Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal
The Department of Health and Human Services?the Center for Medicare and Medicaid
Services (CMS) and the Agency for Healthcare Research a...nd Quality (AHRQ) partnered together in developing a comprehensive survey for ?Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers? known as ?HCAHPS?. The purpose of this survey is to collect patients? reports and perspectives that they developed while being in the hospital. The public is encouraged to express their feelings and concerns about hospitals and to rate their hospital experience. National healthcare quality surveys have found that noise in hospitals is an urgent concern. Noise level is among the physical environment factors that influence the ?healing environment? of any health care (Reiling, Huges, & Murphy, April 2008).

Problem statement:
The Coronary Care Unit of North Shore University Hospital, Manhasset, New York a 12-bed unit has seen a 20% increased in hospital complains about the noise level over the last three quarters of the year. Make sure you know the baseline (so you will be able to measure a difference)

Solution statement:
The Coronary Care Unit of North Shore University Hospital will implement a noise reduction protocol that will include the following evidence based (EB) elements:
A. manage noise level ??
B. reducing staff conversations
C. exterior noises ? be specific
D. overall hospital sound ? what does this mean? (Xie, Kang, and Mills, 2009).

You must propose an EB solution and I can?t see that this is without references (I see they are below ? but you need them here too?
Project objective
It is the management?s job to address the fact that noise became an issue on the patient?s survey. The goals in the Critical Coronary Care of North Shore Hospital are patient?s satisfaction and obtaining financial retribution for the services rendered. Getting a clear understanding of an organization?s business or performance goals is the practitioner?s first step in setting measurable objectives for a communications program. All we need here is your goal
The Critical Coronary Care of North Shore Hospital launched this project of reducing the noise level in the unit, which will be measured by no complains marked on patients? surveys, by July 1, 2013. Go back to your problem ? make sure this objective measures for an improvement. Was your problem based on the survey (it was unclear)

Solution Description:
A. staff education and new employee orientation will mandate staff awareness of managing noise, including use of personal phones, monitor noise levels, and IV pumps, as sound control needs to be regarded with accountability in maintaining an appropriate sound environment (Mazer, 2006).
B. reducing staff conversation and overhead voice paging by introducing the electronic documentation and collaboration via emails, electronic messaging, and electronic orders will improve the quality of noise levels in the unit (Solet, Buxton, Ellenbogen, Wang, & Carballiera, 2010).
C. exterior noises, coming from outside the hospital building (road traffic) will be counteracted by the installation of double window glass is this feasible?, which is soundproof and insulates around the window frames. The exterior noises were found to be the least arousing stimuli, as opposed to other stimuli (towel dispenser, door close, toilet flush, ice machine) that tended to be more arousing (Solet, Buxton, Ellenbogen, Wang, & Carballiera, 2010). These ?sources? of noise are addressed, and being aware of them gives the staff the power of control.
D. installation of the sound waves blocking generators near the nursing station, and in the patients? rooms. Sound masking appears to be the most effective technique for improving sleep, decrease the noise level and promote healing((Xie, Kang, and Mills, 2009). There for, creating small pilots of stations at both ends of the corridors will decongest the main nursing station. Doctors? station is created on a side so they can seat quietly, and be able to concentrate on the patients? charts.

Proposed solution is consistent with current research knowledge
?Unnecessary noise is the most cruel abuse of care which can be inflicted on either the sick or the well,? Florence Nightingale wrote in her 1859 book, Notes on Nursing (Miller, 2006). Sleep disturbance is a factor in the development of delirium, as well as producing specific effects the respiratory, cardiovascular and immunological systems. Critical care patients are especially prone to delirium, better known as ?sundown syndrome? as their normal circadian pattern of adrenocorticotropic hormone and melatonin levels is changed markedly by sepsis, and the change in white blood count due to heart attacks (Xie, Kang, and Mills, 2009). The impact of noise on patients' sleep and the effectiveness of noise reduction strategies is part of the safety program implemented by hospitals to decrease the effects of sundown syndrome. Higher blood pressure leads to a higher risk of cardiac problems as Berlin hospitals found that chronic noise in hospital environment, where people are already ill and psychologically stressed, unnecessary noise can be very harmful leading to heart attacks (Miller, 2006).
The ?sources? of noise are of interior and exterior causes. The phones, the beepers, the cardiac monitors, and IV pumps were found to alter the noise level in critical care units. Other stimuli, such as towel dispenser, closing doors, toilet flush, and ice machine tended to be even more arousing (Solet, Buxton, Ellenbogen, Wang, & Carballiera, 2010). The impact of noise on patients' sleep and the effectiveness of noise reduction strategies in ICUs have shown that staff conversation and alarms are generally the most disturbing noises for patients' sleep in ICUs. Literature explains that working with the staff on reducing the level of noise generated by these sources will become part of the personnel training (Mazer, 2006).
The built of the hospital itself, with hard long lasting materials will contribute in addition to the human and machinery sound emanating in a working environment to monitor and promote patient health. The reason that hospital interiors and furnishings are made of reflective materials is to avoid pathogens to adhere to surfaces. They are easily cleaned and cannot harbor infections. Housekeeping caddies, X ray machines, electrocardiograms and echo machines rolling on a hard surface are causing sounds enhancement, overlapping and lingering longer than normal. Adding to them are the pneumatic tube system, automatic doors, and the rolling ventilators and IABP (Miller, 2006). Controlling noise involves actually adding sound to the environment with a series of speakers installed in the ceiling that distributes electronically a background sound, unperceived by humans that serve to cover or reduce the impact of noise spikes. It is a specially engineered sound creating an ambient environment that is quieter and that enhances speech privacy in healthcare facilities (Xie, Kang, and Mills, 2009). Dispersing the main nursing station by adding small cells of nursing station at the ends of the corridor is beneficial in dispersing the activity horizontally on the floor.


References
Anderson, F. W., & Hardley, L. (2009). Guidelines for Setting Measurable Public Relations Objective. Retrieved from http://www.instituteforpr.org/wp-content/uploads/Settings_PR_Objectives.pdf
Miller, H. (2006). Sound Practices Research Summary. Retrieved from
http://www.hermanmiller.com/content/dam/hermanmiller/documents/research
Mazer, S. (March-April, 2006). Stop the Noise: Reduce Errors by Creating A Quieter Hospital, Environment. Biomedical Instrumentation & Technology, 40(2): 145-6 doi# or journal url
Reiling, J., Huges, R. G., & Murphy, M. R. (2008, April). The Impact of Facility Design on Patient Safety. An Evidence-Based Handbook for Nurses, 28(4), 1.
Solet, J.M., Buxton, M.O., Ellenbogen, M.J., Wang, W., Carballiera, A., (2010), Acoustic
Guidelines For Healthcare Facilities. Retrieved from http://www.healthdesign.org
Xie, H., Kang, J., Mills, G.H., (2009), Clinical review: The impact of noise on patients' sleep and the effectiveness of noise reduction strategies in intensive care units, Critical Care; 13(2): 208, Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles






I started to write this paper myself, but the teacher corrected it and I am confused what to keep and what not. It continues in more sections down, as per instructions. Please build on my idea about the level of noise in a nursing station, and how this will afect the patients' staying.



Individual

Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal:

Complete Section A: Problem Identification.

? Use the problem (with corrections from feedback) identified in week 1 to begin your proposal.
? Describe the problem or issue.
? Provide support that the problem or issue is an important one to solve (significance of the problem).
? State a project objective that is specific, realistic, and measureable.

Complete Section B: Solution Description.

