Wednesday, October 30, 2019
Destructions of Rainforest Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words
Destructions of Rainforest - Research Paper Example For example, The Amazonian rainforest of South America contributes 20% of the world’s oxygen. Rainforest contributes to pharmaceutical developments in the world. Flora and fauna in the rainforest are used in production of approximately 25-40% of pharmaceutical products with a minimal percentage of native life tested for use. Recently, human activities have drastically reduced the size of rainforests. Most scientists argue that tropical rainforests face exhaustion through the current deforestation rate between the years 2030-2050 (politics.co.uk, 2012). Background Human civilization has led to degradation of rainforests. The rise in human population and the quest for fertile land for agriculture contributed to loss of most forests. Advancements in civilization during the industrial revolution led to increased demand for wood fuel and fertile land for agriculture. Improvements in transport and communication affected rainforests. Deforestation accelerated in the 20th century. The modern version for destruction of rainforests was for commercial purposes. Commercial logging, deforestation to create space for livestock rearing became reasons for rainforest destruction. Creation of European sugar plantations in coastal Brazil and Caribbean propagated rainforest destruction. ... Controversies Science argues that destruction of rainforests has negative impacts on the earth. Destruction of biodiversity and indigenous culture is promoted. Desertification and land degradation promotes loss in soil fertility and Greenhouse Effect which reduces the planet’s ability to recycle carbon dioxide. Economic and politics play roles in deforestation. Most rainforests are found in developing countries, which are characterized by weak political and social institutions. Developing countries depend on timber, land for agriculture, and other valuable resources for economic development. Palm oil production and soy industries pose a threat to deforestation. Conservation measur es enforced by the developed world do not reflect the interest of developing countries. This controversy has led to the debate on conservation of rainforests as a rich-poor agenda. Guidelines used to curb rainforest destruction are flouted by some governments. A country like Brazil faces criticism by environmental organizations like Worldwide Fund for Nature for continuous logging and deforestation practices. Despite this opposition, the developed world cannot be blamed for international pressure. Surveys conducted reveal that most European countries react meagerly to stop illegal importation of timber and other rainforest products. Among the EU states, UK is singled out as the only state that monitors its sources of timber. Consumption of timber products in developed countries remains to soar. The timber products fetch smart money from developed countries than developing ones (politics.co.uk, 2012). As a result, indigenous communities from rainforest areas suffer from catastrophe d ecline. Mortality rates have increased because of diseases like flu, measles and smallpox.
Monday, October 28, 2019
The Time Trap Essay Example for Free
The Time Trap Essay Abstract Timeliness is an important and significant factor of production. Timeliness refers to efficient consciousness of time as resource to achieve desired result within specified period of time. It has widely been mis-conceived. This challenges its efficiency and effectiveness. An increased education operationalizes the relevance of timeliness and therefore enhances productivity and its wise utilization. Careful consideration of time management increases the benefits of an organization.            Time is an important resource available to all at equal measures. The wealthier and the poor alike do have, at their disposal, 24 hours each a day. The concern of the world is how mankind uses or account for every second on a daily basis. Timeliness is referred by academician as a deliberate act of consciousness and wise use of time. It can also be defined as working to achieve set objectives within the stipulated framework of a specified time. Timeliness is therefore a measure of efficiency in production. Organizations, especially government institutions, are victims of mismanagement of time. According to them timeliness is not a measure of production and it is always never too late to carry out government task.            The above action draws its foundations on a number of misconceived ideas about time management. One of the misconceptions, is attached success to timeliness, People believe that if they are an achievers, then they are using their time well. This in most cases is misleading as much time is always used to achieve the success claimed. Some persons also practice reluctance most of the time, claiming that they work best under pressure. This is completely unacceptable. It encourages laziness and compromises the quality of output. In other instances, time management has been seen as a way of limiting individuals and therefore depriving them of their freedom to have fun with their friends.            There are diverse aspects that determine individuals’ response towards timeliness. It is widely believed that seniority at corporate level greatly influence the juniors consciousness to timeliness. For instance, when a senior books an appointment with one of the juniors, within the organization, the later will always attempt punctuality. While the former, at times hardly, appreciates the weight of the appointment. Interaction increases cohesion among individuals thereby resulting in different forms of relationships. It has been proven that workers timely output will proportionately measure with the level of interaction. This is because of personal respect and dignity they place on their relationship and may not wish to sour it by lagging behind the time stipulated for production. Another factor that influences the level of timeliness is reward. Where participants’ efforts are appreciated financially, timeliness is considered to some extent.            In the world, there are powerful human forces of nature that exert a magnetic pull on individuals towards mismanagement of time. Mankind, despite of, his busy work schedule, have fallen as a victim of unplanned visit. Many at times exercise avoidance strategy to concentrate on their work. This breaks the social links. Sacrificing social network is never easy consequently; persons give to the pressure of unplanned visit. Time management in European and United State of America is to some extent admirable. Individuals are programmed for the day. However in Africa, activities catch up with them and then they carry it out. This approach, coupled with doing many things at a time and maintaining ego’s desire to please others result to unethical and unsustainable use of time.            Another factor that also perpetuates unwise use of time is fear of offending others. Being in the world where love is measured by how much time you are willing to share with your partner, individual control on time management is, in most cases is compromised. Cultural attachment and values put emphasis on family structures and relationships. Thus community functions, which can not be pre-determined, supercedes individuals plans. Absences of community calendar for its activities there by enhance time mismanagement.            Sensitivity to time management is important and paramount. Insensitivity results in huge economic losses. Mackenzie states that, â€Å"Time which one seemed free and elastic has grown elusive and in tight and our measure of its worth is changing dramatically.†It further, highlights that,†In Florida a man bills his doctor for $90 for keeping him waiting. In New York a woman pays someone $20 an hour to do her shopping.†(Mackenzie, 1997, p.14) With reference to these statistics, lack of consciousness to time management will cripple the continents economy. The government can not afford to pay for economic losses arising from time wastage. This makes timeliness an important pillar in economic development.            Time is an invisible, unique and finite precious resource and also an important factor of production. It always appears to exist in plenty, yet time spent will never come back. This is why time management is instrumental to ensure that the world achieves the maximum potential of accessible time. This therefore is one of the factors upon which economic and socio-cultural development are based.            Improved consciousness to management of time translates to increased production. It has been reported that in Canada Airline, an exemplary and remarkable productivity increase occurred in the management offices as a result of wise use of time. This also promotes and fosters efficient use and conservation of energy. . (Mackenzie,            Comfort and convenience is the desire for every human being. Keen consideration of time management ensures that the health of individuals is not compromised. Scientist, explain that human concentration levels declines with increased in time use. It is always very disheartening and exhaustive to attend a meeting that was scheduled to begin at eight yet it commences at ten in the morning. The danger is that the agendas never get adequate time to be discussed. With improved means of time management, issues will be subjected to the attention they deserve.            Redress for the challenges of efficient time management is timely and needs immediate adoption.†Where there is no vision people perish. â€Å"(Common phrase in many communities.)  People who work without a goal to achieve in live are in most cases frustrated and at the long run achieve less than their expectations. Timeliness focuses our lives. Like the salesmen who set their targets daily, every individual in the world should therefore take initiative to manage time well.            A schedule that document daily, weekly, monthly and if possible yearly programs and activities should be emphasized. This will set monitory indicators that help one assess the achievements and failures. Organizations such as NGOs, CBOs, Private Sectors and government should avoid unnecessary meeting with no serious agenda to discuss. They should also adopt a performance contract with their employees. To enlighten and expose individuals to impacts of lack of consciousness to timeliness, there is need for organizations to hold frequent seminars and workshops on time utilization.            In conclusion, timeliness conscious is very important in economic and sociological development in the world. It is therefore, a responsibility for all, both government and individuals to embrace this concept. References Mackenzie Alec (1997).The Time Trap; The classic book o Time management 3 Ed,     AMACOM Div America Mngt Assn
Saturday, October 26, 2019
Nisei Daughter by Monica Sone Essay -- Nisei Daughter Monica Sone
Nisei Daughter, by Monica Sone 'Even with all the mental anguish and struggle, an elemental instinct bound us to this soil. Here we were born; here we wanted to live. We had tasted of its freedom and learned of its brave hopes for democracy. It was too late, much too late for us to turn back.' (Sone 124). This statement is key to understanding much of the novel, Nisei Daughter, written by Monica Sone. From one perspective, this novel is an autobiographical account of a Japanese American girl and the ways in which she constructed her own self-identity. On the other hand, the novel depicts the distinct differences and tension that formed between the Issei and Nisei generations. Moreover, it can be seen as an attempt to describe the confusion experienced by Japanese Americans torn between two cultures. Â Â Â Â Â First, and most obvious, Monica Sone accounts for, in an autobiographical manner, the important events and situations in her life that helped create her self-identity. She recounts an event at the age of five, when she found out that she, ?had Japanese blood.? This recognition would spark the chain of many more realizations to come. Sone describes the relationships she had with her parents and siblings. She seems very pleased with and delighted by the differing, yet caring personalities of each person in her family. Sone describes herself as a typical American child: going to school, playing mischievously with friends on the block, reading, spending quality time with... Nisei Daughter by Monica Sone Essay -- Nisei Daughter Monica Sone Nisei Daughter, by Monica Sone 'Even with all the mental anguish and struggle, an elemental instinct bound us to this soil. Here we were born; here we wanted to live. We had tasted of its freedom and learned of its brave hopes for democracy. It was too late, much too late for us to turn back.' (Sone 124). This statement is key to understanding much of the novel, Nisei Daughter, written by Monica Sone. From one perspective, this novel is an autobiographical account of a Japanese American girl and the ways in which she constructed her own self-identity. On the other hand, the novel depicts the distinct differences and tension that formed between the Issei and Nisei generations. Moreover, it can be seen as an attempt to describe the confusion experienced by Japanese Americans torn between two cultures. Â Â Â Â Â First, and most obvious, Monica Sone accounts for, in an autobiographical manner, the important events and situations in her life that helped create her self-identity. She recounts an event at the age of five, when she found out that she, ?had Japanese blood.? This recognition would spark the chain of many more realizations to come. Sone describes the relationships she had with her parents and siblings. She seems very pleased with and delighted by the differing, yet caring personalities of each person in her family. Sone describes herself as a typical American child: going to school, playing mischievously with friends on the block, reading, spending quality time with...
Thursday, October 24, 2019
Iraq: Past, Present, Future Essay -- Essays Papers
Iraq: Past, Present, Future Imagine you are back in time, in a land where water flows, date palms flourish and people abound. The part of the globe which the Greeks called Mesopotamia and we call†¦Iraq. In my paper, instead of focusing primarily on the impending war with Iraq, I will focus on why we are continually in a conflict with Iraq (and other Middle Eastern countries) through investigating the past, present and future of Iraq’s history. It is highly interesting how because of the US’ dealings with Iraq that have stretched back for the last twenty or thirty years, many people in this country have flawed senses of the rich history actually present in the region. Mesopotamia, or the fertile crescent, which housed some of the oldest civilizations known to man, has been all but forgotten about by western society, and the greatness and cultural fluidity that once persisted there has been forgotten almost entirely in this age of arbitrary borders and divisive politics. With the partitioning of Turkey at the conclusion of WWI, the middle east was segmented arbitrarily which led to political unrest in the region. Because of this unrest, there has continually been the apparent need and desire (on the part of the western powers, especially the United States) to intervene in the Middle East and especially Iraq. This is how one can explain the current situation we are in and have been in with Iraq for at least twenty years. When leadership is despotic, and these arbitrary border lines are crossed or disrespected, our government usually decides to intervene (especially if oil money is at stake) These interventions are simply patch-up solutions to what is a much larger problem: instability caused by arbitrary borde... ...Life Video and Television. Alexandria, Va. : Time-Life Video and Television (distributor), 1995. 11. Goffman, Daniel. The Ottoman Empire and Early Modern Europe. New York : Cambridge University Press, 2002. 12. Mackey, Sandra. The Reckoning : Iraq and the Legacy of Saddam Hussein. 1st ed. New York : Norton, 2002. 13. Malam, John. Mesopotamia and the fertile crescent, 10,000 to 539 B.C. Austin, Tex. : Raintree Steck-Vaughn, 1999. 14. Tripp, Charles. A History of Iraq. 2nd ed. New York : Cambridge University Press, 2002. 15. Zadok, Ran. The earliest diaspora : Israelites and Judeans in pre- Hellenistic Mesopotamia.Tel Aviv : Diaspora Research Institute, Tel Aviv University, 2002.
