Insects Have Sensors (force-sensitive Organs) Concentrated In Areas Ne

Insects have sensors (force-sensitive organs) concentrated in areas near joints, tips of the legs, and near exoskeletal sites attached to muscle tendons. These sensors act as strain gauges to detect compression of the exoskeleton. Using this information, insects recognize environments, regulate walking movements, and astonishingly "remember" stepping patterns and location. Through memory experiments, scientists see that a spider memorizes its own previous walking movements to backtrack to a fly. After presenting the fly to the spider on a petri dish, scientists chased the spider some distance away from the capture site. The spider then returns to the original spot, even though the fly has been placed elsewhere. If guided along a curved detour path, the spider cuts corners, indicating that it remembered the fly's position. Limitations in this memory experiment include odor and magnetic sense to backtrack to the capture site. To test the latter hypothesis we can place magnets inside the petri dish and run the experiment during cloudy weather to disorient the spider's navigational magnetic sense. Parkinson's is a neurodegenerative disease that causes involuntary movement, muscle rigidity, slowing of movement, and loss of spontaneous motion. As excessive amounts of dopamine-producing neurons of the brain die, the resulting decline in dopamine signaling disrupts smooth functioning of the overall motor network. Damage to the substantia nigra accounts for most symptoms. L-dopa, which readily crosses the blood-brain barrier, was developed to compensate for the decline of dopamine. It is then converted to dopamine by dopamine-making neurons that survive in the substantia nigra and nonneuronal cells in the striatum. Patients experience a desensitization phenomenon, gradually losing sensitivity to L-dopa, which works for shorter and shorter increments. This may be attributed to dopamine's ability to promote free radical synthesis, which may help explain why dopamine-making neurons are particularly susceptible to dying from oxidation. L-dopa increases dopamine levels, eases symptoms, and may ironically damage nigral neurons. With more L-dopa usage, more nigral neurons die, leading to gradual ineffectiveness of the compound. Total desensitization occurs when nigral neuron levels are extremely low. L-dopa's wearing-off effect is similar to that of protease-inhibitor drugs used to help treat HIV. After many years, the drugs lose effect; HIV persists and leads to full-blown AIDS.

The Gold Standard vs. Fiat Money

The Gold Standard vs. Fiat Money An extensive essay on the gold standard on The Encyclopedia of Economics and Liberty defines it as: ...a commitment by participating countries to fix the prices of their domestic currencies in terms of a specified amount of gold. National money and other forms of money (bank deposits and notes) were freely converted into gold at the fixed price. A county under the gold standard would set a price for gold, say $100 an ounce and would buy and sell gold at that price. This effectively sets a value for the currency; in our fictional example, $1 would be worth 1/100th of an ounce of gold. Other precious metals could be used to set a monetary standard; silver standards were common in the 1800s. A combination of the gold and silver standard is known as bimetallism. A Brief History of the Gold Standard If you would like to learn about the history of money in detail, there is an excellent site called A Comparative Chronology of Money which details the important places and dates in monetary history. During most of the 1800s, the United States had a bimetallic system of money;  however, it was essentially on a gold standard as very little silver was traded. A true gold standard came to fruition in 1900 with the passage of the Gold Standard Act. The gold standard effectively came to an end in 1933 when President Franklin D. Roosevelt outlawed private gold ownership. The Bretton Woods System, enacted in 1946 created a system of fixed exchange rates that allowed governments to sell their gold to the United States treasury at the price of $35/ounce: The Bretton Woods system ended on August 15, 1971, when President Richard Nixon ended trading of gold at the fixed price of $35/ounce. At that point for the first time in history, formal links between the major world currencies and real commodities were severed. The gold standard has not been used in any major economy since that time. What system of money do we use today? Almost every country, including the United States, is on a system of fiat money, which the glossary defines as money that is intrinsically useless; is used only as a medium of exchange. The value of money is set by the supply and demand for money and the supply and demand for other goods and services in the economy. The prices for those goods and services, including gold and silver, are allowed to fluctuate based on market forces.   The Benefits and Costs of a Gold Standard The main benefit of a gold standard is that it  ensures  a relatively low level of inflation. In articles such as What Is the Demand for Money? weve seen that inflation is caused by a combination of four factors: The supply of money goes up.The supply of goods goes down.Demand for money goes down.Demand for goods goes up. So long as the supply of gold does not change too quickly, then the supply of money will stay relatively stable. The gold standard prevents a country from printing too much money. If the supply of money rises too fast, then people will exchange money (which has become less scarce) for gold (which has not). If this goes on too long, then the treasury will eventually run out of gold. A gold standard restricts the  Federal Reserve  from enacting policies which significantly alter the growth of the money supply which in turn limits the  inflation rate  of a country. The gold standard also changes the face of the foreign exchange market. If Canada is on the gold standard and has set the price of gold at $100 an ounce, and Mexico is also on the gold standard and set the price of gold at 5000 pesos an ounce, then 1 Canadian Dollar must be worth 50 pesos. The extensive use of gold standards implies a system of fixed exchange rates. If all countries are on a gold standard, there is  then  only one real currency, gold, from which all others derive their value. The stability of the gold standard cause in the foreign exchange market is often cited as one of the benefits of the system. The stability caused by the gold standard is also the biggest drawback in having one.  Exchange rates  are not allowed to respond to changing circumstances in countries. A gold standard severely limits the stabilization policies the Federal Reserve can use. Because of these factors, countries with gold standards tend to have severe economic shocks. Economist  Michael D. Bordo  explains: Because economies under the gold standard were so vulnerable to real and monetary shocks, prices were highly unstable in the short run. A measure of short-term price instability is the coefficient of variation, which is the ratio of the standard deviation of annual percentage changes in the price level to the average annual percentage change. The higher the coefficient of variation, the greater the short-term instability. For the United States between 1879 and 1913, the coefficient was 17.0, which is quite high. Between 1946 and 1990 it was only 0.8. Moreover, because the gold standard gives the government little discretion to use monetary policy, economies on the gold standard are less able to avoid or offset either monetary or real shocks. Real output, therefore, is more variable under the gold standard. The coefficient of variation for real output was 3.5 between 1879 and 1913, and only 1.5 between 1946 and 1990. Not coincidentally, since the government could not have discretion over monetary policy, unemployment was higher during the gold standard. It averaged 6.8 percent in the United States between 1879 and 1913 versus 5.6 percent between 1946 and 1990. So it would appear that the major benefit to the gold standard is that it can prevent long-term inflation in a country. However, as  Brad DeLong  points out: ...if you do not trust a central bank to keep inflation low, why should you trust it to remain on the gold standard for generations? It does not look like the gold standard will make a return to the United States anytime in the foreseeable future.