? Describe the proposed solution (with corrections from week 1 feedback).
? Describe the way(s) in which the proposed solution is consistent with current research knowledge.
? Discuss the feasibility of implementing the proposed solution in the work setting.
? Discuss the way(s) in which the proposed solution is consistent with organization or community culture and resources.

Format your paper consistent with APA 6.0 guidelines.

Submit the assignment in the assignment section.


Complete Section C: Research Support.

? Develop a research base for the proposed solution that is sufficient to support its use.

o Provide a sufficient and compelling research base for the proposed solution (3-5 articles).
o Summarize all research reports used in a concise manner and provide acceptable internal and external validity.
o Describe the essential components of each study so readers can evaluate its scientific merit.



Individual
Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal: Section D Draft Proposal and Assignment Grading Criteria: Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal

Complete Section D: Implementation Plan.

Describe the methods to be used to implement the proposed solution.

? Describe the overall plan for implementing the proposed solution.
? Identify resources needed for the proposed solution?s implementation.
? Describe the methods for monitoring solution implementation.
? Describe the way(s) in which a theory of planned change was used to develop the implementation plan.
? Discuss the feasibility of the implementation plan.


Individual
Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal: Sections E & F Drafts
Proposal and Assignment Grading Criteria: Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal

Complete Section E: Evaluation Plan.

Describe the methods to be used to evaluate the solution.

Outcome Measure:

? Develop or revise an outcome measure that evaluates the extent to which the project objective is achieved. A copy of the measure must be included in the appendix.

? Describe the ways in which the outcome measure is valid, reliable, sensitive to change, and appropriate for use in this proposed project.

Evaluation Data Collection:

? Describe the methods for collecting outcome measure data and the rationale for using those methods.
? Identify resources needed for evaluation.
? Discuss the feasibility of the evaluation plan.
? Identify two possible grant funding sources and why your proposal would be a good fit for these sources.

Complete Section F: Decision Making.

Describe the methods to be used to decide the future of the solution.

? Discuss methods and specific plans to maintain a successful project solution.
? Discuss methods and specific plans to extend a successful project solution.
? Discuss methods and specific plans to revise an unsuccessful project solution.
? Discuss methods and specific plans to terminate an unsuccessful solution.
? Describe specific plans for feedback in the work setting and for communicating the project and its results to professional groups external to the project.




Individual
Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal Proposal and Assignment Grading Criteria: Nursing Research Utilization Project Proposal. This is the entire paper (all sections) put together with all corrections made.
Put all sections of your proposal/paper together; add an abstract, introduction and conclusion. It should not to exceed 5,000 words.
Note. The cover sheet, abstract, references page, and appendices are not included in the word limit.

Include the following content which should incorporate all faculty, class and learning team feedback:

? Abstract, between 250 and 400 words
? Introduction
? Section A: Problem Identification ? Identify a work-setting problem.
? Section B: Solution Description ? Develop a description of the proposed solution.
? Section C: Research Support ? Develop a research base for the proposed solution that is sufficient to support its use.
? Section D: Implementation Plan ? Describe the methods to be used to implement the proposed solution.
? Section E: Evaluation Plan ? Describe the methods to evaluate the solution.
? Section F: Decision Making ? Describe the methods to be used to decide the future of the solution.
? Conclusion

Incorporate all faculty, class, and Learning Team feedback.

Format the paper consistent with APA 6.0 guidelines.

Submit the Research Utilization Project Proposal Paper via the assignment section.  more

E-tailing Behaviors/Sample Persuasive Message

? Resource: University of Phoenix Material: Appendix A

? Identify three behaviors inherent in e-tailing (in business-to-consumer relationships/ communications). Note the communications medium in which each behavior occurs.

? Explain how each medium enables e-commerce.

? Analyze each behavior using the communication process. The analysis should include descriptions of the purpose, sender, receiver, message, environment, technology, noise, and feedback.
? Develop and Write your own sample persuasive message aimed at a virtual audience and evaluate why it is (or isn't) effective.
? Compose a 1,050- to 1,400-word paper that includes your sample persuasive message and demonstrates how the reviewed behaviors/messages enable e-commerce

Topic
E-tailing Behaviors/Sample Persuasive Message ? Resource: University Phoenix Material: Appendix A ? Identify behaviors inherent e-tailing ( business--consumer relationships/ communications). Note communications medium behavior occurs.

Subject: Retail Marketing and Operation Management
Individual assignment ? 3000 word report
Develop a report examining Zara that identifies and assesses their target customers, customer relat...ionship management strategy, value proposition and the supply chain partners and promotions methods that Zara work with and employ in order to deliver their value proposition.
Your report should include:
? A brief background of the organisation
? A description of the consumers and competitors
? A description of the approach greening operations
? An assessment of the customer relationship management strategy
? A description of their value proposition
? An identification of the supply chain collaborators
? A comment on the bricks and mortar approach and limited etailing presence
? An explanation of the promotions mix
? An evaluation of the value proposition delivery.
Note:
? Use the Harvard referencing style http://www.swinburne.edu.au/lib/researchhelp/harvard_system.htm
? Use Australian English in your written work (as opposed to US English)
? Always double-space ? it makes the marking and feedback process much easier
? Always keep a back up hard copy and electronic copy of your work
Prescribed text:
? Dunne, PM., Lusch, RF. and Carver, JR. (2011), Retailing, 7th ed., Cengage, USA.
Additional Texts:
? Berman, B and Evans, JR. (2010), Retail Management, 11th ed., Pearson, USA.
? Dawson, J., Findlay, A. and Sparks, L. (eds) (2008), The Retailing Reader, Routledge, UK.
? Miller, D. (2008), Retail Marketing - A Branding and Innovation Approach, 1st ed, Tilde University Press, Melbourne.  more

Since the inception of the HITECH Act, health organizations have faced increased pressure to update their health information technology (HIT) resources. As discussed last week, many believe that the i...ncreased use of electronic health records and the quick and efficient communication afforded by HIT can lead to improved quality of patient care. Yet there are significant costs associated with implementing such systems. What can organizations do to ensure that the correct system is selected and that the system will be appropriate for those required to use it? Who should be involved in those decisions?
This week introduces the systems development life cycle and discusses how it can guide an organization through the complexities of adopting a new HIT system. In this Discussion, you are asked to consider the role of nurses in the SDLC process.
To prepare:
Review the steps of the systems development life cycle.
Think about your own organization, or one with which you are familiar, and the steps the organization goes through when purchasing and implementing a new HIT system.
Consider what a nurse could contribute to decisions made at each stage when planning for new health information technology. What might be the consequences of not involving nurses?
Reflect on your own experiences with your organization selecting and implementing new technology. As an end user, do you feel you had any input in the selection or and planning of the new HIT system?  more

Please I need help writing this essay. I would like to see this project finished so I can request more essays.
What is the critical leadership problem facing the 56th HBCT Brigade Commander and h...ow will you improve the organization?
The purpose of this paper is for you to demonstrate your ability to synthesize the organizational development processes to a case study. Ensure you address the criteria when formulating your response. Your answer should be no less than four (4) pages
Analysis: Apply critical-thinking skills to identify, explain, and defend the selection of the critical leadership problem. Use relevant facts and assumptions from the 56th HBCT case study to support your argument.
Synthesis: Describe the process you will use to solve the problem and improve the organization
Outcome: Describe your expected end-state and how that will help you achieve your vision for the organization and measure effectiveness.
This is the case study

?The 56th Heavy Brigade Combat Team?

