“On the Sidewalk Bleeding” by Evan Hunter Essay

In the short story â€Å"On the Sidewalk Bleeding† by Evan Hunter, we learn that the main character of the story, Andy, is struggling to remove his jacket while he lay in an alley bleeding. We also learned that it was very painful for Andy to move, let alone take off the silk jacket, but he did so anyway. The jacket he wore symbolized his belonging to a city gang called The Royals. Andy wanted to remove his jacket in his last moments because he did not want people to think of him as being just another member of The Royals; he wanted to be remembered as Andy. Andy did not want to be portrayed as simply another young teenager who was caught up in city gang violence, but as himself; and so he tried to remove it. Andy knew that if he died, he would no longer be a Royal, but just simply Andy. While lying in the alleyway, Andy realized that the only reason a member of The Guardians, their opposing gang, stabbed him was because of his purple silk jacket that had the words â€Å"The Royals† stitched to the back of it. The words of his attacker continuously repeated in his mind; â€Å"That’s for you Royal!† Andy knew that the knife that cut through him did not hate Andy, but hated the jacket. Andy realized that the title of being a Royal was no longer as important to him as it once was. The jacket he had once worn with pride had meant nothing to him, and was the cause of the stabbing that occurred. Andy wondered why he thought the fights, the jumps and the purple jacket were once so important to him. While he was dying, he finally realized that being a Royal was not worth it because he had just wasted his time. Andy suddenly felt as though he had never done anything, seen anything or been anywhere. Although it was painful for Andy to remove the jacket, he did so in his last moments because he had realized how stupid being part of a gang was. Andy struggled to remove his jacket from his backside because he no longer wanted to be part of gang violence. Andy did not want to be a Royal.

Life of Pi Pre-Read Socratic Seminar

Pi reflects on religion constantly, but he does mention that he always goes back to his Hindu customs and rituals that he grew up with. Do you believe that religious or people with strong belief systems growing up always have that religion as their bases for many decisions in their life? Does that religious belief ever change? I feel as though the religion will always be the base for decisions. Even if the person may stray away from that religion, the foundation that was put into their mind by that religion will stay. I know that for me, I grew up in a Christian environment.I went to all the Sunday school classes, VBS activities, volunteered at church, but I remember soon getting very agitated with the very people who I knew to be Christian. My family were leaders within the Christian community: pastors, musicians, teachers, wives of pastors, so it didn’t quite make sense that I saw them in acts of betrayal, dishonesty, and anger toward one another. Despite my becoming Atheist at that point in my life, I couldn’t relinquish the morals that I had grown up with: unconditional love for others, forgiveness, non-violence and conservation of the body and mind.I may not have sensed God’s presence then and there, but the religion was still there. In all instances of my life, I still find myself trying my best to follow the morals I grew up with no matter what I come to believe. I see that today in society it is important to raise our children in a well-mannered household. If a parent wants them to grow up well, they must teach them first the morals they want their family to uphold. But they must also place a certain amount of importance on it and let the child understand that it IS important and MUST be followed or it won’t stick with them.I don’t think that the religion or morals change, however meld themselves to fit the new beliefs of the person. If they believe so strongly toward something, they WILL keep it and honor it. Pi state s that the compulsion to make life more livable by inventing a better story is natural instinct both to mankind and animals alike. Is this so of society today? Do we still have the need to conform? How much of a â€Å"better story† can one make before it becomes too unrealistic? Psychologically it is a need to make ourselves look and feel good. It is a way for us to maintain an image of ourselves.It’s a way we attract our mates and a good self-esteem booster. Confidence and consistency is key in this world for us to achieve our desires. We want to be agreeable, make a social situation run smoothly, and avoid disagreement and discord at all costs, yet we do that with the price of breaking the intimacy and trust that holds a bond together. I believe that in order for humanity to survive it needs to face the facts and deal with the blows as they come. Then and only then will true strength of an individual and that individual’s relationship will come forth.I feel th at if humanity continues to lie to themselves, things will not get done. Global Warming for example is considered a myth by many because we don’t want to accept the reality that it will cause our Earth great harm; that it will cause US great harm. The same with the re-invention of stories to make a person more appealing. We don’t think they will cause harm, but they do. We break down trust and make in the end lose our loved ones and ourselves in the process. I believe ir is at this point we begin to question who we actually are and what we can truly achieve.However, I do also feel that as humanity grows deeper into crisis we need a way to escape from the harsh reality of the world. I think that as long as we are in our confines of our own mind, we can keep altering ourselves for betterment. In Pi’s case he seems to want to escape the past and pass the burden of his story to another person. When Orange Juice fights the hyena, the almost human-like nature of the o rangutan disappears and she becomes violent. Pi realizes that personality that one shows does not always beat natural instinct.Name examples where this is true or provide evidence of where it doesn’t. Can personality triumph over instinct? Personality is a big part of how we shape ourselves. The similarities and differences are shown through how we react to the diversity in the world and how we create or destroy relationships with one another. When a person feels threatened by something, or similarly with an animal, they will react almost instinctively in order to protect their being. If a person feels threatened they will yell, kick, and go bat-shit crazy. So will an animal.There is a fine line between instinct and personality. Over the years we have learned to overcome it, but in times of stress it comes out no matter how hard a person or animal has trained to keep it within. It’s like in the Jungle Book: â€Å"You can take the boy out of the jungle, but you canâ₠¬â„¢t take the jungle out of the boy. † The instinct is our body’s natural way of protecting ourselves. I do feel though that over time and through much work a person and an animal can overcome their fears and obstacles to becomes a less threatening being. So yes, personality will triumph both in my heart and in Pi’s.I think that Pi saw this fine line of personality vs instinct and knew full well how even though society has become more modern, there are still things in this world that offset the balance: natural disasters, politics, and religion. That is why I think Pi puts so much stress on the detail that to him religions were based off love and compassion toward everyone and everything. He is confused with how people react like animals when it comes to their beliefs. Simply put, they are threatened. Scared that the balance will now be leaning more towards one side and that another will gain the power and become the â€Å"Alpha† being.

