Thursday, October 31, 2019
Doing Business in Europe, Asia and the Americas Research Paper
Doing Business in Europe, Asia and the Americas - Research Paper Example Typically, these consisted independent operations in the handle of an expatriate. In its proliferation, the facilitation of information flow prompted the creation of offshore headquarters which functioned isolate of the local core group (Barber, J. P. 2002, pp.1-5). However, these international structures had about one third of the offshore venture in the form of shared ownership (Casseres 2006, p. 4). What firms manifest these days is cognizant of the global outlook. Less differentiation is placed on the local operations vis-a-vis the international division. Strategic structures shift authority and responsibility to the central domain, without the former 'single line authority' in force, rather a multiple lines responsibility (Barber, J. P. 2002, pp.1-5). Sheer size is given importance in the new corporate international strategy (Egelhoff 1988, p. 1-14). These firms have similar and complimenting features, when combined can operate more competently. They are alike because each is an industry icon that spells out of a history of corporate prestige. In the same way these firms compliment, having pursued a different market position in product lines such as novelty brands Oreo cookies over dairy milk chocolate. Cadbury and Kraft supplement one another in geographical footprint, thus distribution lines are less redundant, if not broadened (Beaudin, 2010). In the context and analysis of industry, a pair of firms can operate more competently when combined. In fact, dissimilar capabilities are often synchronized in the manufacture of opposite goods (Casseres 2006, p. 8-12). Acquisitions improve efficiency by seizure of synergies between firms (Crosoni, Gomes, McGinn, & Noth 2004, p.481-512). When put together, Cadbury-Kraft becomes an industry powerhouse. Both sum up an unrivalled portfolio of tremendous potential (The Independent 2010, sc. 2-4). The long term forecast revenues are estimated at a strait annual 5% upward trend in revenues and company growth at 9-11%. On its own, Kraft revenues rises at about 4% with company growth of 7- 9%. A prolonged growth in revenues determines annual cost savings of $625 million (Value Expectations 2010, sc. 1-3). It is argued that such transformation creates larger economies of scale higher and larger geographical markets (Lambrecht 2000, p.1-4). The takeover is meant to reshape market competition, imposing influence on emerging markets. The industry for chocolate and sweets is quite gaping and loosely split between international conglomerates: Mars, Wrigley, Kraft, Hershey, Ferrero and Nestl (Beaudin 2010, sc. 1-4). By the acquisition of Cadbury, Kraft assumes to suppress rivalry by the bundle of capabilities (Casseres 2006, p. 8-12). In other words, the industry turns out to be less competitive and too concentrated (Crosoni, Gomes, McGinn, & Noth 2004, p.481-512). And why global shares are expected to rise by 5% points from the estimated 20% holding for both firms (Value Expectations 2010, sc. 1-3). Takeovers can reduce production costs at minimal or result in
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
Human resource Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 1
Human resource - Essay Example In order to deal with these influences, it is essential for managers to develop their internal structures and employees’ behaviors to enable them handle the external forces. The environment in which an organization operates in is responsible for organizational activities and their eventual outcomes. This paper evaluates the effects of external factors on Human Resource Planning (Rothwell and Kazanas, 2003, P.176). Economic uncertainty Economic factors have a direct effect on recruitment, staffing and rewards that employers can give to their workers. The reason is that demand and supply law holds that when supply of labor is high, employers can obtain labour at lower prices, and when demand exceeds supply, and then employers have to pay higher wages and benefits. In instances where a country’s economy is growing at a positive rate, companies register high demand for their goods and services. In order to cope with such demand, organizations recruit more labor force, event ually lowering the rate of unemployment. When there is low level unemployment, the need for professional workers increases. This necessitates for organizations to enhance their employee retention and training strategies. When the economy is growing at a negative rate, demand for products and services reduces, and firms have to grapple with that in two ways. One option is laying off some workers, or lowering the amount of wages and benefits for in a bid to retain existing employees. Unemployment rates increase and employers are overwhelmed with applicants for advertised vacancies (Mathis and Jackson, 2008, P.454). Socio-cultural context Population trends are a key driver of the social sphere. This is demonstrated in the counter-cyclical shifts, in population trends. UK and other parts of the globe are registering increasing population growth. However, eastern and western Europe is registering low birth rates. United Kingdom in particular and Europe in general experience numbers of mi grants, resulting in an increase in the size of the prospective labor force. Moreover, migrants also form a considerable portion of consumers for the country’s goods and services. Kandula (2007, p 59) notes that the high number of the aging citizens marks a loss in the pool of knowledge, skills and capabilities. The reason is that elderly people have so much knowledge from the organization, and their retirement and departure from the workforce creates a significant gap in organizations. Kandula further notes that elderly people have a vast number of needs and special services. For illustration, elderly people require welfare benefits and caregivers, which is extra consumption for the country. United Kingdom is also registering high an increasing gap between the affluent and the poor. This results in the rise of socio-economic disparity that creates an increase in asset prices. Cascio and Boudreau (2012, P.51) note that socio-economic developments influence organizations human resources in one way or the other, particularly through the supply and demand for labor and consumption goods. Other social trends are such as rising divorce rates and rising numbers of single parents, drug use and changing roots of social individuality. The effect of these trends results in solo-living among people of all ages. Reduced interest in social conformity, vanity and individual