You are LTC Wood a promotable lieutenant colonel who commanded a battalion in the 56th Heavy Brigade Combat Team (HBCT). One month ago you returned to the 56th HBCT after a 2 ?-year absence to assume the Deputy Brigade Commander?s (DCO) position. While you are excited about getting reacquainted and acclimated with your old unit, you know that a lot has happened, including a deployment, in your absence.

The 56th Heavy Brigade Combat Team (HBCT) returned from Afghanistan 55 days ago and is now in its RESET phase of the ARFORGEN process. The 56th?s parent division headquarters and the other three divisional BCTs did not deploy with the brigade. Instead, the 56th HBCT worked for two other divisions during their deployment and with a number of other BCTs. Further, due to operational needs and capability shortfalls in another brigade, the 56th detached one of its combined arms battalions for thirteen of the deployment?s fifteen months. The brigade has been back at home station for almost two months; Reintegration Training and block leave are complete. As you settle into your new position and surroundings, you realize that few, if any, of the HBCT staff remains from your last tour with the unit. Further, many of the current HBCT staff will PCS in the next few months. The change of command for five of the six battalions is scheduled in the next 30 days. Your initial conversations with COL Domingo, the brigade commander (BCO), LTC(P) Johnson, the outgoing deputy brigade commander (DCO), and CSM Howell, the brigade command sergeant major, were positive. All appear to have genuine concerns about the actions needed to improve the brigade and prepare it for the next mission.

You remember that just three short years ago, the 56th HBCT was considered among the best maneuver brigades in Forces Command. By all measurements, the brigade excelled. Morale across the brigade was high, as it seemed the brigade attracted the best of the officer and non-commissioned officer corps. Leaders wanted to lead, Soldiers wanted to soldier, and a supportive family atmosphere existed among the battalions. There was a strong work ethic. Problems existed, but there was a prevailing attitude that all could be resolved. More often than not, the problems were solved at lower levels and rarely reached the brigade command level. Competition within the brigade existed, but it was positively oriented toward the success of the brigade. Frequent coordination occurred among peers to share information, resources, and lessons learned. Often, the brigade and battalion officers would meet informally for happy-hour type social events. Although these were definitely social occasions, the leaders could not help but discuss ways to improve their brigade. Leaders shared information freely with little regard for ownership or competitiveness. Brigade officers were often ridiculed by their peers in the division as ?whackos? who always wanted to discuss ?work? issues. Often, the battalion and brigade commanders were active participants. A similar environment existed among the battalion and brigade NCOs.

Just prior to your departure as a task force senior trainer at the Joint Multinational Readiness Center (JMRC) in Germany, the 56th HBCT received notification that its deployment location changed from Iraq to Afghanistan and that the deployment would be 15 rather than 12 months long. As a battalion commander, you took pride as you observed all leaders pitching in to ?make it happen.? Although some officers, non-commissioned officers, Soldiers, and families voiced concerns about the impact the deployment?s length and the significant change in operating environment could have on the brigade, all were committed to making the transition occur as smoothly as possible. Soon after the notification and your departure, the brigade experienced a change of command. The new brigade leadership team assumed responsibility for the predeployment train-up period. Your remaining brigade contacts indicated the transition and train-up seemed to go as well as could be expected. The 56th completed its Mission Readiness Exercise (MRE) at the National Training Center and deployed for war.

While the majority of the brigade took block leave over the last month, you have had the opportunity to review a number of historical documents, attend routine battle rhythm events, speak with members of the brigade, and walk around the brigade?s footprint.

Your review of the brigade?s historical unit status reports (USR), shows that the 56th HBCT completed all necessary training and received its required equipment prior to departure. The HBCT deployed with a personnel strength of 92 percent, and an assigned strength of 105 percent. The commander?s comments specifically highlighted that brigade leaders and Soldiers were well-trained and qualified. The majority of the non-deployable Soldiers remained at home station for medical reasons that came to light within 60 to 90 days prior to the departure date. During the deployment, the brigade redeployed over 100 Soldiers for non-combat-related medical problems. While the installation?s medical providers addressed many of the non-deployers? medical concerns, a significant number of non-deployable Soldiers remain on unit roles. Additionally, since returning, the number of medical non-deployable soldiers has slightly increased above pre-deployment numbers.

The brigade?s historical records from Afghanistan reveal that the unit was fairly successful in accomplishing all missions. The documents suggested that violence in the 56th?s sector did not significantly increase, nor did it decrease, and casualties in Afghanistan were considered light with one critical exception. Security of the populace and US forces was a major priority that was accomplished very well, but the records indicated the HBCT?s ability to support the host nation was mixed, with limited success in training Afghan Army units and police forces. It appeared the HBCT staff was able to manage day-to-day operations effectively, but struggled with their ability to capitalize on opportunities and to anticipate potential threats.

Approximately five months into the brigade?s fifteen month deployment, a suicide vehicle-borne IED (SVBIED) attacked a patrol in one of the maneuver battalion?s sector. The attack killed the brigade commander, brigade command sergeant major, and one of the Battalion Commanders as well as wounded several other Soldiers and Afghan Security Forces. In the immediate aftermath of the attack, LTC(P) Johnson assumed command of the brigade until the arrival of COL Domingo and CSM Howell. The division headquarters assigned LTC Baker, a battalion command-selectee already commanding a MiTT team with the brigade, to assume battalion command.

Another document you reviewed was a comprehensive report with the findings of a Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) study conducted for the 56th in Afghanistan. From all accounts, the HBCT performed as well as possible in Afghanistan, and the leadership performed well given the circumstances. However, the official record also indicated significant challenges requiring attention. The extensive study identified several specific issues that may have an impact on the BCT?s future effectiveness. You highlighted the following sections of the report.

Multiple and often incompatible communications systems hampered command and control throughout the brigade. At battalion and below levels, the varying battlefield, electronic, and environmental conditions required leaders to carry multiple radios to communicate effectively. Further, the dispersed nature of multiple Combat Outposts (COPs) and Joint Security Stations (JSS) created significant digital network challenges for the brigade?s network technicians. The digital network frequently crashed making communication loss between the brigade and subordinate battalion headquarters a normal, if not daily, occurrence. While tactical satellite (TACSAT) and high frequency (HF) radios provided some redundancy, the limited number of systems and frequencies available to the brigade in some cases created operational and personal friction.

Personnel authorizations on the battalion staffs were not sufficient to allow 24-hour operations over a sustained period. Often, battle captains were taken ?out of hide? to conduct the mission, resulting in unqualified and untrained personnel attempting to perform battalion tactical operations center functions, especially during the evening hours. This contributed to increased friction between the brigade and battalion staffs.

The DCO?s role was not clearly defined. During the brigade?s deployment, the DCO was tasked at different times to supervise the military transition teams (MiTTs) operating within the brigade?s battlespace, synchronize the operations of the brigade support battalion (BSB) at a different forward operating base, be the ?voice? of the HBCT to the media, LNO to coalition forces, and act as a BCT chief of staff. These varied missions for the DCO created confusion within the brigade, and this confusion created the perception of a weakened HBCT command structure.

The modular BCT structure, first implemented during your time as a battalion commander, continued to create training challenges, especially within the combined arms battalions. Whereas previously the maneuver battalion commanders and staffs were able to focus on traditional infantry and armor skills (e.g., Bradley and tank gunnery, individual infantry and armor soldier skills, infantry and armor platoon skills), the same commanders and staffs were required to attain and maintain proficiency at planning and executing individual and collective skills in areas outside their areas of expertise. Moreover, the report identified subject-matter expertise, once resident within the maneuver battalions, was diminished within the maneuver battalions. The impact of this additional complexity and burden was identified at all levels of leadership. The Army?s decision to augment the brigade with three MiTTs just prior to the MRE required the leaders to rethink combat organization.

