Tuesday, December 24, 2019

The Unexpected Downside of Science Explored in Aldous...

The Unexpected Downside of Science Explored in Aldous Huxleys Brave New World Since the first day that humans were put on this earth, they have been curious and have searched for ways to become more efficient. Throughout the years they have created tools to better serve them, created clothing to keep them warm, built homes to protect them from the elements, and produced transportation methods to transport them across the world. In Aldous Huxleys Brave New World (1932), the human race has evolved to being extremely efficient in everything that they do. This efficiency includes producing new human beings. Science has taken over and altered the society. Imagine not having a family to care for you or you for them. In Huxleys book,†¦show more content†¦Each class is specified in Greek letters. The upper class is the Alpha class, followed by the Beta class and so on. One would think that a person of a lower class would prefer to be an Alpha, but in Huxleys book the well conditioning of humans since birth allows the lower class to be thankful that they are not a part of any other class. Most of the mental conditioning occurs during the sleeping hours of the children. While the children sleep, speakers that are scattered throughout the room repeat a phrase over and over. The children then repeat the exact phrase over and over in their sleep. A conditioning phrase giving to the Beta class would state, Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because theyre so frightfully clever. Im really glad Im a Beta, because I dont work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I dont want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. Theyre too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides they wear black, which is such a beastly colour. Im so glad Im a Beta (18). The director running the conditioning of the new humans stated that, Theyll have that repeated [. . .] A hundred and twenty times three times a week for thirty months. After which they go on to a more advanced lesson. Till at last the childs mind is these suggestions, and the sum of the

Monday, December 16, 2019

Intra and Interpersonal Skills Free Essays

Today I am going to introduce what I have learnt in IIC. I have several skills that would be useful for my future, such as concentrate on positives when I am in bad moods, self-disclosure and giving positive response to criticism for better communication. However, these are not the most important aspects for me. We will write a custom essay sample on Intra and Interpersonal Skills or any similar topic only for you Order Now This is because I cherish more on relationships. Besides, I don’t have good relationship with family members. Also, friends cannot always be with me. Therefore, love is the only thing I pursue in my entire life. However, there are lots of barriers on my love path. My lovers just left me very soon and said â€Å"you are too good for me†. I wondered if it is just simply an excuse for breaking up with me. After the Developing and Enriching Intimate Relationship lesson, I realized the reason that none of them want to stay with me and commented I am too good for them. This is because I am having obsessive love with them, giving them too much love and so pressure. This is one of the obstacles for love to the lecture notes. On the other hand, we didn’t have a mutual direction for our future. We had intimacy and passion but no commitment was involved. The first thing I have to do is self-love. This is because obsessive love only gives pressure to the other person. To have a healthy relationship, loving yourself is essential. Then, I have to plan a long-term involvement with that person. I used to have romantic loves. However, that is not I need, what I need is the consummate love. According to Sternberg’s Triangular Theory of Love, consummate love includes intimacy, passion and commitment. I will be open and honest to let my relationship grows healthy. â€Å"Learning to love doesn’t just happen if we meet the right person†. I believe if you want to have a good result, effort is necessary for it, even love. How to cite Intra and Interpersonal Skills, Essay examples