Sunday, October 27, 2019
Understanding The Issues Of Information Overload
Understanding The Issues Of Information Overload In this paper we discussed about Understanding information overload and the common causes of information overload, the disadvantages of information overload for an organization, managing information flow in order to minimize the effect of information overload for the organization, the role of information professional to overcome the information overload extract the useful information. Hope the readers will benefited. Information Overload is an increasing problem both in the workplace and in life in general. It is a state in which the amount of available information is so overwhelming a person is unable to effectively process and utilize it. Information overload is intuitively noticeable in our daily lives. Walking any street, we can hardly measure the amount of information we are exposed to. Information hits us from all directions, newspapers, television, voice mail, cellular phones, email, electronic memos, and the World Wide Web, to name a few. This increase in information, combined with the factor of change in many aspects of our lives, can lead to an unhealthy effect. Information Overload is when you are trying to deal with more information than you are able to process to make sensible decisions. The result is either that you either delay making decisions, or that you make the wrong decisions. . Understanding Information overload The first recorded use of the phrase information overload was used by the futurologist Alvin Toffler in 1970, when he predicted that the rapidly increasing amounts of information being produced would eventually cause people problems. Heylighen (1999) noted, People exposed to the rapid changes of modern life may develop a state of helplessness and inadequacy. Nelson (2001) defines information overload as the incapability to obtain a form of knowledge from a massive amount of information for one reason or another. Information overload can take place for one of these reasons: 1. Not understanding the existing information 2. Feeling inundated by the need to absorb huge amounts of information 3. Not knowing if the needed information exists or not 4. Not knowing where to obtain the information 5. Knowing where the information is but have no access privilege Causes of Information overload Information overload was experienced long before the appearance of information technology and electronic gadgets. Complaints about too many books echo across the centuries, from when books were papyrus rolls, parchment manuscripts, or hand printed. After Printing innovation books were produced and accumulated in unprecedented numbers, and, given their drop in cost, many more readers than before had access to more books than they could read. In the Internet era where millions of smart phones and gadgets are sold every day, zillions of tons of data are being produced. Thus making people spoilt for choices. With a touch, one can easily get almost any data from any corner of the world. The rate of production of different kinds of data such as news, text, multimedia and graphs is breathtaking. For example: YouTube where 24 hours of video is being uploaded in every minute and the rate is increasing everyday. There are millions of sites are there and even the IP address is going to be exhausted. One could imagine the amount of electronic data that is available to digest. Organizations accumulate a huge amount of information about its internal operations and resources. Fifteen years ago only phone, fax and post mails were used for communication. There is a general increase in business communication by voice mail, e-mail, internet and online conferencing in addition to the above mentioned traditional methods which results information overload. Disadvantages of information overload for an organization Too little or too much information is not good for an individual and an organization. Too much reduces their ability to concentrate effectively on the most important messages. People facing information overload sometimes try to cope by ignoring some of the messages, by delaying responses to messages they deem unimportant, by answering only parts of some messages, by responding inaccurately to certain messages, by taking less time with each message, or by reacting only superficially to all messages. Persons exposed to excessive amounts of information are less productive, prone to make poor decisions, and risk suffering serious stress-related diseases. He becomes highly selective and ignore a large amount of information or give up and dont go beyond the first results in many cases, need more time to reach a decision, make mistakes, have difficulties in identifying the relationship between the details and the overall perspective and waste time. Information overload affects-and afflicts-both individual knowledge workers, struggling to perform their jobs while drowning in data, and entire office organizations, whose productivity and customer care suffer as a consequence. The abundance of information we enjoy today comes at a price. Less apparent is the tremendous hidden cost it imposes on the organization as a whole. In one study, for example, people took an average of nearly 25 minutes to return to a work task after an email interruption. Another study found that time lost to handling unnecessary e-mail and recovering from information interruptions cost Intel nearly $1 billion a year. An article in the October issue of HBR, found that forcing knowledge workers to take weekly breaks from email and other work distractions improved performance. Information Overload on an organization is to understand all the lost opportunities it causes and inefficiencies produced. The amount of information has increased for a number of reasons: there is a general increase in business communication, in-company and with customers and suppliers; trends such as globalisation and deregulation increase competition; companies are downsizing and fewer secretaries are employed to protect people from information; more outsourcing means a wider range of other companies with which it is necessary to communicate. There are also more ways to communicate: by fax, voice mail, e-mail, internet and online conferencing, in addition to the more traditional methods, telephone, meetings, post and telex. The cost to business Time is wasted. People spend too much time looking for information. 