The Afghanistan environment placed severe demands upon available manpower. Specifically, the need to protect the population and expand operations in previously unsecured areas increased the need for infantry squads. As a result, armor, engineer, artillery, and other Soldiers filled the void performing typical infantry tasks and not their own military occupational specialty (MOS) core competencies. Soldiers from the Forward Support Companies also augmented maneuver platoons as vehicle drivers and as alternate Quick Reaction Forces (QRF) within the maneuver battalions.

The 56th HBCT trained for the wrong mission-essential tasks during its training ramp-up for deployment to Afghanistan. The brigade trained exclusively on their assigned M1 Abrams, M2 Bradley combat platforms (focusing on gunnery skills and qualification) prior to deployment and during stability operations. However, upon arrival in theater, operational necessity required use of seven different mine-resistant armor protected (MRAP) variant vehicles in lieu of tanks, Bradleys, and up-armored HMMWVs. The brigade had few assets available at Bagram Airbase to execute drivers? training during RSOI, requiring the creation of a drivers? training program to train drivers during the first few months in combat. Further, the number of ?patrol sets? required to support the operational tempo (OPTEMPO) affected not only the maneuver units, but the brigade?s special troops battalion (STB) and the brigade support battalion (BSB). The brigade STB was specifically affected due to a lack of critical MTOE authorizations for the battalion staff to support both brigade and battalion operations. The dispersed nature of the battalions required the BSB to spend increased time on the roads resupplying outlying locations. Lastly, during pre-deployment train-up, the artillery battalion provided indirect fire support for the cavalry squadron and combined arms battalions? tank and Bradley platoon qualification tables. The six months dedicated to supporting this mission, including both an internal artillery gunnery certification program and the direct support to maneuver platoons, limited the amount of time available at the platoon and battery level to train on dismounted infantry and patrolling skills.

The stability operations mission created unique issues for the 56th HBCT. Although the size of the HBCT staff had a positive effect on shaping operations within their battlespace, the additional tasks associated with resourcing and supporting the MiTTs from members of the BCT staff created a ?dual-hatted? staff, which reduced the staff?s effectiveness.

You also received a 360-degree commander and staff assessment of the 56th HBCT from the Center for Army Leadership?s (CAL) Leadership Assessment and Feedback Program. A summary of trends from the assessment indicates that the staff had the trust and confidence of the subordinate units. It revealed the NCOs display confidence in their abilities and have a good tactical and technical knowledge. On the other hand, the assessment revealed that commanders share a lack of willingness to include subordinates in decision-making, and they fell short of expectations on developing subordinates, coaching, and counseling.

The last historical document you reviewed was the brigade?s Reset plan and timeline. A careful study of the document reveals that the brigade is currently at R+55. According to the DA G3/5/7 Reset EXORD for the brigade?s redeployment, the brigade has another 125 days in the ?Reset? Force Pool before transitioning to the ?Train/Ready? Force Pool. Of immediate concern is the pending arrival of the unit?s containers and redeploying equipment not turned in to Army Material Command (AMC) in Afghanistan. The ship arrived at the port ten days ago and immediately began downloading equipment to rail back to home station. Equipment is expected to start arriving and be complete over the next two weeks. Of critical importance is the turn in of ancillary equipment (NBC, NVGs, and Radios) to the Special Repair Teams beginning in ten days. The Special Repair Teams are expected to keep the brigade?s equipment for the next 4 to 6 weeks to complete technical inspections and repair.

You attended the AMC ARFORGEN synchronization conference last week for the HBCT that included representatives from FORSCOM, Department of the Army G1, G3/5/7, G4, G8, AMC, and the division staff primaries; there, you learned from the PM HBCT representative that because the BDE turned in all of its combat platforms (tanks, Bradleys, M113s, Paladins, and TOC equipment) at Bagram during redeployment, you will not receive your new issue for at least another 90 days. Further, PM TOC told you that the brigade will receive all new TOC equipment (tracks, tentage, and C2 systems), but he did not think the equipment would be ready until for another 85 days. The CECOM representative also provided less than optimistic information regarding reset of the brigade?s satellite communication packages. Because the brigade chose to forego much-needed system upgrades prior to the last deployment, the majority of the components on the existing satellite trailers are out of date and no longer under warranty. Additionally, the Army is fielding new communication trailer systems over the next three quarters of the fiscal year with the brigades not scheduled for delivery until just before R+180. Lastly, the AMC representative informed you that the ancillary equipment (wheeled vehicles, trailers, water buffalos, MHE, etc.) the brigade turned into AMC prior to the deployment as left behind equipment (LBE) will be ready for reissue over a 7-week period beginning at R+80.

While the information provided at the conference seemed pretty grim, the Division Chief of Staff, who attended the final outbrief, pledged to both COL Domingo and you that he would remain on top of the Division G4 and G8 to ensure that program managers and AMC upheld their end of the Reset agreement and returned equipment as soon as possible.

The manning section of the reset plan looked about as optimistic as the equipment reconstitution section. The brigade was just about to end the DA mandated 60-day stabilization window and begin shedding people as they PCS?d to new assignments or ETS?d out of the Army. Most significantly, the change of command ceremonies for five of the brigade?s six battalions is slated to occur in the next two weeks. LTC Baker, commander for one of the combined arms battalions, and COL Domingo, will remain in command for at least the next 12 months because they took command while in Afghanistan. On a positive note, about half of the field grade officers in the battalions will remain in the brigade because they deployed late after completing ILE or their division staff time. Generally speaking, the battalion XOs all appear competent and have a good understanding of their battalion?s strengths and weaknesses and brigade-level systems. The brigade did receive some replacement personnel during the deployment, but can expect to fall to below 65 percent strength overall and less than 30 percent strength in key MOSs, especially senior noncommissioned officers until at least R+120. The DA Reset EXORD states HRC is not required to fill the brigade at 80 percent available strength overall and 75 percent senior grade until the end of our Reset window (R+180).

Major Volar is the Brigade S4. The S4 section performed poorly during the last deployment. While MAJ Volar appears to be a good officer that knows the technical aspects of supply and maintenance management he suffers from a lack of understanding of how to run his staff. His staff is seen as one that lacks to commitment to the ideas and direction of the Brigade Commander. The Battalion Commanders also complain of a lack of support from the S4 section when it comes to critical supply efforts to support operations. The S4 section also has conflict with the Division G4 that has lead to an adversarial relationship.

Major Springsteen, the brigade?s S6, appeared to be the least likely officer to complain about workload. However, last week after a particularly stressful staff meeting, he commented, ?Sir, I know you are busy, but I have to talk to someone. I?m not sure how much more of this I can take. Nothing we do on this staff seems to be good enough and staffing actions never seem to get the time they deserve. We?re not allowed to make routine decisions at our level, and it seems we jump from one crisis to another with no apparent vision, goals and objectives. I thought when we returned from Afghanistan the pace would improve a bit, at least for a short while, and allow me to once again get acquainted with my family. It has been far from that! I even had my leave shortened to support the division command post exercise. A division CPX for crying out loud! We just returned from combat! We were told the division?s new staff needed to resolve some internal staffing procedures, so they scheduled an out-of-cycle training exercise. Given this division?s 24/7 mentality and helter-skelter attitude, I would almost rather be back in Afghanistan. At least there everyone knows they have to work 24/7, and no one really expects to know what will happen next. Plus, you don?t have the family wondering why Daddy isn?t home. Even my wife, who basically ran the brigade?s Family Readiness Group (FRG) when we were deployed and is a very dedicated Army wife, is about to throw in the towel.?

