I Love Lucy, And Gilligan’s Island lack something that seems to entertain people today’s society. What is the difference between Scream and I Love Lucy? The answer is simple, violent content. All media, TV, movies, video games, even some books and radio programsRead MoreSuzane Collins The Hunger Games2289 Words   |  10 PagesFew defining characteristics depict a book appropriate for middle schoolers to be taught in the classroom setting. Literature presented to young, impressible, students must be relevant enough to enrich and intrigue without boring them. Deciding whether children in middle school (7th and 8th grades) should be ass igned to read an explicitly violent series such as Suzanne Collin’s The Hunger Games in class is a matter that has been debated numerous times since the first book came out in 2008. The HungerRead MoreEssay on The Media Violence Debate3490 Words   |  14 Pagesthe negative influences that these form of entertainment bring. Many of today’s children grow up with a television at home or even in their own rooms and there have been studies dedicated to the analysis of their impact of a young child growing up to adolescence. Young children are heavily influenced by television and video games, many of which are educational. While there are fun educational shows and games that benefit educational development for young children, the choice of video games and televisionRead MoreThe Effects Of Media On Children s Children2605 Words   |  11 PagesThe media in today’s society is very influential on children. Many children learn violent behavior and they become aggressiv e children because they are exposed to so much mature content. Many television shows contain a lot of violence, for example kids fighting each other, kids bullying other kids and kids yelling and disrespecting their parents. Most people when analyzing this issue tend to focus on drugs, sex, and violence in terms of the television media. It would be more appropriate to determineRead MoreAnalysis Of Watchmen By Alan Moore1843 Words   |  8 Pagestremendous power in our culture; children write cute assignments on who they look up to, adolescents watch and read about heroes in their entertainment, and even adults have personal or fictional heroes they will never get too old to stop idolizing. In our society, we ve been raised to associate this word, Hero, to a perfect being; however, the evolving times and entertainment industry has made the hero a more complex and multifaceted character. From Jerry Siegle s kid friendly Superman, to Frank MillerRead MoreEssay on Media Violence in Childrens Lives2588 Words   |  11 Pagesviolence, as witnesses to violent acts in their homes or communities, or as victims of abuse, neglect, or personal assault. The causes of violent behavior in society are complex and int errelated. Among the significant contributors are poverty, racism, unemployment, illegal drugs, inadequate or abusive parenting practices, and real-life adult models of violent problem-solving behavior. At the same time that there has been an increase in the number of reported violent acts directed at childrenRead MoreThe First Day Of Lecture The True Power Of Film Essay1880 Words   |  8 Pagesâ€Å"The British are coming; the British are coming!† From a very young age, when studying history, we received our information from the points of views of the various authors we read. Yet, we never were able to put ourselves in the same shoes as Paul Revere as he rode late at night to warn Americans of the impending danger. Film gives us that opportunity. It gives filmmakers the ability to artistically depict the information in history in whatever manner they see fit. It gives us as viewers, the opportunity

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

History of the United States Free Essays

The successive phase of mining contributed by subduing the continent. The mining frontier attracted population and wealth as well as advertising the found wonders of he west. The founding of metals helped finance the Civil War as it facilitated the building of railroads, enabled the Treasury to continue specie payments, and brought the silver issue into American politics. We will write a custom essay sample on History of the United States or any similar topic only for you Order Now Cattle raising contributed to the settlement of the Great West by creating a new profitable business that easily sprang up into existence â€Å"as a main pillar of the economy’. And lastly, the successive phase of farming contributed to the settlement of the Great West by contributing to new inventions and techniques used in farming that made it easier and more convenient. . There were various social, ethnic, environmental, and economic factors that made the trans-Mississippi west a unique region among the successive American frontiers. Native Americans made their last and final attempt at colonization in the trans-Mississippi west and still reside there today. Since their â€Å"Anglo† culture collided with that of Hispanic culture, the southwest remains the most Hispanicize region in America. The scale and severity of the environment brought challenges to human ambitions and the environment continued to form a social and political life. The federal government has played a massive role in the trans-Mississippi west economic and social development like in no other region. 4. There were many factors that made western farmers economically vulnerable even as they were expanding their agricultural production in the Great West. High prices had forced farmers into plating single â€Å"cash† crops and use their profits to purchase manufactured goods and foodstuffs at the general store. Large-scale farmers were entering the business world as they were becoming tied to banking, railroading, and manufacturing. They had to ay expensive machinery in order to speed up production of crops, especially wheat. Such widespread use of these expensive machines called for first class management. Many farmers were unskilled though, and put the blame on railroads and banks for their losses. Once farmers had stuck with the idea of single cash crops, their stability was either well or poor, when prices were high all went well and when the prices were low then farmers had to dwell on bankruptcy. 5. There were many strong points in the Farmers’ Alliances as well as many weaknesses. The strongest points of the Farmers’ Alliance were that the embers all agreed on the goals of the Alliance such as, the need to nationalize railroads, abolish national banks, institute a graduated income tax, and create a new federal substructures. Their crusade was an impassioned one and they seemed unstoppable as their efforts to relieve the misfortunes of the farmer were becoming noticed and unavoidable. The Farmers’ Alliance weakest points were that they did not think to include more farmers that would have proved to be more useful and represent a greater and stronger organization. Its programs were only targeted at those who had owned their land. They had ignored and excluded the plight of landless tenant farmers, sharecroppers, framework’s, and black farmers who made up nearly half of the agricultural population. The farmers’ protests scared eastern interests so badly because they were gaining political strength, which was unwanted from the farmers of the South and West. 6. There were various actual effects of the frontier on American society at different stages of its development. Some of those actual effects of the frontier consist of ones that helped transform both the region and nation. The national character was shaped by the westward movement. Hazard of the western wilderness such as distance, deserts, drought, and Indians transformed Europeans into Americans. What was valuable in Frederick Jackson Turners ‘frontier thesis† despite its being discredited by subsequent historians was that the idea of it was based on his belief that the frontier helped to shape and mold the American national character, and that it marked the edge of civilization that included diverse cultures, ideas and traditions. Chapter 28: 7. There were many economic and political effects of the Republicans’ high tariff, high-spending policies of the early asses. Some of those economic and political effects consist of a quarrel between the Republicans and the Democrats over a quorum. The Republican House speaker, Thomas B. Reed had took to make changes to the House rules. He had pieced out quorums and therefore he counted as present certain Democrats in the chamber who had not answered the roll and denied that they were present. The fifty-first, or â€Å"Billion-Dollar’ congress created expensive legislators. 8. Cleveland response to the depression of 1893 created labor and farmer unrest and divided the Democratic Party. Those who had advocated for silver lived that â€Å"hell would freeze over† before Congress passed the repeal measure. How to cite History of the United States, Papers History of the United States Free Essays