The consequences of the 1979 Iranian Revolution for Democracy, Term Paper

The consequences of the 1979 Iranian Revolution for Democracy, Freedom, and Justice in Iran - Term Paper Example The 1979 Iranian Revolution is ‘Never’ Successful According to some scholars, the governing clerics originally thought that the intellectuals and technocrats were inconsequential and that the state machinery could be transformed into something simpler to complement their motives (Lotfalian, 2009). It has been argued that Khomeini’s belief that the institutions of religious education are able to supervise state affairs is accurate. The requirements and value of the state were relaxed to suit the experience and knowledge of those occupying important government positions (Ganji, 2003). But it is the contention of this paper that Iran has greatly endured this ruinous strategy of ‘loyalty to the regime above technical and professional competence’ (Ganji, 2003, 209). The administration of the Akhonds has been unsuccessful in all aspects of nation building. Pervasive corruption has deeply worsened the impacts of its ineffectiveness, ignorance, and preferenti al treatment. The utmost justification of Akhond’s rule was that they would abolish the reliance of Iran on foreign countries and would be genuinely self-sufficient and autonomous. Their regime was to play as an exemplar for ‘the exploited and poor nations’ (Milani, 1993, 359). The rule was to consolidate the Muslim societies across the globe. Its objective was to communicate its revolution to every Islamic community. Yet, the agricultural and industrial sectors of Iran, according to Milani (1993), are wobbling and more reliant on overseas support and imports than ever before. Multinational firms and foreign investors are now gaining more success to the detriment of the local population. The revolution is greatly opposed and ruined in Iran that even the proposal for its transmission to other Muslim communities seems absurd. There are arguments that the Iranian revolution successfully attained its objective and ideology for building a new society. It commenced wit h a vow to improve the standard of living and build a democratic, just, and free society. Yet, it is the contention of this paper that after three decades, what the 1979 Iranian revolution has actually created is a system that has neither a rational or avant-garde foundation, nor a revolutionary blueprint for the nation. According to Kazemi (2003), it fails to carry a humanistic and moral bases and religious authority. Fundamentally, it has become an arrogant, authoritarian regime. The mullahs have been successful in retaining their powers through frauds, corruptions, and violence, yet their status is quite unsteady at present (Ganji, 2003). Obviously they have proved that they are willing to take any measure to remain in power, such as prioritizing over Islam the reinforcement of political control and to the detriment of the people and the nation. The leader of the invincible Assembly of Experts, Akhond Ali Meshkini, proclaimed in 2000 that â€Å"Ayatollah Khamenei’s powers are absolute and subject to no limitations of any kind. Popular elections have no influence on the matter. Until divine justice is restored on earth, he has guardianship over the goods and the souls of men†

Descriptive Statistics Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Descriptive Statistics - Case Study Example This would look like a promising finding because it is higher than the current trend on the mean number of weeks that a prostate cancer patient lives after receiving a confirmed diagnosis of being in stage 4 which is 9.6, with a standard deviation of 3.2. Unfortunately, the data contains an extreme point in this instance, which is 45 and this would certainly draw the mean upwards (Doty, 1996), thereby misrepresenting the behavior of the data. It can also be observed that the standard deviation is unusually high, and since it measures the approximate distance of the data values from the mean (Black, 2010), this indicates that the data set is highly variable. In order to provide a more appropriate interpretation of the behavior of the data, the research team may choose to eliminate this extreme point. This is usually done when a data set contains a minimum number of extreme values that affect the results when the mean is used to interpret it (Fink, 2003). Based on the new calculations made once the value of 45 is removed, the data set will now have a mean of 7.64 and a standard deviation of 2.4. Clearly, such results are lower than the current trend.

