Relationship between American Revolution and French Revolution Essay

Relationship between American Revolution and French Revolution - Essay Example No other revolution that occurred either in Europe or in Americas during that period could be compared to the French Revolution in terms of violence (Doyle 2002). The American Revolution that began in 1776 and pursued the same principles of the natural human rights the French Revolution later did was over in 1787 without leaving any disgraceful legacy of terror that might be used by the participants of the French Revolution as an example to follow. Perhaps the major reason for this was that the American Revolution took place in an absolutely new country without almost any history, while the French Revolution occurred in one of the eldest European states. Consequently, the participants of the American Revolution did not have to overthrow the established aristocratic society and absolute monarchy in order to proclaim either equality of people (because they were equal) or sovereignty of their new state (the British monarch was geographically too far from them). In other words, the birth of the new society in the United States occurred without major tension. The French Revolution began in an absolutely different situation. It was a daring attempt to establish the principle of equality in the traditionally aristocratic society and cultivate political freedom in the most powerful European monarch (Doyle 2002). Economic factors played equally important role in the onset of both revolutions. The American Revolution was largely caused by the economic pressure of Britain, which was economically dependent on the colonies, but often failed to adequately justify the increasingly burden heavy burden of taxes. This problem – often termed ‘taxation without representation’ – is reported to be one of the most essential factors that eventually led to the revolutionary situation (Wood 1998). A similar situation was observed in the pre-revolutionary France where the absolute monarch kept increasing the

General Motors Essay Example for Free

General Motors Essay 1. The history, development, and growth of the company over time (e. g. , critical incidents) General Motors (GM) was founded in 1908. William C. Durant brought together 25 independent car companies to form one large corporation. Each company held its own identity as GM operated as central administration office for the 25 divisions. Due to high cost in manufacturing of automobiles, GM was only able to target wealthy customers who could afford cars. Then Henry Ford, owner and founder of Ford Motor Company, revolutionizes the production process of manufacturing cars and takes the lead in the industry. With this new process, Ford becomes GM’s largest competitor, rapidly growing their market share by mass produce affordable cars, the Model T. GM did not have the same competency to mass produce affordable as efficiently as Ford and their sales plummeted. GM was in a bad situation, producing a wide range of expensive cars for a small target market of middle class customers. From 1910- 1920 Ford grew stronger and wealthier while GM struggled to stay afloat. In 1920, Alfred P. Sloan became the CEO for GM and made major changes to GM’s strategy to more effectively compete with Ford. Sloan restructured GM to regain its competitive advantage, targeting a different segment in the market. His consolidation of the 25 companies into 5 major self-contained and operated divisions: Chevrolet, Pontiac, Buick, Cadillac, and Oldsmobile proved to be successful. In 1925 GM took the lead in the industry, hurting Ford’s sales of the Model T so bad that Ford had to shut down his factories for several months to redesign his production line and produce new models. GM became the United States car market leader with the largest market share, 70% at its highest. 925 to 1975, GM expanded its product line to all kinds of vehicles to full-size trucks, light weight trucks, and various specialized vehicles such as vans and ambulances. GM also started to vertically integrate and at one point, made more than 65% of its cars components. From 1925 to 1975, GM dominated the United States market holding approximately 65% of domestic sales. Together, GM, Chrysler, and Ford, held more than 90% of the United States market. Due to the global oil crisis and low cost/high quality Japanese cars in 1970’s, GM lost its lead in the industry. The oil embargo of 1973 revealed the inefficiency of the American â€Å"gas guzzlers†. Neither GM nor its American competitors at this that time had the competence to build fuel efficient cars. Japanese cars now entered the American market and not only were they fuel efficient, there were reliable and affordable. In the 1970s and 1980s, demand for large sedans fell and thousands of GM workers got laid off. By the end of 1970s Americans flocked to Japanese economy cars or sleek European luxury cars and ignored high cost and low quality American cars. In 1980, GM still earned 3. 3 billion on more than 60 billion in sales. With its large cash flows, GM was still able to act as a dominant competitor. Roger Smith, GM’s new CEO aimed to regain GM’s competitive advantage and launched several major programs to reduce cost and improve quality. By 1990, these programs had cost the company over 100 billion dollars, which at the time, was enough to buy out Toyota and Honda. Smith had the most the difficulty lowering cost due to the high cost labor agreements with the UAW (United Auto Workers). GM invested more than 50 billion to improve and update technology and in 1980 started to develop automated factories using robotics to increase quality and efficiency. GM lacked the competency to effectively operate automated factories and was costing them twice as much in producing parts the traditional way. In 1982, GM created a new division called Saturn to develop low-cost manufacturing skills and produce quality cars by imitating Japanese manufacturing companies. It cost GM 2 billion to build Saturn’s plant, GM largest construction project in history. Saturns were priced to compete with Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla. Saturn did not meet its quotas and 1991 and lost $800 million dollars. The next year, Saturn sales picked up and were ranked top 10 in customer satisfaction but still had a loss of $700 million. Saturn could not replicate Toyota and Honda efficiency, especially its low cost supply chain. Same as other divisions, Saturn had difficulties reducing costs because high labor cost due to previous agreements with UAW. To learn Japanese manufacturing techniques GM had a joint venture with Toyota in 1983 called new United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. NUMMI). NUMMI reopened a failed plant in California under Japanese management in 1984. By 1986, with the use of flexible work teams, plant productivity was higher than any GM factory and twice as much as with the old GM management. The flexible teams were regularly rotated, trained to perform the jobs of other works in the team, taught the procedures to analyze jobs to improve work procedures, designed all the teams’ jobs. This freed managers to focus other tasks. GM quickly implemented this system to all its plants and by 2005; GM was laiming to be the most efficient United States carmaker. However, due to tariffs and high costs involved to bring foreign car to the United States, foreign car makers were eager to open their own car plants in the United States. By 1995, foreign controlled plants were making more than 1. 