Thursday, April 30, 2020

The Islamic Civilization free essay sample

During the post classical era, we find the world evolving by expansion and intense communication along many regions. With expansion and communication, trade and culture travels such as West Africa being introduced to Islam. Moving into western African, between 1000ce-1450ce, the introduction of Islam has brought a great increase in slave trade and rose literacy rates, creating literate officials in state administration. However, no rigorous conversion was made, some traditional practices remained. The increase of slaves was obtained through conquest and the impact of Islam created religious power to officials in state administration due to appeal of legitimacy of rule. However distant ruling centers would be least likely affected by Islam. West Africa’s economy was greatly stimulated by the appearance of Islam. They were able to trade, not only across the Sahara, as they had in Europe and the Middle East. Prior to the influence of Islam, West Africa interacted through regional trade and with help from Tran Saharan route they were able to connect to North Africa. We will write a custom essay sample on The Islamic Civilization or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page With the Muslims, the bringing of Islam enlarged the amount of concubines, sex slaves, in West Africa. Although concubines were not Muslim, because Muslims believed that they couldn’t enslave their own people. We see that within Muslim ancestry they’ve always been nomadic, always relocating in spite of gaining new resources. The establishment of Islam led to the development of 1st regular trade across the Sahara. The impact of Islam turned Africa into a focal point of trade, linking Africa to Eurasian world trade. The Islamic Civilization gave rise to many centers of culture and science, producing notable doctors, nurses, scientists, astronomers, mathematicians, and philosophers. Monarchies and their courts now have literate officials to assist in state administration. A quantity of West African cities had become centers of Islamic intellectual life, increasing literacy rates and legitimacy in state administration. Muslims did not seek to convert West Africans; they did practice their religion while traveling. As time passed Muslim traders were accompanied by Clerics and scholars, these men interacted with local rulers on matter relating to trade, security, and governing. Until the leader of the kingdom converted, with full support would influence citizens to convert to Islam. Although Islam made a very large impression on West Africa, no through religious transformation was made. Being the fact they were rural there was no interaction with Muslims or deepening influence of Islam. Practice such as permission for women to appear in public almost naked, being able to roam freely with unrelated men and the sparkling of dust on one’s head as a sign of respect. Other traditions also remained even though some converted to Islam due to the monotheistic belief related so closely to their belief in one creator God. While in West Africa, Islam rose slave trade along trade routes, increased literacy rates leading to conversion of literate state officials. Albeit, no religious transformation was made. Being the fact that Muslims were nomadic by ancestry they sought to carry out concubines in the slave trade. They believed that it was wrong to enslave their own people so they looked to Africans, their resource, to help them. In effect to the introduction of Islam, many aspects were imposed upon West Africans causing the conversion of monarchy. People found favor in Islam if the leader of the kingdom converted. Also religious legitimacy was brought to the attention of those who would gain status by pilgrimages to Mecca. But aside from the very large impact, no religious transformation was made because most of the cultures were rural and very distant to the places where Islam had interactions with.

Saturday, March 21, 2020

Comparing Writing Styles of Faulkner and Gilman essays

Comparing Writing Styles of Faulkner and Gilman essays I. Writing instructors often tell people to write what they know. When Faulkner wrote A Rose for Miss Emily, he was familiar with the Deep South and its attitudes toward women. When Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wall-Paper, she was familiar with societys beliefs at the time about whether women should have intellectual pursuits. Although the two stories are told differently, each author has produced a story about a woman who was emotionally unstable, and each story has been colored by the beliefs at the time regarding women. II. Faulkner grew up in the Deep South, and presumably, heard many tales about the Civil War. In his story, he drew on those experiences to create a quietly chilling picture a womans declining years. He hides the history of her life in the history of the town and of the house in which Miss Emily lived. For instance, he shows how time has passed her by describing the gas station on the corner of her street where a cotton gin had once stood. Because the story has a narrator, we can only infer what Miss Emilys life was like, and her descent into madness is only revealed after her death. III. The Yellow Wallpaper is written in first person, giving the reader a clear look into the mind of a woman as she descends into insanity. The protagonist of Gilmans story, who is never called by name, is kept in a large attic room because her husband, a doctor, believes it will help cure her. Although she loves to write, she has to write furtively and secretly because her husband believes that such intellectually taxing activities will only make her worse. It becomes clear to the reader that it is the incessant boredom that is aggravating the womans condition. The first person narrative approach creates an interesting presentation because we see the story only through the womans eyes, and it becomes apparent that her understanding ...