38% of managers surveyed waste substantial amounts of time just looking for information. Factors such as the holding of files in different software formats and the speed of the internet at critical times of day contribute to this. Decisions are often delayed: 43% of respondents though that decisions were delayed and otherwise adversely affected by analysis paralysis or the existence of too much information. 47% of respondents said that information collection distracts them from their main responsibilities. They find it difficult to develop strategies for dealing with the information they retrieve. It is interesting to imagine the potential increase in productivity if all distractions were removed. The human costs The study identified for the first time that information overload contributes to stress. Two out of three respondents associated information overload with tension with colleagues and loss of job satisfaction. 42% attributed ill-health to this stress. 61% said that they have to cancel social activities as a result of information overload and 60% that they are frequently too tired for leisure activities. National differences In general these were not considered to be of great significance. Managers in the USA and the United Kingdom get the most unsolicited information. Asian managers appear to need less information to make decisions: only 9% claimed to need enormous amounts of information compared with 31% in the United States. Their major decisions may be made through intuition to a greater extent. More United States managers (39%) agree that they suffer stress than those in the UK and Hong Kong. People can no longer develop effective personal strategies for managing information. Faced with an onslaught of information and information channels, they have become unable to develop simple routines for managing information. Technologies for managing information are often the problem, not the solution. They can create the M25 effect: more lanes just means more traffic. People create and distribute because they can, not because its useful. Intranets can become like the internet full of home-made home pages and dead links. Intelligent agents frequently do not live up to their name. Current research suggests that the surging volume of available information-and its interruption of peoples work-can adversely affect not only personal well-being but also decision making, innovation, and productivity. In one study, for example, people took an average of nearly 25 minutes to return to a work task after an e-mail interruption. Thats bad news for both individuals and their organizations. Theres hope, though. Innovative tools and techniques promise relief for those of us struggling with information inundation. Some are technological solutions-software that automatically sorts and prioritizes incoming e-mail, for instance-designed to regulate or divert the deluge. Others prevent people from drowning by getting them to change the way they behave and think. Who knows: Maybe someday even I will enjoy swimming in the powerful currents of information that now threaten to pull me under. Before we can take action / set the procedure to minimize the negative effect of information overload, we should do the analysis of information flows both individual and organisation. Not only for electronic information source such email, but also for spoken words, reading books and talking to friends and family. The analysis is started with identification what information we need based on our key information areas, when we need the information, to whom we should exchange the information with (information sharing), and why we need the information and how we turn the information into results. After understand the information flow, we will be able to set/construct the procedure of information handling which consists of filtering, information pruning, time management, to-do list and optimization the use of current technology as information organizing and distributing tool. There are two types of filtering information i.e. technical filter and daily communication filter. The technical filter is easier to manage as once we set our preference it will work accordingly. An example of technical filter is filter function that is available in e-mails. Filtering daily communication is more difficult because it depends much on the situation and current conversation at that time. Every reaction to another person is an indication of what you want to hear or not hear during the rest of the conversation. We often think that the information is important/useful for the recipient which actually not from recipient point of view. Filter prime our thinking and test whether the new information is important. However, the filter should not be too rigid, as it may exclude coincidences. We will no longer accidentally stumble across information, as is often part of searches on the internet. As regards of second information flow, we can decide more quickly to simply stop receiving it if the information is just nice to know instead of need to know. We will not miss anything as we dont use this information for making decision. Besides that, this less important information will leave us less time for really important information. There is a tool for technical pruning such as setting up the expiry date and which action should we take e.g. file, cancel, delete, etc. Time management is important as time is always in exceedingly short supply. We never enough with the time that we have. Therefore, attention and concentration are important aspect in time management. With full attention and concentration the time spent for managing information is more efficient. Because we need to remember increasingly more, we need an aid i.e. to do list of actions so that we can keep tracking what things we still need to do/settle. This practice alone will give us a lot of added value. Besides the to-do list, it is also good if we also make not-to-list so that when the time come, we are ready. Nowadays with high technology we can optimize the IT to help us to organize and distribute the information.