Internet security Essay

Our instructor gave us an assignment and I had to look for some information from the online library. I dashed to the public library nearby and at the entrance I was greeted by a sign with the words â€Å"Internet security enforced† So the internet services offered by the library had at last been secured! In the current world the term internet is very common. As Curtin admits in his essay on Introduction to network security â€Å"This is a word that I have heard way too often in the last few years. Movies, books, newspapers, magazines, television programs, and practically every other sort of media imaginable have dealt with the internet recently. Internet is a term used to refer to a ‘network of other networks’ (Curtin, par 21-22). Internet has a history in itself. It was created mainly to improve the interactions among different researchers sponsored by the government. The internet grew rapidly in the years of 1980s in educational institutions, business organizations, government agencies and international institutions. By the years of 1990s, internet usage had phenomenally grown and the networking had increased at a very fast rate compared to any network that had ever been used before like telephone use for networking. When a look is made into the present, millions and millions of internet users are connected with majority being those in business (NIST, par 7). The internet technology works magic in this advanced society. However, one is at risk of attacks sneaking through the front door if the internet site is insecure and the computer system is not ready to handle such cases of insecurity. It is thus important to have internet security. What then is internet security? Internet Security Concept To get a better insight of the positive and the negative side of internet security as part of technology, it is important to understand the concept ‘Internet security’. Security seems to be an ambiguous term. Everyone argues differently of what this is and furthermore the acceptable risk levels. Internet security entails the protection of the network against threats. Security is an issue for not only everyone but also everything. Even the internet needs to be secured from threats such as viruses (Curtin, par 104-105). Viruses are the source of computer system insecurity. Virus is software that clings to host software. It uses the host’s ability to replicate itself. When the host program is executed, the host also executes its duty. It also attaches itself to other programs. Viruses erase programs, steal personal information or declare their presence blocking important information. They pose great dangers to computer system. Therefore computer systems need to be secured (MacForensicsLab, par 17-28). Benefits of Internet Security The benefits that accrue from a secure internet are far reaching and wide. Furthermore, it takes less to prevent than to cure. The main purpose of internet security is to give protection against viruses. Viruses are the greatest evil doers when it comes to the information technology (NIST, par7-10). Just like any other virus that cause diseases, computer viruses are on the increase all of which have their origin from the widely used internet. They can be so dangerous to a computer system and can lead to its destruction. Such infections can lead to loss of important data. Internet security programs such as antivirus ensure that all data obtained from the internet is scanned to remove all the unwanted programs and viruses. Antivirus is a strong antibiotic that strongly fights the computer viruses. This ensures that the incoming information is clean and safe for use in a computer system (Kapsersky, par 6-9). Internet security keeps one’s information confidential. The world of technology has greatly expanded. Internet technology can however be applied wrongly. For instance, if a system is not secure, other person can get access to the system via the internet. Some unwanted programs can be launched into the computer’s memory. However, the security put as a guard warns users of such dangerous processes and prevents harmful changes that may be done on the file system. Internet security also protects the computer from spyware; confidential information such as bank account numbers, passwords and details from credit cards is secured from being viewed by intruders (Kapsersky, par 13). Internet security protects a computer system from hackers. Technology have gone too far such that it is possible to scan another computer’s ports through the network. Such hackers are malicious and are done to attack the network. What the internet security does is to block any further communication with that computer that attempting to attack (Kapsersky, par 16). Furthermore, some internet security programs allow users to only access secure intranet or internet. The firewall determines the limits of the rules. More so a computer can be prevented from visibility by other computers online. Once a certain mode such as stealth mode has been switched on, the computer becomes invisible from other networks. All other network activities ceases apart from the specified. Therefore any plans to invade the systems are altered. Internet security can therefore guard the whole system from attacks by viruses such as the Trojan horse and prevents a computers data access by any unauthorized personnel (Kapsersky, par 18-19). Most of the internet security focus on the physical infrastructures; the network itself. However, there are others that provide total solution as far as internet security is concerned. That is, the network, applications as well as platforms. Examples of these include, Microsoft NT (R) as well as UNIX (R). A protection that is over all is the best for a total security of the computer from the internet ‘evils’. Internet Security provides protection services to enable various organizations in the implementation of a secure access to data as well as assets through the World Wide Web (Business Wire, par 2-3). Damages Caused By Internet If a computer system is not protected, threats may end up ruining the overall system. Computer software and other accessories are exposed to harms from the internet and hence their functioning. There is therefore need to ensure that the system is safeguarded before accessing the internet. Security is ensured by various programs such as antivirus. They detect presence of a virus into a system and repair the situation through a command. Unsecured sites are open to any intruder (NIST, par 9-12). However ‘evil’ internet security has also emerged. ‘Evil’ technology has also continued to evolve currently. There are some stronger viruses that have been made by criminals that the antivirus is unable to detect such as the Trojan Horse. Trojan Horse make defense almost impossible. It exploits the weakness in the user to find some entry into the secured system. The malware pretends to be of importance to the user. The user will be attracted and execute the malware in disguise (MacForensicsLab par 17-28). The virus in it is hidden in the payload and when in the system performs the desired function by its author. The malware can steal information as well as property from a ‘secure’ system. Personal information is stolen to assist in theft from a person’s bank account, credit card and other important areas. The same knowledge that was used to make the internet secure has made it more insecure. Stronger virus programs have also come up through technology to counter the antivirus. Through pretence to give the system security, the viruses find their way (MacForensicsLab par 17-28). Some antivirus has as a result become weak and cannot detect the strong viruses such as the Trojan horse and Autorun viruses. Just like in the Trojan data access, data will also be ruined even in the presence of antivirus (NIST, par 9-12). Conclusion Technology is advanced day in and day out to make better man’s world. Some many discoveries on technology have been made such as the internet. It has been widely adopted in all spheres of human live. Despite the interne technology benefits, it has been misused. Through technology dangerous programs have been made and they are a great threat to internet users such as viruses. More technology has come up with programs to secure the internet. In spite of this security stronger viruses find their way into the system such as the Trojan horse. Something needs to be done to fight the stronger viruses. Work Cited Business Wire. Internet Security Advantages, Inc Offers Secure Centralized Access & Control Consulting Services for Web-Based Business Applications. BNET, 1 July 1998 Web. 5 June, 2010, . Curtin, Matt. Introduction to Network Security. Kent Information Services. nd March 1997. Web. 5 June 2010 . Kapspersky. Kaspersky Internet Security. Kapserspersky. com. nd Web. 5 June, 2010, . MacForensicsLab. Malware on mac os x-virues, Trojans, and worms. MacForensicsLab. 2010. Web. 5 June 2010 . NIST. An introduction to computer security. Web. 5 June, 2010, http://www. rxn. com/services/faq/internet/ISPTG-1. html

Ethics Exam 2 Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Ethics Exam 2 - Article Example I begin by defining such basic concepts as good and evil thereby making a decision based on my understanding of the two. As explained, ethics seeks to minimize harm. As such, I often define evil as any action that is likely to cause harm to others. Good, on the other hand, is an action that promises to safeguard the peace, safety and the moral fabric of the society. In analyzing the impacts that a situation or an action may have on the society, I begin by placing myself at the center of the action. This way, I feel the dilemma that one feels before making a decision and understand how any victim of such actions would feel. This way, I make a decision on whether a situation is ethical or not depending on how it affects the people. A situation becomes unethical when it harms or even threatens other members of the society. An ethical action is one that does not injure anyone. An injury in this context implies to both physical and psychological torments (Badiou 67). An abuse, for example, causes a psychological torment to the society. As such, one acts unethically if he or she abuses others in public. The same is the case with a fight, barbaric aggression or even theft since such acts cause physical injuries to the victims and loss of valuables. My thought process considers the social and cultural values. An ethical action preserves the social values while an unethical action violates the values thereby disrupting the social fabric. Moral leadership requires the leader to serve others and in the process lead them towards achieving a particular goal. Moral leaders strive to set perfect examples to their subjects. This way, such leaders persuade and influence the others by making them aspire to achieve the same levels of integrity. Personal integrity is an important feature that enhances the success of a moral leader. Such leaders must prove that they are trustworthy by adhering to the rules that guide their operations at the institution. A

Operations Management at Superior Maintenance Services Case Study

Operations Management at Superior Maintenance Services - Case Study Example Through the help of the government agency for technical education and skills development it has developed a manpower training programmeand is considered industry partner for skills development in this sector. With its widespread popularity and good reputation, it has recently diversified its offerings to include marketing and distribution of other organisation's products through joint venture agreements, such as those for restroom odourcounteractant dispensers, floor mats, electronic air cleaners, waterfree urinals, air fresheners, liquid soap dispensers, and rent-a plant services. Business operations at SMS include massive recruitment of potential workers, manpower training, client sourcing, client servicing, manpower deployment and deployed manpower monitoring and supervision, and customer accounting. A full time staff of 30 employees handle administrative services such as accounting and finance, personnel administration, recruitment, marketing and sales, and accounts management through regular coordination by account officers with clients as well as deployed personnel at client premises. According to Slack et al (2004), there are five operations performance objectives: speed, quality, flexibility, dependability or reliability, and efficiency, which includes cost-effectiveness. Speed is the length of time to serve customer orders for products or services, from the moment a customer order is placed up to the time a product or service is delivered. The performance objective of speed is to lessen this length of time. At SMS, speed is a very important objective because normally, a client requests for janitorial or manpower services because of a present and usually urgent need. The ability to serve such requests speedily is critical, otherwise the client may opt to place the order with a competing service provider. To help assure a ready supply of manpower for deployment purposes, continuous recruitment and training is conducted by SMS. Qualified recruits are immediately asked to undergo training to prepare them for immediate deployment as soon as assignments are confirme d with the client. Trainees pay a minimal fee for to cover the cost of materials used during training, consisting of reading materials. At times, some qualified personnel have already joined another organisation. But sine, the manpower pool is large, service delivery times are maintained. The cost of recruitment and training are borne by the company as part of its operating expenses. Quality is the degree to which products and services meet the specifications promised by the organisation to its customers. And to achieve a high and consistent quality, a set of standard procedures must be stringently followed to ensure quality service as well as high-quality products manufactured. In terms of quality service delivery, SMS ensures that the workers it deploys are sufficiently skilled and qualified to perform the services they have to deliver by making them undergo the standard training which is a combination of lectures, demonstrations and hands-on drills and exercises. Moreover, since SMS manufactures its own cleaning solutions, equipment and materials, it has

Critical Infrastructure Identification Research Paper

Critical Infrastructure Identification - Research Paper Example The infrastructures that are most critical to protect in New York City (NYC) are the transport infrastructure (including the major bridges and highways), the medical infrastructure, the communication infrastructure, the fire and safety infrastructure, the power, water and other utilities infrastructure, prisons, high occupancy buildings, national monuments and schools. These are essential in any defense or natural disaster mitigation operations and the necessary steps should be taken to ensure that they are protected from terrorist attacks. The increasing threat of international terrorism has resulted in a renewal of the federal government’s interest in issues related to infrastructure. The focus has changed from the adequacy of infrastructure to the protection of infrastructure. One of the problems seems to relate to the identification of critical infrastructure. This has been very important especially in the NYC area which was the scene of the most devastating terrorist atta ck on September 11, 2001. The act defines critical infrastructure as â€Å"systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the United States that the incapacity or destruction of such systems and assets would have a debilitating impact on security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those matters† (Moteff and Parfomak, 2004) Description and Analysis of Best Practice Used In Critical Infrastructure Identification The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has drafted a list of key assets. No real basis was established to determine what is key and so the departments’ listings are often somewhat different. An assets criticality depends on the assets operational or business value and is also a function of both time and situation. The value of the critical infrastructure in New York City (NYC) relates to the key operations military and otherwise that depend on these assets and how these dependencies change over ti me. It also depends on the sensitivity of the City’s operations and services to the loss of the asset. That means if the asset is affected by any natural disasters or other acts of terrorism, the maximum time for which it can be out of use before it results in serious implications for the normal operations of the City. It also depends on whether asset restoration or other backup measures can occur within the time allocated as the asset’s maximum allowable down time. These critical assets will include assets that require special protection because of their potential for destruction and or the value that they provide for the City. They may include symbols and icons that represent the heritage of the nation. The concept surrounding their identification is a means by which the government can place emphasis on high priority assets in its critical infrastructure protection program. All the federal departments and agencies have been given the task of identifying their critica l infrastructure. The heads of these departments and agencies report to the Secretary on an annual basis on their efforts to identify; prioritize and coordinate the protection of critical infrastructure and key resources in their respective sectors (DHS, 2008). The DHS and sector-specific agencies collaborate with the private sector which owns and operates most