Wednesday, March 4, 2020

The Mandarin Meaning of Yin Yang Philosophy

The Mandarin Meaning of Yin Yang Philosophy Yin Yang is a philosophical concept of balance. The symbol associated with this concept is described here by Elizabeth Reninger: The image consists of a circle divided into two teardrop-shaped halves - one white and the other black. Within each half is contained a smaller circle of the opposite color. The Chinese Characters for Yin and Yang The Chinese characters for Yin Yang are é™ °Ã©â„¢ ½ / é˜ ´Ã©Ëœ ³ and they are pronounced yÄ «n yng. The first character é™ ° / é˜ ´ (yÄ «n) means: overcast weather; feminine; moon; cloudy; negative electrical charge; shady. The second character é™ ½ / é˜ ³ (yng) means: positive electrical charge; sun. The simplified characters é˜ ´Ã©Ëœ ³ clearly show the moon/sun symbolism since they can be deconstructed to their elements æÅ"ˆ (moon) and æâ€" ¥ (sun). The element é˜  is a variant of the radical é˜Å" which means abundant. So Yin Yang could represent the contrast between the full moon and the full sun. The Meaning and Significance of Yin and Yang It should be noted that these two opposites are viewed as complementary. To a modern observer coming from a Western background, its easy to think that yang sounds better than yin. The sun is obviously more powerful than the moon, light is better than darkness and so on. This misses the point. The idea behind the symbol of yin and yang is that they interact and that both are necessary for a healthy whole. Its also meant to represent the idea that extreme yin and extreme yang are unhealthy and unbalanced. The small black dot in the white shows this, as does the white dot in the black. 100% yang is very dangerous, as is complete yin. This can be seen in taijiquan, which is a martial art partly based on this principle. Here is Elizabeth Reningers further explanation of the meaning of the Yin Yang symbol: The curves and circles of the Yin-Yang symbol imply a kaleidoscope-like movement. This implied movement represents the ways in which Yin and Yang are mutually-arising, interdependent, and continuously transforming, one into the other. One could not exist without the other, for each contains the essence of the other. Night becomes day, and day becomes night. Birth becomes death, and death becomes birth (think: composting). Friends become enemies, and enemies become friends. Such is the nature - Taoism teaches - of everything in the relative world.

Monday, February 17, 2020

Marketing Prodcts Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Marketing Prodcts - Research Paper Example This paper seeks to discuss the farm product and the service component produced by Holden Trucking Services. Type of product Holden trucking services produces Barley. Barley is a healthy cereal grain high in fiber, protein, maltose and sugar that alternatively can be used for malt syrup sweetener. Fermented, barley makes the perfect ingredient for beer and various alcoholic beverages. It also has a nutlike flavor, chewy texture and is similar to wheat berries though its color it slightly lighter. Barley has varied functions; it can be used for nutritional purposes, as an ingredient in making beer and as feeds for farm animals. Barley has a robust nutritional benefit to consumers. According to research, barley’s soluble fiber lowers the risk of getting coronary heart diseases and reduces cholesterol levels; also it contains insoluble fiber responsible for minimizing the risk of diabetes type 2 and colon cancer. It grows to about 30 inches high in dry subtropical regions experie ncing cool growing and short seasons. The crop is resistant to diseases compared to other cereals; however, sometimes it is attacked by diseases like rust and virus diseases. Service components There are various reasons why addition of services enhances growth opportunities and high profit margins. Innovations and improvements in service normally results in more loyalty, and increased customer satisfaction eventually impacting in higher profits, cost of sales lowered and attracting potential customers. Documentation as a service is a language that goes with or accompanies a product. It often shows its design, development and marketing strategy in clear terms. Documentation will indicate how to improve products and reveal loop holes in sales funnel, which would have eluded the seller. It is also able to put the seller into contact with prospective customers and investors (Blythe, 2006). Another service is transportation/logistics. This is the process of getting products to its intend ed destination. There are many phases involved; there is transporting the product from the firm to the storage facilities the other getting the product to the customer. Luckily, Holden trucking services happens to be in the said service meaning that transportation costs will be lower compared to if the service was outsourced This will ensure that the produce will reach the intended customer on time (Grewal & Levy, 2010). Storage is another service equally important. It allows the seller to store product when it is not needed and helps to avail the items when demand is bigger than the immediate creation bearing in mind that it is a seasonal product. Barley is stored in refrigerated warehouses since it can easily go bad if left in normal warehouses. Packaging, blending and branding plays a crucial role in marketing a product. It not only attracts the customer to try out ones product but also protects the product from damage. Also, packaging assists in portraying information and direct ions about the product. Packaging again is used also to differentiate one brand from another (Blythe, 2006). Expansion to a product line This involves changing product into different forms to meet varied business opportunities and attract more customers. Barley can be used to produce different products thereby creating a product line. Barley has various uses some of them being nutritional as animal feeds and as an ingredient in making beer and alcoholic drinks. As a

Monday, February 3, 2020

Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment Term Paper

Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment - Term Paper Example During the revolution, European philosophers tore down the faulty set of scientific viewpoints established by the forefathers and maintained by place of worship. To replace this inconsistent knowledge, scientists sought to ascertain and convey the factual laws leading the phenomena they experiential in nature. Of all the revolutions that swept over Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries, the most generally dominant was an epistemological revolution that is also known as the scientific revolution (Dupre, page 20). The scientific revolution never occurred instantly, nor begun at any set date. The scientific revolution that is associated with Francis Bacon, Galileo, and Isaac Newton, started much earlier. The period can be back dated to the work of Nicolaus Copernicus at the commencement of the sixteenth century, or Leonardo da Vinci in the central point of the fifteenth century. Although it would require centuries to create, the Scientific Revolution commenced near the conclusion of the Middle Ages, when farmers started to study, notice, and record those ecological conditions that produced the best yields. In time, inquisitiveness about the world extended, which led to additional innovation (Ellen, & Reill, p. 543). The Church’s compassionate stance toward science transformed unexpectedly when explorers like Johannes Kepler and Galileo Galilei started inquiring the ancient knowledge of Aristotle and other usual truths. Galileo’s labor in the fields of inertia and physics was pioneering, while Kepler’s laws of planetary movement exposed, among other effects that the planets stirred in elliptical orbits. Galileo especially met significant confrontation from the Church for his encouragement of the hypothesis of Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus, in late fourteenth and early fifteenth century, who had affirmed that the sun, not the planet earth, was the core of the solar structure and not vice versa, contrary to church’s stand and belie f. Though up against substantial Church resistance, science moved into the limelight in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Galileo had long alleged that scrutiny was a necessary constituent of the scientific technique a point that Francis Bacon coagulated with his inductive technique. Sometimes known as the Baconian technique, inductive discipline stresses surveillance and analysis as the means for coming to common conclusions. A later modern, Rene Descartes, selected where Bacon stopped. Descartes’ abilities ran the gamut from arithmetic to philosophy and eventually the amalgamation of those schools. His job in joining geometry and algebra revolutionized both of those disciplines, and it was Descartes who initiated the idealistic conclusion of asserting that, if nonentity else, he was at least a philosopher. Descartes’ deductive advance to philosophy, using logic and math, enforced a distinct and clear basis for thought that still relics a standard for diffic ulty solving. As it came out, all of these improvements of the scientific uprising were actually just a basic coverage for Englishman Isaac Newton between1642–1727, who cleaned in, built upon the job of his forerunners, and changed the features of mathematics and science. Newton began his vocation with mathematics job that would eventually develop into the entire discipline of calculus. From there, he carried out tests in math and physics that exposed a number of natural regulations that had previously been accredited to divine forces.