Wednesday, October 23, 2019
Mobile Phone and Phoebe Cook Copeland
Phoebe Cook Copeland ENC0025 8 April 2013 Causes and Effects of texting while driving It is a beautiful Friday morning, when all of a sudden a huge crash is heard in the distance. At the scene of the accident there is a car crushed up against a telephone pole with a young girl inside all bloodied and cut up. Taking a closer look, the young girl seems like she is simply asleep, but in her hand she holds her phone with half written message on the screen saying, â€Å"I’ll be there†¦Ã¢â‚¬ Unfortunately, the young girl never had the chance to finish her text message because she hit a telephone pole.This young girl’s life was tragically taken from her; however, this accident could have been avoided if she would have only waited until she got to either her destination or a red light to answer the text message. Sending text messages while driving distracts a person’s attention from the main task, which is driving the vehicle safely. Text messaging is known to co ntribute to deadly accidents that have prompted several legal districts to ban the practice in many states.The reason that people text while driving in unknown and difficult to pinpoint a specific reason; unfortunately, the effects are clearly visible on the roads and also in the news. The causes and effects of texting while driving can be avoided if people just decided to put the phone down and wait until they are not driving. Texting while driving is very dangerous, but people of all ages still do it. Studies have stated that half of the percent of people of all ages text while driving, and the other half of the percent talk on the phone when behind the wheel.Even though there is no evidence that a person is openly pressured into texting while driving, there is an expectation in society to have the dire need to respond to a text message. However, it is more likely for a person to be involved in a serious accident when texting rather than talking on the phone while driving. The rea son behind this is that, when talking on the phone it only distracts the driver, but when texting the driver has to look down at the phone to answer it. Thus, making it not only a distraction for the driver, but they have to take their eyes off the road in order to reply to the message.The effects of texting while driving left a devastating trail that lead to legal implications. Due to having so many accidents on the road, different states passed a law that banned texting while driving. This ban was placed in hopes to lessen the accidents that are caused by people who text and drive. If states can ban driving under the influence, then they can surely ban the no text law in order to keep the roads safer. However, many people have argued that it is hard to spot a person texting while they are driving because they are holding the phone in their laps, which is below the dashboard.So how can the cops catch people who text and drive? The cops are trained to watch for the driver’s b ody language. If the driver seems like they are texting while behind the wheel the cop is allowed to pull them over and issue them a fine. The causes of texting while driving resolves in the most dangerous effects that ends up taking someone’s life. However, not everyone who gets into an accident while texting is unfortunate, but the most serious accidents are due to people taking their eyes and concentration off the road to answer their text message.The reason why people do not take texting while driving seriously is because they think that taking their eyes off the road for a few seconds would not do any harm. Unfortunately, they are sorely mistaken because it only takes a split second in order for something to go terribly wrong. Not only is it dangerous for the person who is driving, but also for the other people that are in the car and on the road. If people just took texting while driving seriously and understood that it is just as dangerous as anything else, then we wou ld have less accidents and less of people’s lives being tragically stripped from them.In conclusion, it is not the lack of knowledge that people text while driving, but the lack of responsibility that goes into the act. People of all ages know the consequences of texting while driving lead to fatal accidents, yet they still do it. The temptation is too grandeur, however, the person who sent that text message can wait. Not waiting to answer that message while driving will not be worth it in the long run. The causes and effects of texting while driving can be avoided if we choose to put the phone down and wait to answer the text message until we are not driving because answering a text message is never worth a human life.
Tuesday, October 22, 2019
Italian Christmas Traditions and Customs
Italian Christmas Traditions and Customs During Christmastime, one readily observable difference between Italy and the United States, for instance, is the lack of crass commercialism that threatens to swallow up and completely secularize the holiday. For instance, instead of writing letters to Santa Claus asking for presents (or, in the digital age, e-mailing Santa Claus), Italian children write letters to tell their parents how much they love them. The letter is normally placed under their fathers plate and read after Christmas Eve dinner has been finished. Italians have also adopted some of the northern European traditions as well. Nowadays, especially in northern Italy, a fair number of families decorate an evergreen tree in their home. Here are some other rituals, customs, and traditions practiced by Italians during the Christmas holidays: Ceppo: The ceppo is a wooden frame several feet high designed in a pyramid shape. This frame supports several tiers of shelves, often with a manger scene on the bottom followed by small gifts of fruit, candy, and presents on the shelves above. The Tree of Light, as it is also know, is entirely decorated with colored paper, gilt pinecones, and miniature colored pennants. Small candles are fastened to the tapering sides and a star or small doll is hung at the apex. Urn of Fate: An old tradition in Italy calls for each member of the family to take turns drawing a wrapped gift out of a large ornamental bowl until all the presents are distributed. Zampognari and Pifferai: In Rome and surrounding areas bagpipers and flute players, in traditional colorful costumes of sheepskin vests, knee-high breeches, white stockings and long dark cloaks, travel from their homes in the Abruzzi mountains to entertain crowds of people at religious shrines. La Befana: Kindly old witch who brings children toys on the Feast of the Epiphany, January 6. According to the legend of la Befana, the Three Wise Men stopped at her hut to ask directions on their way to Bethlehem and to invite her to join them. She refused, and later a shepherd asked her to join him in paying respect to the Christ Child. Again she refused, and when night fell she saw a great light in the skies. La Befana thought perhaps she should have gone with the Three Wise Men, so she gathered some toys that had belonged to her own child, who had died, and ran to find the kings and the shepherd. But la Befana could not find them or the stable. Now, each year she looks for the Christ Child. Since she cannot find him, she leaves gifts for the children of Italy and pieces of coal (nowadays carbone dolce, a rock candy that looks remarkably like coal) for the bad ones. Holiday Season: On the Italian holiday calendar December 25 isnt the only special day. Throughout December and January there are a number of religious holidays to mark the season. DECEMBER 6: La Festa di San Nicola - The festival in honor of St. Nicholas, the patron saint of shepherds, is celebrated in towns such as Pollutri with the lighting of fires under enormous cauldrons, in which fave (broad beans) are cooked, then eaten ceremoniously. DECEMBER 8: LImmacolata Concezione - celebration of the Immaculate Conception DECEMBER 13: La Festa di Santa Lucia - St. Lucys Day DECEMBER 24: La Vigilia di Natale - Christmas Eve DECEMBER 25: Natale - Christmas DECEMBER 26: La Festa di Santo Stefano - St. Stephens Day marks the announcement of the birth of Jesus and the arrival of the Three Wise Men DECEMBER 31: La Festa di San Silvestro - New Years Eve JANUARY 1: Il Capodanno - New Years Day JANUARY 6: La Festa dellEpifania - The Epiphany
Monday, October 21, 2019
Community Social Work In Modern Society Social Work Essay Example
Community Social Work In Modern Society Social Work Essay Example Community Social Work In Modern Society Social Work Essay Community Social Work In Modern Society Social Work Essay This survey is an overview of current authorities proposals for the Large Society within community societal work. In July 2010, Prime Minister David Cameron launched a undertaking called the Big Society. It is considered by Mr Cameron that communities merit to be empowered to hold more of a say in what happens in their local country. The belief is that by making this, many of the local services provided by the authorities can be taken over and run by community and voluntary groups, with Mr Cameron depicting the undertaking as a large progress for people power ( www.bbc.co.uk/news, accessed: 30/10/2010 ) . The theory base of community societal work from a historical and modern position will be presented and evaluated. The survey will supply a literature reappraisal of community undertakings in both neighbouring UK states and Inner City London ; analyzing their effectivity in making community authorization to enable the possible declaration of societal corruption. Particular attending will be paid to the differences that each geographical location possesses in footings of economic system, civilization and category diverseness when sing each undertaking and how this relates to its success. A upper limit of four undertakings will be chosen to compare and measure and the survey will reason with lessons learnt for future societal work in community work pattern with the inclusion of messages from the Social Work Reform Board. The Big Society Argument However, Cameron s impression of the Big Society has come under much unfavorable judgment. The Guardian s Jonathan Freedland has written a cutting onslaught on Mr Cameron s proposals and his article posted What is Community Social Work? The thought behind community societal work is the belief that peoples jobs can be countered by interceding with the people within their societal web. This may include friends and relations, and neighbors. Social workers need to seek and reenforce such support webs for service users and purpose to ease their growing where it has become evident that such has lapsed. The work should be seen as both a protective and preventive scheme and is now considered to be the Par excellence of intercession scheme for advancing societal inclusion. ( Walker and Beckett, 2005, pg93 ) . Therefore, community societal work is efficaciously a method of advancing the societal inclusion of persons and their households by authorising them to seek and make the intercessions they require. Walker and Beckett ( 2005 ) inform that societal work is at the cutting border of persons, households or communities efforts to pull off life challenges that have been influenced by both economic and societal policy, public assistance systems and the manner they are made up internally. However, there are differing positions on the construct of authorising people and utilizing socially inclusive methods within societal work. The first position is that the authorization of service users may be considered to be self-evident if the worker sees the jobs people are confronting as merchandises of the an unjust economic system that, Disenfranchises the weak, vulnerable, disabled or hapless from equal engagement and entree to the resources produced by society. ( Walker and Beckett, 2005, pg93 ) . The purpose of societal work here would be to try to acquire service users involved and seek to authorise them to happen a manner of accessing the services that are available to them. Payne ( 1995 ) suggests of this issue that although public policy statements do take to turn out the value of community engagement and user authorization, community work may so, Draw attending to inequalities in service proviso and in power which lie behind terrible want and hence besides become portion of the battles between people in powerless places against the powerful. ( Payne, 1995, pg165-166 ) . The 2nd position on the authorization of service users is that it can give them ( service users ) an increased outlook of what can be available to them. It is believed that in this instance, societal workers may believe that the right thing to make would be to cut down the outlooks of service users, coercing them to accept the state of affairss they find themselves in and that they may go socially excluded merely because that is the manner it is . If this does go the instance, societal workers may neglect to help in the bringing of services that are available to service users, alternatively merely seeking to assist service users to manage with what they believe is available to them. Possibly the best manner to see authorization for service users is to utilize Trevithick s ( 2000 ) theoretical account of when rehearsing societal work you are either ( a ) making things to service users, ( B ) making things for societal workers, or ( degree Celsiuss ) making things with service users. Community societal work foremost came into being following reviews of community work after placing that such was considered to be a wholly different activity to that of societal work. These reviews found that community workers and outreach workers were going marginalised from their co-workers within proper societal work bureaus. In order to forestall this from go oning farther, there was what was deemed a positive motion to encompass some of the rules and patterns of community work within societal work. Coulshed and Orme ( 1998 ) inform us that although independent community action has continued throughout history by being supported by dedicated community workers, policy developments that incorporated both the linguistic communication of community and the work involved began to inform the actions of statutory societal work as of the late seventiess. Despite this being the instance, it is thought that such motions towards community care enterprises were non what societal workers had needfully thought to be right. The above moves were initiated via the Seebohm Report ( 1968 ) . An article by Eileen Munro said of the actions brought about by the study, The division between ( changing ) societal work was seen as the job, so societal services sections were created to offer a joined-up service. ( www.guardian.co.uk/society, accessed: 9/10/2010 ) . These actions included the creative activity of societal services sections that would hold smaller administrative units with country squads functioning their ain geographical vicinities. It was believed that such would better entree to service proviso for those placed within each vicinity and a wider sense of designation