Sunday, December 8, 2019

Program Design for Create Future Project-Samples for Students

Question: Discuss about the Support adventure and recreation for young people during their transition to independence from state care. Answer: Introduction The youth unemployment in the small towns and cities has been a great discomfort for the governments of various nations. Australia also faces the same predicament and various organizations in the country are looking to implement various type of programs for the development of the unemployed and the under privileged (Harvey et al., 2015). This report provides the details about one of such initiatives adopted by the CREATE organization. This report deals with the program design and the evaluation plan for the CREATE Your Future project. The scenario selected for the evaluation process is the Support, adventure and recreation for young people during their transition from the out-of home care system to the independence from the state. At the present situation the young people are transitioning are facing a great deal of problems. The rate of homelessness, substance use, unemployment and the mental illness among the young people have increased at a considerable rate (Arnau-sabates Giliga n, 2015). Hence, for the resolution of the situation the CREATE have developed a program designed for these under privileged kids that would help them to learn various type of practical, theoretical and interpersonal skills that would enhance them both as an professional and also as a human being. The program is named as CREATE Your Future. The program is a multi-systematic program that is used for the utilization of the solution and the strengths focused approach both for the individuals and the group interventions. The report provides the details about the program and also performs an evaluation of the designed program. The report contains the problem analysis, needs assessment, program strategy, program design and the program evaluations. Additionally, the budget assessments and the analysis of the audiences for the program are also provided in the report. Problem Analysis This report has been used to perform the problem analysis for the program. This can be used for the exploration of the various types of difficulties faced by the people that would be leaving the out-of home care system in Australia. The Kettner model has been used for the problem analysis of the provided situation (Kettner, Moroney Martin, 2017). According to the reports, around 39,000 children were present in the out-of home care system in the country. They were either living in the foster care or the kingship care arrangements in and around the country (McDowall, 2013). According to the court orders of the Victorian custody and the Guardianship court orders the children that aged around 16 to 18 years were in transition from the out-of-home care services of the country. Hence, each year around 400 children makes transition from this system. Hence, as a result the numbers of children in the city living without any support are increasing with the increase of time. In addition to thi s, various type of problems have been experienced by the children during this transition such as: Abuse before entering the care facilities Bad experiences in the care Lack of support to provided to them after they completed their transition from the care They face various types of issues such as homelessness, substance use, unemployment and the mental illness. According to certain reports 45% of the people were in justice systems, 35% were homeless and 28% were unemployed. In addition to this, there was adverse effect on the children after leaving the care (Ross, 2014). The children face various types of problems because the process of transition is accelerated at the care they are released at a very young age. In addition to this they are also not provided with any type of preparation and adequate support after leaving the care. Needs Assessment The needs assessment has been performed in the report to identify the gaps in the service delivery that are related to the children that are leaving the care and these gaps are to be filled up efficiently by the implemented system. Hence, the system is required to enhance the quality of living of the children (Dennt Churchill, 2016). They are required to implement efficient programs for the children so that they can be able to make a stand for themselves in the society. For the assessment of the requirement of the presented situation and interview of the children was conducted. In the interview the children who were out of the care system were asked various types of questions. The basic requirements that were assessed from this situation are: The existing care providing organizations have very limited amount of resources available to them and hence, this leaves the care providers are provided with very less options to work for the betterment of the youth that leaves the care (Fitzpatrick, Claire Coyne, 2016). Hence, the young people should be provided with more opportunities so that they can make a stand for themselves in the society. The surveys also show that the people at the care working with the young people lack the efficiency in communicating with them efficiently and also the systems and the policies at the care are not correctly implemented such as the age at which a child leaves the care and the support criteria for the young people (Morrison Shepherd, 2015). They also do not have the scope to support the young people after the leaving the care. They are also unable the engage the young people in programs that would be enhancing their careers. Hence, there is need of proper support program for the young people after they leave the care. The surveys also revealed that the people were not sure about the career path they want to choose and also they were not indulged in the programs that were related to the hobbies of the young people at the care. Program theory of change The CREATE Your Future initiative by the organization have designed various type of programs that would enhance the knowledge of the young people and also they developed a website for the people that would be able to keep in touch with organization form the different locations (Royse, Thyre Padgett, 2015). The organization helps the under privileged by providing them with the access to the website. There are various types of features provided by the organization to the children and the young people who are leaving the care. They provide health and nutrition activities for the people. They make them conscious about their health and try and change their health habits and provide them with the option of free checkups in case they are ill or injured. The website provides the young people with the options to learn new things and also earn money by performing different type of jobs by which they can earn a considerable amount of money and gain experience. They would be professionally able after engaging to these programs. The organization realizes that there is a need to support the young people who are comes directly out of the care both financially and socially (Urban, Hargreaves Trochim, 2014). There is need to provide the people with different type of facilities such as work, health and education. They would need to acquire some efficient skill so that they can survive independently in the world. The organization thinks that the work and education are main pillars on which the future for the people leaving the care would depend. They also think that the people require an efficient level of counseling for each and every sector of their life. Hypothesis The people who are out of the care directly are often vulnerable to various types of wrong deeds and hence they should be show the proper path and should be guided in the right tracks so that they can establish the aim of their life and work towards making the aim a success in their life (Kurata, Suzuki Nishimura, 2015). Goal Statement The main goal of the program is to provide the young people with the information and guidance about different aspects of life make them stable enough so that they can live independently on their own in the society (Ogbeiwi, 2017). Evidence Base The program and the website are very efficiently designed for the betterment of people leaving the care (Laska, Gurman Wampold, 2014).The website is created for the children who would not be able to reach the organization directly and hence, would be able to reach them via the website. But for the unprivileged in the small cities it might not always be possible to reach the website and this would be a downside of this program. Program Design The program design consists of a set of processes that the participants in the programs have to go through and also they consists of a website that is designed for the care leavers and the people that cannot reach the organization directly (Schoenfield, 2013). The program Logic model provides more information about the design of the project. Goals Objectives The main goal of the project is to reach out to the youths and the unemployed and work for their benefit. The main objectives for the project are: To provide the youth the employment opportunities To provide them guidance in their career To make the care leavers job ready Target Population The target population for the project is the youth that are to be released from the state care. This is design especially for the pupils who are in the transition from the care to being independent in the society. This is almost around 36,000 approximately. Program outline The CREATE Foundation have different type of programs organized for the underprivileged and the unemployed part of the population. They host a number of programs such as the Grant schemes, seminars and also various types of workshops for the young people. The report provides the information about the website of the foundation that is used for their CREATE Your Future program. The website would allow the youths who are out of the care homes of the states to register themselves to the website and also would be able to access the different features of the website free of cost (Chomsky, 2014). They would be able to attend various type of seminars, webinars, and also in various type of workshops that would be organized by the CREATE Foundation. In addition to this, they would also be able to enroll themselves in different type online courses for free and also they would be able to apply for online counseling free of cost where they would be provided with various type of advices and help t hem to interact with the experts and the psychologists. The website also has freelancing option for the people. They would be able to enroll themselves and do various types of freelancing jobs and earn money from it. This would help to enhance the financial status of the youths in the country and also the foundation would be able to generate some revenue from it, which would be later utilized for the benefit of the youths and the society. In addition to this, the foundation also donates a large sum of money for the welfare of the society. They do this from the revenue generated for them. Program partners The create foundation has been created collaboratively and is an organization which work for the benefit of the youths and the society and works towards the greater cause in the society. Budget Cost Management The CREATE foundation has organized have organized the CREATE Your Future project. But before the implementation of the project the economic analysis for the project should be done. This is the check whether the program is economically feasible or not and this is used to check if the project would be sustainable enough to be carried out. Total Budget for the program The total budget for the program is to be finalized before the project is to be implemented. The estimated total budget for the program is $390,000. The detail of the budget is provided in the table below. Budget for CREATE Your Future Expenses Salaries Description Quantity Cost Total Social Workers 70% of Time on Project 10 6,000 $60,000 Counselors Counselor fee (hourly or flat) 5 500 $2,500 Guest speakers Honoraria rate 5 1000 $5,000 Sub - total Salaries $67,500 Website Description Quantity Cost Total Cost of implementation 1 90,000 $90,000 Software cost 1 50,000 $50,000 Hardware Cost 1 60,000 $60,000 Other 1 40,000 $40,000 Sub-total Travel $240,000 Events Description Quantity Cost Total Seminars 7 2,000 $14,000 Webinars 5 1,500 $7,500 Workshops 7 2,000 $14,000 Awards 5 500 $2,500 Sub-total Events $38,000 Training Description Quantity Cost Total Online Course 500 10 $5,000 Non-technical training 2000 20 $40,000 Sub-total Training $45,000 Intermediate Total $390,500 Indirect Costs Quantity Cost Total Indirect 15% of total expenses $390,500 0.15 $58,575 Total Expenses $449,075 Income Program Income Description Quantity Cost Total Advertisement Income from Advertisement 10 500 $5,000 Sales 40 1,000 $40,000 In-kind contributions government funds 3 10,000 $30,000 Grants/Sponsorships/RFP's CREATE 1 30,000 $30,000 Other revenue from partnership 1 20,000 $20,000 Total Income $125,000 Cost benefit Analysis for the program The cost benefit analysis for the program involves the calculations of the NPV analysis and the ROI analysis for the program (Torriti Ikpe, 2014). The NPV and the ROI are positive from the analysis and this denotes that the project is both economically stable and also would be sustainable over a longer period of time. CREATE Foundation CRETE Your Future Year of Project Year 0 Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 Total Net economic benefit $0.00 $125,000.00 $125,000.00 $125,000.00 $125,000.00 $125,000.00 Discount rate @ 5% 1 0.95 0.9 0.85 0.8 0.75 PV of benefits 0 $118,750.00 $112,500.00 $106,250.00 $100,000.00 $93,750.00 NPV of All Benefits $0.00 $118,750.00 $231,250.00 $337,500.00 $437,500.00 $531,250.00 $531,250.00 One Time Costs $350,000.00 Recurring Costs $0.00 $40,000.00 $40,000.00 $40,000.00 $40,000.00 $40,000.00 Discount rate @ 5% 1 0.95 0.9 0.85 0.8 0.75 PV of Recurring Costs $0.00 $38,000.00 $36,000.00 $34,000.00 $32,000.00 $30,000.00 NPV of all Benefits $150,000.00 $188,000.00 $224,000.00 $258,000.00 $290,000.00 $320,000.00 $320,000.00 Overall NPV $211,250.00 Overall ROI 0.66015625 Break Even Analysis Yearly NPV cash flow $350,000.00 $80,750.00 $76,500.00 $72,250.00 $68,000.00 $63,750.00 Overall NPV cash flow $350,000.00 $269,250.00 $192,750.00 $120,500.00 $52,500.00 -$11,250.00 Program Monitoring Evaluation Plan Type of evaluation The program evaluations are generally based on the financial and the social terms. The evaluation of the program would indicate whether the program is sustainable or not. Indicators The main the indicators for the program to be economically feasible are the NPV analysis and the ROI analysis. The NPV and the ROI are positive from the analysis and this denotes that the project is both economically stable and also would be sustainable over a longer period of time. In addition to this, the program is designed for the underprivileged and the unemployed; hence the program works for the greater good of the people. Therefore the program is also socially feasible. Audience The main audience for the program are the CREATE Foundation, the Australian Government, the care leavers and the unemployed sector of the population in the country. Bibliography Arnau-Sabats, L., Gilligan, R. (2015). What helps young care leavers to enter the world of work? Possible lessons learned from an exploratory study in Ireland and Catalonia.Children and youth services review,53, 185-191. Chomsky, N. (2014).The minimalist program. MIT press. Denny, L., Churchill, B. (2016). Youth employment in Australia: A comparative analysis of labour force participation by age group.Journal of Applied Youth Studies,1(2), 5. Fitzpatrick, C., Williams, P., Coyne, D. (2016). Supporting looked after children and care leavers in the criminal justice system: emergent themes and strategies for change.Prison Service Journal, (226), 8-13. Harvey, A., McNamara, P., Andrewartha, L., Luckman, M. (2015). Out of care, into university: Raising higher education access and achievement of care leavers.Melbourne: LaTrobe University. Kettner, P. M., Moroney, R. M., Martin, L. L. (2017).Designing and managing programs: An effectiveness-based approach. Sage Publications. Kurata, G., Suzuki, M., Nishimura, M. (2015).U.S. Patent No. 9,165,553. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Laska, K. M., Gurman, A. S., Wampold, B. E. (2014). Expanding the lens of evidence-based practice in psychotherapy: a common factors perspective.Psychotherapy,51(4), 467. McDowall, J. J. (2013). Experiencing out-of-home care in Australia.The views of children and young people (CREATE Report Card 2013). Sydney: CREATE Foundation. Morrison, R., Shepherd, M. (2015). Exploring factors contributing to the outcomes of Looked After Children.Communicare,1(2). Ogbeiwi, O. (2017). Are your written objectives' really'smart? A descriptive review of the goal framework of objective statements. Ross, A. J. (2014). Working in rural areas-the experiences of Umthombo Youth Development Foundation graduates.African Journal of Primary Health Care and Family Medicine,6(1), 1-7. Royse, D., Thyer, B. A., Padgett, D. K. (2015).Program evaluation: An introduction to an evidence-based approach. Cengage Learning. Schoenfeld, B. J. (2013). Postexercise hypertrophic adaptations: a reexamination of the hormone hypothesis and its applicability to resistance training program design.The Journal of Strength Conditioning Research,27(6), 1720-1730. Torriti, J., Ikpe, E. (2014). CostBenefit Analysis. InEncyclopedia of Law and Economics(pp. 1-8). Springer New York.