5 million cars a year in the United States. Although GM’s market share declined from 50% in 1978 to 35% 1992, it had not reduced it number of plants or downsized its work force significantly. In 1990 Robert Stempel became the new CEO and like Smith, Stempel did not want to down size the company at all. However, an activist GM director, John Smale, set out to stop GM’s losses and convinced the board to appoint Jack Smith as the new CEO. Smith made drastic changes and down sized the company dramatically. His new strategy for GM was to once again become profitable by aggressively focus on cutting cost, aggressive use of marketing of new designed vehicles that better satisfy customer’s needs, and create a new more-flexible decentralized organizational structure. He also reduced number of models and platforms in which they were built. In 2000, GM built a $1 billion state-of-the-art manufacturing plant in Michigan to raise quality to Japanese levels. In 2005, GM did receive higher quality level similar to Japanese competitor but could not preform to be profitable due to high labor costs. In another attempt to lower value chain cost, GM closed down it Oldsmobile division in 2004. GM then focused on improving efficiency with its parts, components and suppliers, making various changes there. In 2000, GM, Ford, and Chrysler formed an organization called Covisint to gain power over global suppliers. Toyota launches program that reduces the number of steps needed to make components and car parts reducing its costs by 2. 6 billion. In 1992, it consolidated its nine groups into five and combined all its car divisions’ engineering and manufacturing units to eliminate redundancy. Also the five design and technical departments were combined into three to speed product development. To promote and improve coordination between departments, GM changed its organizational structure to a global matrix structure and invested heavily in IT to support this new global matrix structure. With the help of IBM, GM was now able to speed information transfer between its divisions all around the world. In attempts to quickly lower its cost, GM spun off several of its component parts divisions and vertically disintegrated. In 1996, form joint ventures with Isuzu Motors and Suzuki to establish facilities and make specialized engines and transmissions for GM. In 2000, GM acquired a 20% equity stake in Fuji, the manufacturer of Subaru cars and received a new CEO, Rick Waggoner. GM also establishes a strategic alliance with Honda. In 2001, GM’s new assembly plant in China begins production. In 2002, GM formed an alliance with Russian company. During this time, GM attempts to rapidly grow globally and competes with Ford to acquire premium European carmakers. GM bought many other European carmakers but did not find any to be profitable, only costing them more money and more failures. GM also acquired Daewoo and Hummer brand in hopes to strengthen product line and market share. All failed. In 2008, GM fell with the recession and spun off, sold, or digested many of its global assets. GM asked the government for bailouts and in the end filed for bankruptcy.

Abortion :: essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   â€Å"Types of abortion†   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Abortion is a common practice that may be performed for several reasons, all sharing the same end result, the termination of an unwanted pregnancy. In cases such as rape, incest or a simple lack of responsibility when having sex, having an abortion is a choice that some women may encounter. There are different types of abortion in today’s society. Some which are too scary to even dream of. There are two types of abortions: Spontaneous abortions; miscarriages and Induced, this is the deliberate termination of the fetus. If the fetus weighs less than 18oz or is less than 20 weeks into the pregnancy, it is usually considered an abortion. These usually occur during the first three months of pregnancy. It is estimated that 25% of all pregnancies end in spontaneous abortion (Epner 725). The very early stage of the pregnancy, up to 49 days after conception, the woman has two choices. The first is to take a combination of drugs. The embryo is then passed out. The other method is to use a syringe, and gently suck the embryo out. The next type can be preformed six to fourteen weeks after conception. The method the doctor’s use is to insert a tube in the vagina, and then hook it up to a suction machine. The fetus is then removed. This procedure takes about ten minutes. The second trimester abortions are called D&E, which stands for dilation and evacuation. These are preformed up to the twenty-fifth week of pregnancy, and usually take ten to twenty minutes. The way they are preformed is the woman is giv en absorbent dilators, which open up the cervix and absorb the fluids. After this is left in overnight the woman then is ready for the evacuation stage. The fetus is easily removed with instruments and suction. In the last trimester of the pregnancy abortions are preformed mainly if the woman’s life is in danger or the fetus is severely deformed. Only one out of every ten thousand abortions are preformed this way. The main way that is used is by injecting a salt solution into the vagina, causing contractions. The baby is then born stillbirth (Epner 724).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The second form of abortion is induced abortion. There are four main types of induced abortions. The first takes place up to 12 weeks. It is called vacuum aspiration. This is where a tube attached to a vacuum is inserted into the uterus and sucks out the embryo and all other material.