with the local country for societal workers. Decisions could be made dependant on the individual and their local demand as opposed to the generic, centralized determinations that took topographic point antecedently. Seebohm s study besides stated that each area-based administration should alter the relationship that societal workers held within the comparative catchment countries that the workers were runing. The study said of this that the sections should, Encourage, support and promote voluntary attempt and prosecute in helping and promoting the development of community individuality. ( Seebohm, 1968, paragraph 477 ) . Despite this alteration in the agreements for which societal services were delivered, Seebohm s study did non decently turn to what it was community workers, or so societal workers working with communities were really supposed to be making. Although the Seebohm study had considered the basic impressions of community societal working, the footings and rules of such were non defined to the full until this was done by the Barclay Committee and published in a study in 1982. This definition was as follows: Community societal work is, Formal societal work which, get downing from the jobs impacting an person or group and the duties and resources of societal services sections and voluntary administrations, seeks to tap into, support, enable and underpin the local webs of formal and informal relationships which constitute our basic definition of community, and besides the strength of a client s communities of involvement. ( Barclay, 1982, p seventeen ) . The accent on the function of the community within society continued following the Barclay Committee s study and re-emerged towards the terminal of the 1980s. In more recent times, the Griffiths Report of 1998 looked at care in the community and was based around an purpose of closer partnerships between statutory services and local communities as portion of a larger public assistance spectrum. The National Health Service and Community Care Act 1990 excessively pushed towards an accent on community work although Adams et Al ( 1998 ) inquiries whether the theory was really put into pattern. Adams et Al besides speculate as to the trouble that community societal work continues to confront as a consequence of go oning alterations to societal policy. In modern societal work, it is considered by Beckett ( 2006 ) that it is good to work with groups or households as opposed to working with persons. Therefore it seems reasonable that such an attack would of course in some respects at least lead towards working within communities. Community societal work is by and large considered to be a similar activity to that of group work. This is because community work intercessions normally involve the worker trying to promote the development of groups. However, community work is aimed more along the lines of self-help or societal action in consideration of the group work spectrum. Community societal work does non let for the worker to do things for people , be that for persons or so groups, but wants to advance The development of organized activity by the community itself ( Beckett, 2006, pg94 ) through either the self-creation of resources to run into its demands or even by fall ining forces to run against the governments for non supplyi ng the necessary installations. Henderson ( 2000, pg72 ) says of such an attack that At the nucleus of the methods and accomplishments is the thought of organizing: assisting people to come together to organize an independent group. The above shows that in this context, the community worker is considered to be something of an enabler instead than the influence peddler within community undertakings. Despite this, it is besides believed that community workers although being employed by the province and therefore still considered as an outsider within the community with which they are working take on a grade of benevolent paternalism as opposed to developing the necessary corporate community action. Popple ( 1994, pg24 ) says of this, Historically community work has developed from two distinguishable roots: benevolent paternalism and corporate community action. With the above in head it is of import to retrieve that the term community is still instead obscure. It is borne from the impression that a complete vicinity can work as its ain entity as opposed to admiting that vicinities consist of many differing communities. Individual involvement, cultural communities, geographics, familial extensions and workplaces all form portion of communities, yet will frequently widen far beyond the vicinity in which they are formed. Community societal work is harmonizing to Smale et al About the procedures the workers engage in, the relationships they make and how they maintain and change them. adding These procedures generate the particular aims and aims of the workers and those they portion the work with. ( 1988, pg23 ) . The most of import things that must be recognised by any community worker is the type of community that they are working with or so the type of community that they are helping to assist construct. Evaluating Community Projects The Study So Far Decision
Sunday, October 20, 2019
5 Secrets to Getting Never-Ending Job Offers! - Guest Post by David Mensah
5 Secrets to Getting Never-Ending Job Offers! - Guest Post by David Mensah Last week I wrote about the importance of follow-up and feedback for success in your business or job search. The article, Do These * 2 * Things and Get Amazing Results in Your Business OR Job Search, really was about how to have fruitful conversations and build valuable connections. This week, my good friend and long-time business writing client, David Mensah, shares his wisdom on a very related topic: how to create a stream of job and work offers through the art of talking to people. Guest post by David Mensah Imagine this experience: You’re in the middle of a conversation with a friend, colleague or new acquaintance, when that person suddenly interrupts the flow of the conversation to offer you some form of employment! For most of my life, I have had that experience on a regular basis, and I have ultimately built a career as a leadership trainer and executive coach as a result. So when I started to expand my consulting practice to include career coaching, I wanted to see whether I could train people to do what I have done successfully in my own professional life: generate employment opportunities consistently, both in official interviews and everyday conversations, whether or not they are looking for a job. Here are my top 5 recommendations for creating â€Å"the never-ending job offer†: BE EXCITED: Choose a career that sparks your passion, and let that passion show! Your excitement is contagious. I can always tell when others are passionate about their careers. Genuine excitement is interesting and contagious, while feigned excitement is forced and boring. Discover your true calling, even if it doesnt make sense or scares you (are you an accountant who always wanted to be a dancer?) Your career is as personal as it gets and it’s worth finding out- and sharing- what lights you up. BE INTERESTED IN OTHERS: When people are authentically curious about me, I feel lucky and safe and I want to know more about that person in return. That’s the type of interest you want to create in others. When talking about your life, make sure to make time to explore the lives of those around you. You might ask questions about people’s background, work successes and challenges, or families. Explore their values and what’s important to them. Train yourself to find something interesting about everyone, including friends, networking contacts, and yes, even interviewers! In every conversation I make it my practice to find 10 things I like about the other person in the first 5 minutes. It makes me listen differently. Keep asking questions until you find an area where the other person is energized, and focus there. You might be surprised at the benefits that come back to you. IN AN INTERVIEW, ASK QUESTIONS: Come prepared to every job or informational interview with questions you want to ask. And don’t stop there. Frankly, if you are not interested enough in the middle of an interview to have a few spontaneous questions, you are probably not interested in the job or the company. Questions emerge from a natural desire to know more- to delve deeply into things that matter to you. When you ask people questions, they learn a lot about how you think and feel about them, their company, and, if applicable, the available position. Your questions reveal something about you at the same time as you learn about someone or something else. BE CONNECTED: People hire people they feel good about and this feeling arises from a sense of connection. To create affinity with people where it might not exist automatically, consider telling stories about yourself emphasizing your humanity. I have been known to talk about my most recent business failure or how my ego gets in the way of my dreams. Stories about our failures and flaws allow others to connect deeply with us and push people quickly past the surface differences that keep us separate. While connecting with others comes easily to some, it can be challenging to some people. Do your personal growth work so that you can easily connect to the new people in your life without internal stories about you or them getting in the way. SPEAK ABOUT YOURSELF USING THEIR LANGUAGE: As any conversation progresses, I learn more and more about the person I am speaking with. Once you know enough about someone, it is much easier to tell them about yourself, because now you can reference the parts of their life that help them understand yours. When I am talking with someone who values their family over everything, it is natural for me to use my love and appreciation for my puppy to describe how relationships motivate my professional successes and failures. When I talk to people who care primarily about making a difference for others, I describe my interest in coaching as a way to teach skills that they can pass on to everyone they touch. The more you truly listen to someone, the more you can use the language they use and speak to their values. You will make deep connections with people who feel seen and understood by you, and who will want to find ways to spend more time in your presence- perhaps by offering you a job. When my clients embrace these practices, not just in interviews but in every interaction with others, they start generating job opportunities. Getting excited about your own career and cultivating an authentic interest in others results in others’ sitting up and taking notice. Your never-ending job opportunity will happen one conversation at a time. David Mensah is a leadership trainer and executive coach living and working in New York City. Please connect with him on twitter @DKBWAVE or learn more about his work at www.DKBWAVE.com.
Saturday, October 19, 2019
Case Analysis-Jet Blue and WestJet Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words
Case Analysis-Jet Blue and WestJet - Essay Example The relocation called for West Jet agents to encounter complex steps in processing the data, yet the airline had not attained the transfer time needed to transfer the files and had not succeeded to reduce its customer loads on flights that were to operate immediately following the changeover. Numerous bookings for prospected flights that were done prior to the changeover could not be accessed during the file relocation and for some time there after, since Sabre had to regulate the flights by use of the new system, thus customer dissatisfaction and a rarity for the airline. In addition to the high number of customer complaint calls, West Jet customers also expressed their displeasure through the internet sources such as face book. Angry flyers flooded the airline’s website, causing it to crash again. To deal with such customers, West Jet quickly apologized to them via their site by explaining the causes of the technological problem, and ultimately weathered the storm with success and realized its profits as before. Following West Jet’s incident, JetBlue was able to avoid some of the risks before implementing its new reservation system. It experienced problems like increase in call wait times, and not all its ticket printers and kiosks came online immediately. Additionally, Jet Blue was to add some booking functions, though the airline was well prepared to deal with these problems. Jet Blue had also some issues with its customers, due to the failure of the management to realize that their IT infrastructure was not strong enough to handle complex crisis. For instance, in February 2007, the airline attempted to operate flights in a storm when the rest of the major airlines had cancelled the flights. It was a poor decision for Jet blue as the weather conditions could not allow the flights to take off, making the passengers to be stranded
Friday, October 18, 2019
Imprisonment in Recent Financial Collapse Assignment - 1
Imprisonment in Recent Financial Collapse - Assignment Example The situation resulted in heightened joblessness and social insecurity. Restoration of financial strength required intervention by respective governments as in case of United States it was the Bush administration who responded with a financial relief program for major firms, â€Å"The Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP -- to provide these financial institutions with funds to survive the turmoil that they had helped unleash. It was a distasteful but necessary thing to do.†(Obama, 2010). Yes, the intellectual crime can be termed a serious crime and the response should be tried and imprisoned but only if it was a deliberate crime that can be attributed to an individual or a group. However, if it is not the case and there is no one to take the burden of this heavy odd to world economy then we have to revisit our approach to the issue. The best response to an intelligence failure is to redress it intellectually. Recovery from the recent financial crisis, no matter to what an extent we have recovered, is also featured through the help of the same experts, intellectuals, and firms. If masses were troubled due to the worst financial slum of the history they also owe to the efforts of the financial experts who find a way out to restore and regain the financial strength. Nevertheless, if some organizations or individuals who were supposed to protect the financial integrity and economic structure and they could not meet the expectations can be interrogated for their failure to avoid any such mistakes in the future. Even then if some segments find it indispensable, a mechanism of penalty can be designed to intensify the sentence. That is what the American president has uttered a year ago while imposing a Financial Crisis Responsibility Fee, â€Å"And that is why, through this fee and broader reforms that we seek, our goal is not to punish Wall Street firms, but rather to prevent the abuse and excess that nearly caused the collapse of many of these firms and the financial system itself.†(Obama, 2010).