Mussolini Policies Essay Example for Free

Mussolini Policies Essay a) Relations with the Catholic Church: Even though Mussolini had seemed anti-clerical and had written â€Å"God Does Not Exist† he had began forming a good relationship with the Roman Catholic Church because of its huge power and influence. He had begun forming this good relationship by getting married in a church in 1926 and having his two children baptized. He had also closed down some wine shops and nightclubs. In 1929 the Lateran treaty was signed after a series of meetings it had recognized the pope’s sovereign rule, the church had received 750 million lire cash and 1000 million lire in government bonds for the loss of the papal states in 1860. Catholicism had also become the state religion; church marriages became legal, religious education were a must in secondary schools, catholic action would continue as long as it was independent of political parties and it was subordinate to the church’s hierarchy. This treaty had gotten the church and it’s faithful followers on Mussolini’s side. However, this treaty had angered the radical fascists who were anti-clerical since the independence of the church meant there would be no totalitarian rule. The church had also been against communism and socialism therefore when the fascist destroyed the left this had brought Mussolini closer to the church. Mussolini had also strengthened this relationship by exempting the clergy from paying taxes in the mid 1920’s in return the Pius XI forced Dom Sturzo to resign since he was a fierce opponent of fascism. However, some friction remained between the fascist government and the Catholic Church as the catholic youth movements rivaled the fascist youth and student organizations. Moreover, some of the members of the catholic student organization were becoming influential and became significant leaders in the Christian Democratic Party in Italy after 1945 such as Aldo Moro in the 1930’s, which created problems for the fascists. The pope had also disapproved of the anti-Semitic laws introduced by Mussolini. However, he had approved of the invasion of Abyssinia in 1935 since it was similar to a crusade and his intervention in the Spanish civil war in 1926 to stop the Left. Mussolini’s relationship with the church remained well since they both gained a lot from their treaty. This policy had brought back the church’s power and had made Mussolini’s aim to build a new fascist generation impossible. b) Education and youth movements: Italian fascism like all other fascists had wanted to influence the young generation. In 1926 the Opera Nazionale Balilla was established bringing together fascist youth organizations and giving government funding. It was placed under the ministry of education in 1929 and they had begun closing rival youth organizations except the catholic youth groups. In 1932 the Ballila membership became obligatory. In 1937 the ONB joined with the young fascists to create one youth organization called Gioventu Italiana del Littorio for 6-21 year olds. The Ballila was political and it was militarized but it was also filled with sports and recreational activities, which attracted children, but 40% of the population had not joined showing the failure of this policy. At first Italian schools had some freedom but Mussolini had appointed the philosopher Giovanni Gentile to become the first minister of education. In 1923 Gentile had passed the education act which had changed education by promoting grammar schools, encouraging philosophy, classical studies and had not emphasized on technical and vocational education. To ensure that the schools would not spread anti-fascist ideas, anti-fascist teachers were removed and teachers were forced to take an oath of loyalty. Mussolini had started to really control schools in the mid 1930’s, as schools were obliged to use fascist textbooks. In 1936 there was also a history textbook that had to be taught which focused on promoting a part of Italian history that would create loyalty to Mussolini. Physical education was also important to have healthy kids who could go to war and be prepared for motherhood. Therefore, Mussolini had greatly impacted education in order to create loyalty to him. c) The battle of the births In order to make Italy a great power Mussolini had launched in 1927 a battle for the births so that Italy’s population could go from 37 to 60 million. The government started encouraging marriage by forcing more taxes on bachelors, awarding prizes to women with the most children, families with 10 or more children were exempted from paying taxes, loans were given to newly married couple, family allowances were introduced in 1934 finally the criminal code in 1932 had banned contraception, abortion and sterilization. This policy had failed since birth rate continued to fall in 1922 there was 147.5 births for every 1000 women of childbearing age while in 1936 it had fallen to 102.7 births. The population had only reached 44 million in 1940. However, this was only due to the falling of death rate and emigration but the government had failed to encourage early marriage as the average age at which they got married rose from the 1930’s. d) The media and the arts Mussolini wanted to suppress opposition so he started by censoring newspapers in 1923 and the fascists government had taken owned 10% of newspapers which meant it did not take over press but controlled what they wrote as the editors that would oppose him would be fined or banned from journalism. At first the fascist government saw radio and film as being insignificant but this changed when the government broadcasts increased and the ownership of radios went up to one million. Similarly, in 1924 a government film agency called Istituto Luce was created to make documentaries. In 1937 the government founded an Italian film studio called Cinecitta. However, Mussolini began really using propaganda in the 1930’s in order to form a new type of Italian, a heroic and energetic one. In 1925 the cult of the Duce was launched as was the biography of Mussolini called Dux. In this book Mussolini was presented as an athlete, hard working and loved the people. There were also many parades to elaborate rituals in order to revive roman spirit. The use of propaganda had aided Mussolini to become more popular in the years 1929-36. However, this popularity had begun to diminish once Mussolini became more radical as he applied the anti-Semitic policy and joined WWII. Mussolini did not get involved in art as much as Hitler had but there were division within the fascists as to which type of art to support. The neo-classicists preferred architecture and art that was inspired by ancient Rome while the modernists encouraged experimental art. Therefore, this lead to the formation of two artistic prizes, the Cremona prize for traditional art and propaganda while the Bergamo prize encouraged experimentation. To try to spread access to art the fascist government organized almost 50 art exhibitions a year. e) Racial policies (Anti-Semitic laws) Early on Mussolini had not shown any signs anti-Semitism however he had been racist against Africans in Libya and Abyssinia. One of the theories is that Mussolini had wanted to weaken the Jews because in the 1930’s he wanted to start a war and was not sure whether they would be loyal or not. Another theory is that in 1938 Mussolini was getting closer to Germany but while Hitler never pushed him to adopt anti-Semitism he might have chosen to adopt it in order to get closer to Hitler. Mussolini had started this policy by writing an article on reducing the number of Jews in 1938. He had then banned marriage between Jews and non-Jews, forbidden the Jews from jobs in civil service, teaching and PNF membership. The Jewish kids were also excluded from state schools and up to 10000 non-Italian Jews were deported. This law had caused Mussolini to become unpopular even within his own party who was made up of one third of Jews. The church that had a major influence had also criticized this law therefore making Mussolini even more unpopular. By 1941 6000 Italian Jews had left Italy among them were businessmen, professionals and academics therefore when they left the economy was badly affected. And wasn’t implemented systematically f) Other areas/ points of your own: Economic policies Mussolini had wanted to improve the economy to prevent foreign input this policy was called Autarky. He had adopted the battle of the grains in 1925 to improve agriculture to increase grain production in order to show economic strength therefore leading to nationalism. This policy had succeeded as imports were reduced by 75% between 1925 and 1935 therefore increasing Mussolini’s popularity. However, to increase production of wheat he needed more land to plant and he started using the land suitable for citrus which caused a decrease in their production and poverty in the south still continued. Another policy he had adopted was the corporate state in 1926 to manage relationships between employer and employee so as to cooperate therefore leading to more production. By 1934 22 corporations were set up and had succeeded to influence the economy. However, the corporations were just advisors that were dominated by fascists therefore they did what is best for them and left the worker’s interests aside. g) Conclusion Mussolini had adopted many policies that had gained him popularity and changed the Italian society such as the relationship with the church and influencing the media and the arts. However, when he had become more radical and adopted the anti-Semitic policy and tried to control education he had began losing popularity, which had eventually lead to his fall. To what extent was Mussolini influential in international affairs in the 1930’s? After the league of nations was undermined by the Manchuria crisis therefore when Hitler had began expanding and broke the treaty of Versailles by announcing his intention to build an army of 550000 men using conscription Mussolini decided to sign the stress front on 1935 with France and Britain. This stated that the three countries would take action if Germany broke the treaty of Versailles further. However, this agreement fell apart when Britain did not consult Italy or France before singing the Anglo-German naval agreement in 1935, which allowed Germany to expand its navy beyond what the treaty Versailles had allowed. Mussolini had also invaded Abyssinian, which Britain and France disapproved of. Therefore this shows that his international affairs with other countries had failed. Moreover, when Mussolini had invaded Abyssinia in 1935 it had changed his foreign policy completely his relationship with Britain and France was destroyed while his relationship with Germany was improving. Although Mussolini though France and Britain would not react to this invasion the League of Nations imposed economic sanctions since Britain was being undermined. However, Germany continued to trade with Italy and Mussolini ignored the sanctions therefore strengthening their relationship and weakening the league. In addition, Mussolini had also intervened in the Spanish civil war as he send 70000 troops to Spain to help support general Franco. Although he had failed he had sent them in order to weaken France who had a similar government as Spain and to have a naval base in the Balearic Islands to help promote Italian power in the Mediterranean. Furthermore, Mussolini’s relationship with Germany had also been strengthened as they had signed the Rome-berlin axis. Italy had also walked out of the League of Nations as Germany had done. It is also said that Mussolini had adopted the anti-Semitic policy in order to get closer to Germany and to make Italy more radical. As Mussolini became closer to Hitler he had changed his foreign policy towards Austria as he allowed Germany to increase its influence over Austria. In 1938 after the newly appointed chancellor Seyss-Inquart had invited Hitler to send troops, Hitler had attacked Austria and Mussolini had not rejected. Moreover, when a crisis broke out because Hitler had wanted to invade Czechoslovakia after he demanded that the Czech government allow the German speaking are of Czechoslovakia to unite with Germany. Therefore, it seemed that Britain and France would side with Czechoslovakia therefore causing war. Mussolini played the role of peacemaker and set up the Munich conference in 1938. Mussolini was also encouraged by Britain and France’s appeasement of Hitler to avoid aggression to start a more violent foreign policy. Mussolini had also been aware of him being the weak partner in the Italian-German relationship therefore this encouraged him to become violent to be more influential. He started by invading Albania in 1939. He then signed the pact of steel with Germany in 1939, which forced the two countries to support each other in case of war. This was an advantage for Germany who was likely to enter a war while Italy would be helped to expand.