Sunday, January 26, 2020

Stakeholder Management and Culture Management

Stakeholder Management and Culture Management The process of identifying and managing project stakeholders and culture is one of the most important processes in project implementation because not only is project success judged by stakeholder satisfaction, but because every stakeholder makes an essential contribution to the project (Verzuh 2008, p.48). Beside stakeholder identification and management, project managers are required to establish a balance between implementing global standards and responding to local needs in their efforts to effectively manage the diffusion of stakeholder principles and practices (Nicolod 2007, p.484). Despite the great importance associated with stakeholder and culture management processes, these thorny processes or areas in project implementation have received less attention especially when comparisons are done relative to other areas that depend on these processes (Sharp et al. 1999, p.1). Such areas include, but are unlimited to, scenario-based requirements and user involvement in the project development stages. It was from this perspective that this paper decided to make the following contributions on this topic: first, a study was developed based on the theoretical framework involved in the identification and management of stakeholder relationships. The project went on to review literature that helps its users to understand clearly the balance that needs to be struck between understanding of organizational culture and stakeholder management. It is from the above perspective that this case study aimed to study the role and the influence of various stakeholders in the implementation of projects. In tackling this case study, the author began by stating the aim the need for studying this topic. This was followed by a review of the literature. The literature review clearly established who the project stakeholders were. In addition, their role and their influence in the project were clearly identified. Moreover, the literature review defined organizational culture and went on to establish its link with stakeholder management. After reviewing the literature, the author, in a holistic view, explored how a reputable Saudi technology firm, Zuhair Fayze Partnership (ZFP), identified and managed its stakeholders during a multi-million project implemented by the company. This project, which was undertaken in the year 2001 involved the analysis, design, development, installation and commissioning of a Facilities Information System to the Royal Saudi Air Forces (RSAF)- a renown aviation branch that services all Saudi Arabias Airbases. Having explored on the findings from his study, the author conclude by giving a critical analysis of his experience. It should be highlighted that this case study, having been compiled after the implementation of a military IT project, presented a unique structure and experience. This was so because it involved the development of a military system and as such some of its details could not be studied openly due to security restrictions. As such, some knowledge gaps might be present in this case study thus constituting its major limitation. 2.0 Aim and rationale of this paper This papers aim was to identify who the key project stakeholders were, how they were managed and how their expectations come to influence the success of the FIS project. In addition, the author assessed how organizational or national culture shaped the expectations of key stakeholders. All these were intended to help him and the users of this paper to develop suitable and effective stakeholder management strategies in their current or future project assignments. More so, in writing this paper, it should be noted that the author was motivated by the fact that despite the many developments in techniques and development tools to effectively manage projects, several projects have still experienced difficulties that have affected their overall quality leading to time and cost overruns. Mohammed (2006) in reviewing Morris and Hough (1987) research on an estimated 3500 projects established that overruns were the norm in project implementation since they ranged between 40 to 200 percent. The figure below depicted general statistics associated with project success from this research. Parameter %-age rating Succeeded 29 Failed 18 Challenged 53 Table 1 showing the statistics of project success and failure Pie chart 1 depicting the statistics of project success and failure 3.0 Literature review 3.1Project stakeholders Singleton (2007) defined stakeholders as organizations or individuals who are actively involved in projects and whose interests may be negatively or positively affected in the courses of completion or execution of these particular projects (p.12). According to him therefore, stakeholders were made up of two categories; indirect stakeholders and direct stakeholders. Indirect stakeholders were summed up by those individuals who, despite having some level of influence or interest in the operations of the business, were not directly involved in the operations of the project. On the other hand, direct stakeholders were composed of individuals who were directly involved in the operations of any project lifecycle. As such, they were affected by the particular project, had the power to influence it or had stakes in the successful completion of the project. The following figure 1 showed the levels of stakeholder influence and interest. High Interest Manage them closely Keep informed of project operations High Influence Low Influence Keep satisfied Monitor their operations Low Interest On their part, Walker and others (2008), in trying to establish a valid description of who a stakeholder was, discovered that stakeholders were groups or individuals who possessed some right aspects or interest in the operations of a project and thus contributed to or were impacted by say, the outcome or the work of the project (p.648). To them, stakeholders could be classified into four groups namely; upstream stakeholders, downstream stakeholders supply-chain partners, project team stakeholders and external stakeholders. Figure 1 below showed these groups of project stakeholders. Walker and his group (2000) in assessing the influence of project stakeholders and their mapping by project teams, came to the conclusion that identifying stakeholders could help trigger a course of investigation that leads to a better understanding of the nature and types of power and influence that may be exerted on, within and to project management teams (p.648). Frooman (1999) expounded on this point by stating that in identifying the project stakeholders, the project managers were likely to determine whether their projects were to be awarded with the needed resources. On their part, Post and others (2002) though acknowledging Freemans popularised description of a stakeholder as the interests and entities that are either involuntarily or voluntarily involved in a firms operations, went on to develop their own stakeholder view that stressed on the need for stakeholder relationships in any project that involved creation of any organizational wealth (p.1). In addition, Sharp and others (1999) just simply defined a stakeholder as any individual or group who affected or were affected by achievement of a projects objectives (p.1). They went ahead to list various categories of stakeholders as including managers of a project, end-users, engineers involved in system analysis, design and development, customers who are going to make use of the developed system, external bodies for instance system regulators, domain experts and many more (Sharp et al.1999, p.1-2). The three scholars expounded on their definition by giving another perspective that stakeholders may be composed of three categories namely those external on the project team; but who are internal in the organization, those internal on the project team and those who are external to both the organization and the project team (Sharp et al. 1999, p.2). 3.2 Understanding organizational or national cultures Weiss (2008) defined organizational culture as the shared values and meanings as held by organizational members in common, and are articulated and practised by an organizations leaders (p. 300). To Weiss therefore, corporate culture is transmitted through: Leadership styles and values as espoused and practised by organizational leaders. The heroes and heroines that the company rewards and holds up as models (Weiss 2008, p.300). The rights or symbols valued by organizations. The way of communication that exists between project heads and their stakeholders. Weiss (2008) went ahead to highlight that though organizational cultures were both invisible and visible, informal and formal, project managers needed to study and understand organizational cultures through observation, listening and interacting with project or organizational stakeholders. Furthermore, they could study organizational culture in the following ways: studying an organizations physical setting and reading company policies to familiarise themselves with its expected norms or behaviours. On his part, Chinyio (2007) defined organizational culture as involving the level of deeper and basic beliefs and assumptions as shared by the members of organizations, that unconsciously operate and defined in the basic taken for granted fashion, as organizations view of themselves and their environment (pp.176-177). Ideally, House and his group (2002) in their GLOBE research program theoretically defined organizational culture as any shared motives, beliefs, values, interpretations and identities or meanings of important events that emerge from most common member experiences and are passed across generations of age (p.5). Furthermore, in helping us to broaden our understanding of culture, Schein (1996) highlighted that culture manifested itself at 3 levels namely the level of deep tacit assumptions, the level of espoused values that reflected on what a group wished to be and the day to day behaviour. For any project success, project implementers needed to have a clear understanding of all the identified levels. From their perspective, Osland and Bird (2000) noted that there was a tendency for observers to confuse individual with group values (p.69). As such, there was need for project expatriates to carry out keen observations to identify the variance in behavioural norms for individuals, organizational cultures, subcultures as well as changing sections of the society (p.70). More so, Schein (1996) when analyzing why innovative projects failed to proliferate and survive noted there was lack of alignment amongst the following categories of culture: the operator culture which existed amongst the subordinates of an organization, the engineering culture which existed amongst the middle level managers and the executive culture which was present amongst the company top management (p.9). 