International Management Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words
International Management - Assignment Example The market was one of rising costs, reduced prices, high competition, and low-cost models. The average selling prices were down by a whopping 35% and there was a clamor for cheaper models in emerging economies and developing markets. The basic phones were available for $ 50, with low end models being available for as low as $ 25 and even $ 10. Multinational set up operations and set new standards for wages, training and technology transfer. An environment of meritocracy was being created and which hard work, ethical behavior and a desire to learn were the watchwords. The fall of the iron curtain in Europe and the transition of State Societies, opened up new markets for Western Europe. Eastern Europe was expected to move towards 100% penetration levels in 2011, from the current 85%. The manufacturing process was being off shored to low cost countries, lately Eastern Europe. Labor costs much lower in Central European Countries than in other Western European Nations. Additionally, they also offered huge advantages in terms of high productivity and simple taxes. However, of late, wage costs were on the rise and labor force was beginning to shrink with people migrating to richer European nations like Britain and Germany. There are three levels of strategy – Corporate Strategy, Business Strategy and Functional Strategy. The corporate strategy deals with the vision and mission of an organization. The Mission of Nokia is â€Å"Connecting people†. Its strategic intention is to â€Å"Build great mobile products†. The word â€Å"Nokia†is named after the Nokia river in Southern Finland. Beginning as early as in 1865 and with a rich history of a century and half of innovation, Nokia transformed itself from a riverside paper mill in Southern Finland to a global telecommunications leader. A conglomerate of paper, rubber, cable and electrical companies, it was only in 1996 that Nokia turned its focus on the telecommunications business. This was an important strategic shift and by 1998, Nokia was the world leader in mobile industry. Its new strategy drive includes changes in leadership and manufacturing specialized products. Its recent strategic direction has taken multi-faceted dimensions : Broad strategic partnership with Microsoft Renew group to capture volumes and value growth Forward investments in next generation technologies Focus on specialized products. The business strategy talks about the strategies related to a specific business of an organization. More specifically, they deal with its products, markets and competitive advantages. Nokia had always prided itself on innovation, differentiation and in building great products through continuous investments in research and development. It does not shy away from investments as well as divestments and focuses on shareholder value by concentrating on core competencies. It always had the larger picture in mind and its decisions were based on global operations and internatio nal strategy and not country-focused. Adapting itself beautifully to global trends, Nokia increased its market presence in China, India, Germany, Indonesia and Russia. It slowly extricated itself form markets like Brazil, Spain and Italy. In 2008, Nokia was the
Thursday, October 17, 2019
International business Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 3
International business - Essay Example Partly, this may be because not all those who use the term distinguish it clearly enough from the popular notion of internationalization. Some writers, in fact, use the two terms interchangeably (Ibid.). Literature shows there is no single agreed definition of globalisation, but that it may be the concept of the 1990s. According to Sklair’s (1999) research, its importance is much exaggerated, but most books suggest it is an idea whose time has come. To sort out all these ideas, globalisation as a concept makes use of Sklair’s (1999) taxonomy of perceiving globalisation in this paper towards the end. Each model is briefly discussed and analyzed from the point of view of sociology. The discussion tapers with a summary of these models, and as presented by Sklair (1999) makes note that they are dominated by European European-North American literature devoid of views from Asia. However, these are only done after discussions in light of how globalisation as a phenomenon has prevailed in the new millennium. What follows are how globalisation has visited the new millennium politically, economically, socially or otherwise. Globalisation, interpreted as global economic integration, is argued, as not being recent since there have been periods of globalisation over many centuries. (IPS, n.d.) It is only that there is now the increasing speed of movement of goods and services, people, capital and technology being experienced around the world. Specifically globalisation in the new millennium is marked by accelerated reduction in transport and communication costs, greater international specialization because of liberalization of trade, increasing trade in services due to the digital revolution, and increasing integration of major emerging markets into the world economy. (IPS, n.d.) . Politically, Macedo (n.d.) would add, the increasing alignment of cultural standards and standards of consumption; the weakening of
Biographical and Cultural Background Paper on John Updike and his Essay
Biographical and Cultural Background Paper on John Updike and his story A&P - Essay Example By simply reading through the texts, one might not see how much of the American society in the 1950’s Updike has exposed. As such, his attitude towards the issues of the society in which the author lived in was also apparent. The irony in the manner he illustrate the settings and the events in A & P shows how much involved the author was in the different issues surrounding him. His sarcasm and negative point of view about Russia and the Cold War was evident in Stokesie’s character where Sammy narrates that he thinks hes going to be manager some sunny day, maybe in 1990 when its called the Great Alexandrov and Petrooshki Tea Company or something (Kirszner and Mandell, p. 95) In D. Quentin Miller’s (p. 3) John Updike and the Cold War: Drawing the Iron Curtain, he describes Updike’s writings as those that reveal the underlying truth about the American society during the Cold War era that requires aggressiveness in order to attain its goals. Sammy’s character in A & P shows the same aggressiveness that each single individual in the American society should posses in order to achieve what they aspire for. However, Updike simply did not make his readers live by the disillusion that they could achieve everything they wish for through any aggressive acts, whereas the reality in which risks and disappointments occur as well. A & P’s end clearly shows how Updike sticks to the existent condition in the society rather than a
Wednesday, October 16, 2019
International business Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 3
International business - Essay Example Partly, this may be because not all those who use the term distinguish it clearly enough from the popular notion of internationalization. Some writers, in fact, use the two terms interchangeably (Ibid.). Literature shows there is no single agreed definition of globalisation, but that it may be the concept of the 1990s. According to Sklair’s (1999) research, its importance is much exaggerated, but most books suggest it is an idea whose time has come. To sort out all these ideas, globalisation as a concept makes use of Sklair’s (1999) taxonomy of perceiving globalisation in this paper towards the end. Each model is briefly discussed and analyzed from the point of view of sociology. The discussion tapers with a summary of these models, and as presented by Sklair (1999) makes note that they are dominated by European European-North American literature devoid of views from Asia. However, these are only done after discussions in light of how globalisation as a phenomenon has prevailed in the new millennium. What follows are how globalisation has visited the new millennium politically, economically, socially or otherwise. Globalisation, interpreted as global economic integration, is argued, as not being recent since there have been periods of globalisation over many centuries. (IPS, n.d.) It is only that there is now the increasing speed of movement of goods and services, people, capital and technology being experienced around the world. Specifically globalisation in the new millennium is marked by accelerated reduction in transport and communication costs, greater international specialization because of liberalization of trade, increasing trade in services due to the digital revolution, and increasing integration of major emerging markets into the world economy. (IPS, n.d.) . Politically, Macedo (n.d.) would add, the increasing alignment of cultural standards and standards of consumption; the weakening of
Tuesday, October 15, 2019
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffery Eugenides Thesis Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffery Eugenides - Thesis Example A handsome young teenager named Trip Fontaine manages to charm Lux and also impress Ronald (the girl’s father). He gets the parent’s permission to take Lux along with other three girls (Bonnie, Mary and Therese) to a homecoming dance. That day on a football ground Trip and Lux have sex. This makes Lux miss the curfew and hence starts a torturous time for all of the sisters. They are taken out of the school and restricted to their house and their liberty is curtailed. In one incident the mother even orders Lux to destroy all the music records she has. After some resistance Lux submits to the demands. From here the lives of the sisters takes a downturn. Smoking and sex on rooftop become common features. A strange smell comes from the house and permeates the neighborhood. All these spectacles create a big interest of the neighborhood in the lives of these girls. It is during this time that the neighborhood boys, who are infatuated by the Lisbon girls, communicate with them by using various methods. For example, they play music records over the phone. All these activities don’t continue for a long time as in the end all the girls kill themselves. When invited by the girls to the house, the boys enter it and find all of them dead. Bonnie is found hanging in the house, Theresa takes overdose of sleeping pills and Lux dies of Carbon Monoxide poisoning. Although Mary doesn’t die immediately she takes overdose of sleeping pills and dies one month after putting her head in the oven. The girl’s parents sell the house and leave the neighborhood. For the senior thesis I would like to explore the relationship between parents and their teenage girls. In the novel parents tried to make their daughters happy by being more lenient in terms of permitting interaction with the opposite sex. But probably what the girls needed was more displays of love and affection. The theme of difference between perception and expectation of parents and teenage
Fish Philosophy Essay Example for Free
Fish Philosophy Essay Just finished reading â€Å"FISH Philosophy†the book and so great it was. It’s a tiny book (two hours of focused read would do) that talks about how to transform your work place (or even your life) into a fun place to enjoy and be excited to come to again and again. I don’t want to talk about the great story in the book, and the details of how a fish market ignited the idea – hence the name FISH – for a manager to transform her workplace, as I want to encourage you to get it and read it. The philosophy is simple, and goes by applying four ingredients that will turn the place from stress and dullness into relax and fun. The ingredients of FISH philosophy are as follows: 1. Choose your attitude 2. Play 3. Make their day 4. Be there Ingredient 1 – Choose your attitude: This is the platform to build upon, and the core concept that everything else depends on. You have the freedom of choice of your attitude: an optimistic and happy attitude, or a pessimistic and sad one. Choose to be happy, smiling, easy going, ignorant of mistakes, and you’ll discover how beautiful and shining you and your place would be. On the other hand, choose to be angry, frowning, hard-headed, picky on mistakes, isolated, and you’ll discover how miserable your day would be! â€Å"Choose your attitude†is the hardest ingredients, but sets the stage for all other ingredients to happen. So work on your attitude, and work on it now. Ingredient 2 – Play: Have fun, even if you have lot’s to do with deadlines nearing, and don’t seem to have enough in your schedule. All that stress come from the fact that you prevent yourself from enjoying what you do. Make it a playful project, an enjoyable study, an easy shopping, a fun meeting, etc. If you cannot enjoy what you do, then try to have some pleasant moments between the heavy tasks you work on. Engage with colleagues or family to create a play yard out of your place. Ingredient 3 – Make their day: By having fun yourself, work on extending that to others who surround you. Make their day by expressing how you’re grateful to have them, or by cheering them up. Get them out of their misery by offering advice and help. You cannot imagine how cheerful you would be when giving a hand to someone. Ingredient 4 – Be there: Be present to your family, customers, colleagues, and people by giving full attention to who calls for you to advice or help. Don’t be ignorant to those calls†¦ get to answer them on the spot, or at least dedicate some time to connect with those you care about to listen to. Ignoring a call for help from your wife, your son, a colleague, or a customer could yield to disappointments and sometimes problems that you could’ve avoided earlier. Applying FISH to your life: I actually believe in the importance of these ingredients to have better place whether at home or at work, and below are some ideas I’m thinking of to practice those in my life (both at home and at work): Ideas| At Home| At Work| Choose your attitude| Be happy, smiling, and open-minded, soft, easy going, ignorant to small acts or mistakes. Spell out the good thoughts, and ignore the bad ones. Say hi or salam to everyone you face! | Play| Educate by fun, and stop yelling. Make the shopping a learning experience for your child where he or she looks for the stuff and picks them up. Enjoy home fixes. Watch cartoons with your child while commenting. | Start your meetings with fun or jokesPost some funny pictures or comics to your desk, or common placesHave a board so employees can post some jokesHave a gaming console and work on a gaming competition| Make their day| Compliments, Compliments, Compliments. Bring your wife some flowers. Invite the family to a day out (I really mean the invite here, and not like †¦ we’re bored, let’s go out). Bring your child something he or she likes (candy for instance). | Compliment the work and attitude of your colleagues. Engage with customers and pinpoint their pains and offer solutions with what they already have. Avoid bad news, and be a passenger of the good ones! | Be there| Listen to your wife and don’t offer solutions, just listen (we all can hear, you need to listen! ). Have a conversation with your child on school or how others deal with him. Listen to the unsaid, and express your willingness to offer help if needed. | Listen to pains from colleagues and customers and offer solutionsStop emails and phone calls if someone calls for your adviceGive full attention when talking to your colleagues or customersNot all people are comfortable talking about their problems, so dig deep within the soles and look for faces that need help. | Remember to work hard on setting the stage by choosing the right attitude! Just finished reading â€Å"FISH Philosophy†the book and so great it was. It’s a tiny book (two hours of focused read would do) that talks about how to transform your work place (or even your life) into a fun place to enjoy and be excited to come to again and again. I don’t want to talk about the great story in the book, and the details of how a fish market ignited the idea – hence the name FISH – for a manager to transform her workplace, as I want to encourage you to get it and read it. The philosophy is simple, and goes by applying four ingredients that will turn the place from stress and dullness into relax and fun. The ingredients of FISH philosophy are as follows: 1. Choose your attitude 2. Play 3. Make their day 4. Be there Ingredient 1 – Choose your attitude: This is the platform to build upon, and the core concept that everything else depends on. You have the freedom of choice of your attitude: an optimistic and happy attitude, or a pessimistic and sad one. Choose to be happy, smiling, easy going, ignorant of mistakes, and you’ll discover how beautiful and shining you and your place would be. On the other hand, choose to be angry, frowning, hard-headed, picky on mistakes, isolated, and you’ll discover how miserable your day would be! â€Å"Choose your attitude†is the hardest ingredients, but sets the stage for all other ingredients to happen. So work on your attitude, and work on it now. Ingredient 2 – Play: Have fun, even if you have lot’s to do with deadlines nearing, and don’t seem to have enough in your schedule. All that stress come from the fact that you prevent yourself from enjoying what you do. Make it a playful project, an enjoyable study, an easy shopping, a fun meeting, etc. If you cannot enjoy what you do, then try to have some pleasant moments between the heavy tasks you work on. Engage with colleagues or family to create a play yard out of your place. Ingredient 3 – Make their day: By having fun yourself, work on extending that to others who surround you. Make their day by expressing how you’re grateful to have them, or by cheering them up. Get them out of their misery by offering advice and help. You cannot imagine how cheerful you would be when giving a hand to someone. Ingredient 4 – Be there: Be present to your family, customers, colleagues, and people by giving full attention to who calls for you to advice or help. Don’t be ignorant to those calls†¦ get to answer them on the spot, or at least dedicate some time to connect with those you care about to listen to. Ignoring a call for help from your wife, your son, a colleague, or a customer could yield to disappointments and sometimes problems that you could’ve avoided earlier. Applying FISH to your life: I actually believe in the importance of these ingredients to have better place whether at home or at work, and below are some ideas I’m thinking of to practice those in my life (both at home and at work): Ideas| At Home| At Work| Choose your attitude| Be happy, smiling, and open-minded, soft, easy going, ignorant to small acts or mistakes. Spell out the good thoughts, and ignore the bad ones. Say hi or salam to everyone you face! | Play| Educate by fun, and stop yelling. Make the shopping a learning experience for your child where he or she looks for the stuff and picks them up. Enjoy home fixes. Watch cartoons with your child while commenting. | Start your meetings with fun or jokesPost some funny pictures or comics to your desk, or common placesHave a board so employees can post some jokesHave a gaming console and work on a gaming competition| Make their day| Compliments, Compliments, Compliments. Bring your wife some flowers. Invite the family to a day out (I really mean the invite here, and not like †¦ we’re bored, let’s go out). Bring your child something he or she likes (candy for instance). | Compliment the work and attitude of your colleagues. Engage with customers and pinpoint their pains and offer solutions with what they already have. Avoid bad news, and be a passenger of the good ones! | Be there| Listen to your wife and don’t offer solutions, just listen (we all can hear, you need to listen! ). Have a conversation with your child on school or how others deal with him. Listen to the unsaid, and express your willingness to offer help if needed. | Listen to pains from colleagues and customers and offer solutionsStop emails and phone calls if someone calls for your adviceGive full attention when talking to your colleagues or customersNot all people are comfortable talking about their problems, so dig deep within the soles and look for faces that need help. | Remember to work hard on setting the stage by choosing the right attitude!