Friday, October 25, 2019
affirmative action :: essays research papers
Affirmative Action                                         Kenneth Huttner                                         ECO 325                                         Professor Krall                                         April 24, 2002      Discrimination is a problem that has plagued our country for many years. In the past few decades the government has been attempting to correct the problem through anti discrimination legislation. Some of the biggest programs have been through affirmative action. There is a general consensus that there are problems in our society with discrimination in many areas. But the questions we must ask are: Is affirmative action a just way to solve the problem of discrimination? Is affirmative action constitutional or is it reverse discrimination? And how do we go about solving the problem of discrimination if not through affirmative action? President Kennedy first introduced affirmative action in 1961 although he did not really possess the power to do much about it without the support of Congress. Affirmative action was expanded into the arena of government contracts. Kennedy made a declaration that said that upon accepting a government contract the contractor must pledge not to discriminate against any applicants or employees on the basis of race, creed, color, or national origin(Elliot and Ewoh, p212). Although the contractors made this pledge there was not much enforcement of it. In 1964 congress took steps battle discrimination in the workplace. Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act said that no person could be discriminated against on the basis of race, color, or national origin when it came to publicly funded programs. This was expanded in 1965 when president Johnson declared that the government would provide equal opportunity employment. Then in 1967 this was again expanded to make it illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender as well as race(Elliot and Ewoh, p213). In 1970 the Department of Labor ordered that all contractors with government contracts, fifty or more employees, and received $50,000 or more in assistance had to develop an extensive affirmative action plan to include minorities in areas where they lacked representation(Elliot and Ewoh, p213). These plans had to include in depth research with goals and timetables, which would be met by the contractors. If the goals were not met then the government would no longer enter into contracts with the contractors. This was called order No. 4, and was revised in 1971 to include women(Elliot and Ewoh, p213). At this time affirmative action was not quota based. Later Jimmy Carter would give the responsibility of overseeing these mandates to the Equal Employment Opportunity Committee.
Thursday, October 24, 2019
Public Speaking †Sharing and the Future Essay
Here’s a thought for you. What is the worlds greatest computer? Mac? PC? How about the huge mainframe computers they have at Nasa? No. You see up here, in our heads. This is the greatest computer. And your eyes, I see you still all have your eyes open, that’s good. But do you know what you are seeing? I mean really seeing. Every second, every single second your eyes take in 72 gigabytes of information. The world’s greatest camera. Now is that not incredible? A computer and a camera. And this data, this code, is up here behind the firewall of our personality. 6 billion neurons, evolved to understand, to translate, to give us our vision of the world around us. The mountains, rivers, great Savannahs, every animal in all their incredible shapes and sizes†¦ Friends family, lovers, the people around you now. Everything and everyone you have ever met are all up here. They are all stories, memories charged with emotion. Your happiness, your sadness, your joy, frustration your loves, your loves lost. And this collection of stories makes you. An ongoing project that only comes to an end when we die. Your memories are your life. Above all we have a genetic imperative, a unique desire, to share. What makes us human? Our sense of self and our ability to share who we are. Our greatest gift. Lets rewind a little. Cave paintings. First we paint to say I was here. Then we paint to say why we are here, to pass on knowledge, experience. To build on what we know. For this is evolution†¦ sharing for survival. We share more and more, now we share our fiends, we share our favorite on Youtube, our location, we share photos, maybe sometimes even a drink. Every time we share we are reflecting our personality. Our selves. But this is normal. Innovation changes the game. Always. 20,000 years ago. 1,000. 