An Annotated Bibliography Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

An Annotated Bibliography - Essay Example â€Å"Multilingual Identities in Higher Education: Negotiating the ‘Mother Tongue’, ‘Posh’ and ‘Slang’†, Journal of Language and Education, Vol. 24., no. 1,pp. 21-39. Preece’s articles analyses linguistic diversity amid minority ethnic undergraduates students classified as from broadening participation background in a new University in Britain. The author recognizes that students negotiate multilingual and bidilectal identities within the framework of an academic writing programme considered as offering English language remediation. Leung, C., Harris, R. and Rampton, B. 1997. â€Å"Multilingualism in England,† Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, no. 7, pp. 224-241. The authors point out about the recent reactions to multilingualism in the national education systems and point to the increasing tension between education policy and research. The authors then suggest that there is so much that has happened in the study and und erstanding of multilingualism in England. To analyze this, the authors focus on the dynamic and contested connections amid educational policy, academic debate and daily sociolinguistic practice. As multilingualism in growing in the United Kingdom as a result of immigration, urban areas are becoming more diverse in their utilization of language. This is resulting in local government regulations being imposed to provide for those who do not speak the prevailing language. These policies are targeted at ensuring diversify and acceptance amid the scope of languages and speakers in any given region. School curriculums are making it possible for students to learn each other’s languages and so make sure good communication between distinct cultures. It is at times presumed that English is sufficient, but in global terms just 60 percent of the population are native speakers and 75 percent speak no English at all. Research on the internet reveals a decline in the relative influence of E nglish online, from 51 percent of traffic in 2000 to 27 percent as of 2011. The United Kingdom requires a multilingual population in order to succeed in a globalised universe, for global citizenships, for diplomacy, security and in global relations and for creating a taskforce to operate proficiently in trade and investment. In spite of the numerous interest groups affected by multilingualism and development of new ways to quantify the linguistic topography in the UK’s exhaustive information on UK multilingualism has only presently surfaced. The in particular emerges from conflicting definitions of language capability and situational usage, with non-standardized measures utilized to explain these (Edwards, 2004). The engagement of the state with the subject of multilingualism functions at numerous levels. The United Kingdom has not general official regulation on multilingualism, even though the EU supports trilingualism. Public discussions about multilingualism are London tra nsforms often, though there is some persistency in promoting specific forms of bilingualism, specifically through formal learning. There is prejudice in the conceived positions of distinct languages. Bilingualism appears to be regarded as an asset if it is learned as opposed to the acquired language prestige. On the other hand, bilingualism is conceived as an inadequate if possessed in a migrant home. There are discussions over if and how the past

Research paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 3

Research Paper Example Another reason for pursuing admission in SIU is the extensive scholarship programs that are used by the university to help its students. The scholarships provided by the university are on a rise and these scholarships promote students in working hard in order to attain scholarships. The university has high number of accreditations from several different accreditation agencies which is a solid reason to become a part of SIU. Other than the popularity of the University among dental students, the university has huge number of programs for the development of those who want to pursue a career in the field of dentistry. It provides students with both practical and theoretical knowledge and application for the development of high quality dental professionals. The university does not only develop the cognitive skills of its students, it even participates in physical development of its students. Due to their educational and athletic offerings I am persuaded to be a part of SIU and look forwar d towards the accomplishment of my

Personal Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Personal - Essay Example Each of the section also contains background information of each type of services offered by the bank. The financial banks offer several services for the customers and each of them has different importance for different types of customers. The introduction of technology and the fast growth of internet usage have allowed the financial companies to add more value to the customers without much effort. The beginning of internet banking has made it easier for the customers to conduct their banking activities at ease and at their convenience. Although the mode of banking has evolvedbut the overall concept of individual activities are still the same. This paper is focused on the services offered by HSBC bank in their website. It will cover three basic services in details, which are Banking, Borrowing and Investing. The Qatar branch of HSBC will also be covered in this paper. Savings Bank Account:The banking segment of HSBC offers two types of services, savings account and current account. An individual can choose anyone or both types of account depending on his requirements. The savings account allows an individual to accumulate funds and gain interest on it. It helps the individual to save money for future use. Current Bank Account: The current bank account is particularly for business purposes and offers services, which are exclusive to financial activities of a business. It allows the customers to deal with liquid funds, such as deposit funds, withdraw funds, write check, etc. Moreover, the customers can make unlimited transactions in a day (Money, 2015). HSBC Qatar offers three different types of accounts based on the requirement of the customers. They are Basic Current Account, Advanced Current Account and Premier Current Account. Money Transfer: The money transfer facility of HSBC Qatar allows the customer to transfer funds to different accounts. The customers can transfer money to pay bills, send money to

Researching Consumer Behavior Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Researching Consumer Behavior - Essay Example Consumer behavior research has found out that with people broadening their minds and the urge for doing something different from the rest of the people around them, have let to something termed as clothing optional cruise. Consumer enjoys fun and love to experience new things in their life. Freedom is one of the important aspects which have given rise to this research. The clothing optional cruises allow a member to experience freedom oh seas. These cruises are open to adults so they can strip away the stress of their life when on the cruise and experience something different. Consumer behavior aims to research on the issues that a consumer might face along with the ongoing trends. The main issue prevailing is stress and to avoid the stress people might go to any extend they want. People go for vacations, hangout with their love ones and so on. Freedom is one thing that was missing in the lives of the people and the future trend of enjoying life gave rise to the idea of offering clot hing optional cruises. The most viable data that might be founded out that people do love when the marketers offer something new and different to the audience. People are actually bored of their daily routine so something new and existing would definitely arouse interest on the target audience. Clothing optional cruises have been popular since the 1970s but at recent times it has received a huge popularity. Because of the popularity of such an offering and since it has been accepted by the audience many companies have started to offer voyage on clothing optional. The strategies adopted by marketer were just to offer something that would be a medium of enjoyment for the people. There were already cruises and people were traveling on them but clothing optional cruises did excite the people and thus became a huge success. The cruises offer all the facilities and mostly sail to sunny locations such as Caribbean, Germany, and France where people could enjoy. Seeing people acceptance and

A Comparative Analysis of Juvenile Crime In The United States And Thesis

A Comparative Analysis of Juvenile Crime In The United States And Japan - Thesis Example The primary purpose of the research is to ascertain differences and similarities in rates of juvenile offender recidivism in Japan and the United States. Crime historian Sir Leon Radzinowicz defines crime as â€Å"something that threatens serious harm to the community, or something generally believed to do so, or something committed with evil intent, or something forbidden in the interests of the most powerful sections of society† (as cited in Kornblum & Julian, p. 164). Juvenile crime is a grim reality in the United States and Japan. It appears that many of the young people in both countries have lost their sense of direction. Reports of violence, sexual deviation, theft, and drugs reflect social problems that are embedded in the youth. ‘In 2009, juvenile courts in the United States handled an estimated 1.5 million delinquency cases that involved juveniles charged with criminal law violations. Juvenile courts handled 30% more cases in 2009 than in 1985’ (OJJDP, 2012). The rise in crime can be contributed to a growing population to a certain extent. As the numbers mount, society is forced to realize just what the youth are capable of, and scrambling to find out why. Dealing with the negative constructs of crime largely is contingent on the beholder’s perspective of why crime occurs. Theories on crime causations include, but are not limited to, the following: social strain or inequality, biology, conflict, and culture. In addition, crime can be categorized by violent personal crimes, property crimes, occupational (white collar) crimes, corporate crimes, public-order crimes, conventional crimes, organized crimes and professional crimes (Kornblum & Julian, 1995). As a subset of crime, juvenile crime refers to crimes committed by underage people. Juvenile crime can include any of the aforementioned categories with the exception of corporate and white collar crime, which generally are