Monday, October 14, 2019
Challenges to Managing Business Process Outsourcing (BPO)
Challenges to Managing Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) One of the major challenges facing Human Resource Management is the introduction and management of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). In dyads or tryads produce a group briefing paper for either; Directors of a company or a specific trade union, of your choice, regarding the changes taking place in the UK labourmarket and economy regarding the impact of outsourcing and/or offshoring. INTRODUCTION The current economic climate is forcing organizations to explore tactics to remain competitive. According to the traditional ‘make or buy decision framework, the fundamental value proposition behind BPO is cost reduction. The recent economic downturn forced HR departments to do more with less. Many HR organisations were asked to increase the scope of their capabilities without increasing overall headcount. As a result, some organisations viewed outsourcing as a way of combating current economic situation and achieving competitive advantage. In spite of the recent economic slowdown, Gartner Group stated that, the worldwide business process outsourcing (BPO) market, is continuing to grow by approximately 9.5. Organisations are increasingly seeking standardization as part of a re-emphasis on strategic business initiatives. They realise that they need to standardize HR processes and policies as a first step in their HR transformation. Business process outsourcing of certain functions is becoming an increasingly popular way to improve basic services while allowing HR professionals time to focus on issues vital to the businesss strategic initiatives, instead of being burdened with HR administration. Chaffey (2003) defines BPO as â€Å"the contracting out of specified services to a third party with a controlled, flexible relationship†. Lee (2002) refers to BPO as the ‘outsourcing of different managerial and operational functions. Specifically in HR, BPO is designed to ensure that a companys HR system is supported by the latest management information systems, with self-access and HR data warehousing options. The Business Issues (1995) further views BPO as ‘the delegation of one or more business processes to an external provider, who then owns, manages and administers the selected processes based on defined and measurable performance metric. The CIPD defines off-shore as ‘the process of outsourcing business activities or services overseas, as a direct or indirect employer. Off-shore does not always involve the services of an external provider . According to the Oxford Dictionary it means: ‘made, registered or situated abroad. The concept of outsourcing centres on David Ricardos theory of Comparative Advantage (cited in Mullins 2001) which states that even if a country could produce everything more efficiently than another country, it would still reap gains from specialising in what it was best at producing and trading with other nations. AIM OF BRIEFING The aim of this briefing is to brief the Directors of Name of our company the effect of outsourcing the HRM function and will encompass its influence on organisational performance and culture; and concurrently its impact on the UK Labour market and economy. The team will carry out a case-study on BT and will critically evaluate, analyse and highlight the advantages and disadvantages of HR outsourcing with the intention of reviewing the outcomes and where necessary suggest solutions where likely problems can be encountered. An analytical review will be carried out of the major HRM problems which can arise from organizational change and where required recommendations made. The team will use British Telecommunications as a case study to establish the impact of BPO. This briefing aims to provide a reasoned critique of existing literature based on surveys, textbooks, journals and official trade data. BACKGROUND British Telecommunications (BT) is a wholly owned subsidiary of BT Group Plc, a public limited company registered in England and Wales and listed on the London and New York Stock Exchanges . BT is one of the worlds leading providers of communications solutions and services operating in 170 countries. It principal activities include networked IT services, local, national and international telecommunications services, and higher-value broadband and internet products and services.Its main activities are web hosting, IT solutions, Internet services, telecommunications and broadband networks. In the fiscal year ended 31 March 2007 BT had a net turnover of  £9,499 billion. In the UK alone it has pool of 87,000 employees and 180,000 pensioners, whilst on a global scale it has 10,000 employees spread over the countries it operates within. For years, British Telecom ruled the UK market as a monopoly. It was the British Telecommunications Act of 1981 that brought this to an end and put in its place a duopoly, where BT competed with Mercury. The company was formed in 1981 as a subsidiary of Cable Wireless, mainly to challenge the monopoly of British Telecom. The privatisation of British Telecom in 1984 opened the industry to full competition and in 1991, this effectively brought the duopoly share by BT and Mercury to an end. With the liberalisation and opening up of the phone market to global competition came renewed pressure on BT from the telecoms watchdog Oftel to open up more of its network to competitors and cut its prices. The pressures on BT became greater than ever. The stiff competition in the telecoms market, the huge cost of paying for third-generation (3G) mobile phone licences, pressure from the industry regulator Oftel to lower its prices and informed, discerning customers meant BT had to deliver even higher levels of quality and service, at competitive prices in order to stay afloat. All these pressures necessitated mindset change and BT was forced to review its business processes. In order to meet up with the arrival of new competitors and the quickening pace of technological change in the industry, speed of action and reaction became critical success factors. With the competition that flooded the UK market in the 1990s, BT started considering cost reduction that will maximise efficiency without compromising quality. One of the major steps taken was to outsource the transactional side of its human resources operation to Accenture HR Services, which in turn off-shored to its India branch. BT believed that the competitive edge for any global communications provider is human capital and to survive and thrive, it requires world-class human resource (HR) competencies and the processes for managing them. Youndt et al. (1996) highlights that a HR system focused on human capabilities is directly related to multiple dimensions of operational performance. Huselid and Becker (1997) describe that a firms effectiveness is associated with HR capabilities and its attributes. ADVANTAGES OF OUTSOURCING / OFFSHORING Outsourcing enables an organisation to improve its focus on its core values allowing it to remain competitive on the market (Morello, 2003) . Prahalad and Hamel 1990 state that firms must concentrate on core competencies to gain competitive advantage. Through outsourcing specialist skills can be drawn out from a pool of expertise when and where needed whilst opportunities for enriched career development exist for the remaining staff. Organisations are able to turn over certain classes of risks to their suppliers, such as demand variability and capital investments. Unlike the buyer, the outsourcing buyer can spread these risks over multiple clients. Profitability can be achieved as outsourcing increases a businesss cashflow by creating cost reductions through cheap labour and reduced operational expenses i.e. office space, utility. Funds which would have been used for large capital investments can be released for other uses. Contracting out operational functions reduces the competition on capital as the outsourcing company provides the capital investment as part of its overheads. Companies can create an integrated market as it is a cost effective way of globalisation particularly when it selects the best available resources and labour. Figure [rumbi insert appendix] reflects the changes to operational costs which BT experienced when it outsourced. According to Som Mittal, former Managing Director of Compaq India has claimed that payroll processing to countries like India companies can achieve a 20-25% gain in productivity. Outsourcing can increase the service level given to clients. With offshoring an organisation has the ability to have a 24-hour a day workforce resulting in a more timely service which would not be possible if the organisation operated in once country. BT gained flexibility through outsourcing to Accenture as agility or quick response to business demands was made. Competitive advantage can be attained through cheaper prices. When the product prices cannot come down further operating in a highly skilled, low-wage labour area will be advantageous. (Frubel, Heinrichs and Kreye 1980) . As the product price falls consumers are willing to demand a larger amount of goods. The off-shored countries receive economical benefits. Nasscom Chairman Som Mittal remarked ‘Its a win win situation for countries which allow outsourcing and the countries which receive outsourcing (Ahmed 2004) . DISADVANTAGES OF OUTSOURCING/OFFSHORING: When outsourcing to a third party resentment can occur between permanent and contracted staff. Contract/temporary staff may fail to have a sense of belonging whilst permanent staff can remain aloof in order to protect their works hindering teamwork. Offshoring particularly on the outsourcing of work to India as the UK labour force believes that they are losing out on career opportunities. However the McKinsey Global Institute Report states that there are actually too many jobs and not enough people in the UK to fulfil them. Therefore fears of a widespread unemployment are unlikely and thus this resentment could be seen as unnecessary (Lander 2006) . The lack of direct communication between the organisation and the client can hinder the development of solid relationships and can result in the main organisation lacking control of the outsourced project. One of the key aspects of motivation is social interaction and self actualisation (Maslow cited in Mullins, 2001). Another perceived drawback of off-shoring is the decrease in levels of communication. When English is not the native language of the source area, poor command of the English Language leads to prominent resentment of offshored services (Ahmed,2004). Results of a survey carried out by the Nationwide building in 2005 reflected that 91% of UK adults would prefer their calls to be handled by UK-based call centres (Lander (2006). A major drawback is the expense of regaining a customer once lost, because it could cost up to 6 times more in marketing costs to gain a replacement. Cultural differences can be a disadvantage of offshoring i.e. Ryan Kinzy of K3 Group a large outsourcing company states that there are 3 months which are viewed as the most auspicious time for weddings in India, for example half the staff are out of the office. Ryan highlights that building up teamwork is a difficult challenge as employees may lack intuition due to their culture, Indian workers require a lot of direction. Their relationships are hierarchal, family and caste dependent and they have an educational system that emphasises routine learning over independent research. Outsourcing can prove expensive as payment of redundancy packages for the laid off staff can be a major drawback. As the number of companies offshoring to India rises, employee retention becomes a challenge due to the fact that as market competition increases, salaries are required to be competitive. Organisations will have to decide whether the cost-savings outweigh the revenue generated. Risks can be encountered due to the socio-economic conditions which can hinder the progression of operations i.e. maintaining trade risks. The chance of off-shore fraud also exist as the use of funds can be diverted. There is also the risk or data loss. BT faces the risk of fraud emanating from HR outsourcing as off-shore workers have full access to personnel details ranging from bank account numbers, home addresses and other personal details. Non-automated transactions and processing responsibilities enable off-shore workers to have access to highly confidential information. There is an increase in foreign organised crime groups who have targeted foreign off-shore enterprises to gain access data which they process. Organisiations can face compliance risks and their reputation being damaged due to negative publicity resulting from the third party being inconsistent in meeting ethical standards and internal policies. The organisation needs to carryout thorough audits to ensure control . Expertise levels need to be measured to ensure that required service levels of service are met. {Figure xxRumbi to appendix 2} reflects results of problems faced by several companies which have off-shored. The main problem met appears to be low control of performance and data. Offshoring has the limited disadvantage in that the core function of an organisation cannot be accomplished if passed onto an external source . A business which outsources a department still requires in-house technical experts to monitor activities (Greco 1997) Political infrastructure such as changes in government can affect can impact the outsourcing company. Shortly after the election of Sonia Ghandi stock markets plummeted on fears that her leftist allies would roll back fundamental economic reforms. Erratic power grids inexperienced officials and unmotivated employees can also prove to be a disadvantage. ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE BTs management believes organisational culture is innovative with teams that are strategically aligned to BTs operations. Advances in technologies have been applied to benefit BT and its customers to improve processes. Culture can be an object which is manipulated to achieve productivity and organisational improvements, and change over time (Tran, 2008) . In this context, culture is the character of an organisation. However if culture is accepted as being â€Å"†¦.the basic, taken- for- granted assumptions and deep patterns of meaning shared by organisational participation and manifestations of these assumptions†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ( Johnson, 2007) then in this respect culture can be difficult to change. In order to explain the content of cultural context in BT after HR outsourcing, the cultural web will be used. The table below shows the content of the organisational culture with HR outsourcing. Rumbi to appendix 1] According to the above table the organisational culture hinders collective learning in the organisation. Individuals see each other as rivals, rather than a partners. This paradigm creates various obstacles for learning within the organisation, that usually arise due to rivalry, power conflicts and absence of network communication channels (Mullins, 2001). The disadvantage of this power structure is explained by Mullins (2001) who claims that such approach decrease the effectiveness and efficiency of operations management, as participants are detached from the decision-making. BTs new organisational structure is bureaucratic, with the emphasis on standard procedures and operational routines. It might slow down the communication process, with the absence of feedback channels and unnecessary layers that might increase obstructions and cause various distortions in the communication process( Graham Bennet, 1998) . BT has placed its employees after revenues. The management has failed to take into account individual needs of each employee hence developing a coercive rather than participative approach. Within this approach people are being treated as liabilities rather than the core elements of the operations management process, where people become the primary determinant of the outcome quality (Armstrong, 2003) . The organisational culture implies for traditional type of performance appraisal system, which utilises various types of monetary techniques. Wright (2007) argued that the utilisation of monetary tools does not provide the development of a higher level of effective commitment or higher degree of intrinsic motivation and provides a blurred understanding of the relationship between their performance and corresponding appraisal. The communication component forms an important of the above mentioned changes. According to McGregor (1960, cited in Mullins, 2001) in order to get people to direct their efforts towards organisational objectives, management must tell them what to do, judge how well they are doing and reward or punish accordingly. There is also an informative and a motivational purpose. He claims that a clear and thorough description of individual duties and rights within the framework of the organisation may prevent the rise of unmet expectations. As it shows on the table, the communication in the company is of a top-down nature, without proper feedback. This type of communication scheme is good for conveyer-type organisations and not ideal for innovative market-led companies. CHANGE MANAGEMENT The new requirements for adaptation made it necessary for the company to undertake the reengineering of the whole business process, including both â€Å"hard â€Å"and â€Å"soft†elements. According to Senior (1997) â€Å"hard system†change implies â€Å" an attempt to use the benefits of a scientific method whilst recognising that in the real world of business where thing are happening fast, there may not be time to be as scientific as one would like†. In BTs case, â€Å"hard system†change referred to the introduction of new operations management systems, equipment and business facilities, designed to speed up existing operations and reduce the cost per a single transaction. It was designed to maximise the efficiency of every single operation within the business process. Senior (1997) indicates that â€Å"Soft System†changes imply for the change of the organisational culture. The main idea of this approach is listening to the organisation, good communication, developing a shared, vision, gaining real commitment to the change and the vision, education and training, and understanding the tools and techniques for the process. William et al.(1993) indicates that to facilitate effective adaptation of the employees to new working conditions, managers shall reduce restraining forces and reinforces driving forces. However, it shall be considered, that not all measures are equally effective. As Hetzbergs maintainance theory ( cited in Mullins, 2001) shows , the presence of certain factors may act as a powerful motivating factors, while the absence of other elements may produce slight dissatisfaction. At the same time strategic priorities shall reflect the current organisational aims. Under such conditions in order to improve the situation and meet objectives (create a better customer focus) the high involvement of senior managers, who acts as a link between operational and business levels of the organisation, is required. Senior managers shall act as major change agents. Taking the role of change agents, it is important for senior managers not to ignore employees natural resistance to new systems, but to create appropriate incentives to fasten the transactional process from resistance to commitment (Graham and Bennet, 1998). The ignorance of or resistance to changes will introduce different open conflicts, which will significantly worsen the organisation environment affecting its performance level and flexibility. This could result to failure to raise performance and attract or retain customers, which may lead to significant costs and even reduce the companys chances to survive and succeed in changing market conditions. According to Mintzberg Quinn and Ghoshall (1995) the overall rationale for any outsourcing activity is that outsourcing provides, greater economies of scale, flexibility, increase in levels of expertise, cost effectiveness, reduced costs and added value to any organisation. The rationale of BT outsourcing its HRM functions were to increase shareholder value, sustain progress and cope with the pace of change. Outsourcing of parts of the HR function has become more common. Lonsdale and Cox (1998) argue that outsourcing decisions can be classified under the following three headings: 1 outsourcing for short-term cost and headcount reductions; 2 core-competence-based outsourcing, where peripheral activities are passed to third parties and core activities are retained in-house; 3 iterative and entrepreneurial outsourcing, where periodic reviews of critical market activities are undertaken, with subsequent decision to retain or outsource. IMPACT ON UK LABOUR FORCE Human capital is emphasized as the most valuable asset of the 21st century business. The primary effects of outsourcing/offshoring on HR and Labour Relations are related to managing transition in HRM such as personnel changes, managing layoff, downsizing issues, and the costs/dynamics of actually managing an off-shore contract. The laying off of UK employees as a result of restructuring to effect the outsourcing contracts can have a negative impact on employees. Layoffs cause major morale problems among in-house ‘survivors and may lead to dissatisfaction and reduced delivery speed. Some UK companies experienced productivity dips and potential legal action from laid off employees resulting in costs of severance, retention bonuses and retraining being encountered. According to a survey by Deloitte and YouGov (2006) revealed that fear of job losses was prevalent in the UK with 82% of public perceiving offshoring as a threat . 1 in 3 people stated that UK companies should be forced to bring back jobs to the UK. Chief economist of the Work Foundation, Ian Brinkley commented ‘Fears have been stoked by claims that the Chinese and Indians are coming to get your lunch to describe the insecurity that offshoring has caused. With regards to knowledge transfer there is concern that some of the job experience is being exported. If low-level skill tasks are sent off-shore then so is the experience gained from performing those tasks. When the time comes to perform higher-level tasks where previous experience is mandatory, there is no alternative than to go off-shore because that is where the experience will available. In some instances company plans imply that higher-level tasks will remain performed on-shore, the lower-level tasks are performed miles away. The knowledge and experience of those ‘low-level jobs will be gone forever, and may impact the proper development of the ‘higher-level jobs. Forrester a US research group released a study that by 2015 Europe will have lost a collective number of 1.2 million jobs to off-shore locations increasing its reliance. Alan Blinder a US economist and former advisor to Bill Clinton has supported this thesis by stating that offshoring will lead to a ‘third Industrial Revolution. He views that off-shore is now a man-made comparative advantage and that workers will be forced to seek employment in personal services which remain non-tradable. There is a long-term impact on the types of jobs that people are training for, as well as the ‘transfer of knowledge relating to many job structures in the workplace such that there is a ‘domino effect. Steve Loy feels that these ‘outgoing tide of jobs could threaten fundamental technology research as well as jobs. The astute students will recognise the rapidly dwindling job opportunities in HRM and will choose other programs of study thus loss will be encountered in HR leading to a labour-force that has inadequate HRM knowledge to compete in a high knowledge based economy. The evaluation of the impact of off-shore is mainly based on estimations of collective data. Jobs most at risk are non-client facing and low knowledge content jobs those which use a lot of Information technology, creating outputs that can be transmitted via IT. An analysis by the CPRP concluded that 20% of non-client facing jobs are likely to be moved abroad. The potential is apportioned as a function of international trade and investment, the industrial structure of the economy, human capital, employment indicator, product market regulations indicator. Not all jobs created off-shore by UK companies automatically translates to job losses in the UK labour market. Employees are increasingly demanding services hence time difference plays a role in off-shore, offering them extended services. The lower price makes it possible for instance to offer services which would not be available otherwise i.e. 24 hr call centres. The information collated by the European Restructuring Monitor (ERM) s hows that job loss due to offshoring is in fact very small. During the first quarter of 2007 ERM recorded 420 restructuring cases in Europe. They announced 137,762 job losses and 184,511 job gains. Only 5.5% of all jobs lost were due to offshoring activities. For the year 2005 the percentage of job losses due to offshoring was only 3.4% of the total job losses. To measure the extent of job loss due to restructuring we can use redundancy notification, the effects of offshoring does however vary with the country. In France, national Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies estimates in its 2007 report on the French economy that offshoring has been responsible for the destruction of 15,000 jobs per year between 2000 and 2003. This is to contrast with a job creation in the private sector of 200,000 per year . In the UK there is no significant decline as per the results of the LFS Redundancy Tables ‘Employment growth in the occupations considered susceptible to offshoring has been very strong. The redundancy levels for these occupations, although high relative to the whole economy, have been falling in the last four years. The overall employment rate for these occupations has also shown an increase showing the cost of moving low-skilled jobs abroad is either falling or positive job creation is highly prevalent in the IT enabled occup ations. This does not mean that jobs are not being off-shored, and it is entirely possible that in the absence of offshoring, employment in these areas might have been higher. The adverse impact is entirely triggered by much larger changes in domestic demand for such services, the UK in particular has been extremely successful in developing as a world leader in knowledge based international trade. Jobs created through the expansion of exports of services are likely to outweigh the contraction of jobs caused by import of services. According to a report by Amiti and Jin Wei (2005) job growth at divisional levels has not been negatively related to service outsourcing but has had a negative impact on the demand for unskilled labour. In the UK outsourcing has had no reflected effect on the labourforce. The Deloitte and Recruitment Employment Confederation Report states that both permanent and temporary staff billings continue to rise. National press recruitment advertising in the UK went down by 11.3% in July 2005 in both public and private sectors reflecting a positive direction in the labour market and no relevant changes in the economy. Outsourcing is increasing consultancy work in the United Kingdom hence is beneficial as it offers flexible working hours / days for UK employees. This is particularly favorable for women who are raising children as is allows them to earn a salary whilst at the same time having adequate time with their children. There is also the flexibility of home-working. Structural changes can occur in the economies of both the outsourced/sourcing companies and due to the debate on who is benefiting/losing racism can be allowed to rear its head. A report prepared for the Department of Trade Industry by Ovum (2006) concludes that even though the actual impacts of an increase in trade and the expansion of global sourcing have been quite modest to date, offshoring can change the skills structure of labour demand, increasing the vulnerability of low-skilled workers in particular. ECONOMIC IMPACT Concern over off-shoring has become a surrogate for wider issues about economic insecurity, said Work Foundation chief economist Ian Brinkley. An interesting corollary benefit of outsourcing is the benefit to the economy. Indias National Association of Software and Services Companies commissioned a report by Evaluserve that stated that for every $100 worth of work sent abroad by US companies, $130 to $145 will be reinvested in the US economy. Cost savings are said to create value in the UK economy. Ahead of monetary capital, knowledge economy has become a focal point in the policy of outsourcing and off-shore. Strategies have been devised i.e. the Lisbon Strategy centres to promote, research, innovation in the development of human capital. In the future, human capital is the only way that Europe can remain prosperous. The main beneficiaries in the UK are the educated high skilled workers and the losers will be semi/low skilled workers. The UK government needs to investment more in education to continue pushing towards a leading knowledge based economy to avoid vulnerability. It needs to investment in human capital and focus on domestic policy choices for the losers of rapid structural changes within the UK. As a result of off-shoring the UK government is losing funds which could possibly be raised by corporate and income tax. However, it has stated that it does not have plans in place as yet to prevent outsourcing. The Department of Trade Industry has stated ‘it is a commercial decision for companies to decide where to locate their business operations such as call centres. The absence of official statistics on off-shore outsourcing leads to speculation and there is also misinterpretation of indirect measures/evidence. The experience of an individual company may or may not select a trend in a specific sector but does not allow conclusions to be made on the economy as a whole. It is possible that the rise in rice prices caused by lower production could be a result of a shift by the working population in India from working in the agriculture moving to the services sector. A great deal of knowledge is tacit and therefore difficult to transfer. Its reproduction can be extremely costly and requires an environment in which it can be harnessed effectively. According to a recent World Bank publication India is at the bottom end ranking 98 out of 128 countries of an index that measures the ability to create, absorb and diffuse knowledge therefore its threat is minimal to the UK economy. The economy-wide measures such as a countrys balance of payments can assist us in understanding the patterns of cross border trade and establish the impact of offshoring. If the outsourcing of tasks by UK based companies to off-shore locations i.e. India is soaring then the UK should be importing more of these services from India. The CBI has stated that the UK companies have benefited from off-shore as they are now receiving improved work-force skills at a low rate making their enterprises more profitable. According to results obtained from the Office for National Statistics the redundancy rate for the three months to January 2008 was 4.4 per 1,000 employees, down 0.9 over the quarter and down 1.1 over the year. These figures on the redundancy rate reflect that though a large number of organizational services have been off-shored services this has not had a significant impact on the UK economy. The UK has emerged as a world leader in ‘knowledge services and between 1995 2005 exports of its services grew by over 100% compared to its exports of traditional service exports such as transport. India is ranked 6th for global ‘insourcing behind the US, UK, German France and the Netherlands who appear to be the top rec Challenges to