3.3 The link between stakeholders and organizational culture Studies on project management have shown that coupled with leaderships, organizational cultures are central to projects operating efficiency and overall effectiveness. Studies have generally revealed that cultures are the glue that holds other organizational dimensions (strategy, structure, people and systems) together (Weiss 2008, p.300). Project success will only be achieved if project leaders come to associate themselves with modelling, building and helping to sustain ethical and legal organizational or national cultures via comprehensive and properly defined compliance and ethics programs. 3.4 Key steps in stakeholder management Singleton (2007) identified the following as the key steps in any stakeholder management process: Identification of key stakeholder groups Determination of stakeholder influences and interests Development of management strategies for each identified groups. On his part, Gibben (2010) postulated that before going ahead to implement any project, project leaders or managers needed to take into account the following issues (p.14); Clearly identify project stakeholders; Gather key data or information of the identified stakeholders; Use the collected data to determine or identify stakeholder priorities; Establish the strengths and weaknesses of the various stakeholders; Identify the stakeholder support; Predict the stakeholder behaviours. This can be determined by studying organizational culture and finally; Prepare a stakeholder management strategy. All the above stages can be summarized under stakeholder analysis approach. Tellingly, Strong and Rath (2005) argued that the approach of stakeholder management contained three key steps namely; stakeholder identification, stakeholder analysis and stakeholder planning (p.173). Furthermore, on their part, Carayannis and his group (2005) stated the following as the key steps involved in stakeholder management (p.184). Identifying and classifying the stakeholders of the project (against, neutral, for) and analyzing their possible project impacts. This could be done using the project lifecycle. Isolating and analyzing project stakeholders with any likely negative impacts Incorporating and involving key primary project stakeholders (included and not limited to the clients, labour union, suppliers, contractors, consultants, and government agencies) in the project plan and in every subsequent phase of the project Ensuring that the required information is regularly availed to the identified stakeholders at appropriate times. This will ensure that the identified key stakeholders will clearly concur with project objectives leading to a successful completion of the particular project. 3.5 Stakeholder management strategies These are the approaches used by project managers in minimizing the influences caused by the identified project stakeholders. From his research, Karlsen (2002) found out that in most projects, systematic or formal stakeholder management strategies did not exist (p.22). From his research, stakeholders were managed on a random basis since there were no plans, processes, methods or well-functioning strategies. As a result, project managers decided on the best solutions of managing any identified stakeholder weaknesses. However, Wolper (2004) went ahead to propose the four generic strategies of managing stakeholder relationships (p.172). These were: Collaborating cautiously with the stakeholders who were found to have a mixed blessing relationship on the project. Involving and trusting the supportive stakeholders Implementing defensive strategies that are pro- active in nature for the non-supportive stakeholders; and Monitoring the stakeholders with little/marginal relationships with efficiency. 4.0 Project case study 4.1 How ZFP identified and managed its key stakeholders This being a military technology system, ZFP used a different but distinct approach of implementing the system. The process of stakeholder identification was the third in its project implementation stages after the definition of the strategic issue and the determination of underlying factors. The following is a detailed analysis of how ZFP carried out this important but mostly overlooked process of project implementation. The company project implementation committee started by identifying the key stakeholders. In doing this, the committee categorised the stakeholders into two broad categories. These were the primary and secondary stakeholders. The following were identified as belonging to the primary stakeholder category: Customers or users of the FIS system (Saudi Arabian air force soldiers) Project managers, supervisors and engineers from ZFP and RSAF. RSAF shareholders (all Saudi Arabian air force bases: Dhahran, Tabuk, Taif, Al Kharj and Khamis Mushait and the Saudi Government) Suppliers/contractors/subcontractors of hardware and any software packages Project steering committee Primary stakeholders were considered as those individuals or groups who had key interests in the FIS project. As such, they were likely to be affected by the operations in the FIS project lifecycle. On the other hand, secondary stakeholders were described as those individuals who had no or very few interest on the FIS project. They were considered vital in this project since their actions may have, in one way or another influenced the quality of the general system that was to be developed then. For instance, the steering committee had pointed out that the Saudi Arabian media constituted a key secondary stakeholder since any negative covering on this huge public and military project might have caused great damage to the successful completion of this project. This was so because negative publicity towards the project may have raised public outcry which would have resulted in the Saudi treasury suspending the financing of this complex and multi-million FIS project. Besides the media, other individuals or groups who made it to the secondary stakeholder category included and were unlimited to the following: The licensing agency (Malath Cooperative Insurance Reinsurance) Saudi Arabian environmentalists The general Saudi Public Professional organizations in the Saudi Kingdom for instance, Legalized Institutes for Project management in Saudi Arabia. Competitors (those firms who lost their bids to deliver the system) Anyone one who validly claimed to have a stake in the FIS project Having successfully identified FIS project stakeholders, the steering committee left it to the project manager to analyse their influence and create a management strategy for this project. As such, the project manager, after close consultation with project supervisors, developed the following as the stakeholder analysis and management strategy: Stakeholder(s) Interest/Issues of concern Action (s) Saudi air force soldiers, RSAF shareholders, management teams and project engineers They were to be the key users of the system and as such were to provide a supportive relationship. Were low as potential threats but high on ensuring potential co-operation. Since they had a supportive relationship, their relationship management was likely to be managed on a rare basis. ZFP was to involve these supportive stakeholders in all its relevant project issues. The licensing agencies, environmentalists, professional organizational, competitors and the general Saudi public These were to present three types of relations; mixed blessing, non-supportive and marginal stakeholder relationship. As a result of these relationships, they were to constitute high potential threats and thus needed high potential co-operation from the project managers to address their hidden and bad intentions. These categories of stakeholders were to be managed through cautious, monitoring and proactive defence strategies. Besides using these strategies, generic strategies, most appropriate to any new diagnostic category, was to be adopted. For instance, instead of ZFP defending itself against negative publicity, it was to develop a high quality system at an affordable competitive price. The quality of the FIS system would thus speak for itself leading to the non-supportive relationships losing their credibility in their efforts to dispute the project Table 2 showing how ZFP analysed and developed stakeholder management strategy 4.3 How stakeholder expectations affected the successful delivery of the project. As noted earlier, the declaration that a project was successful can only be justified if the specific project clearly answered to the needs or expectations of most, if not all, stakeholders. In this technology project, the identified primary and secondary groups of stakeholders had their own unique expectations which were clearly and appropriately addressed by the overall project manager (with the assistance of the steering committee members). 