Creating a computer system Essay Example for Free

Creating a computer system Essay 1. 1 Introduction Wooten Basset Rugby Club, are a rugby club in the Swindon area, whom play 15 a side rugby union. They put out a numbers of teams each week ranging from junior levels, senior teams and womens rugby. Of my concern is the U-16s, whom would like to computerise a number of tasks and have a reference for relevant data including player and parent information. In any particular season there will be between 20 and 30 players at the club. These players are trained by the head coach and around three other coaches all of whom are made up of parents of the players. The head coach is responsible for much of the current administrative work. 1. 2 Current System Currently all tasks for the club are carried out manually. For example when organising a match against a rival team a letter is written specifically for each player. With as many as 30 players at the club, this is tiring and tedious work. Data is currently stored in files kept at the head coachs house. This system of holding information has become unreliable as over the history of the team players have moved on or changed their details. When this occurs due to time constraints, addresses for example are often added to rather than modified creating two distinct addresses complicating matters when important letters need to be sent. In the past when players have left their file has not been removed leaving large amounts of useless information. All of this complicates matters when searching for data making the process longer and increasingly unreliable. Among the squad of players, each player has his own specific needs. For example different players require different training methods such as fitness or tactics. With many players and few coaching staff it becomes difficult to organise. Currently this is organised through memory which is difficult due to the above reasons. The current system has no scope for evaluating players from teams the club faces. No data is kept on players from other teams like their scoring or disciplinary records. They can therefore not assess before a fixture which players are a danger and tactics suffer. Scoring and disciplinary data is stored on paper kept in files. This data is again not well managed and prone to being lost making analysing a players progress somewhere between difficult and impossible. Also they are unable to see which players are the top scorers or most ill disciplined. Money management is also a problem. Fees used to pay math officials are deducted form the fees paid by players. This is organised by the coaches, however often players miss this payment and the referees payment is short. Yet with at least 15 players playing in every match records of owes money are not kept and this information is simply forgotten. 1. 3 Interview Summary In order to create this system it was important that I conduct an interview with one of the end users for the system. This will give a good outline of the requirements for the system. The interview was with the head coach whom will be the predominant user of the system. From the interview this is an outline of what the new system will have to achieve: Â  Produce template letters for a number of issues. These letters include Match details, which will tell players about a match its date, venue and other relevant information. Invitation letter to other clubs inviting them to a match. Player and parent data. Store contact details about players and parents. Â  Statistics. Store statistics on players including points scored, tries and appearances. Â  Team information. Store details on rival teams such as contact details. Fixtures. Store fixture information including scores, dates and venues. Â  Ability to see reports on players from the club. Â  An ability to track membership payments. The system must indicate whether a players has paid his membership for that season. Â  Create leagues of the clubs leading scorers and those with the worst disciplinary records. Â  Store data about what type of training each player is on. For example some players may have fitness training or others forwards training. Monitor finances for each fixture. For each fixture a player has to pay a fee of i 2. Other important points taken from the interview: Â  System must be as automated as possible as user wants system to save him time. Simple user interface. Several of the coaches whom will use the system have very little knowledge of computers and will struggle with a complicated system. Â  System will be run from head coachs lap top computer and therefore not need any network capabilities. Head coach has copies of Microsoft Access already stored on his computer. IT experience consists only of use of Microsoft applications. Â  Data on fixtures and statistics only to be kept for one season at a time. After this period data will be deleted and new record will be kept. Â  Hold data relating to tournament and determine the clubs progress in these tournaments. 1. 4 Data Requirements From the interview it has become apparent that I will need to store a considerable amount of data. I have divided this data into the following groups: Players, Fixtures, Rivals, Rival Players, Players-Fixtures and Rival Players-Fixtures. A primary key will be used in every case to uniquely identify each record, these are marked by these symbols, and . PLAYERS deals with data relating to players such as membership and contact details: Membership Number A unique code used to identify each player. Each Membership code is made up of three numbers and a letter. The letter represents the age group, as this letter only deals with one age group each membership code will have the letter, E. For example, 001E Name Christian and Surname only Parent Store parents name for contact details. Address1 Store first line of a players address. Address2 Store second line of a players address where applicable. Postcode Training-What type of training the player is on. User will only be able to select from these values: Fitness, Backs, Forwards or General. Telephone Number Membership Paid Whether a player has paid membership fees for current year or not. FIXTURES handles data revolving each fixture played or to be played: Fixture Code Identifies each fixture uniquely as some fixture may be against the same team. Team Code Determines which team is to be played or has been played Team Score Score for Wooten Bassett, null if not played. Rival Score Score for rival, null if not played. Tournament Code Foreign key which identifies which tournament a fixture belongs to. Friendly fixtures will be determined by a specific code. Date Venue Select from either home or away. Round Determines which round of the competition, for example first round or semi final. RIVALS holds data on teams played by the rugby club, this includes contact details: Team Code Each team will be assigned a unique in case of two teams having the same name. Team Name Name of each rival team. Telephone Address1 First line of each teams address. Address2 Second line of each teams address if applicable. City Postcode Directions Description of how to reach rival club. PLAYERS-FIXTURES relates to the actions of players in each fixture, this includes scores and disciplinary information: Membership Number Used to identify player for which record is stored. Fixture Code Identifies which fixture record relates to. Tries Number of tries scored by a particular player in each fixture. Penalties All penalty kicks converted by a player in a fixture. Drop Kicks All drop kicks scored by a player in a fixture. Disciplinary Whether a player was disciplined in a fixture and what level of action, a yellow card for example. Fee Owed -The amount paid will be displayed from. TOURNAMENT holds data relating to tournaments the clubs plays in: Tournament Code Unique code which identifies each tournament. Winner Eventual winner of tournament. 1. 5 Entity Relationship Diagram This diagram of how data will be kept in the new system. The Players-Fixtures data store will link Players and Fixtures together. It will store data relating to what a particular player does in each game. Each record will be identified by using a players membership code and the corresponding fixture code, these two foreign keys will create a composite key. Each player may have played in many fixtures and therefore have many records in Players-Fixtures. This creates a one to many relationship between, Players and Players-Fixtures. Similarly many records in Players-Fixtures may relate to one fixture and so a one to many relationship exists between Fixtures and Players-Fixtures. The Rival Players-Fixtures data store is similar to Players-Fixtures, however it stores data about rival players as opposed to players for Wooten Bassett rugby club. Each record will be uniquely identified using the foreign keys of rival player code to determine which player, and fixture code to determine the fixture. Again a one to many relationship exists between Fixtures and Rival Players-Fixtures as one fixture may have many related records in Rival Players-Fixtures. Each Rival Player may have many records in Rival Players-Fixtures as they have played in many fixtures, a one to many relationship will exist here. Wooten Bassett will face many different rival clubs with many different Rival Players. Therefore Rivals will store data about all rival clubs and each record will be uniquely identified by team code. Rival Players will store data will store data about all the players who play for these clubs will be identified by the rival player code. To determine which player plays for which club Rival Players will have the foreign key Team code. This means many Rival Players can play for one club, again a one to many relationship will exist here. Each fixture will be against one of the teams detailed in Rivals. In order to identify which team is being played the foreign key, team code from Rivals will be used. One Rival may play in many fixtures creating a one to many relationship from Rivals to Fixtures. Tournament holds data relating to competitive fixtures. Therefore one tournament will have many records in fixtures, and again a one to many relationship is present. 1. 6 Data Flow Diagrams 2 Design 2. 1 System Design. The system will be divided into five entities described in Analysis. These are Players, Rivals, Fixtures, Players-Fixtures and Tournament. 2. 2 Attribute Design Following are description of all the attributes to be stored in the system: 2. 3 Form Design In order for the user to interact with the system, it must be presented in a user friendly interface. Within Access this is done using forms and reports, each form should allow the user to easily understand the information and be able to perform sufficient actions such as adding or deleting data. Following are the forms required by the system: 1. frmFixtures. This form will deal with all the actions relating the handling of data with fixtures. Here the user will be able to add, alter or delete any records from the Fixtures table. For example if a new fixture has been organised then the user can use the Add Fixture button to add a fixture to the schedule. Also changes to the date for example can be made. In order to maintain the consistency of data validation is being used. The FixtureCode attribute is updated automatically as an auto number preventing the user from making mistakes. Also a TeamCode will be selected from a combo box so a user cannot enter a team that does not exist. Also only two values will be able to be entered into the Home/Away attribute, home or away. To simplify the users navigation of the system a combo box at the top of the form allows the user to select any existing record quickly. 2. frmPlayers The Players form works on a similar principle to the Fixtures form. There are button to add and delete Player records and there is also a combo box to allow the user to navigate through the system. For validation the training attribute uses a combo box to ensure the user enters the correct value and an input mask controls the MembershipNumber, so that data is entered in the appropriate format. 3. frmRivals Again the Rivals form works in a similar fashion to Players and Fixtures. Buttons on the right control adding and deleting functions and a combo box is used for navigation. Validation is ensured by using an auto number data type to automatically update the TeamCode attribute. 4. frmTournament The tournament form works exactly the same as the previous forms, with add and delete buttons clearly labelled and a combo box for navigation. The TournamentCode attribute does not require input as it is an auto number ensuring validation. 5. frmFixture Statistics This form is directly different form the previous forms. In this form a user can manipulate data in the Players-Fixtures entity. The user can view specific fixtures through a combo box, when a fixture is selected it will open a sub form containing all the data about the players whom played in that match. Here new data can be added about a fixture or incorrect data can be corrected. The FixtureCode and MembershipNumber attributes will be controlled by a combo box, eliminating user error and the consistency of the data. 2. 4 Query Design For the system to perform the function required of it queries are used to extract the precise data from the database.