Last week, you witnessed an exchange at a BCT command team meeting. The commander and command sergeant major of one of the brigade?s combined arms battalions provided COL Domingo and CSM Howell a detailed review of the effect of the installation?s ?red cycle? on their unit training plans, receipt of equipment and execution of the reset of personnel and equipment, reestablish garrison systems, and leader and incoming Soldier training to address shortfalls identified in Afghanistan. The battalion commander stated, ?We?re caught between a rock and a hard place because we tell Soldiers to reconnect with their families after being away for fifteen months, then pile so many competing requirements on the plate that they have to work until 1900 each night to meet turn-in suspenses. When you add on red-cycle taskings, the problem increases because you have fewer Soldiers to do the same amount of work. When I have to defer equipment turn-in for two weeks or keep Soldiers late telling them it?s more important to guard motor pools and ranges than recover our equipment from war, we all lose credibility. Soldiers know the difference between activity to keep them alive, and make-work.?

The battalion CSM added, ?This is worse than I?ve ever seen it. It seems we cannot catch a break on the ever-increasing extra duties and work details. When I mentioned this to the division CSM at his last senior NCO call, he dismissed me by saying, ?we have had red cycles throughout my 26 years in the Army. They?ll always be here, so live with it. Quit complaining! You guys have been nothing but whiners since you returned from Afghanistan!?? In support of the battalion?s argument, CSM Howell described his attempt to convince the division CSM of the impact the red cycle was having upon the 56th. He expressed his frustration and stated, ?I?m not sure why the division seems to have different interests than we do. I once thought we were all on the same team, but now I?m not sure.? After hearing this, COL Domingo turned to CSM Howell and asked him to once again talk to the division CSM. He stated, ?We have got to try and get a handle on this quickly. I?ll talk to the division commander. Meanwhile, let the BXO know of your discussions with the division CSM.?

Your experiences with the officers in the brigade S3 shop were positive. All appeared professional, cooperative, and well-motivated by LTC Rockwell. However, recent comments to you by two battalion S3s indicated a dictatorial side to the brigade S3. They indicated Rockwell?s unwillingness to consider new ways of approaching the diverse training needs brought by the reconfiguration. Moreover, Rockwell indicated if they took their concerns to their battalion commanders (one of whom was fairly new) they would regret it. When this was mentioned to LTC(P) Johnson, he stated, ?Hell, that?s just Rockwell flexing his muscle. There?s no better brigade S3 in the division, and everyone knows it. Those battalion officers need to quit sniveling and get to work.?

In a private conversation last week, CSM Howell shared with you, ?I?m worried about my senior NCOs. They appear competent, but I don?t see any results from their work. There appears to be little teamwork among themselves and their officers. When I ask them why they don?t speak up and get involved, they ask, ?Why should I? Nothing ever comes of it.??
Finally, your informal conversations with friends within the division suggest the 56th gained a reputation in Afghanistan for being very ?heavy-handed? in dealing with locals. While the characterization started during the initial relief-in-place/transition of authority (RIP/TOA), their behavior took a marked downturn after the death of the brigade command team and battalion commander. According to several sources outside the brigade, this approach appeared to inhibit the brigade?s ability to conduct host-nation responsibilities. One of your more trusted sources stated emphatically, ?Johnson?s negative attitude of the Afghanis created a cancer among some within the brigade, and it?s still there. You need to be very careful.?

The past few weeks have been a blur for you. You understand the brigade has undergone numerous changes and know significant challenges lie ahead. Fortunately, the information you received from historical records, CALL and CAL assessments, and conversations and observations with leaders throughout the brigade and division provided some much-needed information. You are scheduled for a meeting with the brigade commander to provide your assessment of the brigade?s status and to chart a course for the next few months. His major concern is where to start. He knows there is not much time before the brigade will be back in the rotation for deployment.

One Week Later

Situation:

You are the Deputy Brigade Commander, LTC(P) Wood. The BCO has asked for your assessment of the Brigade, a recommendation for improving the organization, and how you propose to measure success. He also asked for a recommended vision statement based on your assessment and where you see the Brigade in the future. You have one week to prepare your assessment of the brigade including identification of the critical leadership problem facing the brigade, the process you will recommend for solving the problem and how you will measure success related to your proposed vision.  more

Request: (Writers

Part 1: (Page 1)
Read: Harry, B., Sturges, K. M., & Klinger, J. K. (2005). Mapping the process: An exemplar of process and challenge in grounded theory analysis.... Educational Researcher, 34(2), 3-13.
Read the article listed above and provide your impressions. In one page, summarize the authors experiences in conducting a grounded theory study in an educational setting. What were some of the challenges they faced? What are your thoughts in general on conducting qualitative research in the field of education?

Part 3: Page 6 (Do part 2 [below] first)
(This assignment should be done after doing the assignment below.) When youre finished with the assignment below, answer the following questions in one page Briefly summarize your article critique. In your opinion, what were the articles main strengths and weaknesses? What might you do differently in the implementation or the write-up?

Part 2: (page 2-5)
For this assignment, please select one of the five traditions (use the Phenomenological approach) and provide a brief description of 1) your topic or research question, 2), the approach, 3) your sampling and recruitment strategies, and 4) an outline of each step of the data collection and analysis process. When describing your approach and outlining the steps of your data collection and analysis, be sure to provide a rationale for your methodological choices and cite your sources. For example, if you will be conducting open coding, what are the steps and how did you learn about this approach-what is your source? Your paper should be between 3-5 pages. When citing the literature, please remember to follow APA style. (Learning Outcome 3)

Below is the rubric is previous work Ive done on this subject:
Rubric for Mini Method Paper Assignment 4
Criteria 0-14 points 15-17 points 18-20 points
A description of the research question/topic selected, the approach and justification for its appropriateness to the students selected topic Paper is lacking a research question and/or an approach to qualitative inquiry or the approach is not appropriate to answer the research question presented The student provides a brief description of the research question and approach; however, is lacking the rationale for its appropriateness to answer the research question Student includes a description of the research question/topic selected, the approach utilized and the justification for its appropriateness to the students selected topic, such that the student demonstrates a clear understanding of the need to select an approach that will best answer the research question and provide a justification of the selected methodology to the aims of the research
Student provides an outline of the data collection and analysis process, including sampling and recruitment strategies. Students outline of the data collection and/or analysis process is missing and/or does not mention sampling and recruitment strategies. Student presents the steps in the data collection and analysis process; however, is missing one, or more critical steps. Mentions sampling and recruitment strategies; however does not describe in any detail Student provides a complete and accurate outline of the data collection and analysis process which adheres to the approach described. Provides sampling and recruitment strategies, including a rationale.
Adheres to APA format; coherent; grammatically correct. Multiple errors in APA format. Grammatically incorrect, awkward construction and/or poor flow of ideas. Some APA errors. Writing shows evidence of self-editing with some construction and/or flow problems. Accurate use of APA format with minimal errors. Coherent development of the ideas using well-formed sentences and flowing paragraphs. Grammatically correct.