Saturday, November 30, 2019

Should social media be banned free essay sample

Social media has made an effect on the modern world together. Some people consider social media to have a very negative impact on people, especially our younger generation, causing inappropriate language being used. It is a topic that divides an opinion. People say social media is an amazing tool, but others worry about the impact it has on lives. Here are some reasons why you should not ban social media. During the royal wedding, a lot of people went crazy. There were people trending all across the world about it. Thousands of people around the world were able to share one special moment. In a local article is has been proven that ‘more than 300 tweets per second’ were filling the well branched website, Twitter. Also on Facebook there were ’74 status updates per second. ’ This has shown that there were millions of viewers watching the royal wedding. The royal wedding was a special, yet memorable moment it has been shared through social media. We will write a custom essay sample on Should social media be banned or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page In addition to that many people knew about the wedding through social media. If we did not have social media, not that many people would have known about the wedding. Not everyone has a TV so that’s where social media comes into recognition. Whoever wanted to watch Prince William and Kate Middleton’s big day could watch it on a live stream through YouTube. ‘Google was expecting 400 million views. ’ Google is a massive piece of media. Many people watched the live stream on YouTube. The royal wedding got more views that Barak Obama’s inauguration in 2009. 70 million people online viewed his inauguration itself! 2 billion people worldwide watched the royal wedding. There was a massive frenzy. A 14 year old killed herself after getting bullied on a site called, ask. fm. After her death her father made a Facebook page on her behalf. ‘This page has nearly 30,000 likes. ’ This shows that many people support her dad for his loss. Mr Smith has asked people to sign an e-petition to introduce safeguarding measures on sites used by children. Her dad is looking out for other children and does not want this to happen to any other child in the future. The petition says ‘please sign if you would like the government to step in and insist that ask. fm and similar sites help us protect our young people. ’ Due to all the people liking this page they are eager for a change to sites and want to help the younger generation. Social media can help make a change to websites like ask. fm. A Facebook page can make a difference; it’s better to do something than do nothing. ‘Through the UK council of child internet safety we are working with social networking sites and internet providers to make the Internet a safer place for young people. ’ The chief executive of the NSPCC wants to make a difference. There have been many concerns put forward by academics, people of the older generation and particularly the media about the apparent dangers of social network sites and some have even asserted that a ban from them be put in place. Some of these concerns include the breakdown of communication, ‘cyber bullying’ and problems associated with exposing personal details on these sites. In addition, they have expressed distress about social network sites being used as a means of communication for terrorist groups and causing people to become dangerously addicted to them. There are many reasons why social media should be banned. Here are some reasons why. Social media is an ideal place to create a hostile environment. ‘Hide behind their screens’ I bet you one person has said something nasty to you through a computer. These people are scared to say it to the victim’s faces. They hide, its called cyber bullying. The people behind the screens would be showing their anger but its nit fair on the victim to get hurt. This will create a hostile environment for everyone affected. Many parents dislike social networking. They believe that sites such ask. fm and Facebook attract child predators. Others believe that cyber-bullying takes place on these sites. Still others feel that social networks distract a child from his or her schoolwork. Normally a school child’s after school is routine is to go on the computer and finish off some homework but ‘86% of children open Facebook up first. ’ This is a huge distraction, they might forget to do some homework and start talking to friends or scroll through there newsfeed just to see what has happened in a day. Who knows if the work will get done at its best standards? Ask. fm is a social networking site that allows people to post questions to anyone anonymously. ‘The cruel nature of cyber bullying allows perpetrators to remain anonymous. ’ Because people are allowed to say anything anonymous then they can say anything. Anything. When the royal wedding was taking place the BBC was putting a live stream on bbc. co. uk but the BBC was ‘unable to cope. ’ The BBC website wobbled under the strain as huge numbers of Britons tried to access its coverage. So many people wanted to watch the live stream. Even though BBC is new media they couldn’t cope because too many people wanted to go onto the website. The London riot is an example of how social media can be used. There are the cases of young teenage boys and girls who went on looting sprees night after night. The youngest defendant was a shocking 11 years old. Some of these young people allegedly used Twitter and Facebook to organise themselves and encourage their friends to join in. However, whatever the cause of the riots, something amazing happened, which should not be forgotten or overlooked; Londoners of all backgrounds, including young people, came out in force to defend and clean up their city. Rather poetically, the clean-up was organised using the very same social networking mechanisms that were used to orchestrate the chaos. In a truly unique and very British display of defiance and civic pride, thousands of people formed an army of cleaners, equipped with brushes and bags. David Cameron has been trying to tell us that we need to build the Big Society; this response showed that his empty rhetoric is redundant, because for the large part, we already have the Big Society. Social media can be seen as both positive and negative for the following positive reasons are: people can communicate easier and share a special moment that has an effect on the world. For the following negative reasons they are: cyber bullying and lack of concentration for the young generation. Based on that I think social media should not be banned because it’s easier to communicate to people around the world and you can get information quicker. It is the persons choice if they want to cyber bully another person ad it is their education not mine. But we can change the way people use social media.

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

How to Conjugate Protéger (to Protect) in French

How to Conjugate Protà ©ger (to Protect) in French You will use the French verb  protà ©ger  when you want to say to protect. A verb conjugation is required if you want to use it for the past tense protected or the future tense will protect. This word has a couple tricks to it, but a lesson in its simplest conjugations will explain everything you need to know. The Basic Conjugations of  Protà ©ger Protà ©ger is both a stem-changing  and  spelling change verb. While that may seem scary at first, both issues have a purpose and are relatively easy to handle. The stem change occurs with the accented  Ãƒ ©Ã‚  in  protà ©ger. You will notice that in some forms- the present tense, in particular- the accent changes to an  Ãƒ ¨.  You will also notice that the future tense gives you the option between the stem changes.  Pay attention to this while studying so you can spell it correctly when needed.   The stem change pops up in the regular -er  conjugations where the ending begins with an  a  or  o.  For these, the  e  is retained to ensure the  g  has a soft pronunciation as it does in gel. Without the  e, the vowels would make it a hard sound as in gold. The indicative mood and the basic present, future, and imperfect past tenses are covered in this first chart. These should be your top priority to memorize because youll use them most often. All you need to do is pair the subject pronoun with the corresponding tense to learn which endings to use. For example, je protà ©ge means I am protecting and nous protà ©gions means we protected. Present Future Imperfect je protà ¨ge protà ©geraiprotà ¨gerai protà ©geais tu protà ¨ges protà ©gerasprotà ¨geras protà ©geais il protà ¨ge protà ©geraprotà ¨gera protà ©geait nous protà ©geons protà ©geronsprotà ¨gerons protà ©gions vous protà ©gez protà ©gerezprotà ¨gerez protà ©giez ils protà ¨gent protà ©gerontprotà ¨geront protà ©geaient The Present Participle of  Protà ©ger The spelling change is also required in the  present participle  of  protà ©ger because of the -ant  ending. The result is the word  protà ©geant. Protà ©ger  in the Compound Past Tense Another way to express the past tense in French is with the  passà © composà ©. This requires both the  past participle  protà ©gà ©Ã‚  and the present tense conjugate of the auxiliary verb  avoir. For example, I protected is  jai protà ©ge  and we protected is  nous avons protà ©gà ©. More Simple Conjugations of  Protà ©ger Once again, youll find some spelling and stem changes in the following conjugations. Also, the conditional- used for if...then situations- offers the option between the accented es. However, if you pay careful attention to those things, these forms of  protà ©ger  can be quite useful. The subjunctive, for instance, allows you to call the act of protecting into question. When reading or writing French, youll likely encounter  the passà © simple  or  the imperfect subjunctive  because these are literary tenses. Subjunctive Conditional Passà © Simple Imperfect Subjunctive je protà ¨ge protà ©geraisprotà ¨gerais protà ©geai protà ©geasse tu protà ¨ges protà ©geraisprotà ¨gerais protà ©geas protà ©geasses il protà ¨ge protà ©geraitprotà ¨gerait protà ©gea protà ©geà ¢t nous protà ©gions protà ©gerionsprotà ¨gerions protà ©geà ¢mes protà ©geassions vous protà ©giez protà ©geriezprotà ¨geriez protà ©geà ¢tes protà ©geassiez ils protà ¨gent protà ©geraientprotà ¨geraient protà ©gà ¨rent protà ©geassent The French imperative  may be useful for a verb like  protà ©ger. Its used for short and assertive statements, and when you use it, theres no need to include the subject pronoun.   Imperative (tu) protà ¨ge (nous) protà ©geons (vous) protà ©gez

Friday, November 22, 2019

President Jimmy Carters Record on Civil Rights and Race Relations

President Jimmy Carters Record on Civil Rights and Race Relations When Georgian Jimmy Carter won the 1976 presidential race, no politician from the Deep South had been elected since 1844. Despite Carter’s Dixie roots, the incoming president boasted a large black fan base, having supported African-American causes as a lawmaker in his home state. Four out of every five black voters reportedly backed Carter, and decades later, when the country welcomed its first black president, Carter continued to speak out about race relations in America. His record on civil rights before and after entering the White House reveal why Carter long garnered support from communities of color. A Voting Rights Supporter During his tenure as a Georgia state senator from 1963 to 1967, Carter worked to overturn laws that made it challenging for blacks to vote, according to the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. His pro-integration stance did not prevent him from serving two terms as state senator, but his views may have hurt his gubernatorial bid. When he ran for governor in 1966, an outpouring of segregationists turned out to the polls to elect Jim Crow supporter Lester Maddox. When Carter ran for governor four years later, he â€Å"minimized appearances before African American groups, and even sought the endorsements of avowed segregationists, a move that some critics call deeply hypocritical.† But Carter, it turned out, was simply being a politician. When he became governor the following year, he announced that the time had come to end segregation. Clearly, he’d never supported Jim Crow but catered to segregationists just to win their votes. Appointments of Blacks in Key Positions As Georgia governor, Carter didn’t just verbally oppose segregation but also worked to create more diversity in state politics. He reportedly raised the number of Georgia blacks on state boards and agencies from just three to a staggering 53. Under his leadership, almost half, 40 percent, of public servants in influential positions were African American. Social Justice Platform Impresses Time, Rolling Stone Gov. Carter’s views on civil rights so markedly differed from other Southern lawmakers, such as notorious Alabama Gov. George Wallace, that in 1971 he made the cover of Time magazine, which dubbed the Georgian the face of the â€Å"New South.† Just three years later, legendary Rolling Stone journalist, Hunter S. Thompson, became a fan of Carter after hearing the lawmaker discuss how politics can be used to effect social change. A Racial Gaffe or More Duplicity? Carter sparked controversy on April 3, 1976, while discussing public housing. The then-presidential candidate said that he thought community members should be able to preserve the â€Å"ethnic purity† of their neighborhoods, a statement that sounded like the tacit support of segregated housing. Five days later, Carter apologized for the comment. Had the pro-integrationist really meant to express support of Jim Crow housing, or was the statement just another ploy to get the segregationist vote? Black College Initiative As president, Carter launched the Black College Initiative to give historically black colleges and universities more support from the federal government. â€Å"Other administration education initiatives covered in the collection include science apprenticeships for minority students, technical assistance to black colleges, and minority fellowships in graduate management education,† according to the â€Å"Civil Rights During the Carter Administration† report. Business Opportunities for Blacks Carter also tried to close the wealth gap between whites and people of color. He developed initiatives to give minority-owned businesses a boost. â€Å"These programs focused primarily on increasing the government’s procurement of goods and services from minority business, as well as through requirements for procurement by federal contractors from minority firms,† the CRDTCA report states. â€Å"The aided industries ranged from construction to manufacturing to advertising, banking, and insurance. The government also maintained a program to help minority-owned exporters gain footholds in foreign markets.† Affirmative Action Supporter Affirmative action became a heavily debated topic when the U.S. Supreme Court heard the case of Allan Bakke, a white man denied admission to the medical school at the University of California, Davis. Bakke sued after UC Davis rejected him while admitting less qualified black students, he argued. The case marked the first time affirmative action had been challenged so vigorously. Yet, Carter continued to support affirmative action, which endeared him to blacks. Prominent Blacks in the Carter Administration When Carter became president, more than 4,300 blacks held elected office in the U.S. African Americans also served in the Carter cabinet. â€Å"Wade H. Mc-Cree served as solicitor general, Clifford L. Alexander was the first black secretary of the army, Mary Berry was the top official in Washington on educational matters prior to the establishment of the Department of Education, Eleanor Holmes Norton chaired the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and Franklin Delano Raines served on the White House staff,† according to the Spartacus-Educational website. Andrew Young, a Martin Luther King protà ©gà © and the first African American elected as a Georgia congressman since Reconstruction, served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. But Young’s outspoken views on race caused controversy for Carter and Young resigned under pressure. The president replaced with him another black man, Donald F. McHenry. Expansion from Civil Rights to Human Rights When Carter lost his bid for re-election, he opened the Carter Center in Georgia in 1981. The institution promotes human rights across the world and has overseen elections in a number of countries and curbed human rights violations in places such as Ethiopia, Panama, and Haiti. The center has also focused on domestic issues, such as in October 1991, when it launched the Atlanta Project initiative to address urban social problems. In October 2002, President Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize for â€Å"his decades of untiring efforts to find peaceful solutions to international conflict.† The Civil Rights Summit Jimmy Carter was the first president to speak at the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library Civil Rights Summit in April 2014. The summit commemorated the 50th anniversary of the groundbreaking Civil Rights Act of 1964. During the event, the former president  urged the nation to do more civil rights work. â€Å"There’s still a gross disparity between black and white people on education and employment,† he said. â€Å"A good amount of schools in the South are still segregated.† Given these factors, the civil rights movement isn’t just history, Carter explained but remains a pressing issue in the 21st century.

Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Ethical Issues of the Fundamental Differences in Values between Essay

Ethical Issues of the Fundamental Differences in Values between Clinicians and Families - Essay Example One of the problems in Ayeesa’s case is the language barrier, as a result, she is unable to communicate her wishes autonomously. However, an earlier offer to admit her to the local hospice for the control of her symptoms was declined. Similarly, she has also seemed reluctant to see the Macmillan nurse, as well as to undertake chemotherapy. This appears to indicate that the patient is reluctant to continue treatment, since the first surgery and chemotherapy, albeit successful has resulted in a relapse and second-line chemotherapy has also provided only temporary relief. However, her daughter is insistent that chemotherapy is continued for her mother, using a new drug. This raises ethical issues of the fundamental differences in values between clinicians and families. Trough (2007) points out the clinicians may justify withdrawal of treatment despite the requests of family members on the basis of (a) the inevitability of a prolonged death with unnecessary suffering for the patient and (b) the concern about excessive expense and (c) the moral distress associated with provision of futile care. These reasons may supersede the requests by the family to continue treatment in Ayeesa’s case as well, especially since she appears to show a reluctance to receive further treatment. Another aspect to consider is Ayeesa’s apparent refusal of treatment as opposed to her daughter’s request for it to continue. Winter and Cohen (1999) point out that advance refusal of treatment is becoming less effective in modern situations because they are required to be precisely worded and have not kept pace with the advances in medical technology. Therefore, an alternative approach that is being developed is valued history, wherein the patient’s values are recorded as the basis for making decisions on medical treatment, because they enable an identification of the patient’s core values and beliefs which are important to the patient, in so far as terminal care is concerned.  

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Discussion and Conclusion Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Discussion and Conclusion - Essay Example for â€Å"prefer not to interact with the community† (?=6.29). The high mean score of the number of the respondents were as a result of negative perception towards the community as well as the rewards associated with teaching in the community schools. The low motivation in the school communities makes many people to shy away and don’t want to interact or take part in any activity which might join them together. It may also have resulted due to the conflict which exists between that group of teachers and the community in question causing the disparity. As many people would like to identify themselves with certain aspects of the society, others seems to rebel and don’t want to be associated with certain aspects of the community hence limiting their interaction. The similar situation was the same with respondents who â€Å"would prefer not to interact with the community in the future† (?=6.13) items; and, second, more modest expectations of the improvement of community relatedness, as indicated by lower mean scores for items such as â€Å"could become closer if interacted a lot† (?=4.85). ... This group of participant may be made up of the teachers who came from that community and can freely interact with the community if they became closer to them. At the same time, the scores may represent those individuals who have not identified themselves with the community and have not realized the benefits. Competence scores present an even more striking result related to the science teachers’ perception of both their own teaching performance and the one of the whole schools community. This is indicated by the mean value for â€Å"feeling pretty good at teaching science in urban schools† (?=2.09), close to â€Å"highly unlikely† response, with the noteworthy higher mean (?=5.85) for â€Å"feeling pretty good compared to other science teachers†. The above mean scores shows that many teachers feels pretty good in teaching science subjects unlike the small number which does not feel pretty good for the teaching of the subject At the same time, autonomy supp ort score show less strong preferences of the survey participants, with total score as well as the separate item statistics appearing to be generally close to neutral estimates. An interesting insight in this regard can be provided by the observed modest but highly significant correlation between perceived autonomy support and negative community-related experience. The low score on the Autonomy support for the principal is as a result of negative attitude that teachers community have on the principal/administration. This might be as a result of a number of factors related to community involvement in running of the schools affairs as well as issues related to good governance and ethics. The results from ANOVA and one-sample t-tests indicated

Saturday, November 16, 2019

The ethical theories of natural law and situation ethics Essay Example for Free

The ethical theories of natural law and situation ethics Essay There are two main approaches to ethics which are held by Christians today. Over the years it has proved to be a very controversial and widely debated issue. Catholics and certain other strict denominations of the Christian church hold the view that natural law should be the means of making ethical decisions, whereas more liberal Christians consider situation ethics as a more suitable ethical system to go by. Natural law was advocated by St Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century. It states that all ethical decisions should be made by looking at the absolute moral laws which have been laid down for us by God. For Christians these stem from The Ten Commandments. Believers in this are known as Ethical Deontologists. They maintain that an action is intrinsically good, bad, right or wrong. When faced with a moral dilemma, one should refer to the Law, irrespectively of what the outcome will be. It is suggested that the human purpose of life is to live and reproduce, to live harmoniously, to learn and to worship God. Problems can arise when the consequence of the decision causes more harm than good. An example of this can be found in Catholic moral theology abortion is immoral and can never be permitted. A loophole in this law means that a surgical procedure may be acceptable even if the result of it leads to the death of a foetus. In this case abortion isnt the primary intention, but is a by-product of the primary objective. This makes it permissible, but can lead to further problems if there are more biological complications. It is at points such as this that the basic natural law approach begins to fall apart. In this day and age it is becoming increasingly difficult to apply absolute moral laws to every situation that arises. On the basis of the principle, it could be argued that it is acceptable to kill thousands of Afghans so as to avoid the deaths of a few Americans. Evil effects can be easily justified by claiming that they are by-products of ones actions. This brings us to the question of whether God has laid down firm and unalterable rules or whether as human beings, we need to make our own moral decisions. As a result of the major flaws that appear in the theory of natural law, a Teleological approach to ethics was later introduced by the Anglican theologian, Joseph Fletcher, although the basic ideas of situation ethics have a much longer history. This relative theory of ethics is based on consequentiality the outcome of an action. The main principle of this theory is that for an action to be ethical, it simply has to be carried out in a loving manner. Nothing is intrinsically good except for love. Actions are good if they help human beings and they are bad if they hurt people there are no other criteria. What is right in one case may be wrong in another. The individual and the situation are the only important thing when making a decision, rather than applying a principle (for example thou shalt not kill). The following quotations help to summarise situation ethics, There is only one ultimate and invariable duty, and its formula is Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. How to do this is another question, but this is the whole of moral duty. (William Temple) The law of love is the ultimate law because it is the negation of law; it is absolute because it concerns everything concretethe absolutism of love is its power to go into concrete situations. (Paul Tillich) Even though the teleological approach is a relative theory of ethics, it still involves an absolute law which is to do everything in love. However, the relativity of this theory allows room for exceptions to rules. Relativism doesnt imply that anything goes. For something to be relative, youve got to have something to be a benchmark, and situation ethics states that it should be relative to love. Fletcher said that it relativises the absolute, it does not absolutise the relative! Jesus and the apostles replaced the Torah, the strict Jewish Law with the principle of love. In the New Testament Jesus condemns the Pharisees for taking the Jewish Laws to such extremes because it loses the spirit in which the Law was written. This Christian love that Jesus taught and lived is known as agape. Agape does not depend on being loved in return. The command of love calls individuals to a high level of personal responsibility. Agape is not selective and doesnt have favourites it is a matter of attitude not feeling. It desires the good of others, not of the self. Above all, Christian love is practical (James 2:14-26). Jesus tells us that we should love our enemies our neighbour is anybody and everybody. As with just about every theory of morality, situation ethics is open to a considerable amount of criticism. The notion of basing actions on consequentiality is not always helpful because it can be difficult to determine the outcomes of certain situations, especially in the long-term. Humans also tend to look at situations subjectively so it becomes easy for selfishness to taint love. It can be difficult to assess a situation with objectivity. Even some actions dont necessarily become good just because they are done from a loving motive. The two theories that I have looked at are in stark contrast to one another. I think that it is difficult, if not impossible, to say that there is one approach that should be used at all times to justify every ethical decision that needs to be made. Each situation can throw up unexpected technicalities and difficulties that we have to contend with, but that doesnt mean to say that we shouldnt make decisions on the basis of our own moral beliefs. Bishop John Robinson once wrote, There is no one ethical system that can claim to be Christian and I completely agree with that. A supporter of the natural law approach asks what the law says and the situationist asks what is the best decision to help human beings, but why cant there be a middle ground? We should be able to use what was once the Law as a guideline when making ethical decisions rather than sticking rigidly to one approach just for the sake of theological argument. The Pope believes that the Law is Gods revealed will but it could be said that God revealed his will most fully through Jesus time on Earth. Not only did He preach on the importance of love, but He also showed us perfect examples of it throughout His life. It is the subtle difference between these doctrines that lies at the heart of many issues which are in hot debate at the moment. If the Church could ignore these theological ambiguities and become reunited, perhaps they could then learn to fulfill their purpose in Christ.