Human Impact on Oceans

Human Impact on Oceans ‘How do I impact the ocean, how does the ocean impact me?’ Oceans, vast expanse of waters, holding immeasurable wealth and diverse species of marine fauna are prone to human activities-good and bad. Some of us have turned a blind eye to the existing threats that our oceans face. But why and how should we protect our oceans?   WHY ARE OCEANS SO IMPORTANT? Fish, octopus, shrimps- important sources of protein- are all derived from our seas-seas that are home to close to thousands of other aquatic species equally important for nature to maintain its usual course . The ocean can eradicate certain pollutants by natural processes like bacterial decay (explaining why factories use it as discharge systems). Today leisure, recreation and tourism define our country’s fame throughout the world, all thanks to the beautiful beaches and seas that we pride ourselves in. Coral reefs guard our coasts by shielding us from storms. Tidal and wind energy are our Oceana’s mightiest forces which if channeled effectively could present huge benefits to power stations. HOW ARE WE DEGRADING OUR OCEAN? However humans have in the long run abused these marine resources in greed of expanding trade. Domestic sewage, effluents from nearby factories and used water discharged can sometimes find its way to lagoons and ultimately introduce diseases and harmful chemicals into coastal waters. Human factors such as men dumping wastes or lethal chemicals in seas and natural factors such as storms or seismic waves can harm our natural fauna. Our natural barriers are impaired by malpractice of fishermen through wrong fishing techniques. WHAT ARE THE REPERCUSSIONS FROM DEGRADING OUR OCEAN? Resources in our seas may deplete to such an extent that widespread damage to aquatic bio-diversity may irrevocably warp the natural food chain so we have more sharks roaming in our bays than fish. It is anticipated that in the near future shortage of sea food caused by massive exploitation may dim the future of next generations. In the next two decades or so, we risk importing fish to support the needs of our growing population. Sea pollution blemishes our good reputation and progress occasioning in a decadent tourist industry along with detrimental environmental effects. Chemicals accumulate within bodies of marine organisms that are later consumed by men while polyps-the minute biotic elements that synthesize corals- die. Not to mention the damage extended by fishermen would make certain that corals can neither be created nor preserved. HOW TO SAVE OUR OCEAN? Setting up of breeding grounds for highly exploited marine fish-a practice known as aquaculture-would reduce the strain on conventional ocean-derived foods and leave ocean-fish time to procreate and mature before getting caught in nets of fishermen. Marine-Protected Areas in certain over-fished regions may be established to safeguard some aquatic species. Agencies must more regularly monitor factories effluents. Raising awareness about the devastating outcomes of pollution amongst people to deter any misdemeanour and also stressing the crucial importance of sustaining clean marine environment. If the tidal and wind energies emanated from seas were harnessed to manufacture electricity concerns will wane on CO2emissions that also adversely disturb oceans. CONCLUSION If our current manner of abusing seas maintains its trend, aquatic life may not recover and chain of events triggered by men himself may unfold teething troubles that will cripple our children’s children and the other children to come. Hence before it’s too late humanity MUST resort to all viable measures at hand to save our oceans before nature turn on us for our misdeeds. ‘How do I impact the ocean, how does the ocean impact me?’ Oceans, vast expanse of waters, holding immeasurable wealth and diverse species of marine fauna are prone to human activities-good and bad. Some of us have turned a blind eye to the existing threats that our oceans face. But why and how should we protect our oceans? WHY ARE OCEANS SO IMPORTANT? Fish, octopus, shrimps- important sources of protein- are all derived from our seas-seas that are home to close to thousands of other aquatic species equally important for nature to maintain its usual course . The ocean can eradicate certain pollutants by natural processes like bacterial decay (explaining why factories use it as discharge systems). Today leisure, recreation and tourism define our country’s fame throughout the world, all thanks to the beautiful beaches and seas that we pride ourselves in. Coral reefs guard our coasts by shielding us from storms. Tidal and wind energy are our Oceana’s mightiest forces which if channeled effectively could present huge benefits to power stations. HOW ARE WE DEGRADING OUR OCEAN? However humans have in the long run abused these marine resources in greed of expanding trade. Domestic sewage, effluents from nearby factories and used water discharged can sometimes find its way to lagoons and ultimately introduce diseases and harmful chemicals into coastal waters. Human factors such as men dumping wastes or lethal chemicals in seas and natural factors such as storms or seismic waves can harm our natural fauna. Our natural barriers are impaired by malpractice of fishermen through wrong fishing techniques. WHAT ARE THE REPERCUSSIONS FROM DEGRADING OUR OCEAN? Resources in our seas may deplete to such an extent that widespread damage to aquatic bio-diversity may irrevocably warp the natural food chain so we have more sharks roaming in our bays than fish. It is anticipated that in the near future shortage of sea food caused by massive exploitation may dim the future of next generations. In the next two decades or so, we risk importing fish to support the needs of our growing population. Sea pollution blemishes our good reputation and progress occasioning in a decadent tourist industry along with detrimental environmental effects. Chemicals accumulate within bodies of marine organisms that are later consumed by men while polyps-the minute biotic elements that synthesize corals- die. Not to mention the damage extended by fishermen would make certain that corals can neither be created nor preserved. HOW TO SAVE OUR OCEAN? Setting up of breeding grounds for highly exploited marine fish-a practice known as aquaculture-would reduce the strain on conventional ocean-derived foods and leave ocean-fish time to procreate and mature before getting caught in nets of fishermen. Marine-Protected Areas in certain over-fished regions may be established to safeguard some aquatic species. Agencies must more regularly monitor factories effluents. Raising awareness about the devastating outcomes of pollution amongst people to deter any misdemeanour and also stressing the crucial importance of sustaining clean marine environment. If the tidal and wind energies emanated from seas were harnessed to manufacture electricity concerns will wane on CO2emissions that also adversely disturb oceans. CONCLUSION If our current manner of abusing seas maintains its trend, aquatic life may not recover and chain of events triggered by men himself may unfold teething troubles that will cripple our children’s children and the other children to come. Hence before it’s too late humanity MUST resort to all viable measures at hand to save our oceans before nature turn on us for our misdeeds.