Airasia Xs Business Environment Tourism Essay

Airasia Xs Business Environment Tourism Essay X targeted the less disposable income travelers who overlooked by traditional airlines even by some low cost carriers. The low price of ticket and abundant of destination network provided travelers more opportunities to fly. Moreover, X explored the new technology to reduce transaction cost for travelers the cell phone sales of ticket. As Asias economic grew, people from Asia have higher spending power and they will select air transportation to travel more frequent than before. X should cater to a broader passengers segment across different needs categories. Back to a short time after the inception of X, the Malaysia Transport Ministry even refused to release the air route from Kuala Lumpur to Sydney for X in order to protect Malaysia Airlines which is the national airline. Afterward, X prepared for IPO but did not want to be list on the KLSE. Due to worry about the Malaysia government could slow down some of Xs expansion and continue to refuse some routes application. X put off the IPO till the end of 2011 and early of 2012. AirAsia Xs industry environment Although the entry barrier of airline industry is high such as huge capital requirement and governmental legal barriers, low cost long haul carriers are suffering strong competition. On one hand, most of low cost long haul carriers are launched by their parent company. For example, X is a sister company of AirAsia, Scoot Airline is a subsidiary of Singapore Airline. They can enter the industry because of the background of their parent company. On the other hand, the cost of aircraft, fuel and airport is the majority expense in airline company, the high bargain power of suppliers gave much pressure to them. Train and ship are the substitutes of airline, but they are hardly to take place of low cost long haul airline. Even though the price is more expensive than bus and ship, low cost long haul carriers provide variable, efficient and convenient transport service. Sometimes, low threat of substitutes indicates high competition in the industry. In Southeast Asia market, Jetstar from Australia and Scoot from Singapore are the main competitors of X. Jetstar is the earliest company to operated low cost model of them, it has much experience about low cost control. It has huge fleet and good quality service. Its fatal weakness is the highest ticket price provided among the three companies. Scoot is a new low cost long haul carrier in 2012. It has narrow route network and higher price than X. However, it has absolute cost advantages in route from Singapore to Australia currently. Compared to them, X has the lowest average ticket price and the largest passenger load. AirAsia Xs Strategy X successfully integrated low cost model in every organizational activities. It sharply griped the true needs of lower disposable income customers to attract new customer segments and created value to customers around low cost. Primary activities Activities Description Inbound logistics Although X formally separated from AirAsia, they still jointly purchase important resources such as aircraft and fuel. It will strengthen their bargaining power towards suppliers. X reduced costly investment in terminal or non-airplane related infrastructure help to decrease the cost of flight for passengers. Meanwhile, X pays much attention to flight safety. It has a high standard aircraft maintenance team. Operations Different from full service airlines, X should maximize its load in each flight to reach the break-even point because of the low enough price. Moreover, X arranges high efficient flight scheduling to increase the profit. Outbound logistics X is an airline company and responsible to long haul transportation. There is no more outbound logistics except the low cost long haul transportation. Marketing and sales In order to attract new customer segments, X was differentiated around low cost and building he global brand. To reduce cost, X utilized 100 per cent online sales before. To make further efforts, X was exploring the cell phone sales of ticket. In spite of the extra cost, X set sales point in at each airport and operated call centers throughout the world. X also had agreements with travel agencies. Service X made effort to keep the booking process and pricing model simple. The ticket price listed online including ticket fees and related tax charge. It is transparent to customers. X never charged any online, telephone or personal booking fees. In late of 2010, X launched BIG program to review more benefit to loyal customers. Support activities Activities Description Infrastructure X used flat organization structure in the company. The structure helped X to reduce the cost of administration and develop the efficiency among the employees. One of the most important activities is preparing for global IPO. This move is the foundation for Xs global expansion. Human resource management Low cost human resource of X absolutely has benefits from the low labor cost of Malaysia. Furthermore, X and AirAsia established their own training academy for new pilots, engineer and cabin crews. It saved a lot of money for X again. Technology development X explored cell phone sales of ticket to make up 100 per cent online sales. It provided more convenient to customers in booking system. Procurement X searched the lowest price with acceptable quality of merchandise or procured with AirAsia to obtain more price advantage. In the value chain of AirAsia X, every activity is around low cost to create value to customers. Some moves in value chain decide the AirAsia Xs cost per seat mile (US$0.02 per seat mile) less than one quarter of the cost of the average budget US s low budget airlines (US$0.09 per seat mile). From the inception of X, it operated as a simple organization structure. X used minimum staffs to complete flight tasks in safety and efficiency. Additionally, the cost of human resource saved a large sum of money for AirAsia X. Labor costs in Malaysia and the absence of unionization helped keep costs low. As wright said, passengers prefer to get off airplane directly onto the airport tarmac instead of added cost to the ticket price. To reduce costly investment in terminal or non-airplane related infrastructure help to decrease the cost of flight for passengers. It satisfied the real needs of Xs target market. Appraisal the strategies of AirAsia X Sustaining development cannot be created by operating business in external environment with high opportunity and low threat. It must depend on resource and capabilities and utilizes them to implement strategies in industry competition. In order to figure out these resource and capability, management must find out resource of value, rareness, imitability and non-substitute from internal environment. In the beginning of AirAsia X, it almost shared all resources from AirAsia to ensure the successful launch. As formally separated AirAsia X from AirAsia in 2010, AirAsia X already had its own value resources such as some suppliers. It provided infrastructure to administrate strategy and develop. Low cost control system but high safety aircraft and standard maintenance is the most valuable resource in AirAsia X. The flight time in AirAsia X changed from day to day is a very different schedule in airline industry. The purpose is to satisfy to break even through arrange aircrafts in the air as long as possible because the ticket price was too low. Low cost human resource in Malaysia is a kind of imperfectly imitable resources. Scoot Airline from Singapore and Jetstar Airline from Australia have no this resource. Low cost philosophy also is important imperfectly imitable resource. AirAsia X can achieve very low cost per seat mile as US$0.02 when the average budget airlines cost per seat mile is US$0.09. This is mission impossible to AirAsia Xs competitors. As an airline company, aircraft manufacturer is one of the core suppliers. Aircraft selection is very important to airline company; it must consider the size of aircraft depended on fly distance and maintenance cost. AirAsia X utilizes single type of aircraft to simplify maintenance, reduce staff training needs and gain better purchasing term in negotiation. Conclusion Integrated above Porters five forces analysis, value chain analysis and VRIN analysis, the current competitive advantage in AirAsia X is cost leadership. Because of low enough price, AirAsia X can grip opportunity to succeed when other low cost carriers failed. Meanwhile, the competitive advantage offsets some weaknesses such as less diversification of service and differentiation from competitors. With the development of AirAsia X, some current strengths maybe transfer to weaknesses. These will influence sustaining development of AirAsia X. Therefore, AirAsia X should build sustaining competitive advantages in the future. Sustaining competitive advantages Description Cost leadership Low cost philosophy must practices as the core competency throughout AirAsia X. Low distribution cost Currently, low distribution cost is still strength in AirAsia X, but it is heavily relied on online sales. Once information system interruption, AirAsia X will suffer heavy loss, besides, online sales are an easy kind of resource imitated by competitors. Thus, AirAsia X should explore new low cost distribution. High aircraft utilization and operation AirAsia X is good at safe and efficient flight schedule. It balances low ticket price and company revenue. This capability is sustainable and imperfectly imitable. Flat organization structure This capability helped AirAsia X to save a lot of money. However, it is short-term competitive advantage. As AirAsia X expands, flat organization structure will influence the quality of decision making. AirAsia X should maintain this capability to as sustainable competitive advantage. Strong branding and marketing Strong branding and marketing is one of important capability to against competitors expansion. AirAsia X must build its strong branding and marketing. As the completion of budget long haul airlines become sharp day by day. AirAsia X should maintain the capabilities which are easy imitated such as distribution channel or short-term competitive advantages such as flat organization structure.

Green Capitalism Essay

Green Capitalism is a new approach for resolving the problem of environmental destruction while ensure the sustainable development of capitalism practices (Bess, 2000). The world is witnessing the effects of global warming. In addition, economic sustainability remains a major concern by the global community. Based on this, green capitalism concept dictates for use of green energy sources to support the economy (Bess, 2000). By ethics of care, individual humans must protect the environment for the good of the whole community. Critics have blamed capitalism for its exploitation of available resources without concern of the negative environmental implications of the same (Beaufoy, 1993). From an ethical point of view, green capitalism concept is quite limited in its practicability due to the fact that capitalism by its nature seeks to maximize profits regardless of associated consequences (Beaufoy, 1993). On the other side, green practices dictate for protection of the environment and its ecosystem. Thus, the theory of green capitalism remains a conflict between caring for the environment and maximization of capital (Beaufoy, 1993). True to the letter, the world is claimed to have enough renewable resources to sustain its population. Nevertheless, most of these resources like solar, wind, and tidal energies are unpredictable for supporting our current economic energy requirements. Still, the green capitalism concept advocates for reduced consumption of anti-green products in the community (Bess, 2000). This has an ethical implication of harming the global market capital, a claim that has been blamed for economic meltdown (Beaufoy, 1993). As a solution to these real concerns on green capitalism theory, there is need having in place other models of addressing the problem of environmental pollution. Just to note, the effects of capitalism are permanent trends that cannot be reversed if capitalism prevails. References Bess, M. (2000). Greening the Mainstream. Environmental History, 5, 12-18. Beaufoy, H. (1993). Case Study: The Green Office in Britain: A Critical Analysis. Journal of Design History, 6, 9-14.