Legislations that affect school work Essay

Identify and summarise five pieces of legislation (to include codes of practice) which schools have to follow. Explain how each of these affect work in schools. Legislation refers to the actual law enacted by a governing or legislative body at national or local level. There are legislations for more or less all aspects of life but we are particularly going to discuss the ones that affect schools. These laws are produced and implemented in order to protect children and the people who work with children. Legislations ensure their safety and make sure their rights are respected. Code of practice is a practical guide that provides ways on how to effectively work under legislation. The Code of Practice is not a legislation itself that is why schools are not legally bound to follow them. Examples include: †¢Special Educational Needs Code of Practice for Wales. †¢Safeguarding Children: Working Together Under the Children Act 2004. Let us now look at five different legislations and how they affect work in schools. 1. The Data Protection Act 1998: The Data Protection Act means that schools need to make sure that all the information they hold is kept securely on site. If its paper storage it should be locked in filing cabinets. If the information is electronic it should be on password-protected computers. This legislation bounds schools to use this information only for the purpose it was collected and not share it with unauthorised people. It affects schools and staff in many ways e.gs as a teaching assistant it puts a responsibility on us to make sure that pupil information is confidential and if it needs to be shared with adults working with a particular pupil (like a speech therapist), we have the parental consent to do it. 2. The UN Convention on Rights of Child 1989: The UN Convention on Rights of Child 1989 was ratified in the UK in 1991 and adopted by the Welsh Government in 2004. It is made up of 54 articles covering rights to survival, protection, and development of children. It can be summarized by saying it protects children from any form of discrimination. Children have a right to know and access the relevant information about themselves. They have the freedom to practice their own beliefs and come together and enjoy as groups. It states that all children  have an equal right to education and a right to privacy. They have the right to express their views and feelings. Children with disabilities have a right to lead full and independent lives and they have a say in the decisions that affect them. This legislation has a major impact on schools as it bounds the staff and teachers to listen to what the child has to say. E.g. a teacher cannot just make a decision about a child on their own just because he/she is an adult. They have to respect the wishes of the child. This law gives children a voice and control over their lives. It empowers children and brings in confidence but at the same time it can be used by a child in a negative way and teachers may find it hard to discipline a child and to deal with a behaviour problem. That is where the Code of Practice comes in as a useful tool and tells what to do in a particular situation. 3. The Education and Inspections Act 2006: The Education and Inspections Act 2006 is intended to represent a major step in ensuring that all children in all schools get the education they need to enable them to fulfil their potential. The Act provides greater freedoms to schools, including the possibility of owning their own assets, employing their own staff, setting their own admissions arrangements etc. This gives local authorities more responsibility for managing schools. This law gives staff a clear statutory right to discipline students. By law, all state (not private) schools must have a behaviour policy in place that includes measures to prevent all forms of bullying among pupils. This policy is decided by the school. All teachers, pupils and parents must be told what it is. School staff needs to be well aware of the policy. Although these legislations must be followed but the Children Act overrides all other laws when it comes to safeguarding children. 4. Children Act 2004: Children Act 2004 is an updated version of the Children Act 1989. The Children Act 1989 allocated duties to local authorities, courts, parents and other agencies to ensure children are safeguarded and their welfare is promoted. (Wikipedia.org ‘Children Act 1989’). It centres on the idea that a child’s welfare is paramount and comes before everything else. Wherever possible, children must be cared for by their own families and that adequate  support is available for parents and children in need. The law suggests that professionals should work in partnerships with parents at every stage. The Children Act 2004 introduces multi agency approach to safeguarding children. Detailed information is available for people in the ‘Working Together Document’. The idea behind the Act is to promote co-ordination between multiple official entities to improve the overall well-being of children. The 2004 Act also specifically provided for including and affecting disabled children. This Act promotes the achievement of the five outcomes of ‘Every Child Matters’ framework, that are: †¢Stay safe. †¢Be healthy. †¢Enjoy and achieve. †¢Make a positive contribution. †¢Achieve economic well-being. This legislation has a huge impact on schools and on the way they address issues of care, welfare and discipline. Teachers and the support staff’s work has been affected directly by the act and they need to have training or guidance in its implementation. 5. The Equality Act 2010. On 1 October 2010, the Equality Act 2010 replaced all existing equality legislation such as the Race Relations Act, Disability Discrimination Act and Sex Discrimination Act. It protects the children and staff from being discriminated. It also extends protection to pupil who are pregnant, have recently given birth or who are undergoing gender reassignment. In Wales the Act applies to all maintained and independent schools, including Academies, and special schools. The Act makes it unlawful for the responsible body of a school to discriminate against, harass or victimise a pupil in relation to admissions, in the way it provides education, in the way it provides pupils access to any benefit, facility or service, or by excluding a pupil or subjecting them to any other detriment. Teachers now have to make sure that children with disabilities or additional needs are also included in and have access to all activities so there is no form of discrimination. (gov.uk ‘Equality Act 2010’)

Blue flowers (Pvt.) Ltd Essay