5.0 A discussion of my experience 5.1 Identification of key stakeholders As previously highlighted, the steering committee that was chosen to oversee the implementation of this huge IT project had, in liaison with the project manager, held several sessions in the initial stages upon which key FIS project stakeholders were identified. From the workshops held, it was established that two categories of stakeholders claimed ownership to this project. These were the primary and secondary stakeholders. Primary stakeholders were constituted by Saudi air force soldiers, RSAF shareholders, project management, project engineers, project suppliers, contractors and sub-contractors amongst others. Secondary stakeholders were constituted by the licensing agency (Malath Cooperative Insurance Reinsurance), environmentalists, professional organizational, competitors and the general Saudi public. 5.2 Understanding key stakeholder expectations Other than the RSAFs managing providing a detailed description of the requirements of the FIS system that was to be developed, the project manager and the steering team had to do their best to ensure that additional funds were provided to the various phases of the project on a need basis. Moreover, the management from both companies were frequently updated on the status of the FIS project amongst other stakeholder expectations. In the end, a hi-tech Facilities Information System was delivered, installed and commissioned to the delight of the many project stakeholders. 5.3 The assessment of key stakeholder influence The FIS project steering members and the overall project manager carried out a comprehensive analysis of the two categories of stakeholders. This was done with the main intention of determining their influence and the need to counter it. During this analysis stage, four stakeholder relationships were identified by the management team. It is from these relationships that the influences of these stakeholders were determined. The two types of relationships were: The supportive relationship which was constituted by all the primary stakeholders as listed above. This category of stakeholders posed a low potential threat to the success of the FIS project since they fully supported the aim and goals of the FIS project. They thus worked hard to help achieve the project aim and goals. The non-supportive relationship was made up of a few secondary stakeholders for instance the competitors. They formed a most distressing relationship and as such were high potential threats. 5.4 management of key stakeholder influence In managing the influences of key stakeholders, the steering committee members decided to use a collaborative and proactive defence to address the influence of the non-supportive stakeholders. In adopting this strategy, the management intended to turn the negative non-supportive relationship into a supportive stakeholder relationship. For example, when environmentalists tried to inquire on the suitability of the FIS system in conserving the environment, the steering committee took it upon them to organize a consultative and awareness forum where this specific stakeholder was comprehensively updated on the strengths of the FIS system in conserving and preserving the environment. At the conclusion of the forum, all stakeholders had joined the supportive stakeholder relationship. The influences of supportive stakeholders were addressed through a strategy that was dubbed as trustworthy involvement. This strategy placed little attention to the management of these stakeholders since they posed a low threat to the survival or successful completion of the FIS project. 5.5 Understanding the organisational culture Having established the above stakeholder management strategy, ZFP held meetings and reviewed organizational policies. This was carried with the main intention of understanding RSAFs organizational culture. From the reviewed reports and the observations made, it was established that most air force soldiers in the four airbases were technology gigs and as such, would comfortable interact with the high-tech FIS system that was being developed. 5.6 Understanding national culture characteristics of its team members and identified key stakeholders Being a Saudi Arabian technology firm and boasting a hundred percent Saudi workforce, ZFP did not experience difficulties in understanding cultural characteristics of the Saudi Kingdom. The steering committee had noted that most Saudis were tolerant, self-directed, efficient, logical, task-oriented, multi-tasking, collaborative, team-players and entrepreneurial. These characteristics were manifest in most stakeholders and were even identified by the project manager as the key strengths that propelled the FIS project to emerge a success. 5.7 How my observations compared with the literature The author had reviewed a lot of literature both from the class lectures and electronic sources. This literature had comprehensively covered amongst others the following objectives: To study some of the stakeholder concepts To understand the nature of stakeholder engagement in various projects To clearly define who the stakeholders were and go ahead to state their role in project implementation To understand the various stakeholder influences and how stakeholder management strategies were developed to counteract the established stakeholder influences. To define national and organizational culture and to establish their link with stakeholder management. Having participated in almost all project phases and keenly observed the various project activities, the author highlight that ZFP, as a reputable technology firm, was worth its reputation as one of the best Saudi Arabian technology firms. This is because of the systematic manner in which its employees implemented the various project phases. For instance, before identifying the key stakeholders, the steering team had clearly stated and established the strategy for this project. This had been followed by a comprehensive review of the factors influencing the project. The stakeholder management, though overlooked in most worldwide projects, received its value of attention with key stakeholders being clearly identified, their analysis being carried out and a management strategy established to counteract their influences. All this matched the concepts studied in the literature review. 5.8 Effective implementation of the project As the saying goes, it is always hard to achieve 100 percent success in any (project) endeavour. Despite the FIS project being declared a success, it should be noted that this project, if objectively analysed, had some weaknesses in its implementation stages. The following recommendation can be made on the stakeholder and culture management phases; which were the key themes of this study: The project management team should specifically identify the key stakeholder in any future project. This will help the management to carry out comprehensive analysis of the specific stakeholders. As such, they will adequately propose as many options of managing their influences. This is vital because it was noted that the management team had generalized some of their stakeholders. For example, instead of just listing competitors as secondary stakeholders, they should have gone ahead to identify who constituted these technology competitors. For instance, The Consolidated Contractors International Company had in many cases emerged as the greatest competitor to ZFP. There was thus need to establish a management strategy that could counteracted its influence in such multi-million technology projects. Conclusively, it should be emphasized that the presented case study has reviewed theoretical and highlighted the observations from a practical perspective. Through theoretical literature review, the author had the opportunity to expound on his knowledge on the categories of individuals that summed up the project stakeholders. Furthermore, the author found out that rational approach to stakeholder management involved exhaustive identification of stakeholders through mapping of their project roles. To add, the idea that the implementation of suitable communication processes to projects with multiple stakeholders reinforced my knowledge that communication was the key aspect of winning the support of project stakeholders. In the end, in identifying the limitation of this study, the author points out that the observations made in this project were restrictive in nature. This is because the author, being a learner, was not granted permission to study all project aspects due the restrictive measures that accompanied this military project. There is therefore need for further research to examine relationships between performance and corporate actions, key aspects which have been studied on a sketched outline in this case study.