High Attrition Rate at Call Center Industry: an Hr Manager’s View

UNIVERSITY OF SANTO TOMAS COLLEGE OF COMMERCE AND BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION This Research Proposal is being presented to the Faculty of the Department of Human Resource Development & Management Entitled: High Turnover Rate and Employee Benefits in Call Center Industries: The HR Manager’s View By: Buotan, Aldrin M. Dimaculangan, Rey Karl A. Flores, John Andrew S. Malabanan, John Peter M. Marquez, Gerard Ephraim L. Tagunicar, Cedie N. September 1, 2012 Espana, Manila IntroductionToday’s best companies understand the real key to maintaining a world-class workforce is not just to hire the best employees, but to keep them once they are hired. Retaining progressive workforce has not been an easy task to every employer or organization and thus becomes a real challenge to cope up with the fast pace business world currently we are on and if this fails, surely high turnover rates will occur and will be prominent in an organization. An employee turnover rate refers to the movement o f employees out of an organization.It is often cited as one of the factors behind the failure of an employee productivity rate and is also one of the chief determinants of labour supply (Snell & Bohlander, 2010, Principles of Human Resource Management, 15th edition, United States, p,415). Competing organizations are constantly looking to steal top performers, and â€Å"poaching talent is becoming an increasingly common way for organizations to build themselves them up as a larger company to be able to expand and earn more profits, while at the same time tearing their competitors down (Noe et. l. 2010, Human Resource management: Gaining a Competitive Advantage, 7th edition, New York, p461). Turnover comes in good times and in bad, to good companies and to those that are struggling of every size. Losing a good and talented employee is never easy, and sometimes is predictable, but sometimes, it can be prevented, â€Å"you can’t run a service business when you are at war with y our employees† (Greg Davdidowitch, Noe et. al, 2010, Human Resource Management: Gaining Competitive Advantage, 7th edition, New York).Knowing the rate of turnover at a certain organization is the first step to understanding whether employees’ departs within the range of normal for a type of business and industry. Turnover is a key benchmark in assessing the health and stability of organizations. A high turnover rate suggests there may be something wrong with the basic structure of a company, its salary levels or even its benefits. Too high turnover rate can also mean that an organization is losing productivity and knowledge, including an understanding of products and processes. The consequences of the loss are both financial and in the morale of those who remain.Leading reasons that employees give for their departure: a better opportunity or increased responsibilities, higher pay or more benefits, or they are moving to a different location. Benefits may one of the best reasons to reduce turnover rate and increase the retention in an industry. Employee benefits that is part of the total compensation package, other than pay for a worker, provided employees in whole or in part by employer payments, example of which are life insurance, pension, workers compensation and vacation (Milkovich, G & Newman, J1984, Compensation, New York, p. ). Employee benefits are compensations given to employees in addition to regular salaries or wages. Some benefits are legally required, e. g. , social security benefits, Medicare, retirement benefits, maternity benefits, service incentive leave, etc. Other benefits are offered by the employer as an incentive to attract and retain employees as well as increase employee morale and improve job performance (Labor and Employment Blawg†¦ A work in progress, June 1, 2010, Philippine Labor Laws, < http://www. laborlaw. usc-law. rg>, viewed: August 22, 2012). Aside from giving benefits mandate by law, there are other benefit s that an industry can offer to reduce their turnover rate. Our study will focus on how an industry uses its turnover rate in making decisions to improve their benefits program. The researchers have chosen the call center industries in the Philippines to best suit their subject matter about employee turnover rate and benefits. There are certain reports and data that shows the high turnover rate over call center industries locally.Turnover rate in the country’s call center has gotten so worse that it has hit 60 to 80 percent, according to the Call Center Association of the Philippines (CCAP) (AURELIO A. PENA, Davao Today March 20, 2008, http://www. gmanetwork. com/news/story/85640/news/specialreports/rp-call-centers-reel-from-world-s-highest-turnover, viewed: 8/20/2012). Globally, it is an accepted norm in the industry to have a 30 to 40 per cent turnover. Both Australia and India call centers have turnover rates of only six to 10 percent.Top government officials are alarmed t hat an emerging industry that has generated around 2 billion US dollars in annual revenues is reeling from a worsening turnover crisis. Labor accounts for between 65% and 75% of the ongoing costs of running a contact center. But employee turnover is so high in the call center industry that much of that money is spent on repeated efforts to hire and train people who aren’t right in the first place, and/or are managed ineffectively, resulting in high turnover.Call center organizations have come to accept that a recurring percentage of their workforce will have to be replaced every year. Those replacements will have to be found, assessed and trained. And then the cycle will repeat again, as a percentage of those new hires will in turn leave. The average turnover is about 35% in the call center industry, which means – in three years, an entire contact center agent pool will have been turned over (Inova Solutions, July 5, 2011, â€Å"Reducing Agent Turnover in Contact Cent ers† viewed 8/20/2012, http://blog. novasolutions. com/2011/). This studies shows that there are certainly high turnover rates on call center industries in the Philippines. A study conducted by Datacraft Asia in 2009 suggested that Asian call center agents are aware of the large demand for their service, so they are confident that they can easily land a new job after they resign. Better salary offer from other call center outsourcing firms, tight and shifting schedules, stress from dealing with difficult customers and lack of holiday breaks are also causing many agents to leave their job.Also, allegations of labor code violations in small call centers are on the rise. Some agents who did not receive incentives or bonuses as promised during recruitment are likely to terminate their contract (Eli, May 24 2011, Philippine call center outsourcing industry fights attrition rate, http://outsourceyourcallcenter. com, viewed: 8/20/2012). Due to this high turnover rates that are curren tly in call center