Executive summary Blue flowers (Pvt.) Ltd is an artificial flower manufacturing company situated in Monaragala with 350 total workforces. It provides artificial flowers for local and international markets. This has five functional departments namely Purchasing, Sales and Marketing, Production, Accounting and HR. They got a decision to increase production in 14% by last year onwards and an incentive program also implemented. When the carder produces more than the original target, company granted 10%-15% additional incentive. After 6 months company had evaluate their pros and cons and results was as follows, Production increased 1st month – 20% 2nd month-30% 3rd month-32% 4th month-20% 5th month-20% 6th month-20% Lower Quality and Rejection Rate – 10%-15% After implementing this incentive program production employees complained that the reason of this problem is the slowness of other departments, and also 60% production employees were complained their objections through their Trade Unions. After that TUs called a meeting to its members. 60% employees said that this is not an incentive scheme but just another way of exploiting labor and they suggested a TU action. Then TU representatives met management and informed them that this incentive scheme is not lucrative or equitable. But management said that if they are not in a position to carter to this increase in order in the future, they are in for a heavy loss and as a result they might even consider an employee redundancy plan also. After this meeting trade unions requested some conditions also. Problem Statement In this case we can identify several Management issues which influenced for the smooth functioning of the company. Those issues as follows; Issue 1 Organization decided to increase their production and implement an incentive program for employees who had produce more than the original target given.  But they did not screen the internal and external environment before implement this production and incentive scheme. They did not done feasibility study, SWOT analysis or a PESTEL. Issue 2 There was no any awareness program for employees about those production targets and incentive schemes. There was no any target group identification or Job evaluation. Incentive was given without any Performance evaluation therefore other department people (Other than Production dept.) were enjoyed more of this incentive scheme. Issue 3 Incentive scheme was not lucrative and not equitable. And also it was not conducted in a proper manner. Lower level workers were not reaping any benefits of this incentive scheme. Issue 4 Given target is not SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time bound) They only announced to employees that production must be increased by 14%. They did not specify individual goals and objectives or Team goals and objectives. They express organizational goal and tried to achieve it through an incentive scheme. They should have to inform employees through a job description but they didn’t. Issue 5 Some managers and supervisors considered employees as machines. Also there were biasness in branding low quality and product rejections. In the meeting which held between management and Trade Unions management said that if employees were not in a position to this increase in order in the future, they were in for a heavy loss as a result they might even consider an employee redundancy plan also. There was no any interrelationship between management and employees. Management implements decisions without having employee’s collaboration. Therefore Trade Unions can influence. Recommendations with Literature Review Issue 1 There was no any feasibility study. No any internal or external environmental study. Both internal and external environmental factors are widely influence for the organizational functions. Before take any strategic decision organizational management should scan the internal and external environment. In this case organization is going to increase their production through incentive schemes. That means this organization is going to develop. Organizational development is all about improving organizations performance. But this performance development should be done by facing internal and external environmental changes. To do this organization should scan the internal and external environment. For internal scan organization should implement SWOT analysis and for external scan organization should implement PEST analysis. SWOT PEST Figure 1 In this case before implement the decision of product increment and incentive scheme organization should have to scan environmental factors. First of all whether existing employees are sufficient for fulfill this current target, if not organization should recruit additional employees to fulfill this target. If existing workforce is sufficient they should have being given a proper Training to do new job well. Existing employees. (Job rotation, Job enrichment, Job enlargement, Training and Development, Promotions etc.) External employees. (Just in time talent, Identify talent pool, Attract, Gain, Retain) Not only that but also organization should have to conduct a feasibility study. They should scan whether existing technology is enough whether existing machinery or machine capacity is sufficient whether raw material supply is satisfy the given target etc. After scanning those types of internal factors organization should scan external factors also. In this case Blue Flowers did not scan anything about environment they just announced a target and told employees to fulfill it. Issue 2 No target groups, Awareness program, Job evaluation and Performance appraisals Before implement an incentive scheme organization should have to point out which group has being given the target. It will be helpful to give incentives for employees who actually meet targets. According to this case Production Department employees are the target group. By identifying the target group correctly other department people will not be able to enjoy incentives without performing towards the target. After identifying the target group organization should inform them about what to do? How to do? When to do? Which benefits can gain through the target? This can be done through conducting an awareness program or an inauguration. And also the target group can be informing by a proper job description. Not only the target group but also the other department employees also should clarify according to the target to achieve and they also inform by proper job descriptions. Then organization should conduct a Job Evaluation to grade jobs according to its worth. Job evaluation is a systematic comparison done in order to determine the worth of one job relative to another. It provides a basis for grading and establishes pay structure. After identifying the grades pay