Tuckmans Team Building Model Management Essay

Tuckmans Team Building Model Management Essay To achieve stated goals and objectives people in organizations work in teams. These teams go through various stages. The extent to which project leadership success or failure, relates to the stages of teams formation, in the pursuance of these goals and objectives are not clear cut as past researches have given divided opinion and bringing other factors in contention. This assignment will introduce the concept of team formation and project leadership and critically discuss the extent to which the stages of team formation relate to the success or failure of project leadership. To critically evaluate how the stages of team formation relate to the success or failure of project leadership, Tuckmans team building model which explain the five forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning stages of the team formation (please see appendix 1) and Blanchards situational leadership model which explain the four leadership styles that a leader should adopt during the team development situations will be evaluated as the team behaviour and leadership style can be clearly seen in these two models. Tuckmans model emphasis that as the team develops, the leader changes leadership style. At the forming stage a successful leader follow a directing style which is similar to telling phase described in situational leadership model, at the storming stage leader coaches their team to come out from the conflict which is similar to the selling phase of the situational leadership style model, at the norming stage the leader facilitates its team to develop standards which is s imilar to the participating phase of the situational leadership model, at the performing stage leader delegate task to the members and almost detached which is similar to the delegating stage of the situational leadership model. At this stage the team initially formed, the team members meet each other; identify the purpose of the team, terms of reference and its composition. Team members endeavor to test each other, establish their personal identity and create an impression within the group with most consideration given to structure of the team, code of conduct, objectives, individual roles and responsibilities. If the team is more diverse, it is more difficult for the team to maneuver through as this stage takes longer. Therefore, in the formation of multicultural teams it is a particularly sensitive stage as it is characterized by commonality, courtesy, caution and confusion. To take the team to the performing stage leadership is crucial. Team members will not be comfortable if there is lack of clarity. If a leader could not direct the team members effectively, team would not able to reach the next stages of the team formation; therefore this stage does impact the success or failure of the project leadership. When team members truly consider that they are the part of a team, generally this stage is complete. Table 1: Members and Leadership competencies in Forming stage of a team. Member competencies needed: Leadership competencies needed: Asking open-ended questions Maintaining equity and being fair Listening without making assumptions and judgments Helping the group to articulate its purpose and overriding goal Observing group patterns of communication Facilitating discussions Using inclusive communication patterns Intervening to include all Disclosing ones needs appropriately Stage 2 Storming: This phase of team development is typically marked by conflict between team members, criticism and tension. Conflict arises due to the competing approaches to obtain the groups goals, disagreements over responsibilities and appropriate task related behavior. Team members might disagree about who should be leading the team and how much power the team leader should have and can result in redefining of the teams overall goals and specific tasks. Team members are likely to individually decide their level of commitment to the group tasks and extent, to which they like the team tasks, therefore may resist the control imposed by the team. At storming stage the team members may begin to withdraw, therefore this stage relates to the success or failure of the project leadership. If leaders coach their teams effectively, teams can proceed to the next stage. Therefore this stage is a critical stage for the group survival and effectiveness as the conflict harms the team progress and negatively affects some interpersonal relationship. When teams control is no longer resisted by the team members and everyone in the team agree about who will lead the team, this storming stage is completed. Table 2: Members and Leadership competencies in Storming stage of a team. Member competencies needed: Leadership competencies needed: Using inclusive language and behaviors Establishing an agreed-upon work plan Managing emotional expression Using mediation skills Giving and receiving feedback appropriately Using diverse methods of feedback and conflict transformation Stage 3 Norming: At this stage norms and expectations about what different members are responsible for doing are realize and develop as the team delineates task standards, develop intra group cohesiveness and establish standards, rules and regulations. Team members really start to feel their belongings to the team and the development of close ties with other team members. Therefore this phase of team development is characterized by: commitment, collaboration, cooperation and cohesion as team members attempts to mutually agree upon objectives and goals, accept different opinion and try to open exchange of information. Feeling of belongings and friendship to team, help to work towards team goals. At the norming stage the leader facilitates and enables their team to establish the standards and reach to the performing stage. By the end of this stage, standards to guide behavior in the group are agreed by the team members. This stage is similar to the participating stage of the situational leadership model. If the leader does not participate to establish standards, the team may develop their own standards and norms which may me contrary to the project overall objectives and lead to the project leadership failure. At this stage the major decisions are normally made by the team members jointly and the minor decisions may be delegate to the individuals. Table 3: Members and Leadership competencies in Norming stage of a team. Member competencies needed: Leadership competencies needed: Demonstrating support on task and in relationships Reinforcing high standards for task Recognizing individual and cultural differences in how appreciation is shown Coaching where needed Stage 4 Performing: This is the stage at which real work is done, team members know their role and duties and performing their work according to the expectations. Team members concentrate on the achievement of common goals and objectives. Sometime it can take long to reach to the performing stage, in most cases when they are self-managed work teams. Team members make progress towards common goals and feel comfortable working within their roles. This phase is marked by consideration among members, creativity challenge and group consciousness. At this stage the team morale is high and team has a good ability to focus on the task as relationship issues have been resolved. At the performing stage the team may produce another successor leader. At this stage the team members does not need assistance and instructions, but they need delegated tasks from the leader. Therefore at this stage leader delegates, observes and almost detach, this stage is similar to the delegating stage of the situational leadership model. This is the main stage where actual work will take place; delegation of wrong tasks to wrong person may lead to project leadership failure. Table 4: Members and Leadership competencies in Performing stage of a team. Member competencies needed: Leadership competencies needed: Adapting and changing Establishing a process for incorporating change and renewal Including new members Sharing leadership Stage 5 Reforming or Adjourning: At this stage a task force teams disbands after the fulfillment of its goals or due to poor performance. But some teams are permanent (ongoing work teams), therefore may not reach to the adjourning stage and often remain to the performing stage. This final stage can be characterized by communication, closure, compromise and consensus. The adjourning phase is not the main task of developing a team, but this stage is very relevant to the team members. Table 5: Leadership Activities at Different Group Formation Stages Stage Leadership Activity Forming Direct the team and establish objectives clearly by negotiating ground rules. Storming Establish process and structure, and work to smooth conflict and build good relationships between team members. Generally provide support, especially to those team members who are less secure. Remain positive and firm in the face of challenges. Explain forming, storming, norming and performing idea for people to understand why conflicts occurring, and that things will get better in the future. Teaching assertiveness and conflict resolution skills. Norming Help the team take responsibility for progress towards the goal by arranging a social, or a team-building event. Performing Delegate as far as possible. Once the team has achieved high performance, the aim now is to have as light a touch as possible by focusing on other goals and areas of work. Adjourning When successfully achieved the objectives time should be taken to celebrate the achievements. The above table clearly depict the relation between the stages of team formation and successful project leadership, the reverse will mean failure. 4. Conclusion Teams are formed because they can achieve far more than their individual members can on their own, and while being part of a high-performing team can be fun, it can take patience and professionalism to get to that stage. Effective team leaders can accelerate that process and reduce the difficulties that team members experience by understanding what they need to do as their team moves through the stages from forming to storming, norming and, finally, performing. Successful project leadership should realize that not all teams and situations will behave in the way depicted by Tuckman. However, in using this approach, the leader should not attempt to force situations to fit it but make sure that people dont use knowledge of the storming stage as a license for boorish behavior. There are some drawback with Tuckmans team formation modal as it does not talk about the time teams do spend and should spend in different project and external environment does not take into account. 1. Abstract People in organizations work in teams in achieving stated goals and objectives. The extent to which project success relates to the management of task, the individuals and the teams formation in the pursuance of these goals and objectives are not of equal proportion and need to be well judged and balanced by the leader. This assignment will use John Adairs Action Centre Leadership model to related the dynamic between task, individuals and team; critically discussing the extent to which these three needs are related to the management of a successful project. Introduction One person cannot handle whole project, he/she need other individuals an effective team to successfully complete the project. An effective team is a team who has high commitment, is highly appreciated by upper management, is always ready (adaptive) to change open to new ideas and always achieves its goals. Bailey and Cohen (1997: 4) considers a team as a collection of individuals who are interdependent in their tasks, share responsibility for outcomes, see themselves and are seen by others as an intact social entity, embedded in one or more larger social systems and who manage their relationships across organizational boundaries. Adairs Action Centred Action (ACT) model will be used to find the dynamic between task, team and individual as relate to managing projects successfully, as this model identifies three core interrelated functions, which explain the management and leaders core management responsibility. These three core function consist task: achieving the teams goal. team: developing and building your team, so that its ever more effective. individual: helping individuals develop their full potential in the workplace. Discussion Davis (2001) identified three factors, which can determine whether the team is effective or not, such as: The people (individual) within the team: Effective team determining factor for individual aspect include personal job satisfaction, low or no conflict and power struggles, having job security, appreciation by management and mutual trust of colleagues. The organizations rules and culture: includes the people do thinks and believes of the individuals. The tasks to be completed: including appropriate leadership, team involvement in decisions, appropriately skilled team members, challenging work, goals and objectives. According to Davis (2001) it is easy to appreciate the impact of organizational rules and job tasks on each other and on people (individual), but it is much more difficult to understand the impact of individual-related factors on other factors of successful teams of a successful project. Individual related factor such as trust is a major component in forming an effective working team that achieves results. Leaders/ managers are primarily responsible for creating trust. Adair (1997) describe the best leaders is who balance the task, team maintenance, and individual needs. Balancing task, team and individual Adair found that effective leaders pay attention to three areas of need for members of the team: those relating to the task, to the team itself and to individual team members with emphasis on variation with all three interdependent variables. Teams can be more effective for making decisions effectively and quickly than the traditional hierarchical structure according to the large body of research (Thompson 2008). As group members come and go, due to turnover, promotions, hiring and other reasons; therefore resulted over time change in teams, goals, group tasks etc (George et al. 2008). Teams can be classified on the basis of size, organizational level, composition, potential contribution to organizational performance, objectives, permanent versus temporary. According to Colloquia et al., there are 5 general types of teams such as work teams, management teams, parallel teams, project teams and virtual teams. Leadership is the ability to affect human behaviour to accomplish a mission, the act of influencing people to set and achieve goals (McGraw, 2009). Great leaders are visionary people who are able to achieve results using people. They exhibits authority in themselves and exhume confidence in their team members. Some leaders are democratic, allowing team members to express their opinions. Some are dictatorial, explaining what they want from their teams to the team members to execute. All styles have opportunity and challenges and may be used in certain circumstances. Team leaders must also realise that there are different types of human traits that can be exhibited among team members. These traits rarely have advantage over others as they are complementary. It is the duty of an effective team leader to identify the trait in individual members of his or her team and know how to use the qualities to advantage. All these traits have the qualities which effective team leaders can exploit and none is better than the other. Tasks are those activities that need to done in order to achieve the desired goals and outcome. Leader can help to facilitate these tasks by planning the work, allocating the resources, checking performance and reviewing progress. Team maintenance relates to maintaining good relation and building team spirit, training the group, maintaining discipline. Individual needs can be satisfied by attending to personal problems, training the individual, giving them status and praise, meeting their needs and reconciling conflicts between group needs. To achieve the task, management should make it clear who is going to do what, proper delegation of responsibilities, everyone is clear about the objectives, is adequate authority delegating to the team, are working conditions right for the group, have the time planned affectively, who will cover the absent person, is there adequate resources to complete the tasks. In building and maintaining the team, management should make it clear is the size of the team is correct, are the right people working together, are the rules seen to be reasonable, is the team motivated to achieve the tasks, is the conflict dealt properly, does the team accept the objectives do the team knows about the expected standards of performance. In developing the individual, management should make it clear that have the targets been agreed and quantified, does the individual know about their contribution to work, overall result, does the individual got sufficient authority to achieve the task delegate to them and has adequate provisions been made for retaining and training team members. According to the Hackman (1987), there are 3 primary definitions of team success, and these relate to the task, social relations, and individuals. A successful team completes its task. While completing the task, team members develop social relations that help them work together and maintain the team. Teamwork should help to improve an individuals social and interpersonal skills. Mullins (2010:369) suggests that the action taken by the leader in any one of these area of need will affect one or both of the other areas of need with the ideal position been the complete integration towards the achievement of all three. However, building the team and satisfying individual needs are considered to be part of leadership whilst achieving the common task involves the process of management. According to Robbins (1998) Individual behavior have key variables, which make up individual difference. Every individual has their own attitudes, personality, values, talent, ability to learn, motivation factors, perceptions. Different nature of these variables (attributes) make individual different. Attitude is the judgment an individual make about events and people. This judgement can be positive or negative. Basic values influenced attitude and attitude affect the individual behaviour. Sometime attitudes can change, while values are unlikely to change. Values: Values are the general belief about what is good and bad. Values affect the individual behavior and attitude and difficult to change. Personality: Individual act and behave in a particular way, which called personality. Personality can be learned and inherited. Talent: Talent means the intelligence and ability of the individual. Level of persons talent will depend on how those people perform their job. Ability to learn: This is related to the change in behavior based on experience and getting new ideas. Motivation: Motivation means willing to do something with inspiration, not by force. Different individual have different motivating factors, such as money, name and fame etc. According to Bowditch et al the motivation of team members of joining a team, strongly influence cohesiveness of the team and the members productivity. Perception: Different people give different meaning to what they see around them; therefore people perceive things in different ways. By Knowing about individual differences leaders can understand why individual respond differently. Leaders should appreciate that it is difficult to change values, therefore they may be try to change attitude. As attitude affect behavior, which affect job performance and motivation. The key learning point from these different factors is that if leader want to get best from their team he should appreciate that individuals need to be treated differently. There is also Myer-Briggs model (1956) which effective team leaders have to contend with. This model is about personality types. Myer-Briggs identified four ways people differ from each other. These are: the way they think; the way they view; the way they feel/perceive and the way they see things. Team diversity include language difference, cultural difference, background difference, qualification difference, class, age, sex and experience also have effects in a team which the leader must manage. Mckenna and Maister draw attention on the importance of group leader establishing trust among the group by helping them understand the behaviours that build trust (Cited in Mullins, 2010). Successful project management will require the following list of common tasks for each of the three management responsibilities so that leaders will balance their resources appropriately. Task Team Individual Establish deadlines for project tasks, and explain the quality standards expected. Ensure that everyone in the team has the skills and training to accomplish the final goal Help define each individuals role within the team and agree the tasks they are responsible for. Clearly state the final goal of the team. Monitor team relationships, and resolve conflicts where necessary. Appropriately praise and reward individual team members for their contribution to the team. Ensure everyone understands the resources, people, and processes that they should be using If team will be working in smaller teams, appoint a leader for each team, and ensure that he/she is effective and properly trained. Ensure that one on one time is spent with each member: identify their strengths and weaknesses, their needs, and any special skills they can bring to the team. Create a detailed plan for how the group is going to reach their final goal. Work on keeping the team motivated with high morale. If any team members seem to be lagging behind, coach them until they are back on track. Identify the purpose of the team and communicate team members. Identify the style the team will be working in (very formal, relaxed, etc.) Ensure each team member has the skills to perform his or her role successfully. Give regular feedback on the teams performance. 4. Conclusion Leaders have many responsibilities when it comes to managing their teams. And, its easy to get so focused on one area that the others slip by the wayside, leading to an unbalanced, poorly-functioning group. ACL model states that leaders must balance the actions they take across all three key areas if they want their project to succeed. The areas are interdependent; if a leader focuses too much on one area and neglects the other two, then the group will experience problems. The leaders do not necessarily have to divide their efforts equally across these but balance according to the situation and over time. Using a tool like Action Centered Leadership can help any leader stay on top of the most important responsibilities, and keep the group working efficiently, happily, and productively. John Adairs simple Action-Centered Leadership model provides a great blueprint for leadership and the management of any team, group or organisation. Good managers and leaders should have full command of the three main areas of the ACL model, and should be able to use each of the elements according to the situation. Leaders who are able to achieve the task; building the team and develop keeping the right balance, gets results, builds morale, improves quality, develops teams and productivity, and is the mark of a success.