industries, there are certain solutions pertaining to benefits and motivation that could help to lower down the high turnover on call center industries.Government mandated benefits such as: Social Security System (SSS) contributions, Philippine Health Insurance (Phil Health) contributions, Home Development Mutual Fund (Pag-ibig Fund) contributions, 13th month pay, service incentive leave, meal and rest periods, overtime pay, special holiday/rest day rates, and night shift differentials and company benefits such as: holiday bonus, mid-year bonus, and paid holiday and vacation leaves (Honey Amabelle D. Young, March 8, 2012, â€Å"Employee Benefits in the Philippines†, weblog, viewed: August 22, 2012, < asyoutsource. om/blog/>). With these benefits, call center industries will surely lower down their turnover rate and could save more money on costly training and development programs. Other companies give a little more than the minimum benefits required by law in order to be competitive or at least be at par with community or industry practices. There are also employers who give more benefits than required out of compassion for employees who are loyal to the company. Managers of call center face many challenges.They are responsible for operations that are capital intensive, with a high demand for continual investment to keep up with rapid developments in technology. They are also responsible, in many cases, for large numbers of staff often working with different shifts. Human resources manager in call center industries plays a vital role in valuing employees to reduce high turnover rate and improve their company retention capability. HR managers have the â€Å"bird’s eye† view on what is happening on personnel related issued on an industry.Their views on issues such as turnover rates and giving benefits to their employees are important points to consider because they are the one who would create certain solutions to such pro blems for the more efficient and smoother run of a call center industry. As HR students and future HR managers, the researchers would like to understand and to get the views and insights of HR managers on this phenomenon and find out if there are improvements to employee benefits to lower this turnover rates.As HR students, the researchers would like to spearhead this study in order to analyze and make realistic solutions that could help the call center industries on this growing phenomenon. The researchers will conduct a semi-structured interview to the HR Manager of call center industries here in the Philippines. The following central questions will guide the interviewers: 1. ) How do Human Resources Managers view on the high turnover rate on call center industries? 2. ) What new benefits are implemented to reduce turnover rate and what changes in employee benefits were introduced to improve employee retention?Our study will focus on how a call center industry uses its turnover ra te in making decisions to improve their benefits program rates in call center industries. Methodology Research Design The research design that the researchers adapted in this study is phenomenological research design, particularly the transcendental or psychological phenomenology. This design aims to get the meaning of as this is a qualitative analysis of narrative data, methods to analyze its data must be quite different from more traditional or quantitative methods of research (Janet Waters, â€Å"Psychology; Capillano University, viewed: August, 25, 2012, http://www2. apilanou. ca). This type of research design is the most effective in terms of expressing the essence of how high turn-over rate shapes the organizations’ benefit system. Data Gathering Procedure The researchers has gathered — Human Resource Managers from different Call Centers Companies, both Local(PacificHub) and International(HSBC and PhilAm Life) Companies, who have an adequate years of experience in dealing with the prevalent High Turn-Over rate in their previous and present employers.The subjects’ group age ranges from late 20s to the late 40s with the average years of experience of 3 to 10 years from the same employers. The researcher adopts a person-centered and holistic perspective. It helps to generate an in-depth account that will help the researcher a picture of reality regarding their lived experience to answer the researcher inquiry about the subject. The researchers will conduct their interview by setting a date time for each manager during the collection of data or their answers regarding the interview.The Researchers will proceed to the process of meeting the manager and Data Collection. Each session may last up to 2 hours, depending on the interviewee’s length of views and insights on their experiences also known as Extended Interview. Story telling will be conducted also to ask the emotions of the HR Manager and his/her intellectual memory and con sciousness about the turnover rate in call center industries. The Researcher has chosen Call Canter Companies that has attrition rate of 30 to 40 % to be able to qualify as a reliable source of information about the topic. Data ExploitationDuring the interview, the main concern of the researchers was to get the view of HR manager in the high turnover rate and the benefits given? The questionnaire for HR mangers shall include their robotfoto (Kelchtermans & Ballet 2002), basis on the rate of employee turnover in the last 3 years, number of employees employed and the employee benefits or other discretionary benefits given. The researchers will be using an interview to gather the participants' descriptions of their experience, or the participants' written or oral self-report, or even their aesthetic expressions (e. . art, narratives, or poetry, essays). The phenomenon of high turnover rate is the main subject of this research and how the HR managers have experienced it in call center i ndustries. This research is going to be conducted by taking interview; Interview is the appropriate method for collecting of data and giving a questionnaire to the Human Resource managers with full knowledge in the call center industry chosen by the researchers, to find out their view on the high turnover rate and benefits given to their employees.The HR Managers are chosen by their number of years in service in the industry. After the researchers gather the essential data for their research, they will, and then follow the Collaizi’s Procedure, reading and re-reading of the interview and analyzing or extraction of the information to significant statements or quotes and coming up with the categories (Cool Analysis) and combines the statements into themes (Warm Analysis).The researchers will develop phenomenal referents of the person’s interviewed. After this procedure, the researchers can gather the data by the use of data analytic tools in data reduction such as Repert ory or Kelly Grid in order to categorized and give themes to the insights/referents of the manager. Study site Data Gathering Procedure