structure should established. And the incentive scheme should align with the Evaluation and target group should have being given more worth. According to this case although Blue Flowers implement an incentive scheme they did not conduct any Performance Evaluation program. Through PM organization can measure Actual performance of employees and can compare it with expected performance. Through this measurement organization can identify high performers and low performance and make rewards or punishments. Issue 3 Incentive scheme was not lucrative and not equitable. According to this case Incentive scheme was not lucrative or equitable. As production people mentioned other department employees enjoy more of this incentives. As I express in issue 2 it can be prevent by target group identification. Proper awareness, Job evaluation and Performance Appraisal based incentives. According to this case organization can introduce Group Incentive Scheme. Group Incentive Schemes are targeted at improving performance levels or the output among a group of employees. This is like an individual incentive scheme but give pay over and above base salary to all team members when the group or team collectively meets specified standards for performance, productivity or other work related behavior. Blue flowers  are going to increase production by 40%. They can introduce targets to Production team, Accounts team, Sales team, HR team and purchasing team. Then organization can introduce incentive schemes for separate departments as per its worth. But there is a disadvantage. By providing team incentives some employees can enjoy incentives without performing towards target. To prevent this organization can introduce individual performance appraisal system also and they can reward high performers and identify low performers. This will be reduce demotivation of high performers, reduce tardiness, reduce LTO, and mainly can achieve the target efficiency and effectively. Organization also can use motivation theories for implement sound incentive scheme. Basically organization can use Two Factor Theory by Fredric Herzberg, Vrooms Expectancy Theory and Goal setting theory. Two Factor Theory Herzberg view that man lives at two levels, physical and psychological level. Several factors lead to employee satisfaction while the other lead to dissatisfaction the satisfiers are called Motivators and the dissatisfies are called Hygiene factors. Motivators appeared to produce motivated behavior and hygiene factors produced dissatisfaction. Vrooms Expectancy Theory This says that an employee will be motivated to exert a high level of effort when he believes that effort will lead to a good performance appraisal; that a good appraisal will lead to organizational rewards and that rewards will satisfy the employees’ personal goals. This theory emphasize that motivation begins with a desire for something. Goal Setting Theory According to this theory, a person get motivated by following things The goal should be SMART They should be challenging but reachable Goals are seen as fair and reasonable Individual participation in goal-setting Feedback ensures that people get a feeling of pride and satisfaction from the experience of achieving a challenging but fair goal Feedback is used to gain commitment to even higher goal After evaluating above factors organization can take following steps; 1. Identify the objective properly 2. Consult with staff and trade unions 3. Relate the scheme to the business remuneration system 4. Ensure that the planned scheme is competitive 5. Decide on performance measures for organizational staff 6. Regular review and obtain feedbacks Issue 4 Target was not SMART According to this case the given target was not SMART. All organizations have their corporate targets. Those targets are divided into sections and assigned individual departments with those divided targets. Then those individual departments assigned departmental target among their department members. Those are calls individual targets. Those individual targets and departmental targets should fulfill through strategic plans, and those decisions which implement to achieve departmental targets should always align with the corporate target. Ex: Figure 2 When an organization establish a target it should be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time bound) and also it should be structured with performance, conditions and standards. Ex: production team should produce 10000 flowers individually, 100% accurately within a given day within given machine capacity. Issue 5 Biasness of managers and supervisors. No interrelationship among management and employees In this case there was no any interrelationship among management and employees. Some managers/supervisors consider employee as machines and they reject production or brand as low quality as their wish. This is no fair and conflicts, high LTO, high absenteeism, high tardiness can be happened The best theory for the Human Relation is Hawthorne Studies. Elton Mayo was the founder and he did a research in Western Electricals. He searches how the lightning and illumination affect to the worker performance. From this research he founded that human relations can affect worker performance rather than physical conditions. We all are human being. We all are pleased to have pleasant relationships. It is a psychological need. In an organization if there are so many good physical conditions but no interrelationship between employer and employee that organization will not be able to achieve its desirable targets. According to this case thre was no interrelationship between employees and management and also biasness was there. As a result employees were get together with Trade Unions for gain their rights. That was a huge disadvantage for an organization. And also in the meeting with TUs management stance that if employees enable to fulfill targets on time they will be implement a redundancy program. That was not suitable and a point of conflict. To prevent this situation organization can Implement Soft Skill programs for managers and supervisors. Maintain fair welfare programs. Implement Participative Management System. Make standard level of production quality and make aware employees about that. Then rejection and low quality branding will not be bias. Conclusion Blue Flowers (Pvt.) ltd is a leading artificial flower manufacturer which provides artificial flowers for local and foreign markets. They desired to increase their production by minimum 40% but faced problems because of poor environmental awareness, poor targets, and weak incentives. If Blue flowers follow sound incentive system through a strategic plan they will never become unsuccessful in gaining 40% production increment.