Thursday, November 14, 2019

A Cappella? Is That How You Spell It? :: essays research papers

A Cappella? Is That How You Spell It? The phrase a cappella is among the most butchered and misunderstood musical terms. The predominant, and most "correct" spelling, is ... a cappella - two words, two "p's", two "l's." A Cappella, A Picky Definition Musicologists have fun debating the extent to which a cappella, 'in the style of the chapel,' can include instrumental accompaniment. Some argue that early sacred a cappella performances would sometimes include instruments that double a human voice part. So, the correct definition of a cappella should be something like 'singing without independent instrumental accompaniment.' At Primarily A Cappella, we are trying to popularize this style of music, so we like to keep it simple. a cappella - two words, two "p's", two "l's." singing without instruments A Capella? Some musical dictionaries indicate that the Italian a cappella is preferred over the Latin a capella (one "p") yet both are technically correct. Why do those dictionaries muddy the waters with two spellings? The phrase was first used in Italian Catholic churches, where Latin was the language for sacred text. Thus, the Latin spelling for 'in the style of the chapel' - a capella - has some historical basis. However, most other musical terms - forte, accelerando, and many others - are Italian in origin. Since the Italian spelling is more consistent with other musical terms, it has been used more frequently. Given the difficulty of spelling our favorite style of music, we'd like to endorse the simplicity of a single spelling: a cappella - two words, two "p's", two "l's." singing without instruments Acappella Joining the two Italian words together to make Acappella is a popular variation in the U.S. For many streetcorner singing fans, Acappella means unaccompanied singing of 'fifties (and early 'sixties) songs. There were a series of recordings released in the early 1960's of Mid-Atlantic unaccompanied doo-wop groups called "The Best of Acappella." The liner notes on the first LP noted that Acappella means "singing without music." In this matter we do tend towards being picky - instruments do not alone music make! A cappella (or Acappella) singers make music while they are ... singing without instruments A more recent, second meaning of Acappella has emerged. The Contemporary Christian group Acappella is the first formed by prolific songwriter Keith Lancaster. In the early 1990's he added Acappella Vocal Band (now mostly known as AVB) and "Acappella: The Series" which uses studio singers (plus LOTS of electronic help) to perform songs around specific themes. All of these efforts are now combined in The Acappella Company. The good news is they have sold millions of recordings and have contributed greatly to the awareness of a

Monday, November 11, 2019

Factors affecting participation in certain sports Essay

Peer group Your peers are the people you mix with who have similar interests and backgrounds and are roughly your age. Your peer group has a big influence on the way you behave and the things that you do. This is not always expressed words. If you wear the â€Å"wrong† clothes or do the â€Å"wrong† things you can very quickly feel left out. If you peers approve of an activity, you will feel encouraged to do it. Sadly, peer-group pressure can also force people to give up sports even though they enjoy them. Family Your family can have a similar effect on you as your friends can. We pick up many of our habits and values from home. If your family enjoys sport and gives you the opportunities to participate, then it is likely that you will. Most young people depend upon parents and family for kit and help with travel to sports events. The opposite is again true. If your Family has a negative attitude to physical activity it is likely you will to. Gender There is a mistaken believe held by some people that sports is a man’s world. There certainly seem to be few barriers put up to prevent men from participating in physical activity. Far more men Participate in physical activity than women. Race People from minority ethic groups can be discriminated against when it comes to physical activity. Many people have the mistaken belief that they are physiologically different because they are a different colour, and this means they will be good at some activities and not others. For example some people believe that all black people are fast runners and they can not swim very well. This belief could be the reason why we see so many black runners and so very little black swimmers. Socio-Economic The activity you participate in may be determined to a large extent by what you can afford. Activities like sailing, golf and riding can be very expensive so many people from lower socio-economic groups are excluded from them. There are also many activities that cost very little. A kick around in the park with a group of friends, for example, and sport at school are mostly free. Unemployed people are in a difficult situation: plenty of time to fill but not much money. To encourage them, sports facilities often charge less, especially at quiet times of the day. Age Young people are encouraged to participate at school and have plenty of free time to take up sport. It also depends on the activity. To be a good gymnast you need to be young and flexible. Today, however, with computer technology not all youngsters want to spend their free time playing sports and not all sports are open to very young people. People tend to take part less in physical recreation as they get older as they often have more responsibilities and less free time to spend on sport. Stereotyping can mean that older people are discouraged from being physically active. Some older people stereotype themselves and believe that they are too old to take part in physically activity. However, there are many sports that you can enjoy into your old age. All you need is motivation to do it, the right facilities and no barriers to prevent you. Disability A disability may restrict your activities and other people’s prejudice can be a barrier to your participation. But disabled sport has received a much higher profile since the Paralympics games in Sydney, and the efforts of disabled athletes like Tanni Grey-Thompson have provided disabled people with excellent role models. Many sports have charged their rules to suit the needs of disabled people and have set up coaching and competitions for them. Facilities must now include ramps and lifts and special changing rooms so that disabled people can have full access. Access If there is a sports facility near where you live, and there is a good road system and public transport in place, then getting there is made easy. However, many people do not live within easy reach of sports facilities, and the public transport system is poor, so participation is made more difficult. Popularity, Promotion and Role models Participation in many sports varies. Because of media coverage during Wimbledon fortnight, tennis courts across the country are heavily used as seeing role models perform on TV encourages people to play the sport themselves. Not all sports attract media attention, however, and not all media coverage is positive. Some sports have increased in popularity by operating national schemes. Basketball, for example, is much more popular since the Basketball Outdoors Initiative of the 1990’s. Thousands of free facilities began to appear in parks and school playgrounds across the country encouraging more people to play. Environment and climate Participation in some activities also depends upon the environment and climate. It is very hard to become a top skier if you live in a very hot country and, if you want to practise mountaineering and you live in Holland, you have got to travel. So it is not hard to understand why countries like Switzerland and Canada produce very good skiers. Britain is traditionally good at sailing because it is an island and surrounded by water, Tradition and Culture Tradition and Culture also affect participation. For examples some cultures disapprove of women taking part in physical recreation in public or in mixed company. This is one reason why many sports centres operate â€Å"women only† sessions. Most sports (like rugby) have had a tradition of being male only. Women have had to work hard to be allowed to participate. Education Your education has a big effect on your attitude to sport physical recreation. If your school is keen on sport you will be encouraged to participate and if you enjoy it, you are likely to continue after you leave. The opposite is also true, however, for those who dislike PE. It is know that there is a drop in participation at the age of 16 when youngsters leave school. This is know as the post school gap and is perhaps caused by the desire to leave all school based activities behind you when you leave. Thankfully, many young people then see the benefits of physical activity and return to it later on in life. Politics The extent to which people take part in a physical activity also depends on their politicians. All governments get involved in sport for one reason or another. For example, facilities cost so much to build that the government usually has to pay at least something towards them. A government may promote sport for all in an attempt to cut the cost of the health service or cut crime. It may promote excellence in sport so as to bring a sense of pride to the country and raise its standing in the outside world. Sponsorship Sponsorship also has an effect on participation, as it is this that brings money into sport. Even local level, small businesses often sponsor teams and help them financially, allowing people to play. How ever sponsors can decide to pull out of the deal very easily and leaves the team needing to find another one or stop playing.

Saturday, November 9, 2019

Letter from Birmingham, Martin Luther King Jr.