Saturday, January 18, 2020

Mahatma Gandhi

One of the greatest men in the history of India is unarguably Mahatma Gandhi . He sacrificed his own life for the sake of his country. The respect that he earned for himself despite leading a simple lifestyle is much appreciable. Mahatma Gandhi played a vital role in the freedom struggle of India. His non violent ways and peaceful methods were the foundation for gaining independence from the British. Mahatma Gandhi was born on 2nd October at Porbandar located in Gujarat His full name was Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi He went off to South Africa after marriage and worked as barrister there for twenty years. Once while he was traveling in a train, he was thrown out of the first class compartment despite having a ticket. This made him swear that he would do his best to erase apartheid from the face of his world. He went back to India only to find that his own country was being ruled by the British and his fellow citizens were being treated harshly by British. Non Co-operation Movement One of the first series of non violent protests nationwide was the non cooperation movement started by Mahatma Gandh. In this freedom struggle, the non cooperation movement was basically aimed at making the Indians aware of the fact that the British government can be opposed and if done actively, it will keep a check on them. Thus, educational institutions were boycotted, foreign goods were boycotted, and people let go off their nominated seats in government institutions. Though the movement failed, Indians awakened to the concept of going against the British. Civil Disobedience Movement Gandhi again took off with another non violent movement known as the civil disobedience movement. This movement was more active than the non cooperation movement and brought about a revolution of sorts. This movement aimed at bringing the British administration to a stop by withdrawing support from everything. There was agitation against land revenue, abolition of salt tax, cutting down military expenditure, levying duty on foreign cloth, etc. A very important movement was that of Salt Satyagraha where Gandhi undertook the Dandi march as a protest against the Salt tax.