The purpose of this research study is to determine the effects of popular social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter and other social media technologies (i.e. texting, chat) on the oral and written communication skills of American college students. Social media was designed to improve communication among peers, colleagues, family, friends, and associates, instructors of all academic levels. In addition, social media, social software, and social networking sites (textese) seem to have a great potential as learning and teaching tools. However, what is noteworthy and relevant about these technologies is research has also shown that dependence on social media has naturally reduced the face-to-face interactions formed among students, parents, and professors because of disengagement stimulated by electronic media, texting, and social media compositions, hiding the features associated with a students real character and voice (MacArthur, 2007). The more the students depend on social media to interact with superiors and associates, they will use increasingly textese and abbreviate writings to convey their options, and the more they will find opportunities to avoid confrontations.
As such, there is a great concern that because of social medias prevalence, writing skills in the classroom have and will continue to deteriorate, reversing competent writing skills because of textese. As such, the current paper is designed with the purpose of investigating the effects of social media and texting on college students writing. This research aims at exploring the use of popular social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter and social software such as Wikis on how college students speak and write in the classroom. As it is important to study and compare the reading fluency and writing skills in the age group that uses textese the most, the following questions are relevant. The comparisons between frequent textese users and infrequent textese users will show if frequent use of textese has impeded and/or will impede reading and writing skills of college students.
Below are the research questions that will guide this current study:
1. Is there a significant relationship between frequent use of textese on college students reading fluency and writing skills?
2. Is there a significant relationship between frequent use of textese and the deterioration of college students reading fluency and writing skills?
3. How does the frequent use of social media affect vocabulary and composition skills of college students?
4. How does the reading fluency and writing skills of frequent textese users compare to the reading fluency and writing skills of infrequent textese users?



References
Baker, I. (2007). Txts r gr8 but not in exms. Times Educational supplement, 4723, 20.
Baron, N. (2004). See you online: Gender issues in college student use of instant messaging. Journal of Language and social Psychology, 23, 397-423.
Carrington, V. (2004). Texts and literacies of the Shi Jinrui. British journal of Sociology of Education,25, 215-228.
Crystal, D. (2006). Language and the internet (2nd edition). Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University.
Drouin, M., & Davis, C. (2009). R u txting? Is the use of text speak hurting your literacy? Journal of Literacy Research, 41(1), 46-67.
Drouin, M A. (2011). College students text messaging, use of textese and literacy skills. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 27(1), 67-75.
Fox, R. (2003). News Track . Communications of the ACM 46(5), 9-10.
Graham, S. &. (2007). Writing next: Effective Strategies to improve writing of adolescents in middle and high schools. A report to Carnegie Corporation of New York. Alliance for Excellent Education, 67-78.
Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the New Media Age. London: Routledge.
Lenhart, S. A. (Apr 29, 2008). Education, Teens, Email, New Media Ecology- Writing, Technology and Teens . WAMU: American University Radio.
MacArthur, G. S. (2007). Best practices in writing instruction. New York: Guilford Press.
Plester, B. W. (2008). Txt msg n school literacy: Does texting and knowledge of text abbreviations adversely affect children's literacy? Literacy, 42, 137-144.
Puglisi, M. (Tuesday, October 12, 2010). Social networking hurts the communication skills of college students. West Virginia:West Virginia student publication.
Ryker and Kleen. (2010). Texting and the Efficacy of Mnemonics: An Exploratory Study. A report to Information Systems Educators Conference. Nashville
Tagliamonte, S. &. (2008). Linguistic ruin? LOL! Instant messaging and teen language. American Speech, 83, 3-34.
Yuan, L. (2005- August 11). Text messages sent by cell phone finally catch on US. Wall Street Journal (Eastern edition), B1-B3.


Text messaging first occurred in 1993 when an engineering student working for Nokia sent the first text message (ODonnell, 2003). Since then, text messaging has increased exponentially. From widespread text messaging, users had to develop an easy way to use the alphabet-based form of messaging. Abbreviation and textese emerged as a major feature in texting. Textese is the abbreviated form of language used in social technologies such as instant messaging, social networking, chatrooms, etc. Recently, there has been negative attention centering around the use of textese and its potentially negative effects on literacy skills. Some are concerned that it will affect standard English and some others are concerned that use of textese will cause the current generation to forget standard English as todays youth grows older. In this study, MA Drouin examines the use of text messaging and textese influence on literacy skills such as reading accuracy, spelling and reading fluency in a test population of American college students. In this study, the participants described using text messaging and textese more often than in previous years. Their rate of use of textese use changed according to circumstances. The study observed a considerable positive relationship between text messaging regularity with spelling and reading fluency. However, it also observed significant detrimental relationships between textese usage in certain technologies such as social networking and email with reading accuracy).
Another trend English Educators are observing, as outlined on the College English Association (CEA) website, is using new mediums as a tool in the classroom. There are many schools that are incorporating eBooks in English classrooms in conjunction with the use of the ipad and cell phone compatible learning "apps" tools. According to Jared Bistrong, Multimedia Specialist at Brown Mackie College in Miami, "Brown Mackie College is giving brand new, 2nd generation ipads to newly enrolled students" (J. Bistrong, personal communication, May 22, 2012). Education programs internationally are starting to be more accepting of interactive programs.
The Problem
In the past five years or so, teachers and professors alike have observed a significant change in the writing skills of high school and college students for the worse. The climate in English writing is that social networking is hurting communication skills at the college level (Puglisi, 2010). Currently, The National Council of Teachers of English recommends teaching Social Media Literacy to separate it from formal academic writing. Their belief is that once one separates the writing mediums in regards to a teaching discipline, students will separate them as writing genres themselves as they do with writing for academics, journalism, literature, etc. Although, there is negative attention surrounding the use of textese, educators are hopeful through research, evaluation, and curriculum changes, they can change the downward shift in Standard English language skills and advert the potentially negative effects on literacy skills.
Purpose of the Study
This study seeks to uncover the truth about social technology and its influence on reading and writing skills of young adults. In paragraph 4, Drouin makes the case for exploring this subject further. She hypothesizes from a theoretical point a view that parents, educators and media sources may not be
entirely unfounded (2011). The study offered theories from other well-known historical studies that look at memory to connect how texting can be detrimental. Two such memory theories, Retroactive interference and decay deal with the retaining of information. Retroactive interference proposes that information presented at a later time may interfere with information presented at an earlier time (McGeoch 1932; Britt 1935). While, decay theory states that learned information that is not accessed may be less accessible over time (Brown 1958). This information leads me to believe that students can very easily forget grammar and spelling rules learned in elementary when they start texting and abbreviating later in life. It is very common to leave off subjects and linking verbs in text messages as it is assumed that the receiving party will understand the subject and linking verb.