Managing Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Challenges to Managing Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) One of the major challenges facing Human Resource Management is the introduction and management of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). In dyads or tryads produce a group briefing paper for either; Directors of a company or a specific trade union, of your choice, regarding the changes taking place in the UK labourmarket and economy regarding the impact of outsourcing and/or offshoring. INTRODUCTION The current economic climate is forcing organizations to explore tactics to remain competitive. According to the traditional ‘make or buy decision framework, the fundamental value proposition behind BPO is cost reduction. The recent economic downturn forced HR departments to do more with less. Many HR organisations were asked to increase the scope of their capabilities without increasing overall headcount. As a result, some organisations viewed outsourcing as a way of combating current economic situation and achieving competitive advantage. In spite of the recent economic slowdown, Gartner Group stated that, the worldwide business process outsourcing (BPO) market, is continuing to grow by approximately 9.5. Organisations are increasingly seeking standardization as part of a re-emphasis on strategic business initiatives. They realise that they need to standardize HR processes and policies as a first step in their HR transformation. Business process outsourcing of certain functions is becoming an increasingly popular way to improve basic services while allowing HR professionals time to focus on issues vital to the businesss strategic initiatives, instead of being burdened with HR administration. Chaffey (2003) defines BPO as â€Å"the contracting out of specified services to a third party with a controlled, flexible relationship†. Lee (2002) refers to BPO as the ‘outsourcing of different managerial and operational functions. Specifically in HR, BPO is designed to ensure that a companys HR system is supported by the latest management information systems, with self-access and HR data warehousing options. The Business Issues (1995) further views BPO as ‘the delegation of one or more business processes to an external provider, who then owns, manages and administers the selected processes based on defined and measurable performance metric. The CIPD defines off-shore as ‘the process of outsourcing business activities or services overseas, as a direct or indirect employer. Off-shore does not always involve the services of an external provider . According to the Oxford Dictionary it means: ‘made, registered or situated abroad. The concept of outsourcing centres on David Ricardos theory of Comparative Advantage (cited in Mullins 2001) which states that even if a country could produce everything more efficiently than another country, it would still reap gains from specialising in what it was best at producing and trading with other nations. AIM OF BRIEFING The aim of this briefing is to brief the Directors of Name of our company the effect of outsourcing the HRM function and will encompass its influence on organisational performance and culture; and concurrently its impact on the UK Labour market and economy. The team will carry out a case-study on BT and will critically evaluate, analyse and highlight the advantages and disadvantages of HR outsourcing with the intention of reviewing the outcomes and where necessary suggest solutions where likely problems can be encountered. An analytical review will be carried out of the major HRM problems which can arise from organizational change and where required recommendations made. The team will use British Telecommunications as a case study to establish the impact of BPO. This briefing aims to provide a reasoned critique of existing literature based on surveys, textbooks, journals and official trade data. BACKGROUND British Telecommunications (BT) is a wholly owned subsidiary of BT Group Plc, a public limited company registered in England and Wales and listed on the London and New York Stock Exchanges . BT is one of the worlds leading providers of communications solutions and services operating in 170 countries. It principal activities include networked IT services, local, national and international telecommunications services, and higher-value broadband and internet products and services.Its main activities are web hosting, IT solutions, Internet services, telecommunications and broadband networks. In the fiscal year ended 31 March 2007 BT had a net turnover of  £9,499 billion. In the UK alone it has pool of 87,000 employees and 180,000 pensioners, whilst on a global scale it has 10,000 employees spread over the countries it operates within. For years, British Telecom ruled the UK market as a monopoly. It was the British Telecommunications Act of 1981 that brought this to an end and put in its place a duopoly, where BT competed with Mercury. The company was formed in 1981 as a subsidiary of Cable Wireless, mainly to challenge the monopoly of British Telecom. The privatisation of British Telecom in 1984 opened the industry to full competition and in 1991, this effectively brought the duopoly share by BT and Mercury to an end. With the liberalisation and opening up of the phone market to global competition came renewed pressure on BT from the telecoms watchdog Oftel to open up more of its network to competitors and cut its prices. The pressures on BT became greater than ever. The stiff competition in the telecoms market, the huge cost of paying for third-generation (3G) mobile phone licences, pressure from the industry regulator Oftel to lower its prices and informed, discerning customers meant BT had to deliver even higher levels of quality and service, at competitive prices in order to stay afloat. All these pressures necessitated mindset change and BT was forced to review its business processes. In order to meet up with the arrival of new competitors and the quickening pace of technological change in the industry, speed of action and reaction became critical success factors. With the competition that flooded the UK market in the 1990s, BT started considering cost reduction that will maximise efficiency without compromising quality. One of the major steps taken was to outsource the transactional side of its human resources operation to Accenture HR Services, which in turn off-shored to its India branch. BT believed that the competitive edge for any global communications provider is human capital and to survive and thrive, it requires world-class human resource (HR) competencies and the processes for managing them. Youndt et al. (1996) highlights that a HR system focused on human capabilities is directly related to multiple dimensions of operational performance. Huselid and Becker (1997) describe that a firms effectiveness is associated with HR capabilities and its attributes. ADVANTAGES OF OUTSOURCING / OFFSHORING Outsourcing enables an organisation to improve its focus on its core values allowing it to remain competitive on the market (Morello, 2003) . Prahalad and Hamel 1990 state that firms must concentrate on core competencies to gain competitive advantage. Through outsourcing specialist skills can be drawn out from a pool of expertise when and where needed whilst opportunities for enriched career development exist for the remaining staff. Organisations are able to turn over certain classes of risks to their suppliers, such as demand variability and capital investments. Unlike the buyer, the outsourcing buyer can spread these risks over multiple clients. Profitability can be achieved as outsourcing increases a businesss cashflow by creating cost reductions through cheap labour and reduced operational expenses i.e. office space, utility. Funds which would have been used for large capital investments can be released for other uses. Contracting out operational functions reduces the competition on capital as the outsourcing company provides the capital investment as part of its overheads. Companies can create an integrated market as it is a cost effective way of globalisation particularly when it selects the best available resources and labour. Figure [rumbi insert appendix] reflects the changes to operational costs which BT experienced when it outsourced. According to Som Mittal, former Managing Director of Compaq India has claimed that payroll processing to countries like India companies can achieve a 20-25% gain in productivity. Outsourcing can increase the service level given to clients. With offshoring an organisation has the ability to have a 24-hour a day workforce resulting in a more timely service which would not be possible if the organisation operated in once country. BT gained flexibility through outsourcing to Accenture as agility or quick response to business demands was made. Competitive advantage can be attained through cheaper prices. When the product prices cannot come down further operating in a highly skilled, low-wage labour area will be advantageous. (Frubel, Heinrichs and Kreye 1980) . As the product price falls consumers are willing to demand a larger amount of goods. The off-shored countries receive economical benefits. Nasscom Chairman Som Mittal remarked ‘Its a win win situation for countries which allow outsourcing and the countries which receive outsourcing (Ahmed 2004) . DISADVANTAGES OF OUTSOURCING/OFFSHORING: When outsourcing to a third party resentment can occur between permanent and contracted staff. Contract/temporary staff may fail to have a sense of belonging whilst permanent staff can remain aloof in order to protect their works hindering teamwork. Offshoring particularly on the outsourcing of work to India as the UK labour force believes that they are losing out on career opportunities. However the McKinsey Global Institute Report states that there are actually too many jobs and not enough people in the UK to fulfil them. Therefore fears of a widespread unemployment are unlikely and thus this resentment could be seen as unnecessary (Lander 2006) . The lack of direct communication between the organisation and the client can hinder the development of solid relationships and can result in the main organisation lacking control of the outsourced project. One of the key aspects of motivation is social interaction and self actualisation (Maslow cited in Mullins, 2001). Another perceived drawback of off-shoring is the decrease in levels of communication. When English is not the native language of the source area, poor command of the English Language leads to prominent resentment of offshored services (Ahmed,2004). Results of a survey carried out by the Nationwide building in 2005 reflected that 91% of UK adults would prefer their calls to be handled by UK-based call centres (Lander (2006). A major drawback is the expense of regaining a customer once lost, because it could cost up to 6 times more in marketing costs to gain a replacement. Cultural differences can be a disadvantage of offshoring i.e. Ryan Kinzy of K3 Group a large outsourcing company states that there are 3 months which are viewed as the most auspicious time for weddings in India, for example half the staff are out of the office. Ryan highlights that building up teamwork is a difficult challenge as employees may lack intuition due to their culture, Indian workers require a lot of direction. Their relationships are hierarchal, family and caste dependent and they have an educational system that emphasises routine learning over independent research. Outsourcing can prove expensive as payment of redundancy packages for the laid off staff can be a major drawback. As the number of companies offshoring to India rises, employee retention becomes a challenge due to the fact that as market competition increases, salaries are required to be competitive. Organisations will have to decide whether the cost-savings outweigh the revenue generated. Risks can be encountered due to the socio-economic conditions which can hinder the progression of operations i.e. maintaining trade risks. The chance of off-shore fraud also exist as the use of funds can be diverted. There is also the risk or data loss. BT faces the risk of fraud emanating from HR outsourcing as off-shore workers have full access to personnel details ranging from bank account numbers, home addresses and other personal details. Non-automated transactions and processing responsibilities enable off-shore workers to have access to highly confidential information. There is an increase in foreign organised crime groups who have targeted foreign off-shore enterprises to gain access data which they process. Organisiations can face compliance risks and their reputation being damaged due to negative publicity resulting from the third party being inconsistent in meeting ethical standards and internal policies. The organisation needs to carryout thorough audits to ensure control . Expertise levels need to be measured to ensure that required service levels of service are met. {Figure xxRumbi to appendix 2} reflects results of problems faced by several companies which have off-shored. The main problem met appears to be low control of performance and data. Offshoring has the limited disadvantage in that the core function of an organisation cannot be accomplished if passed onto an external source . A business which outsources a department still requires in-house technical experts to monitor activities (Greco 1997) Political infrastructure such as changes in government can affect can impact the outsourcing company. Shortly after the election of Sonia Ghandi stock markets plummeted on fears that her leftist allies would roll back fundamental economic reforms. Erratic power grids inexperienced officials and unmotivated employees can also prove to be a disadvantage. ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE BTs management believes organisational culture is innovative with teams that are strategically aligned to BTs operations. Advances in technologies have been applied to benefit BT and its customers to improve processes. Culture can be an object which is manipulated to achieve productivity and organisational improvements, and change over time (Tran, 2008) . In this context, culture is the character of an organisation. However if culture is accepted as being â€Å"†¦.the basic, taken- for- granted assumptions and deep patterns of meaning shared by organisational participation and manifestations of these assumptions†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ( Johnson, 2007) then in this respect culture can be difficult to change. In order to explain the content of cultural context in BT after HR outsourcing, the cultural web will be used. The table below shows the content of the organisational culture with HR outsourcing. Rumbi to appendix 1] According to the above table the organisational culture hinders collective learning in the organisation. Individuals see each other as rivals, rather than a partners. This paradigm creates various obstacles for learning within the organisation, that usually arise due to rivalry, power conflicts and absence of network communication channels (Mullins, 2001). The disadvantage of this power structure is explained by Mullins (2001) who claims that such approach decrease the effectiveness and efficiency of operations management, as participants are detached from the decision-making. BTs new organisational structure is bureaucratic, with the emphasis on standard procedures and operational routines. It might slow down the communication process, with the absence of feedback channels and unnecessary layers that might increase obstructions and cause various distortions in the communication process( Graham Bennet, 1998) . BT has placed its employees after revenues. The management has failed to take into account individual needs of each employee hence developing a coercive rather than participative approach. Within this approach people are being treated as liabilities rather than the core elements of the operations management process, where people become the primary determinant of the outcome quality (Armstrong, 2003) . The organisational culture implies for traditional type of performance appraisal system, which utilises various types of monetary techniques. Wright (2007) argued that the utilisation of monetary tools does not provide the development of a higher level of effective commitment or higher degree of intrinsic motivation and provides a blurred understanding of the relationship between their performance and corresponding appraisal. The communication component forms an important of the above mentioned changes. According to McGregor (1960, cited in Mullins, 2001) in order to get people to direct their efforts towards organisational objectives, management must tell them what to do, judge how well they are doing and reward or punish accordingly. There is also an informative and a motivational purpose. He claims that a clear and thorough description of individual duties and rights within the framework of the organisation may prevent the rise of unmet expectations. As it shows on the table, the communication in the company is of a top-down nature, without proper feedback. This type of communication scheme is good for conveyer-type organisations and not ideal for innovative market-led companies. CHANGE MANAGEMENT The new requirements for adaptation made it necessary for the company to undertake the reengineering of the whole business process, including both â€Å"hard â€Å"and â€Å"soft†elements. According to Senior (1997) â€Å"hard system†change implies â€Å" an attempt to use the benefits of a scientific method whilst recognising that in the real world of business where thing are happening fast, there may not be time to be as scientific as one would like†. In BTs case, â€Å"hard system†change referred to the introduction of new operations management systems, equipment and business facilities, designed to speed up existing operations and reduce the cost per a single transaction. It was designed to maximise the efficiency of every single operation within the business process. Senior (1997) indicates that â€Å"Soft System†changes imply for the change of the organisational culture. The main idea of this approach is listening to the organisation, good communication, developing a shared, vision, gaining real commitment to the change and the vision, education and training, and understanding the tools and techniques for the process. William et al.(1993) indicates that to facilitate effective adaptation of the employees to new working conditions, managers shall reduce restraining forces and reinforces driving forces. However, it shall be considered, that not all measures are equally effective. As Hetzbergs maintainance theory ( cited in Mullins, 2001) shows , the presence of certain factors may act as a powerful motivating factors, while the absence of other elements may produce slight dissatisfaction. At the same time strategic priorities shall reflect the current organisational aims. Under such conditions in order to improve the situation and meet objectives (create a better customer focus) the high involvement of senior managers, who acts as a link between operational and business levels of the organisation, is required. Senior managers shall act as major change agents. Taking the role of change agents, it is important for senior managers not to ignore employees natural resistance to new systems, but to create appropriate incentives to fasten the transactional process from resistance to commitment (Graham and Bennet, 1998). The ignorance of or resistance to changes will introduce different open conflicts, which will significantly worsen the organisation environment affecting its performance level and flexibility. This could result to failure to raise performance and attract or retain customers, which may lead to significant costs and even reduce the companys chances to survive and succeed in changing market conditions. According to Mintzberg Quinn and Ghoshall (1995) the overall rationale for any outsourcing activity is that outsourcing provides, greater economies of scale, flexibility, increase in levels of expertise, cost effectiveness, reduced costs and added value to any organisation. The rationale of BT outsourcing its HRM functions were to increase shareholder value, sustain progress and cope with the pace of change. Outsourcing of parts of the HR function has become more common. Lonsdale and Cox (1998) argue that outsourcing decisions can be classified under the following three headings: 1 outsourcing for short-term cost and headcount reductions; 2 core-competence-based outsourcing, where peripheral activities are passed to third parties and core activities are retained in-house; 3 iterative and entrepreneurial outsourcing, where periodic reviews of critical market activities are undertaken, with subsequent decision to retain or outsource. IMPACT ON UK LABOUR FORCE Human capital is emphasized as the most valuable asset of the 21st century business. The primary effects of outsourcing/offshoring on HR and Labour Relations are related to managing transition in HRM such as personnel changes, managing layoff, downsizing issues, and the costs/dynamics of actually managing an off-shore contract. The laying off of UK employees as a result of restructuring to effect the outsourcing contracts can have a negative impact on employees. Layoffs cause major morale problems among in-house ‘survivors and may lead to dissatisfaction and reduced delivery speed. Some UK companies experienced productivity dips and potential legal action from laid off employees resulting in costs of severance, retention bonuses and retraining being encountered. According to a survey by Deloitte and YouGov (2006) revealed that fear of job losses was prevalent in the UK with 82% of public perceiving offshoring as a threat . 1 in 3 people stated that UK companies should be forced to bring back jobs to the UK. Chief economist of the Work Foundation, Ian Brinkley commented ‘Fears have been stoked by claims that the Chinese and Indians are coming to get your lunch to describe the insecurity that offshoring has caused. With regards to knowledge transfer there is concern that some of the job experience is being exported. If low-level skill tasks are sent off-shore then so is the experience gained from performing those tasks. When the time comes to perform higher-level tasks where previous experience is mandatory, there is no alternative than to go off-shore because that is where the experience will available. In some instances company plans imply that higher-level tasks will remain performed on-shore, the lower-level tasks are performed miles away. The knowledge and experience of those ‘low-level jobs will be gone forever, and may impact the proper development of the ‘higher-level jobs. Forrester a US research group released a study that by 2015 Europe will have lost a collective number of 1.2 million jobs to off-shore locations increasing its reliance. Alan Blinder a US economist and former advisor to Bill Clinton has supported this thesis by stating that offshoring will lead to a ‘third Industrial Revolution. He views that off-shore is now a man-made comparative advantage and that workers will be forced to seek employment in personal services which remain non-tradable. There is a long-term impact on the types of jobs that people are training for, as well as the ‘transfer of knowledge relating to many job structures in the workplace such that there is a ‘domino effect. Steve Loy feels that these ‘outgoing tide of jobs could threaten fundamental technology research as well as jobs. The astute students will recognise the rapidly dwindling job opportunities in HRM and will choose other programs of study thus loss will be encountered in HR leading to a labour-force that has inadequate HRM knowledge to compete in a high knowledge based economy. The evaluation of the impact of off-shore is mainly based on estimations of collective data. Jobs most at risk are non-client facing and low knowledge content jobs those which use a lot of Information technology, creating outputs that can be transmitted via IT. An analysis by the CPRP concluded that 20% of non-client facing jobs are likely to be moved abroad. The potential is apportioned as a function of international trade and investment, the industrial structure of the economy, human capital, employment indicator, product market regulations indicator. Not all jobs created off-shore by UK companies automatically translates to job losses in the UK labour market. Employees are increasingly demanding services hence time difference plays a role in off-shore, offering them extended services. The lower price makes it possible for instance to offer services which would not be available otherwise i.e. 24 hr call centres. The information collated by the European Restructuring Monitor (ERM) s hows that job loss due to offshoring is in fact very small. During the first quarter of 2007 ERM recorded 420 restructuring cases in Europe. They announced 137,762 job losses and 184,511 job gains. Only 5.5% of all jobs lost were due to offshoring activities. For the year 2005 the percentage of job losses due to offshoring was only 3.4% of the total job losses. To measure the extent of job loss due to restructuring we can use redundancy notification, the effects of offshoring does however vary with the country. In France, national Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies estimates in its 2007 report on the French economy that offshoring has been responsible for the destruction of 15,000 jobs per year between 2000 and 2003. This is to contrast with a job creation in the private sector of 200,000 per year . In the UK there is no significant decline as per the results of the LFS Redundancy Tables ‘Employment growth in the occupations considered susceptible to offshoring has been very strong. The redundancy levels for these occupations, although high relative to the whole economy, have been falling in the last four years. The overall employment rate for these occupations has also shown an increase showing the cost of moving low-skilled jobs abroad is either falling or positive job creation is highly prevalent in the IT enabled occup ations. This does not mean that jobs are not being off-shored, and it is entirely possible that in the absence of offshoring, employment in these areas might have been higher. The adverse impact is entirely triggered by much larger changes in domestic demand for such services, the UK in particular has been extremely successful in developing as a world leader in knowledge based international trade. Jobs created through the expansion of exports of services are likely to outweigh the contraction of jobs caused by import of services. According to a report by Amiti and Jin Wei (2005) job growth at divisional levels has not been negatively related to service outsourcing but has had a negative impact on the demand for unskilled labour. In the UK outsourcing has had no reflected effect on the labourforce. The Deloitte and Recruitment Employment Confederation Report states that both permanent and temporary staff billings continue to rise. National press recruitment advertising in the UK went down by 11.3% in July 2005 in both public and private sectors reflecting a positive direction in the labour market and no relevant changes in the economy. Outsourcing is increasing consultancy work in the United Kingdom hence is beneficial as it offers flexible working hours / days for UK employees. This is particularly favorable for women who are raising children as is allows them to earn a salary whilst at the same time having adequate time with their children. There is also the flexibility of home-working. Structural changes can occur in the economies of both the outsourced/sourcing companies and due to the debate on who is benefiting/losing racism can be allowed to rear its head. A report prepared for the Department of Trade Industry by Ovum (2006) concludes that even though the actual impacts of an increase in trade and the expansion of global sourcing have been quite modest to date, offshoring can change the skills structure of labour demand, increasing the vulnerability of low-skilled workers in particular. ECONOMIC IMPACT Concern over off-shoring has become a surrogate for wider issues about economic insecurity, said Work Foundation chief economist Ian Brinkley. An interesting corollary benefit of outsourcing is the benefit to the economy. Indias National Association of Software and Services Companies commissioned a report by Evaluserve that stated that for every $100 worth of work sent abroad by US companies, $130 to $145 will be reinvested in the US economy. Cost savings are said to create value in the UK economy. Ahead of monetary capital, knowledge economy has become a focal point in the policy of outsourcing and off-shore. Strategies have been devised i.e. the Lisbon Strategy centres to promote, research, innovation in the development of human capital. In the future, human capital is the only way that Europe can remain prosperous. The main beneficiaries in the UK are the educated high skilled workers and the losers will be semi/low skilled workers. The UK government needs to investment more in education to continue pushing towards a leading knowledge based economy to avoid vulnerability. It needs to investment in human capital and focus on domestic policy choices for the losers of rapid structural changes within the UK. As a result of off-shoring the UK government is losing funds which could possibly be raised by corporate and income tax. However, it has stated that it does not have plans in place as yet to prevent outsourcing. The Department of Trade Industry has stated ‘it is a commercial decision for companies to decide where to locate their business operations such as call centres. The absence of official statistics on off-shore outsourcing leads to speculation and there is also misinterpretation of indirect measures/evidence. The experience of an individual company may or may not select a trend in a specific sector but does not allow conclusions to be made on the economy as a whole. It is possible that the rise in rice prices caused by lower production could be a result of a shift by the working population in India from working in the agriculture moving to the services sector. A great deal of knowledge is tacit and therefore difficult to transfer. Its reproduction can be extremely costly and requires an environment in which it can be harnessed effectively. According to a recent World Bank publication India is at the bottom end ranking 98 out of 128 countries of an index that measures the ability to create, absorb and diffuse knowledge therefore its threat is minimal to the UK economy. The economy-wide measures such as a countrys balance of payments can assist us in understanding the patterns of cross border trade and establish the impact of offshoring. If the outsourcing of tasks by UK based companies to off-shore locations i.e. India is soaring then the UK should be importing more of these services from India. The CBI has stated that the UK companies have benefited from off-shore as they are now receiving improved work-force skills at a low rate making their enterprises more profitable. According to results obtained from the Office for National Statistics the redundancy rate for the three months to January 2008 was 4.4 per 1,000 employees, down 0.9 over the quarter and down 1.1 over the year. These figures on the redundancy rate reflect that though a large number of organizational services have been off-shored services this has not had a significant impact on the UK economy. The UK has emerged as a world leader in ‘knowledge services and between 1995 2005 exports of its services grew by over 100% compared to its exports of traditional service exports such as transport. India is ranked 6th for global ‘insourcing behind the US, UK, German France and the Netherlands who appear to be the top rec
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