Thursday, January 9, 2020

Ibn Khaldun Achievements and Profile

Ibn Khaldun is an important figure in Medieval History. Key Facts Other Names: Ibn Khaldun was also known as Abu Zayd Abd al-Rahman ibn Khaldun. Notable Achievements: Ibn Khaldun was noted for developing one of the earliest nonreligious philosophies of history. He is generally considered the greatest Arab historian as well as the father of sociology and the science of history. Occupations: PhilosopherWriter HistorianDiplomatTeacher Places of Residence and Influence: AfricaIberia Important Dates Born: May 27, 1332Died: March 17, 1406 (some references have 1395) Quotation Attributed to Ibn Khaldun He who finds a new path is a pathfinder, even if the trail has to be found again by others; and he who walks far ahead of his contemporaries is a leader, even though centuries pass before he is recognized as such. About Ibn Khaldun Abu Zayd Abd al-Rahman ibn Khaldun  came from an illustrious family and enjoyed an excellent education in his youth. Both his parents died when the Black Death struck Tunis in 1349. At the age of 20, he was given a post at the court of Tunis and later became secretary to the sultan of Morocco in Fez. In the late 1350s, he was imprisoned for two years for suspicion of participating in a rebellion. After being released and promoted by a new ruler, he again fell out of favor, and he decided to go to Granada. Ibn Khaldun had served the Muslim ruler of Granada in Fez, and Granadas prime minister, Ibn al-Khatib, was a renowned writer and a good friend to Ibn Khaldun. A year later he was sent to Seville to conclude a peace treaty with King Pedro I of Castile, who treated him with great generosity. However, intrigue raised its ugly head and rumors were spread of his disloyalty, adversely affecting his friendship with Ibn al-Khatib. He returned to Africa, where he changed employers with unfortunate frequency and served in a variety of administrative posts. In 1375, Ibn Khaldun sought refuge from the tumultuous political sphere with the tribe of Awlad Arif. They lodged him and his family in a castle in Algeria, where he spent four years writing the  Muqaddimah.   Illness drew him back to Tunis, where he continued his writing until difficulties with the current ruler prompted him to leave once more. He moved to Egypt and eventually took a teaching post at the Quamhiyyah college in Cairo, where he later became chief judge of the Maliki rite, one of the four recognized rites of Sunnite Islam. He took his duties as judge very seriously -- perhaps too seriously for most of the tolerant Egyptians, and his term did not last long. During his time in Egypt, Ibn Khaldun was able to make a pilgrimage to Mecca and visit Damascus and Palestine. Except for one incident in which he was forced to participate in a palace revolt, his life there was relatively peaceful—until Timur invaded Syria. The new sultan of Egypt, Faraj, went out to meet Timur and his victorious forces, and Ibn Khaldun was among the notables he took with him. When the Mamluk army returned to Egypt, they left Ibn Khaldun in besieged Damascus. The city fell into great peril, and the city leaders began negotiations with Timur, who asked to meet Ibn Khaldun. The illustrious scholar was lowered over the city wall by ropes in order to join the conqueror. Ibn Khaldun spent nearly two months in the company of Timur, who treated him with respect. The scholar used his years of accumulated knowledge and wisdom to charm the ferocious conqueror, and when Timur asked for a description of North Africa, Ibn Khaldun gave him a complete written report. He witnessed the sack of Damascus and the burning of the great mosque, but he was able to secure safe passage from the decimated city for himself and other Egyptian civilians. On his way home from Damascus, laden with gifts from Timur, Ibn Khaldun was robbed and stripped by a band of Bedouin. With the greatest of difficulty, he made his way to the coast, where a ship belonging to the Sultan of Rum, carrying an ambassador to the sultan of Egypt, took him to Gaza. Thus he established contact with the rising Ottoman Empire. The rest of Ibn Khalduns journey and, indeed, the rest of his life was relatively uneventful. He died in 1406 and was buried in the cemetery outside one of Cairos main gates. Ibn Khalduns Writings Ibn Khalduns most significant work is the Muqaddimah. In this introduction to history, he discussed historical methods and provided the necessary criteria for distinguishing historical truth from error. The Muqaddimah is considered one of the most phenomenal works on the philosophy of history ever written. Ibn Khaldun also wrote a definitive history of Muslim North Africa, as well as an account of his eventful life in an autobiography entitled Al-tarif bi Ibn Khaldun. More Ibn Khaldun Resources Biographies Ibn Khaldun His Life and Work by M. A. EnanIbn Khaldun: Historian, Sociologist Philosopher by Nathaniel Schmidt Philosophical and Sociological Works Ibn Khaldun: An Essay in Reinterpretation (Arabic Thought and Culture) by Aziz Al-AzmehIbn Khaldun and Islamic Ideology (International Studies in Sociology and Social Anthropology) edited by B. LawrenceSociety, State, and Urbanism: Ibn Khalduns Sociological Thought by Fuad BaaliSocial Institutions: Ibn Khalduns Social Thought by Fuad BaaliIbn Khalduns Philosophy of History - A Study in the Philosophic Foundation of the Science of Culture by Muhsin Mahdi Works by Ibn Khaldun Muqaddimah by Ibn Khaldun; translated by Franz Rosenthal; edited by N. J. DowoodAn Arab Philosophy of History: Selections from the Prolegomena of Ibn Khaldun of Tunis (1332-1406) by Ibn Khaldun; translated by Charles Philip Issawi

Wednesday, January 1, 2020

Evaluation Of A Projects Sustainability - 1352 Words

The TE didn’t give explicit rating for the project’s sustainability. Instead, it analyzed the potential for sustainability of project achievements by the project’s 5 technical focus areas. The PIR 2000-2006 constantly assessed the risks of the following six categories to the project: a. Pilot projects will not be able to proceed because external financing is no longer available; b. CREIA (The Chinese Renewable Energy Industries Association) does not receive any direct subsidies from the UNDP/GEF Project and will not be economically sustainable after 5 years because of low income generating capacity; c. The implementing capacity of national organizations is weak and the responsibility for the implementation of multiple outputs†¦show more content†¦The TE reported some immediate financial support was provided to sustain the impact of the project (not the project itself):† i. The Project resulted in the formal initiation of the long-term wind resource assessment national project in China, which secured a total of RMB 300 million (about US$40.7 million) of financial support from the national budget; ii. The results of the Project prompted the government to establish a national target for building 100 biogas power plants in China.† (TE, p.148) There is also evidence of low risk regarding the financial sustainability of the project. The risks identified by the PIR related to the financial resource sustainability is â€Å"Pilot projects will not be able to proceed because external financing is no longer available† and â€Å"CREIA does not receive any direct subsidies from the UNDP/GEF Project and will not be economically sustainable after 5 years because of low income generating capacity†. For the project’s external financing, 2006 PIR rated it as â€Å"non-critical†, and 2005 PIR rated it as â€Å"low risk†, due to â€Å"All projects are completed at this point with respect to financing iss ues.†(PIR 2006, p.43). For the self-sufficiency of CREIA, 2006 PIR rated it as â€Å"non-critical†, and 2005 PIR rated it as â€Å"low risk† due to â€Å"CREIA is functioning as a fully