Affirmative Action :: Affirmative Action Essays

In 1997, three students were denied admission into the University of Michigan. Each of them, in turn, sued the school, charging them with discrimination. In one of the cases, a student was denied admission into Michigan’s law school. Chicago Sun-Times writers Dave Newbart and Kate Grossman reported that last Monday, June 23, 2003, in a 5-4 majority ruling, swing vote Justice Sandra Day O’Connor judged for the school maintaining their right to consider the race of their applicants. In a second decision, the court ruled that they supported the University’s use of race in their admissions policy, but use of a point system was unconstitutional under the fourteenth amendment (Equal Protection Clause). Why then was the student still dissatisfied with the ruling? She was suing the school for reverse discrimination stemming from the University of Michigan’s use of affirmative action towards their applicants. The student was white. The lawsuit sent shockwaves across the nation. Though the case centered on college admission practices, affirmative action plays a role in many everyday matters, especially towards procedures regarding employment. Before delving into discourse and opinions, the background and history of affirmative action should be discussed. According to writer Stephen Cahn, affirmative action’s origins stem from an executive order that John F. Kennedy wrote in regards to the hiring practices of employers. Cahn writes that the President’s Committee on Equal Opportunity Employment stated federal contractors â€Å"...will not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, creed, color, or national origin. The Contractor will take affirmative action, to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin." The principle of this order from President Kennedy was more developed with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which in part stated that "No person in the United States shall, on the grounds of race, color or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving federal fin ancial assistance." About one year later, President Lyndon B. Johnson defined the concept of affirmative action emphasizing that civil rights laws alone were not enough to resolve discrimination. Just months later, President Johnson issued an order to enforce affirmative action toward prospective minority employees in all aspects of hiring and employment. Employers must take specific measures to ensure equality in hiring and must document these efforts.

Essay examples --

Sympathy is a feeling of understanding which cannot be easily denied. Feeling sympathy towards someone or something comes naturally to humans. It is not required that one must undergo the same challenges to understand a person’s struggle. The extent of one’s sympathy depends upon the extremity of one’s plights. Regardless of who or what, everyone has felt sympathy or has been given sympathy. Euripides, a famous Grecian playwright wrote Greek tragedies known for eliciting sympathy from the audience. An example of this is Euripides’ play Medea. Medea is one of Euripides’ most well known characters Euripides created Medea to be a sympathetic character. Medea was originally published in Greek; therefore many aspects of the play may have been lost in translation as it is difficult to translate both the literal and implied meaning of the original play. Although many may dispute that Medea is a sympathetic character it is evident through, various sacrific ial acts of love, Medea’s unstable mental state and role as a foreign woman in the ancient Greece society help Euripides portray Medea as a sympathetic character as conveyed by his social commentary. Sacrifices are often made in one’s everyday life. However, it is the repercussions of these sacrifices that elicit sympathy from one’s peers. Medea with, â€Å"...her heart unhinged in her love for Jason...persuaded the daughters of Pelias to kill their father† (Euripides 8-10). Euripides uses a mythological allusion by briefly referring to the legendary journey of Jason and the Argonauts. Euripides portrays Medea as a character who selflessly victimizes herself. Through this sacrificial act of love Medea, victimizes herself by acquiring enemies on Jason’s behalf. Furthermore, Medea betrays her... ...cal to further develop a clear understanding of her motives. Although Medea’s actions were arbitrary and illogical, the reasoning behind her actions was completely selfless and motivated by love. Additionally, Medea’s irrational state of mind contributes to her illogical selfless actions. Euripides demonstrates how Medea allows herself to be a victim to her anger which overpowers her rational thinking. Furthermore, Euripides’ social commentary on the role of women and foreigners in the ancient Greece society display how Medea is poorly judged due to both these factors and her disinterest in conforming to societal norms. Therefore, it is apparent that Euripides created Medea as a sympathetic character. Although many aspects of the original play may have been lost in translation, it is proven that Medea is in fact a sympathetic character as shown through her plights.