Key Findings
This study evaluated text messaging and textese usage on literacy skills. It observed 80
college students. Thirty-four were texters using textese and 46 were did not use textese. It assessed their proficiency and familiarity with textese as well in addition to their literacy skills according to standardized literacy levels and misspellings of common textese users. The results exemplified that textese users used vocabulary more proficiently. Significantly, there were no observable differences between the two groups standardized literacy scores. The analyses showed that the use of textese is not related to poor reading and writing performance. On the other hand, over 50% of the college students in this both groups of the sample, specified that they considered usage of textese a hindrance on their reading and writing literacy skills.
Opportunities for Further Research.
Although this study focuses on texting and social media in the college student population, it only looks at a segment of the population in one area of the country. I see an opportunity to observe textese usage on E.S.L. (English as a Second Language) students. Although globalization and technology have allowed businesses to expand and have brought people from all walks of life together, it has also provided a platform that shuns reading. Barker (2007) asserts that secondary school teachers are seeing textisms (text abbreviations) in school assignments. As an English instructor, I have witnessed first hand the detrimental writing problems that technologies like the Internet and social media has birthed. My students are using computer language prominently in their class assignments and forgoing proofreading. Marcus (2010) reports that with spellcheckers and the proliferation of social media, teachers, admissions officers, and employers are seeing more and more papers littered with grammatical errors. Undoubtedly, this type of technological environment poses an obstacle for how students read and learn. While working for Inlingua Language Centers, my students would argue with me that I was teaching them incorrectly when I corrected their improper usage of subject and verb agreement. They mentioned how they heard Americans on the streets and read content online such as They was or He dont and assumed that was correct. Such misusages are so prevalent by native speakers that my students didnt realize the language was being butchered. Lam (2006) emphasizes that there are multitudes of social and multi-media environments that affect what we read. In my doctoral studies, I hope to examine more closely the relationship between cultural influence on reading literacy, grammar, writing, assessment, and learning.
The Rationale
My study centers on the field of social networking and writing skills, so I searched for dissertations that dealt with that subject matter. However, I was unable to find substantial dissertation material related to social networkings impact on writing skills. I contacted the library, and they provided me with this journal article by Michelle A. Drouin. This journal article does a great job of mixing the quantitative and qualitative data to present a broad perspective on the issue.



References

Barker, I. (2007). Txts r gr8 but not in exams. Times Educational Supplement, 4723, 20.
Britt S.H. (1935) Retroactiv inhibition: a review of the literature. Psychological Bulletin 32, 381??"440.
Brown J. (1958) Some tests of the decay theory of immediate memory. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 10, 12??"21.
Drouin, M A. (2011). College students text messaging, use of textese and literacy skills. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 27(1), 67-75.
Lam, W. (2006). Re-Envisioning Language, Literacy, and the Immigrant Subject in New
Mediascapes. Pedagogies: An International Journal, 1(3)
Marcus, D (2010). As spell-check replaces proofreading, students learn the hard way that
mistakes can really matter. New York Times Upfront, 143 (7)
McGeoch J.A. (1932) Forgetting and the law of disuse. Psychological Review 39, 352??"3 70.
ODonnell, F. (2003). False dawn of the photo phone boom. The Scotsman.
Puglisi, M. (2010). The Daily Athenaeum. Retrieved from http://www.thedaonline.com/opinion/social-networking-hurts-the-communication-skills-of-
college-students-1.1689315#.T7mV6r-KxdE
References
Long, M. H. (2005). Second language needs analysis. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Nielson, K (2011). Self-study with language learning software in the workplace: what
happens?. Language, Learning & Technology. 153: p110.
Snyder, W., & Stromswold, K. (2007). The Structure and Acquisition of English Dative Constructions. Linguistic Inquiry, 28(2), 281-317. JSTOR. Retrieved from
http://www.jstor.org/stable/4178978
Ursula, O. (2010). Nafsa-national association for foreign student advisers. Retrieved from http://blog.nafsa.org/2010/04/20/foreign-language-learning-what-
the-u-s-is-missing-out-on-2/


There are faxes for this order.  more

Research Paper

Compose a well-organized research paper with an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Assignment should be 1200 words, typed and follow APA guidelines. You should dr...aw on at least three scholarly sources (e.g. academic journal or book).

Please note that the bullet points are merely guidelines or suggestions. You are NOT expected to address each and every question outlined below. Focus on the main sections (bolded) and use the questions to guide your analysis. You are also not limited to these points ??" you may expand on other ideas not listed.

Assignment:
Social media and the Internet have transformed our social landscape and the ways in which people interact with each other and the extent to which we have increased access to information. In this option, you will examine how social norms and attitudes have transformed as a result of the Information Age.

(BOLDED) Choose a social media platform (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, etc.)
What are the social conventions of your chosen platform?
How do people interact and share with each other (e.g. pictures, text, symbols, etc)?
What unique features of the chosen platform enable new ways of interacting?

(BOLDED) Discuss how social interaction via social media differs from face-to-face interaction.
Is the way people present themselves online different from how we perceive them in reality?
Discuss the potential consequences of a societal shift to an increasing reliance and presence on social media?
How does social media enable people to manipulate how people perceive them?

(BOLDED) Consider the potential dangers and future consequences of creating digital profiles of ourselves on the internet.
Examine the role of targeted marketing (e.g. the use of social media sites for advertising).
How might the information put on social media be misused or misinterpreted (e.g. cyber-bullying, by future employers, marketing companies, etc).
Find an example in the news (past or present) of an issue involving social media and/or other communication over the internet. Assess the extent to which this issue is a result of social media interaction.
Consider the steps we might take in monitoring and protecting the information about ourselves on these sites.

Please read all the requirements of this assignment carefully and complete it by March 20th/13 . You must add at least 3 scholarly sources such journals, books etc..  more

INDIVIDUAL COURSEWORK 2000 words, indentation: left - 1.5cm, right - 1.5cm, double line spacing, arial 12 point font.


Submission date : Wednesday 1st December 2010.

Lectur...er's recommended format to construct the management report: INTRO: 200 words,

ANALYSIS OF ENVIRONMENT: 300 words,

Zongshen's competitive stance: (*Use 5 forces & value chain for this): 400 words,

SCALE & SCOPE: 100 words (*Scale more of the same, Scope relate to Zongshen but don't do the analysis yet), say whether Zongshen is rapidly expanding in terms of scale or scope.

ANALYSING STRATEGY: 500 words

EVALUATION OF SUSTAINABILITY IN CONCLUSION 500 words. (*Say whether Zongshen is a unique company who will be around in 5t years time, or if it is environmentally sustainable, as more points can be gained for this section.


Important information about assessment 1

Please be aware that I have made some small amendments to the submission of Assessment 1.
First, I have changed the assessment date to give you and extra week. Second, I am asking all students to submit an electronic copy through Turnitin which will be the copy that is marked.

There are two reasons for these changes:
1. I want all students to have another week to work on the assignment and
2. I would very much like students to know their assessment 1 mark before they depart for the holiday.
The above will ONLY be possible if we can have your assignments at the earliest opportunity to give us sufficient time to complete the marking and second-marking. TO avoid any potential delays, I am asking you to submit your assignment electronically.

How to submit your assignment
1 ?" Electronic submission
You are required to submit your Zongshen report to Turnitin in order to ascertain similarity with work already on the internet. You can re-submit your work to Turnitin if your score is too high. Generally, but not always, a score of 10+ is too high and the work will be carefully looked at to see if plagiarism has occurred.

The final version that you submit is the copy that will be marked by the module team. It is essential, therefore, that the Undergraduate Assignment Feedback sheet is the first page of your assignment! Please copy + paste it into the final document that you submit to Turnitin.

Copy + paste Feedback sheet to the front of your report.
Complete:
Student number prefixed with u.
Make clear the name of your seminar tutor . Enter the Turnitin id.
Enter wordcount.
Circle your seminar group number.
When you have completed the above, simply submit your assignment to Turnitin in the normal way.

2 - Hard-copy submission
Although it is the electronic-copy that will be marked and returned to you with the feedback, under the university regulations, you MUST also submit a hard-copy to the undergraduate centre. Print out the same copy that you submitted to Turnitin with the completed coversheet and submit.
If you fail to do this, you will not receive a mark at all as it will be seen as a non-submission.

The Zongshen Assignment
This will relate to the analysis of the strategic situation of a firm. A case study relating to the firm in question will be distributed to you no later than week 4 (week commencing 18 October). You are expected to undertake independent research to supplement the case study and bring it up to date, though you should note that the great majority of the marks for this assignment relate to analysis, not to research.