Just Arguments in the Battle against Segregation â€Å"If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having patience, I beg God to forgive me† (King 301). Martin Luther King Jr. writes an argumentative letter defending demonstrations against segregation. While serving eight days in prison for participating in protests in Birmingham, King writes his famous â€Å"Letter from Birmingham Jail† (293).King is effective at arguing his case because he provides counter arguments, gives many examples of real life situations, and reflects on statements made. King begins by providing background and explaining the true purpose of non-violent direct-action demonstrations. In the letter, King refutes the arguments made by clergy, which were untimely action, breaking laws, direct-actions precipitate violence, extremist, and commended police. King explains that he traveled to Birmingham to participate in non-violent protest against segregation, stating â€Å"injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere† (289).King responds to the clergy by saying, â€Å"your statement†¦ fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations† (289). King continues by explaining the four basic steps of non-violent direct-action, which are: â€Å"collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self purification; and direct-action† (290). While providing great detail on the situation and steps taken, King continues to build his argument against the statements made by the clergy. The first statement was that the action taken in Birmingham was untimely.In the letter, King provides great details about the planning and execution of the demonstration, which shows that much thought was placed on the timing of the protest and explained that it was, in fact, not untimely. King uses a very effective method to evoke personal feelings by writing a long list of heart-throbbing experiences of Negro people during segregation (289-292). Next, King refutes the second statement that demonstrators break laws. King explains that â€Å"there are two types of laws: just and unjust† (293). King’s reflecting help the reader understand his arguments (293-294).The third statement from the clergy says the direct-actions precipitate violence. King states he does not advocate breaking the law. However, â€Å"[King] submit[s] that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law† (294). The fourth statement is condemning the actions in Birmingham as extreme. King counters by providing examples where extreme measures were taking to right an injustice, such as with Abe Lincoln and freeing the slaves (296-297).Finally, King addresses how the clergy commended the police force for keeping order. King responds with examples during the demonstrations in which the police acted inhumane (300-301). By providing considered and well formulated arguments, King is effective at arguing his case against segregation. King addresses any possible counter arguments on his stance and does so in great detail. By reflecting on statements made, King allows the reader to fully understand his arguments and point of view. The â€Å"Letter from Birmingham Jail† is an excellently structured argumentative letter against segregation.

Thursday, November 7, 2019

ALicia keys research paper Essay Example

ALicia keys research paper Essay Example ALicia keys research paper Paper ALicia keys research paper Paper and had millions of fans around the entire world. She would write her own music but was also very private about her personal life. She had a lot of songs about relationships but most of the time they were never personal. She caught the young urban attention because a lot of her music was very touching and related to many people who were going through the same things When she first came out she was a girl artist that had little support and had some to prove given where she grew up. Although she had some struggles growing up, she never let that stop her from getting where she wanted to be. As a way to get off the streets she would dedicate all er time to practice the piano and singing. Her music had a huge impact on the music industry because of where she came from. It also had a blissfulness that overshadowed where she came from. Her music showed the world what else there is to offer and she did Just that. Many artists came out after her in the same kinds of categories and are famous today. No one could ever come aligned to Alicia, but her music was what made other artist comfortable with coming out and showing what they have to offer. American cultures quickly shifted after she came out and were very dedicated and interested in what she would come out with next. She had illions of fans that would line up and wait for her in tears literally, Just so she can perform. Her music was moving and heart rending and would give her fans chills whenever she would walk out on the stage. Alicia also had an impact on American culture because she would go out of her way to always do something with herself. She would try out for acting positions and would quickly get those roles and be a stunning actress. By her doing that , it Just showed that people could be multi talented and to never stop what they wanted to In life. The impact she had on me personal is very huge. When I was growing up I always loved her music and verything she set out forth. I myself am very dedicated to music and I love to play the piano and learn and play all types of music. I remember when I was a little girl I would sneak out of classes and go to the music room where there was a piano and just play all of her music. For me, it was a way to get away from everything I was going through. Her music was deep and had meaning to every single word in the lyrics. To me, that was all I needed. I would do research on her and see what she would be doing and her interests and we were Just interested in the same kinds of things. She was and always will be my biggest idols. When I was younger, I always longed to go to her concert and sit in the audience and Just feel her music in me. By freshman year, I finally got tickets to see her and it was the most amazing experience ever. It meant so much to me that I was actually in tears while she was singing live and it felt so perfect. A few years later, my senior year, I went to go see her again. And this time it was an even better feeling. Her drive and determination to help anyone in her path is what touches me and makes me want to do the same things for my community and everyone around me. When Alicia was in her twenties, she had taken a trip to Africa. This trip changed her life because it showed her the way other people lived and what they had to go through. When she got there she realized that people really do have hard lives and that her music and her voice could quickly make people have faith and believe that there is light at the end of the tunnel. After talking to people who lived in the village that she visited, she realized that she needed to do foundation called Keep A Child Alive. This foundation accepts donations and anything that can help support and provide for these people in numerous countries to help them prosper and grow from the hard conditions that they all live in. Once she created this foundation I heard about it and I was old enough to talk to my mom and tell her I wanted to donate to it or do research to try and help. This was moving to me because it showed me that there still is a whole other world than Just in America and that not everyone has it as good as we do. Just knowing that Alicia would do anything to try and help others made me feel like I can do the same thing. This led me to volunteer and help people and show that I am committed to my community and would do anything to help. I would help at local food drives, food banks, and homeless shelters and even after school programs. Alicia Keys has always been a huge factor in my life and shaped me to who I am today. She opened my eyes and showed me that there is way more out there in life than Just what is right in front of our faces. Two of my favorite songs by Alicia Keys are Tell you Something and Brand New Me. The song Tell You Something is a song about living everyday like it is your last and to cherish the time you have with the people around you who you love. The song is personal to her because she wrote this about her grandmother. She wrote this because she felt that it is important to get everything off your chest when its ecessary. She thought it was a bad idea to ever wait, so instead she says brings up the question What if there was no tomorrow? She preaches that its important to love and cherish everything that you have. Some themes that stand out in this song are Relationships and lifestyles. If you live your life everyday like it is your last and cherish everyone who is in it, you have nothing to regret in the future. In her eyes, relationships are key but everyone has to do their part to maintain them. This song was written with a sad kind of melody in the background. It was mellow and had a atchy tune to it to show emotion and importance in it. The song Brand New Me is also personal to her because she starts to talk about her growth and how she has grown over the years. She talks about her opening her eyes and realizing that there is more to life. This song has many themes in it as well. It can relate to relationships, lifestyles, and social issues. A lot of people can connect to this song because it talks about self growth and how people change and can change for the better. She even states in the song that people shouldnt be surprised that she is changing and that she is a better person than she ever was before. The beginning of this song starts of slow, but changes to a happier tone to express her happiness on how she has grown and who she has become. All in all, Alicia keys impacted the entire world of music and shaped the music industry to what it has become today. She opened doors to a new type of sound and type of music that had slowly been forgotten. Not only was Alicia a huge factor I the shift in music, but she also did everything she could to change the world and the people in it. Although she is now 32, she still continues to make music and puts a lot of emotion into her lyrics to open peoples eyes.