Compare and Contrast Two Supply Chains

To start, it is vital to clarify the concept of a supply chain. It consists basically of all the process that the materials suffer as they flow from the source to the final customer. There are many concepts linked to this term, purchasing, warehousing, manufacturing, etc. Or more precisely: â€Å"a supply chain is a system of business enterprises that link together to satisfy consumer demand. The elements of a supply chain can be contained in the same business or be part of different companies† (Riddalls et Al. 2000) For this essay I have chosen two very different companies; Zara, a Spanish fashion collection manufacturing company, and Dell, American multinational information technologic corporation. Some years ago, in the fashion industry there was a relationship between price and quality. For high quality brands, there was a need to spend a high amount of money. Zara was one of the first companies that changed this assumption by introducing good quality clothes at a good price. Normally, if you look at any other brand such as Loewe, Louis Vuitton, etc. you will realize that they basically have two different collections of clothes: autumn- winter and spring-summer. Zara does not use in this way of supplying their stores. On the contrary they believe in change. They are constantly changing their clothes and supplying their stores (over 14,000 stores in the whole world) with new and different outfit two times per week (only for the European stores) to satisfy the needs of their customers. Traditionally all the fashion companies required long time to supply the stores with the clothes. Basically the whole supply chain has very long lead times; if you want to produce a new t-shirt, the production, manufacturing, packaging and specially distribution will require a lot of time which will make the planning for weeks or even months. Zara, on the contrary, has manage to minimise the time to supply the demand as much as possible but, how do they do that? First of all they minimize the time spent in design, as they don’t always look for the most innovative and creative clothes. What they do is listen to consumer preferences and what it is more popular and produce what they want. That is why they always have fresh and trendy designs. In terms of production, they have and control the main factory in La Coruna (north of Spain) to be able to supply as fast as possible all the stores. The fact of having the factory in Europe and not in other countries such as China is high, but it is something that is covered by lower transportation costs as well as the capacity to supply demand almost immediately, which its translated in big amount of sells. It is a very flexible demand based production. Another positive point of Zara, due to high frequency of changing clothes is the low risk that this report. As they change constantly the outfit, if there is a product that is working good it can be immediately replace within a maximum of one week, while in other companies, where the stock is bigger, it will need to be stored in the shops for longer time. This will carry on low inventory costs. Zara, has an agile production that focus it success in the quick response to demand even though it is no, a priori, predictable. Dell’s supply chain, on the other hand it is completely different that Zara’s one. The components of Dell’s supply chain are the customers, Dell’s website (which is the only official place where you can buy a Dell computer), Dell’s assembly plant and Dell’s suppliers. The way Dell computers production works is completely different from Zara. In the previous example we saw that the company was the one regarding the demand and trends in order to make their products (clothes). Dell provides the customers a platform, their webpage, where they have all the different options for their products.

Hrm- Training Need Analysis

Training Needs Analysis Purpose A Training Needs Analysis (TNA) is used to assess an organization’s training needs. The root of the TNA is the gap analysis. This is an assessment of the gap between the knowledge, skills and attitudes that the people in the organization currently possess and the knowledge, skills and attitudes that they require to meet the organization’s objectives. The training needs assessment is best conducted up front, before training solutions are budgeted, designed and delivered. The output of the needs analysis will be a document that specifies why, what, who, when, where and how. More specifically, the document will need to answer these questions: why do people need the training? what skills need imparting? who needs the training? when will they need the new skills? where may the training be conducted? and how may the new skills be imparted? There are so many ways for conducting a Training Needs Analysis, depending on your situation. One size does not fit all. Is the purpose of the needs assessment to: lead in to a design of a specific purpose improvement initiative (e. g. customer complaint reduction) enable the design of the organization’s training calendar identify training and development needs of individual staff during the performance appraisal cycle †¦ and so on and so on. In clarifying the purpose of the TNA, consider the scope of the TNA. Is it to determine training needs: at the organization level? at the project level for a specific project? or at the department level for specific employees? Your answer to these questions will dictate: who will conduct the TNA how the TNA will be conducted, and what data sources will be used Training Needs Analysis Method Below are three scenarios in which you may find yourself wanting to conduct a Training Needs Analysis. This is not an exhaustive treatment, however, it will give you some tips on what to do. Employee Performance Appraisal In many organizations, each employee’s manager discusses training and development needs during the final part of the performance appraisal discussion. This method suits where training needs are highly varied amongst individual employees. Typically, the manager constructs an employee Performance Development Plan in collaboration with the employee being appraised. The Plan takes into consideration: the organization's strategies and plans agreed employee goals and targets the employee’s performance results the employee’s role description feedback from internal/external customers and stakeholders, and the employee’s stated career aspirations The employee’s completed Performance Development Plan should document the area that requires improvement, the actual development activity, resource requirements, expected outcomes and an agreed time frame in which the development outcome will be achieved. Check out our Training Management Template Pack for a customizable Performance Development Plan and instructions for use. You may find some commonality amongst individual training and development needs identified in the various performance appraisals. In this case, it may pay the organization to review and classify each of the needs and convert them into appropriate training courses (or other interventions). The next step is to prioritize their importance and aggregate the results so that you end up with a list of courses and participant numbers against each. Then negotiate a delivery schedule that fits in with managers/supervisors and employees whilst keeping an eye on your budget. Improvement Project Most, if not all, improvement projects have some employee training associated with them. Examples of improvement projects include planned and structured attempts to reduce the incidence of product defects, increase sales volume and decrease the number of customer complaints. Here, the Training Needs Analysis begins by clarifying the measurable organizational improvement targets and the employee behaviors required to meet these targets. For example, the organization might set a target of a 50 percent reduction in customer complaints by the end of the year. Employee behaviors required to achieve this target might be: empathetic listening to customer complaints regular follow up of complaint resolution †¦ and so on. To get to this point, though, the cause of the underperformance needs to be determined through a series of structured questions. If there is no one else to perform this initial diagnosis, you as the training professional may be called upon to do this job. A performance consulting approach can help you here. With this approach, the person doing the diagnosis first asks managers to identify their problems in concrete terms. Next, possible causes and solutions are discussed and training solutions identified, where appropriate. To do this successfully, the performance consultant needs to be well-versed in process improvement methods and employee motivation theory and practice. For small projects, you can use a simple employee performance flow chart in working with managers to help identify the cause of performance deficiencies. Where training is identified as an appropriate solution or as part of the solution, we then recommend that you work through a training needs analysis questionnaire with the appropriate stakeholders. This will give you the information you need to move to the training program design phase. An effective training needs analysis questionnaire worksheet will cover at least the following areas: The results from these structured interviews are then written up in a formal document, along with the answers to the other questions raised above. Check out our Training Projects Template Pack for an example of a customizable training needs analysis template that you can download today. The results of the TNA are then fed into the next phase of the instructional systems design life cycle; the high-level design of the training program. Following all of the above is of course more time consuming than getting a simple wish-list from managers and delivering a smorgasbord of training courses. However, by using a structured approach, you will avoid the 80 percent wastage of resources that any companies experience in delivering programs that don’t truly fit their needs. Constructing a Training Calendar When constructing an annual training calendar, be wary of simply asking managers what training they want delivered. Assessing training needs this way, you will most probably get a wish list with little connection to the real needs of the organization. When the time comes and they and their workers are pressed for time, you may fi nd it difficult to fill seats. Training is expensive, and there is no better method for wasting your scare training dollars. Why is this so? We find that many managers are not skilled in identifying which of their problems can be solved by training and which cannot. For a training calendar to be effective, it needs to be tailored for your specific organization’s real needs. Ask your managers what training they need. However, make sure you engage them in constructive dialog about what their real problems are and which of them can realistically be addressed through training. If the performance shortfall is a one-off problem, such as an increasing number of customer complaints, it may be more effective and cost efficient to address the issue on an improvement project basis. Training calendars are best suited to repeatable and regular demand, such as refresher skills training for infrequently performed technical tasks and for new recruits joining the organization. In these cases, review what training is required on a regular basis and look at what new recruits need to be proficient at soon after they join your organization. Generally speaking, consult with your management team by checking off which of the following areas require inclusion in your training calendar: management, leadership and supervision skills oft skills, such as communication and conflict resolution environment, health and safety human resource processes, such as performance management business skills, such as strategy, planning and process improvement technical line and staff skills such as telephone etiquette and inventory management In constructing your training calendar, we suggest you also consider looking at one or more of the data sources listed in the next section. Once you have composed your list of courses, assess demand for each course and the required frequency, all the while, keeping an eye on your budget. With a limited budget, we suggest you get your management team to help you assess priorities. Data Sources In conducting your training needs analysis, you may have a variety of data sources available to you. Which data sources you use will depend on a number of factors. These factors include: the amount of time you have available the human resources you have available he level of accuracy you require the reliability of each data source the accessibility of each data source The data sources that you have available may include: interviews/surveys with supervisors/managers interviews/surveys with employees employee performance appraisal documents organization’s strategic planning documents organization/department operational plans organization/department key performance indicators customer complaints critical incidents product/servic e quality data For example, if you are considering providing training in project management to project managers, you may want to interview the prospective participants, the project managers, and their managers on what problems they are facing. It may also pay to review planning and procedural documents to ascertain what project management methodology and tools your organization is using, or is planning on using. Data sources that may show light on where the training needs to focus the most are project performance data and post-implementation reviews. Which sources you will actually use and how much time and effort you expend on each will depend on your particular circumstances. Needless to say, there is no magic formula and you will need to exercise a fair amount of judgment in most cases. Although there are no hard and fast rules in conducting a Training Needs Analysis, we have outlined above some general guidelines and helpful hints. We can also help you with some practical TNA tools, such as a training needs analysis questionnaire and training needs analysis spreadsheet, in our customizable template packs.