An Introduction to the Interquartile Range

An Introduction to the Interquartile Range The interquartile range (IQR) is the difference between the first quartile and third quartile. The formula for this is: IQR Q3 - Q1 There are many measurements of the variability of a set of data. Both the range and standard deviation tell us how spread out our data is. The problem with these descriptive statistics is that they are quite sensitive to outliers. A measurement of the spread of a dataset that is more resistant to the presence of outliers is the interquartile range. Definition of Interquartile Range As seen above, the interquartile range is built upon the calculation of other statistics. Before determining the interquartile range, we first need to know the values of the first quartile and third quartile. (Of course, the first and third quartiles depend upon the value of the median). Once we have determined the values of the first and third quartiles, the interquartile range is very easy to calculate. All that we have to do is to subtract the first quartile from the third quartile. This explains the use of the term interquartile range for this statistic. Example To see an example of the calculation of an interquartile range, we will consider the set of data: 2, 3, 3, 4, 5, 6, 6, 7, 8, 8, 8, 9. The five number summary for this set of data is: Minimum of 2First quartile of 3.5Median of 6Third quartile of 8Maximum of 9 Thus we see that the interquartile range is 8 – 3.5 4.5. The Significance of the Interquartile Range The range gives us a measurement of how spread out the entirety of our data set is. The interquartile range, which tells us how far apart the first and third quartile are, indicates how spread out the middle 50% of our set of data is. Resistance to Outliers The primary advantage of using the interquartile range rather than the range for the measurement of the spread of a data set is that the interquartile range is not sensitive to outliers. To see this, we will look at an example. From the set of data above we have an interquartile range of 3.5, a range of 9 – 2 7 and a standard deviation of 2.34. If we replace the highest value of 9 with an extreme outlier of 100, then the standard deviation becomes 27.37 and the range is 98. Even though we have quite drastic shifts of these values, the first and third quartiles are unaffected and thus the interquartile range does not change. Use of the Interquartile Range Besides being a less sensitive measure of the spread of a data set, the interquartile range has another important use. Due to its resistance to outliers, the interquartile range is useful in identifying when a value is an outlier. The interquartile range rule is what informs us whether we have a mild or strong outlier.  To look for an outlier, we must look below the first quartile or above the third quartile.  How far we should go depends upon the value of the interquartile range.