Monday, November 4, 2019

Briefing note performance management

Two purposes of performance management and their relationship to business objectives: Performance management drives employee behaviour to align with business goals and objectives. This alignment happens because job responsibilities and expectations are clear, resulting in increased individual and group productivity; and also better information is available to use for promotion decisions. Having a Performance management system in place will serve the following purposes; †¢Employee decision-making Appraisal information is used as a basis for pay increases, promotions, transfers etc. †¢Employee development Appraisal information is used to guide training, job experiences, mentoring and other developmental activities. Three components of performance management systems: There are several components of a successful performance management system. An effective performance management system is not a one-size-fits-all approach but will generally include the following components: Plan: Setting clear objectives and goals and establish performance standards. Monitor: Identifying key performance indicators and conducting accurate and regular performance appraisals/ reviews and rewarding performance effectively. Review: Regular and honest feedback through performance planning conversations and career development initiatives. The Relationship between motivation and performance management On a basic level people are motivated towards desired outcome such as congratulations from the manager for a job well done or to avoid an undesired outcome such as an argument with the boss about targets not been hit. ?There are extrinsic and intrinsic factors to how we as individuals channel our motivational energy. ?Getting people to ‘opt in’ as oppose to ‘opt out’ is an important part of communication in business. The ideas of Abraham Maslow have had considerable influence on management thinking since the late 1940’s. Maslow has a positive view of human nature; a belief in the individual’s potential for personal growth – what he called self-actualisation which is displayed in his pyramid of Hierarchy of Needs. Maslow suggested that needs only motivate people when they are unsatisfied. When applied to his hierarchy lower-order needs (basic physical needs, comfort, safety and security) have to be satisfied before higher order needs (self-esteem and personal growth) assert themselves. To apply these theories into the workplace you should make sure your workforce is getting its basic physical and safety needs (reasonable working conditions, job security etc. ) Applying Maslow’s model will mean employees are more likely to work towards company goals only when there is harmony with their own personal goals. MaslowHerzberg Fred Herzberg’s two factor theory is based on looking at the main factors which result in either satisfying or dissatisfying experiences at work. The assumption is that if the individual is satisfied in their work, this will mean good performance, or, at the very least a willingness to stay on the job. Factors leading to dissatisfaction were found to do with conditions of work – company policy and administration, technical supervision, salary, interpersonal relations and physical working conditions. Herzberg called these the hygiene or maintenance factors. These are necessary minimum for a healthy workplace – they make people come into work and stay there but, they don’t necessarily encourage people to be productive. It is the other factors, the ‘satisfiers’ or ‘motivators’ such as achievement, recognition, the work itself, responsibility, advancement, that encourage people to work harder. The link between motivation and performance seems to be an obvious one. If individuals are highly motivated, they will perform better. In turn better performance may well lead to a sense of achievement and result in greater motivation. Thus relationship between motivation and performance can be a mutually reinforcing one. Factors to be considered when managing different levels of performance: Many managers mistakenly spend most of their effort on trying to improve their low performing employees, believing that their high performers are low maintenance. The low maintenance belief is prolonged because high performing  employees are self-motivated individuals that need very little daily work direction. However the fact is that high performing employees do need a lot of attention to sustain their high level of performance. They need praise, recognition and collaboration. High performing employees are very skilled at working independently and will become frustrated if their manager give s them too much direction. These employees will seek guidance form their managers when they need assistance, they take ownership and pride, seek challenges and are bored quickly with mundane tasks; they need to feel valued by their manager and the company. As a manager you must make them feel like a business partner, not just an employee. Get them involved in goal setting, seek their advice from their area of expertise, give them exposure to higher management and other executives – all these things will show you value and trust them – in turn they will give you their loyalty. Plateaued Performers have the mind set of either not preparing or wanting to progress any further, they have petered out or are ready and willing to progress but are stuck in their current role due to other factors surrounding them. They are likely to be less enthusiastic, in a sales role they are likely to rely on existing relationships to drive sales, and they will appear to be ‘going through the motions’ with a sense of disengagement. Plateaued performers are experienced, valued employees who once, often recently performed at a higher level. However due to some unseen issue or closely held mind set, they are no longer reaching their potential. The likely outcome, if the problem goes untreated is that a once solid performer will find themselves plateaued stagnated in bit performance and professional development. Managing poor performance, whether related to capability or attendance, raises a number of different issues for employers and their HR professionals. Failure to perform or attend may be related to the following factors, which may or may not be connected and which may not be readily apparent such as lack of application or misconduct on behalf of the employee; lack of the required skills; and/or illness or disability. If poor performance is due to lack of application (unconnected to an underlying medical condition) or following the falsification of qualifications and  experience for the position that the employee holds or simply by a plain refusal to obey lawful orders, then it is appropriate to deal with the matter under normal disciplinary procedures for misconduct. However, the disciplinary procedure may not be appropriate when dealing with employees who are failing through no fault of their own. Where the failure to perform is due to a lack of the required skills, following say a reorganisation or where an employee has been prematurely promoted, then the employee should be assisted, wherever practicable, with further training or coaching and given a reasonable period to reach the required standard. Some employers therefore prefer to operate a gentler capability procedure referring to cautions rather than warnings and greater flexibility with regard to timescales The main purposes of reward within a performance management system are to retain, motivate key employees and to reduce turnover. It’s a known fact that people are the most important asset in the organisation. The Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement also believes that staff rewards have a valid purpose in this process. The groups Leadership and the Performance of People in Organisations: Enriching Employees and Connecting People study pointed out that many companies are using their performance management processes to encourage employees to work towards personal goals such as training and skills development. Claiming that such an approach can result in improved financial performance as well as being beneficial to the individual, the research said: Reward systems need to be adapted to reflect a leadership approach that ultimately satisfies peoples basic needs for achievement, a feeling of control over ones life and a sense of belonging.   Identify at least 3 components of a total reward scheme: The total reward system is a multitude of tools that the employer has in its hand and may be used to attract, motivate and retain employees. From the employee point of view the total rewards represent everything that he/she perceives to be of value resulting from the employment relationship. The reward conce pt covers both financial and non-financial pay. The components of a total reward system are: Compensation – is a critical component of the reward system that includes: basic pay system (annual or monthly salary rate) and variable or incentive pay systems (sales commissions, appraisal/performance-related pay, skills-base pay, etc. ) Benefits – are used to supplement the cash compensation that the employees receive and are designed to protect the employees and the family from financial risks. These can be life insurance, medical insurance, dental, retirement plan, savings scheme, uniform, gym membership, company car, breaks, company holidays, extra annual days, personal days, etc. Work life in this category is included the followings: workplace flexibility, paid and unpaid time off, health and well-being, caring for dependents, financial support, community involvement, and management involvement/culture change intervention. Performance and recognition Performance is a key component of the organisational objectives and involves the alignment of organisational, team and individual effort towards the achievement of business goals and organisational success. The recognition acknowledges and gives special attention to employee’s action, efforts, behaviour or performance. Recognition programs acknowledge the employee contribution immediately after the task has been completed. This type of recognition award can be financial or non-financial (e. g. , verbal recognition, certificates, trophies, tickets, dinners, etc. ) Development and career opportunity – includes learning opportunities (e. g. on the job learning, tuition, seminars and conferences attendance, corporate universities, self-development tools and techniques, new technology training, etc. );coaching/mentoring(e. g.  , leadership training, formal and informal mentoring programs, association memberships, exposure to resident experts, etc. ) and advancement opportunities (e. g. , internal job openings, promotions, overseas assignments, internships, succession planning, career pathways, etc. ) 2 sources of data required by individual involved in performance and reward management processes: Gathering performance information from a variety of sources increases objectivity and ensures all f actors impacting performance are considered. This information should include objective data like sales reports, call records or deadline reports. Other valuable information includes: feedback from others, results of personal observation, documentation of on-going dialogue, records of any external or environmental factors impacting performance many reviews also include an employee self-evaluation. Other documents that help define performance objectives include: past performance appraisals, current departmental and organisational objectives and documented standards related to career goals. In order to gather feedback from other employees, organisations will often use a 360 ° feedback process. Along with the completion of a self-assessment, selected peers, assistants, and managers are asked to contribute feedback around pre-identified areas. The feedback is based upon specifically identified skills or competencies and the final results are compared against the employees self-assessment this type of feedback increases self-awareness and in some cases is used to support the performance evaluation process

Saturday, November 2, 2019

No topic needed. It's only essay assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

No topic needed. It's only essay - Assignment Example As a result, the world was divided into two major blocks; communist and capitalist countries. In brief, cold war was all about these two conflicting ideologies. The war started as the two economic giants started using all means possible to lure other countries to follow their economic system, an aspect that had started as a mild problem only to become serious problem later that ultimately split the world into two blocks that were following different ideologies. Korean war (1950-1953) is one of the key factors that fueled cold war in the 1950s whereby USA was leading the UN forces to support South Korea with China, which was a communist power supporting North Korea. In the 1960s, the most remarkable element that perpetuated the war was the Cuban Missile Crisis that took place in 1962. In the 1970s, the main factor that was prolonging the war was the Vietnam War that had started in the late 1960s whereby the American forces were bombing the Northern region that was led by Viet Minh, and later started bombing Cambodia (Davidson, DeLay and Heyrman 168). Other factors included the issue of Nuclear Arms Race that was very popular in the 1970s and in the 1980s. The war later ended in 1985 as a result of a number of factors with the change Soviet leadership being a major factor. Gorbachev who was a modern leader compared to the past generations took over power and introduced various reforms in order to save the country’s economy that was rampantly dwindling. He reduced the military support Soviet was giving her military in other countries thus leading to the weakening of the communism philosophy that led to breakdown of the Berlin Wall in 1989. After Gorbachev, Yeltsin was elected as the Soviet Empire came to an end and completely ended the war. Â   The Vietnam War originated from the attempt by Viet Minh to gain independence from their colonial masters, France. This attempt led to guerrilla war

Thursday, October 31, 2019

Implenting Lean Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Implenting Lean - Case Study Example (Womack and Jones, 1996). USA was the first country where the concept of "Lean" has been adopted in service or non-manufacturing concerns. (Womack and Jones, 1996). The advantages and benefits are now known and accepted by almost all top managers. However, there is still a bit of a hesitation in implementing "Lean" in service and non-manufacturing organizations. The reason is not that they do not want to implement the change but rather because they are unaware of the process involved. This paper seeks to describe the modalities and implications of implementing "Lean" in service and non-manufacturing organizations with a reference to the concept of Kaizen as a Continuous Improvement (CI) agent. Simply stated, Lean thinking is about achieving more with less. It is not about 'sweating the assets' but about carefully analyzing how best to achieve a given result with the purpose of utilizing resources to their best advantage. In broad terms Lean is usually defined as elimination of waste and things that do not add any value as defined by the customer. It is also pertinent to note at this stage that "Lean" principles are alternatively known by a number of synonyms e.g. Lean Manufacturing, Lean Production, Toyota Production System, etc. But whatever the name given to the process, this definition holds well. Advantages of Lean in Service Organizations Lean is not just a concept to be implemented at various tiers; it is also a commitment at all levels that can bring about dynamic and far-reaching changes in the very culture of an organization. Its advantages are more pronounced and identifiable in manufacturing concerns but service and non-manufacturing organizations can also reap the same benefits. Some of the advantages of implementing Lean in service environment are as follows:- It can not only improve the standard of services but also increase the competitiveness of the people involved. It can resolve severe organizational problems by uniting the change efforts

Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Business Strategy Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 3

Business Strategy - Assignment Example These analyses have assisted the report to evaluate the critical success factors of the organisation. It has also assisted to design various strategic recommendations for the organisation such as STP strategy, Horizontal and Vertical integration and Ansoff’s Matrix. These strategies have been illustrated to suggest the future activities of the organisation to acquire a strong position in the different market segments of Singapore. Value based pricing and cost plus pricing strategies have been recommended for the new as well as existing product line of the organisation. These strategies will assist the organisation to attract new consumers towards their products and services to improve their global market growth. The report is focused on analysing the strategic position of Quirky Inc. to recommend a competitive positioning for the organisation in the Singapore market. In the first stage the analysis of the current strategic position of the organisation will emphasise the internal as well as external environmental analysis of the organisation. This analysis will allow the assessment of key driving forces and critical success factors of the organisation. In the next stage the report will evaluate various strategic options for expanding the business in the Singapore market. It will also provide valuable recommendations to assist the proper execution of the strategies. Quirky Inc. was founded by Ben Kaufman in 2009 and it’s currently situated only in New York. It is a crowd sourcing company specialized in formulating the innovative ideas of the population. The organisation not only encourages inventors to submit their innovative ideas they also assist them to develop new product as per those ideas. The website of the organisation also allows people to sell their innovative range of products. The organisation has strong partnership with various digital retail outlets for instances, Best Buy