Evaluation of Leadership Development Plan of Maersk Oil in Qatar The WritePass Journal

Evaluation of Leadership Development Plan of Maersk Oil in Qatar 1.0 Introduction Evaluation of Leadership Development Plan of Maersk Oil in Qatar ). The diverse workforce present in the organization needs to be managed in an efficient and effective manner. The dissertation will try to identify the importance of a leadership development plan, investigate the current practices of the company, evaluate its effectiveness, and identify common obstacles for employee’s leadership development plan at the company. The dissertation will also propose some recommendations based on its findings for creating a viable improvement to the leadership development program. The dissertation will be divided into five chapters. The first chapter will be comprised of the introduction, overview of the research, background, and research objectives. The second chapter will detail the research methodology. The third chapter will present a literature review and theoretical background of the research. Fourth chapter will present the findings and analyze the data. Finally, chapter five will present the results and conclusions of the research. 1.1 Research Objectives Investigate to what extent does the company care for its employees through its leadership development plan Identify the significance of employees leadership development plan Investigate practices of employees leadership development plan Evaluate the effectiveness of employees leadership development Identify most common barriers for employees leadership development plan 1.2 Research Questions What is the employees’ attitude towards the company regarding its transformational leadership development program? Is transformational leadership more efficient than other forms of leadership? How does the transformational leadership benefit the objectives and goals of the company? What is the significance of the transformational leadership development plan for both the company and its employees? To what extent do the employees consider the development plan at the company efficient? What are the common barriers associated with the transformational leadership development plan at the company? 1.3 Rationale for the Current Research Although there is a large array of literature on human resource development, practitioners often come under criticism for doing very little to evaluate the learning and development solutions that have been designed to deliver whereby significant and often scarce resources are allocated blindly in development plans that are considered to be effective (Harisson, 2005). When undergoing financial stress, organizations often downsize human resource development budgets. Human resource development personnel undergo tight scrutiny in justifying their expenditures and are required to prove the effectiveness of their employee development plans. Thus evaluation of employee leadership development plan is a viable solution. The importance of evaluation in further signified as the learning and development theory and practices in the modern day is undergoing a considerable change in order to keep up with new circumstantial requirements. In fact, one of the major changes occurring nowadays and in the upcoming years is the organizational changes driven by ‘higher integration between coaching, organisational development (OD) and performance management’ (CIPD survey, 2010: pg.6). Similarly Sloman (2007) made several important propositions regarding the ongoing change in the employee development practices and approaches (see appendix 1). The shift in the learning and development approach and employee development practices signifies the importance of evaluating the current practices of an organization to see whether they are abreast with the prevailing best practices. Additionally, employee development approaches and practices of the oil and gas rich Middle Eastern countries and the Gulf Nations is an under-researched area in HRM literature. Moreover, the available literature regarding employee development practices generalizes the Middle East and the Arab World rather than addressing individual countries or companies (Harry, 2007). The existing gap in the literature pays way for the current proposed study to evaluate the leadership development plan at Maesrk Oil in Qatar. 2.0 Literature Review 2.1 Definition of employee leadership development Employee development plans have been defined as a set of planned efforts by an organization which facilitates the learning and acquaintance of knowledge, specific skills and behaviors for its employees; all of which are essential for them to be successful in their current jobs (Goldstein, 1993). Dotta (2009) defines it as a â€Å"sequence of concurrent activities, initiatives and programs that an organization is involved with to maintain, improve and enhance the skills, capabilities and performance levels of its workforce and other staff members. Employee development plan encapsulates various individual development plans. A leadership development plan goes one step further than this: as well as providing all of the support listed above the employee is also being trained for a management role through the subtle development of the most desirable qualities. According to Department of Defense of USA (2006), an individual employee development plan is a tailored written plan developed by the supervisor and employee outlining the employee’s developmental objectives and the developmental activity for achieving these objectives. The purpose of an employee development plan is to increase the current proficiency, development, and progression of the employee through a systematic development plan. The personal progression of an employee can only be realized if they have been instructed in the transformational leadership qualities which will optimize the business as a whole. Based on aforementioned definitions, several important points can be stated: Employees’ development plan is aimed at enhancing the capabilities and competencies of an organization’s workforce. Employees’ development plan is also crucial for the progression of a career path. Through leadership development it is common for organizations to train and develop their employees to occupy critical positions in future. A transformational leadership development program helps employees to understand the key roles of leadership and develop qualities which will make them an inspirational motivator to their workforce. 