10 years. Tomorrow. It doesn’t matter. Interference is a good thing. Whether it be a smile or a tattoo, the phone in your pocket. Disruption and interference of all sorts, creates rifts and makes possible unimaginable leaps forward in technology and communication. Today we see a world on fire. On fire with data. With information. But there is a revolution around the corner, nothing less than the total translation of our human emotions, these urges into information. Pure communication. I believe we are at the frontier. Ahead lies the internet of us. An internet of pure emotion – genuine connection. To finally take us beyond the cave painting. This is not science fiction. Doctors can talk to people in comas, you can control a toy with your mind. This is now. A world of shared emotion. Where the greatest experiences are magnified, a million, a billion times. Can you imagine love? Now can you imagine a love that is a billion times more powerful? An empathy†¦ true feeling. A new future. A world that we will create, but the borders of language will be gone. Imagine what we would be able to achieve. The next generation of us is coming. For tomorrow is the future we all share. here is a thought for you, what is the worlds greatest computer? Mac? PC? how about the huge mainframe computers they have at NASA? No. you see it Jo here in our heads, this is the worlds greatest computer. and your eyes, I see you still have your eyes open, that’s good. but do you know what you are seeing? I mean really seeing? Every second, every single second your eyes take in 72 gigabytes of information, the worlds greatest camera. Now is that not incredible. A computer and a camera. and this data this code is hidden up here behind the firewall of our personality. 86 billion neurons evolved to understand, to translate, to give us our vision of the world around us.
Wednesday, October 23, 2019
Body Alterations
Cosmetic surgery is the most common kind of plastic surgery nowadays. It consists on medical practices intended for enhancing one’s appearance, maintaining it or embellishing it beyond an average level toward an esthetic ideal. Tattoos, piercings and any other ornaments are applications that also take the human’s body as their final object. In his essay â€Å"The Body Jigsaw†, Philippe Liotard states that cosmetic surgery and body alterations stand at opposite sides. In the following, I’m going to take a position relatively to the above statement, before analyzing the situation in my home society, Lebanon. First of all, Liotard believes that body modifications are ways that one can use in order to look different from the common mass. For him, it is as expression of â€Å"refusal to comply with social norms†(Liotard, 264). So far, it’s true that having a foreign tattoo or a piercing in a society that doesn’t originally apply them commonly makes a person looks out of the box. Moreover, different combinations of body alterations emphasize the uniqueness of each individual and reflect a mixture of cultures. On the opposite side, cosmetic surgery can be applied for several reasons. One of them is looking for example as a certain idol, celebrity or any public figure. This aim is becoming very redundant between women who seek having this actress’ nose or that singer’s lips. From this way of thinking, we can say that cosmetic surgery promotes a kind of stereotype. For that, the uniqueness of each individual is abolished. For this way of interpretation, I stand on the same shore as the author. Moving to my home society, views and opinions concerning both â€Å"alternative†body alterations and cosmetic surgery vary a lot. There’s no single common way of handling these applications. In fact, some alterations are rejected while others can be tolerated. For most Lebanese, a familiar thought is that piercing as well as others body ornaments or some techniques are not manly. For that, a man with a pierced ear is subject to negative connotations. On the other hand, tattoos for instance are accepted to a certain extend. Concerning cosmetic surgery, we encounter three main categories of opinions. There are some people who completely support these surgeries whereas others reject them completely while some have intermediate views. As far as I’m concerned, I don’t mind people having a tattoo even though I won’t do it. I personally believe that the decision of having a permanent tattoo is based on mood or temporary convictions that can collapse with time. On the contrary, I’m not against having a temporary one. Also, about cosmetic surgeries, I support them when they aim to correct an inborn defect or an accidental one. A personal experience I had was when I broke my nose and the only solution was having a surgery to repair the bad appearance caused by the accident. On the opposite side, I disapprove plastic surgeries when they are applied just to have someone else’s nose, lips†¦ To sum up, I agree that cosmetic surgery and â€Å"alternative†body alterations are philosophical antonyms even though they both affect the body. And, like in everything else, the best use of body alterations relies in moderation. As a Lebanese proverb says: â€Å"Every excess means less†Works Cited Liotard, Philippe. â€Å"The Body Jigsaw†. Shades of Gray. 2nd edition. Ed. Zane Sinno et al. Essex: Pearson, 2008. Print
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