Sunday, October 27, 2019

Business Process Reengineering in Service Sector

Business Process Reengineering in Service Sector Over the years, there has been a realization that for all businesses, manufacturing or service, change is key to success. Increasing costs, challenging timelines, cutthroat competition, and technological innovations are some of the major factors propelling change. Since most of the services are people / process oriented, the change is not easy to carry. Add to it, the fast vanishing geographical boundaries make the tasks even more difficult for the organizations. Whether the company operates in manufacturing sector or in services; organizations have been forced to rethink their strategies. Many a time, service sector has been ahead of manufacturing in the Business Process Reengineering queue. Improved Product / Service quality, reduced cycle time, reduced cost to the customer are direct outcomes of BPR. BPR is essentially different from other changes in an organization that it defies the Old wine in a new bottle principle. Business Process Reengineering is by definition, the means by which an organization can achieve radical change in performance as measured by cost, cycle time, service, and quality, by the application of a variety of tools and techniques that focus on the business as a set of related customer-oriented core business processes rather than a set of organizational functions. The shift is imminent. Competition is now global as against Local or regional in the past. Markets are focused in comparison to Mass. Operations are flexible in contrast to controlled. The focus is on Best service than performance. BPR is the answer as it talks of radical change vis-a-vis Traditional approach which limits itself to incremental changes. Business Process Reengineering involves tinkering with the organizations DNA and producing an evolved species. The mistake companies tend to make is pick the wrong process to be reengineered, or make only superficial changes. According to James A. Champy one of the founders of the management theory behind Business Process Reengineering, and proponent of a process oriented view of business management, BPR is not just about reducing cost but also improving quality, speed to market and changing the customer experience. Why BPR? The changing economic environment has led to an increasing interest in improving organizational processes to enhance business performance. BPR has been instrumental in success of various organizations. Sidikat, Ayanda (2008) in paper titiled, Impact Assessment of Business Process Reengineering on Organisational Performance concluded that business process reengineering has become useful weapon for any corporate organization that is seeking for improvement in their current organizational performance and intends achieve cost leadership strategy in its operating industry and environment. Different objectives of BPR include: Reduced transaction process time Improved customer service Increased volume of business Reduced operating cost Higher profitability Improved Employee loyalty Key enablers of BPR BPR involves a rationale change at every level of organization starting with top management. The most important thing to keep in mind while implementing any such exercise is to work across processes and not functions. Equally important is to have a strong internal team that is working on the implementation. Key enablers of BPR can be listed as follows: People Management Leadership Organizational Culture Functional Expertise Instantaneous reaction Performance Indictors Quality, Lead Time, Cost, Service Service Sector in India The service sector has experienced rapid growth over the years as many nations including India shifted from a manufacturing-based economy to a service economy. A major spur in this shift happened as a result of computerization and advancements in telecommunication. Along with this shift, the consumers expectations have grown manifold. It is extremely difficult to meet desired service levels in todays age without a shift from age old systems to high-tech advanced systems. Before discussing about BPR in service sector, a brief list of different Service sectors is as follows. Trade Hotels and Restaurants Railways Other Transport Storage Communication (Post, Telecom) Banking Insurance Dwellings, Real Estate Business Services Public Administration; Defense Personal Services Community Services Other Services BPR Service Sector Though Business Process Reengineering has been instrumental in changing the fate of many manufacturing industries, it has played an equally pivotal role in service sector. Additional Ps People Process that differentiate Services from Products along with PhysicaI Evidence are the most important drivers leading to this overhaul. Suzanne Wintrob (1995) in research paper titled It wont work if users kept in dark discussed the incomparable role of people in Business Process Reengineering. According to Sunil Chandiramani, National Director Advisory services, Ernst Young, The external team (consultants) can facilitate the process, but it has to be led by the internal team. In recent past, many service sector companies have successfully seen the transition from being overloaded with papers to technology driven time-saving systems. In India, with government giving a go-ahead to private players in 90s, public sector companies felt the heat and started losing market share to private counterparts. The private companies implemented modern centralized core processing systems. Banking is one of many Indian industries where this transition holds true. Indian Post and Indian Railways are other two takers of this dynamism. Banking Finance Public Sector Banks in India are the building blocks of Indian economy. Ironically, they had been deprived of all modernized systems till late 90s. They offered the most basic services such as manual deposits and withdrawals as compared to a bouquet of services such as facility of ATM, 24-hour banking, E-banking, M-banking provided today. State Bank of India is one such example which had undertaken a massive computerization effort to automate all its branches, implementing a highly customized version of Bankmaster core banking system. However, because of Banks historic use of manual systems void of centralization and problems in communication systems, it had to resort to decentralized system to start with. The need for reengineering arose because SBI along with other public sector counterparts started losing existing customers and were handicapped to tap the ever growing potential of middle class. In 2000, SBI engaged KPMG for this overhaul and in 2002, KPMG recommended an IT driven systems to counter the private players led competition. To start with 3300 branches were selected for implementation which was later expanded to 14600 of SBI affiliate branches considering unparalleled success. SBI planned to provide a single window system, better customer service, wanted to reach out to urban as well as rural population and control the customer switching along with many other objectives that it sought. The biggest problem that drove this restructuring for this Public sector giant was that since branches were not connected, the customer was a Branch customer rather than a Bank customer. Moreover Information Technology till now, was aimed only at Internal efficiency. Hence, it was planned to share operations for back-office functions and rework the workflows and processes. Indian Postal System BPR has aimed at radical improvements by means of elevating efficiency and effectiveness of the business processes that exist within and across department. The key for BPR is to look at business processes from a clean slate perspective and determine how they can best construct these processes to improve the way business is conducted. Department of Posts occasionally conducts workshops related to BPR involving the people such as Nodal Officers who are part of BPR strategy and implementation. India Post has been making several upgradations to existing systems and has started offering bouquet of services such as Money Transfers, One-stop bill payment (Telephone, electricity), Driving license renewals etc. Speed Post, started by Department of Posts in August 1986 for providing time-bound and express delivery of letters documents and parcels across the nation and abroad, is the market leader in the domestic express industry. Through ePOST service launched in 2004, customers can send their messages to any address in India with a combination of electronic transmission and physical delivery through a network of more than 1,55,000 Post Offices. ePOST sends messages as a soft copy through internet and delivered to the addressee in the form of hard copy at nominal charge of Rs 10 per A4 sheet. ePayment is a comprehensive bill payment service offered by India Post to help meet the needs of the business customers.  This allows collection of bills (telephone bills, electricity bills, university fee, school fee, insurance premia etc) on behalf of any organization. The collection is consolidated electronically using web based software and payment is made centrally through cheque from a specified post office. The payment information can be assessed online by the user. Instant Money Order (iMO), the instant on-line money transfer service, provides speed, mobility, safety and reliability for money transfer. IMO is an instant web based money transfer service through Post Offices (iMO Centre) in India between two resident individuals in Indian territory. Though the number of services offered is many, still huge gaps exist in quality as compared to international standards. To enable Department of Posts to achieve the business objectives of becoming the IT enabled complete service provider, Project Management Unit have been entrusted with the task of creating state of the art electronic network covering all its offices and all products and services including third party services and enable electronic transmission of information for conducting monitoring operations, consolidating transactions data and generating an effective MIS. Business Process Reengineering groups were formed and their reports are being evaluated by concerned Divisions of Directorate, which would form the base to make the comprehensive IT strategy and roadmap for Department of Posts. Indian Railways Its been long since computerized passenger reservation system was started by Indian Railways. Today the reservation related workload has increased manifold but railways have been able to manage the work without much increase in manpower. Different systems incorporated by railways includes- Software Aided Train Scheduling Network Governance Main objectives of train scheduling are that it should be convenient to the passenger and feasible to run on the system. Introducing new train services and augmenting older ones is an art and a select group of planners are highly skilled in this task. Indian Railways have now started using information technology to aid the planning process. Web Enabled Claims System The worlds biggest employer, the Indian Railways, which earlier used to prepare various claim (Court/Accident) documents manually, has shifted to web claims format which maintains up to date database of all such cases. Thereby, eliminating complex file maintenance providing for queries that gives the precise status of registered cases in Chief Claims Office. Punctuality Module This module was implemented in February, 2004. This module captures the delays involved in train running at interchange points and detention causes for the delays at the divisional level. Based on this input, reports are generated for traffic managers. CONCERT Country-wide Network for Computerized Enhanced Reservation and Ticketing developed by CRIS, is a total networking solution to Indian Railways Passenger Reservation System. Seat Availability/PNR/Journey Planner/Fare/Time Table enquiries and e-Reservation of tickets are available on the internet. Along with above initiatives, ATM integration with reservation/enquiry system is being planned as well. A number of Banks in India shall be issuing Reserved and Unreserved Tickets through their ATMs under an arrangement with Zonal Railways. It is not only the old stalwarts who have reengineered. Even the private sector and novice companies in upcoming sectors have seen this change. For Spencers, RPG Groups retail chain, massive ramp-up in operations necessitated a series of restructurings. The chain planned to increase from an area of 2.5 lakh square feet to 15 lakh square ft i.e. from 52 to 400 stores. This meant that the older systems were no longer adequate. Hence, instead of doing an incremental improvement on the existing processes, the company introduced an automatic replenishment system. This has resulted in decreased stockouts and increasing efficiency. It may be concluded that BPR initiatives have less to do with controlling costs and more about managing business, which underlines the importance of this concept.