2.2 Significance of transformational leadership development In today’s business environment, which is characterized as multi-faced, highly complex, extremely competitive, and dynamic, organizations are required to be very flexible and adaptable in order to survive and succeed. Employee development, a practice that seeks to assist organizations in meeting their business goals through continuous learning and development (Harisson, 2009) is a critical element for achieving that flexibility and adaptability. So much that often human resource development personnel are qualified as ‘agents of change’ (Harisson, 2009). It is only through continuous, effective learning and development of employees that modern day organizations can acquire the essential competencies to adapt to a new conjuncture. Transformational leadership is significant as it not only benefits the leader in question, but also the morale of the employees. Candidates for the development program will be taught the traditional methods of leadership, such as how to ta ke responsibility and effectively manage a team, while also being taught to be motivational, inspirational and influential among their colleagues (Barling, Christie and Hoption). 2.3 Best Practices in Employee Development Plan Numerous studies have recommended several successful approaches towards employee development programs. There is a general consensus among researchers regarding the foremost need for an organization to conduct an analysis of its existing needs and requirements (Jacobs and Jones, 1995; Clegg et al, 2005). According to Jacobs, (1995) an employee development can be rendered meaningless if it does not respond to the organizational needs. Existing needs and requirements can be identified through an effective market analysis, analysis of existing and future labor trends. (Clegg et al, 2005). Since every organization needs to secure its’ future in the business industry it stands to reason that leadership is a high priority in the organizations needs, and transformational leadership can arguably give the best opportunity for employees to grow and develop along with the requirements of the company. Apart from the needs’ assessment, several best practices have been identified by human resource practitioners and researchers. A survey of best practices of 71 companies practicing employee development activities identified three underlying factors important for an effective employee development plan. These are: (1) individual development plans should be developed for key and high potential employees with the ability to become future leaders (2) the individual development plans and practices should be strictly aligned with organizational strategies and goals, with the future of the company in mind and (3) the entire workforce should be facilitated for its progression through the developmental process (Reynolds, 2005). 3.0 Research Methods and Approach 3.1 Research Philosophy Identifying a research philosophy is imperative for designing a viable research method as it determines the manner in which information regarding a research problem/question is collected, evaluated and applied. Researcher have identified mainly three research philosophies namely positivist and interpretivist and realist (Galliers, 1991). A positivist research philosophy perceives reality as a constant phenomenon; something that can be perceived objectively (Levin, 1988). It is a stance of a natural scientist. According to Hirschheim (1985 p.33), â€Å"positivism has a long and rich historical tradition. It is so embedded in our society that knowledge claims not grounded in positivist thoughts are simply dismissed as ascientific and therefore invalid†. Interpretivism, on the other hand, seeks to understand reality from a subjective perception in order to make sense of motives, actions and intentions of those that they study. They emphasize the social construct of the reality (Husserl, 1965). Interpretivists contend that reality and its perceptions can be better understood by placing people in their social contexts (Hussey and Hussey, 1997). Realists believe that the existence of reality is independent of human thoughts, emotions and beliefs. The research philosophy underpinning the proposed research is interpretivism. The research aims to evaluate the employee leadership development plan of Maersk Oil through the perceptions, attitudes and beliefs of its employees, managers, and executives; thus it aims to gain subjective insights for evaluation. 3.2 Research Approach and Strategy A research approach can be either deductive or inductive. The premise of a deductive approach is to test a hypothesis, explain casual relationships and enable generalization of a theory. On the other hand, inductive approach focuses upon building a theory by understanding a phenomenon seeking an answer for a question. The approach adopted for the proposed research is inductive, as this study will look to identify the weaknesses or strengths or the current employee development plan at Maersk Oil Qatar, and answer several proposed questions pertaining to its evaluation. The research strategy for this study will be exploratory as it will aim at providing insights and understanding of the nature of the phenomenon under study in new light. Within the exploratory approach, this study will utilize both qualitative and quantitative data. On one hand, statistical analysis will carried out for the survey responses which will be distributed among the employees of a company, whilst interviews will be conducted with some senior officials and employees in order to gain insights regarding the evaluation of the employee development program. It will complement the understanding gained through the data analysis results. 