Life is Beautiful essays

Life is Beautiful essays Throughout the course of history there have been events for which we are immensely proud of, and events that make us sick to our stomach. One such sickening time period was in the late 1930's and early 1940's during World War II when Nazi Germany strategically eliminated people of the Jewish faith. Because the events of World War II evoke such strong emotions, there have been many films made portraying the brutal carelessness for life that many Germans had. Usually these films take a completely serious approach to this issue, however Life is Beautiful does not. In 1997 Director Roberto Benigni released this movie to provide a never before seen viewpoint of the holocaust. Combining romance, comedy and tragedy, Life is Beautiful won three Oscars including best picture in 1997. It takes place in Italy for the first half of the movie where the main character, Guido Orefice, enjoys life to its fullest in an Italian city. Through a series of romantic and humorous events he meets the love of his life and they are on the verge of living happily ever after. That is where the movie changes face and Guido and his son, both Jewish, are taken by the Nazis. When his wife realizes what has happened, she demands to board the train to the concentration camp as well. In an effort to explain to his son what is happening to them, Guido makes up an elaborate story to satisfy his sons questions. Things appear to be improving for the family when Benigni meets a friend of his at the camp, only to find out he is a Nazi and will not help them. Then the war ends and it looks as if they can escape until Guido is captured and then killed. Thanks to Guidos ultimate sacrifice his son and wife are re-united in the end. Life is Beautiful was very accurate in terms of setting and costumes it used. Using bright and vivid colours at the beginning accentuated how great Guidos life was i...

Kotter#5,6 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Kotter#5,6 - Essay Example In this step, Kotter (4-12) emphasizes to delegate the powers, authority and autonomy to direct the change efforts in order to reshape a new behavior, replacing the old behavior. On the other hand, Haddad (98-99) has focused more on feasibility, effectiveness and benefits of participatory design while implementing a strategic change. If participation is encouraged from those who are directly going to be affected by change implementation, that change program will fulfill their needs more appropriately rather than implementing such a change in which employees participation is overlooked. This bottom lime strategy clearly resembles with that of fifth step of Kotter (4-12) which puts more weight on â€Å"empowering others to act in the vision†. I agree with points raised by Kegan and Lahey (49-59) to understand the concept why people won’t change, simply because of the 180-degree difference in their stated commitments and competing commitments. However, if these behaviors are identified and appropriately confronted with the participation of employees, the implementation of strategic change will be far more convenient for the organizations. The analysis of Beer and Nohria (13-23) outlines the two mindsets of managers in dealing with the change. These mindsets are formulated as Theory E and Theory O by Beer and Nohria (13-23). Those managers who have the mindset of Theory E, investigates the Economic value of everything which they find in the organization’s culture. These managers toil hard to maximize the wealth of shareholder as their ultimate goal of success. On the contrary, Theory O believers have the standpoint of developing the capabilities of the organization. If the combined effects of both these theories are analyzed, these effects are closely related to the sixth step of Kotter (4-12) which involves short-tem wins.

Concepts of Leadership Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Concepts of Leadership - Essay Example Their length of time in existence attests to the exemplary leadership practices manifested by the organization’s management team; in conjunction with their ability to capitalize on their strengths and make effective use of the opportunities that abound within the external global environment they operate in. In this regard, the current discourse aims to achieve the following objectives: (1) to apply one of the leadership theories from the course text to the organization by explaining how the theory works and through the inclusion of pertinent examples; (2) to explain the effect of power and influence that leaders have on followers in the organization; specifically addressing and explaining the responses to the following questions to wit: (a) are the followers receptive? (b) would you recommend another strategy?; (3) to evaluate the role and effectiveness of transformational and transactional leadership in the organization; (4) to assess the traits and characteristics of an effe ctive team leader within the organization; (5) to explain how the leadership supports vision, mission, and strategy in the organization; and (6) to explain the response to a hypothetical scenario where: if one would be seen as a leader in the organization, what would be changed and why? Application of a Leadership Theory One leadership theory that is apparently applied in Johnson & Johnson is the competing values frameworks (CVF) model which reportedly â€Å"brings together the organization, its changing environment, and leaders’ competing roles, and also enables a descriptive and prescriptive examination of leaders’ roles and activities with regard to their effectiveness† (Weiss: Contemporary Leadership Effectiveness, 2011, par. 1). This value is best applied by the management team and leaders of Johnson & Johnson through their explicitly designed guiding philosophy, termed â€Å"Our Credo† (Our Credo). As one reviews this guiding principle, it could be deduced that the organization, through the management team and leaders, have pledged responsibilities and commitments to the following, in this order: â€Å"to the doctors, nurses and patients, to mothers and fathers and all others who use our products and services† (Our Credo, n.d., par. 1); â€Å"to our employees, the men and women who work with us throughout the world† (Our Credo, n.d., par. 2). â€Å"to the communities in which we live and work and to the world community as well† (Our Credo, n.d., par. 3); and finally, â€Å"to our stockholders† (Our Credo, n.d., par. 4). By identifying the stakeholders who they pledge responsibility, accountability, and commitment to, the organization has