3.3 Data Collection According to Yin (1994), there are five ways of collecting data; these are â€Å"experimental, surveys, archival analysis, history, and case studies†. This research will utilize a survey strategy. According to Kelley et. al, (2003) â€Å"the survey strategy refers to the selection of a relatively large sample of people from a pre-determined population, followed by the collection of data from those individuals. The researcher therefore uses information from a sample of individuals to make some inference about the wider population. For the purpose of evaluating the employee leadership development plan, a questionnaire will be prepared, reviewed, and distributed to a random sample of Maersk Oil Qatar employees and people in leadership roles. Survey strategy will allow the researcher to collect a large amount of data within in short time with minimum costs and efforts (Naresh et.al, 2003). Interviews, the qualitative form of collecting data within survey method will be used concu rrently. Semi-structured interviews will be designed and conducted of several senior officials at the company. References CIPD (2010), ‘Annual Survey Report : Learning and Talent Development’, Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, {online} cipd.co.uk/NR/rdonlyres/BC060DD1-EEA7-4929-9142-1AD7333F95E7/0/5215_Learning_talent_development_survey_report.pdf (cited on 13th September, 2012) Clegg ,S. et all, 2005: Managing Organizations: An introduction to Theory and Practice. Sage Cohen N., 2002Pressure on AP Moller to Be Open, Australasian Business Intelligence, April 23, Department of Defense of USA (2006) The individual development. {online} usuhs.mil/chr/idp.pdf (cited on 13th September, 2012) Dotta, P.(2009) ‘What Is an Employee Development Plan?’ {online}: ehow.com/about_5161579_employee-development-plan.html (cited on 13th September, 2012) Goldstein I. L., 1993 â€Å"Training in Organizations† (3rd Ed.) Pacific Grove, California: Books Cole Harrison, R. (2005) Learning and development. 4th ed. London: Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. Harrison, R. (2009) Learning and development. 5th ed. London: Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. Harry. W (2007) Employment Creation and Localization. The crucial human resource issue for GCC. Int Journal of Human Resource Management. Vol. 18, no.1, pp 132-146. Husserl, E. (1965), Phenomenology and the crisis of philosophy, New York: Harper Torchbooks. Hussey, J. Hussey, R. (1997), Business Research: A practical guide for undergraduate and post-graduate students, London: MacMillan Press Ltd Jacob, R L and Jones, M J. (1995) Structures on Job Training- Unleashing Expertise in the Work Place. San Francisco. Berrett Koehler. Kelley, K., Clark, B., Brown, V., and Sitzia, J (2003) Good practice in the conduct and reporting of survey research. Int. Journal for Quality in Health Care. Volume 15,  Issue 3 Pp.  261-266. Levin, D. M. (1988). The opening of vision: Nihilism and the postmodern situation. London: Routledge. LSA Global (2008) ‘Top 10 training best practices for effective learning and development programs’. {online} http://jobfunctions.bnet.com/abstract.aspx?docid=375846 (cited on 13th September, 2012) Maersk Oil (2012) ‘About Us’ {online} maerskoil.com/ABOUTUS/Pages/AboutUs.aspx (cited on 13th September, 2012) Naresh,M. et.al.,(2003) Methodological issues in cross-cultural marketing research. International Marketing Review. 13 (5) 7-43 Reynolds, S.(2005) Training and development managers share best practices and courseware through LearnShare. Toledo Business Journal. 5(2) 155-163. Sloman, M. (2007) ‘The changing world of the trainer: emerging good practice’, Oxford: Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann. Yin, R. K. (1994) Case Study Research. Design and Methods. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, Inc.

Free Market Systems essays

Free Market Systems essays The concept of economic society in the middle Ages, and forces of change were different from region to region and from century to century. Modern market societies were beginning to manifest in the medieval cities of Italy and Holland from the tenth to seventeens centuries to the seventeenth and into the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in some places. I will discuss what agents were powerful enough to effect changes need to bring about the free market society. First I will start with list of key concepts and terms Feudalism influential forces of change included these forces Itinerant Merchants initiated trade, money, and the keen characteristics of feudalism life Urbanization a by product of the Itinerant merchant slow urbanization of medieval life as for example one house hold per year. Crusades were only a cause of European economic development, also a symptom of the development that had previously taken place, and the introduction of new ideals to which the church was vigorously apposed Unifying commerce supporting national sales The age of exploration and of the gold from Spanish mines of Mexico and Peru The emergence of new religious ideals sympathetic of business Organization of set monetary dues with in the manorial system As result of these forces we see separation of economic from social life which no longer fit with the norm of religion, social, and political customs and practices, but form a distinct area of social life it self. The advent of free laborers, and landlords selling his or her services on the market for land and capital and labor which also created different classes entering the market among these new relationships was the wage labor but the owner of the product was the employer. Unlike the previous periods for instance labor was something done by slaves or as the word the book uses serfs to build pyramids, cathedrals that were ow...