The assignment is strictly limited to 2,000 words. Anything after the 2,000th word will be ignored. Please be sure to include the word count on the coversheet. Tables, appendices and the list of references do not count against the 2,000 word limit, but cannot be used to stretch the word count artificially. Appendices are there for supplementary data and analysis ?" if we have to read them in order to make sense of what you are saying, then we shall count them as part of your report.

The assignment should be written up as a management report, not an academic essay.:

Research: 10%

You should supplement the case study with recent material from reputable newspapers, business magazines and journals. The research should be factual ?" references to sources of theory do not earn marks under this heading. The use of the Universitys Nexis and EBSCO databases is strongly encouraged. If you do not know how to use them, then please seek guidance from the library staff. Google isnt good enough!

For a mark of 70% or better for research, students should cite a respectable range of recent, relevant and reliable sources (as a guideline, 12-15 separate articles from at least 6 different newspapers or journals). All sources should be properly referenced using the accepted Harvard referencing system.

Assignments featuring a more limited range of research may earn marks under this heading in the range 40-69%. The mark will be lower depending upon the extent to which the author makes use of sources that are:
o Not recent (more than two years old)
o Not relevant
o Inconsistently referenced

If the referencing is absent or insufficient to allow us to identify the original newspaper or journal from which the facts are drawn, then the mark awarded for this section will be zero.


Please do not include direct quotes (word-for-word) in your work. They are very rarely necessary and only serve to illustrate that you do not understand them sufficiently well to use your own words! They are also a culprit when it comes to allegations of plagiarism. Best avoid them altogether.

If you make any use at all of unreliable or un-referenced sources, you can expect no more than 20% of the marks under this heading. Examples of unreliable sources that can poison your mark include Wikipedia, and various rather odd and unreliable revision sites such as businessballs.com, marketingteacher.com, gossip sites such as Yahoo! Finance and student essay crib sites such as coursework. info and ivoryconsulting.com. Avoid them! You should also note that other students essays and dissertations cannot be cited as reliable data sources. This applies even if they are Masters level work and are from prestigious universities.

Analysis of the organisations business environment and of industry survival and success factors: 30%

You are expected to use theory from the module, such as the Porter forces and the industry life cycle, to analyse the business environment, assess the impact of emerging trends from the macro-environment, and draw out the implications for survival and success in the future. If you can find and use relevant theory from sources other than the module textbooks this will enhance your grade ?" but the theory base is here is mature, so that new theoretical insights are likely to be hard to find.

The theory must be applied. If you do no more than reproduce relevant theory without applying it to the company you are studying, you can expect no more than 15% of the available marks.

You are expected to produce your own analysis and to draw your own conclusions. If your conclusions are drawn entirely from what you have read from secondary sources, then you cannot expect more than 35% of the marks for this section, however thorough and well-referenced those sources may be. We want to know what you think ?" and why you think it.

You should move beyond A-level techniques such as PEST(EL). While PEST(EL) is an acceptable tool, it is only the beginning of your analysis. If that is that is the only theory you use in this section, you should not expect better than 45%, and may well end up with a mark of less than 40%.

For a mark of 70% or better under this section, we should be able to see clear evidence that you have deployed the full range of relevant theory and drawn relevant, insightful conclusions that are solidly grounded in the factual evidence. The theory will have been correctly employed, and you will have a clearly deduced what the success factors and survival factors in the industry are likely to be in the light of emerging trends in the environment.

For a rade of 60-69% you will have employed the relevant theory correctly, and grounded your conclusions in the factual evidence. Your conclusions may lack the insight expected of a first class answer or may not explore the impact of emerging trends.

For a grade of 50-59% you are likely to have employed some relevant theory. However there are likely to be gaps in your argument. You may have executed a thorough piece of analysis but not drawn out the implications. There may be some gaps in your understanding of it, shown by errors in your use of the terminology. Or you may have reached a plausible and soundly argued set of conclusions but used no theory at all.

For a grade of 40-49% you are likely to have shown a basic understanding of the easier elements of theory, such as PEST, but there will be errors in your use of the more difficult elements. For example, you may have confused the firm with its environment. You are unlikely to have considered the implications of your analysis for the future of the industry. Your conclusions are likely to have little support from analysis or factual evidence.

A completely descriptive piece of work that accurately and thoroughly reproduces the facts, but adds nothing to them, will get a grade of around 30%.

Analysis of the organisations strategy: 30%

You are expected to use theory from the module, such as positioning and differentiation (competitive stance), the value chain and strategic resources, to analyse the strategy being followed by the firm you are examining. As in the previous section, work that is descriptive or uses no theory will be given low grades, as will work whose conclusions are drawn entirely from secondary sources ?" your analysis should be your own.

You should move beyond A-level techniques such as SWOT. SWOT is not a substitute for the deeper and more detailed analyses we are seeking at final year undergraduate level. It is also surprisingly difficult to do well. You should be warned that published SWOT analyses, such as those from Datamonitor or student crib sites are often of poor quality ?" they are shallow, lack supporting evidence and put things under the wrong heading.

For a mark of 70% or better under this section, we should be able to see clear evidence that you have correctly employed a full range of relevant theory and drawn relevant, insightful conclusions that are solidly grounded in the factual evidence. The theory used will include more difficult frameworks such as value chain analysis. Conclusions will be supported with quantitative data such as appropriate financial ratios.

For a grade of 60-69% you will have employed the relevant theory correctly, and grounded your conclusions in the factual evidence, including quantitative data. Your conclusions may however lack the insight expected of a first class answer.

For a grade of 50-59% you are likely to have employed some relevant theory. However there are likely to be gaps in your argument. You may have executed a thorough piece of analysis but not drawn out the implications. There may be some gaps in your understanding of it, shown by errors in your use of the terminology. Or you may have reached a plausible and soundly argued set of conclusions but used no theory at all.

For a grade of 40-49% there are likely to have be errors in your use of the theory. Your conclusions are likely to have little support from analysis or factual evidence.

A completely descriptive piece of work that accurately and thoroughly reproduces the facts, but adds nothing to them, will get a grade of around 30%.

Critical appraisal of the strategy: 20%
You are expected to bring the two previous elements together, to assess the sustainability of the firms competitive advantage in the future. You should compare the firms strategy with the industry survival and success factors, and draw suitable conclusions.

It is possible to obtain a high mark (80%+) in this section if you argue confidently and clearly, and support your arguments well. It is also possible to obtain a mark of zero if you do not reach coherent conclusions or miss this section out.

As in the previous two sections, if you seek to rely upon the opinions of other people rather than developing your own conclusions, you will get a grade of around 35%.

Presentation: 10%

You are expected to submit work that follows a clear and logical structure, is written in correct English that is easy for the reader to follow and is professionally laid out, with page numbers and numbered sections. Appropriate and (better still) imaginative use of tables and figures will enhance your mark.

Persistent poor spelling, grammar, sentence structure, etc. and other avoidable errors will be penalised.
Submission to Turnitin of Work Submitted for Assessment

Turnitin is an internet-based text matching service that has been developed by a commercial company. It is used, under license, by most UK Universities, including the University of East London. Work that is submitted to Turnitin generates a Turnitin Originality report, showing which parts of it have been reproduced from which sources.

The system compares submissions to material that is to be found: on the world-wide web; in its database of previous submissions; and in its growing number of databases of published articles. You should not assume that a Turnitin Originality report with a low similarity index is evidence that the piece of work concerned is free from plagiarism.

Our policy on the use of Turnitin recognises the educational desirability that all of our students should enjoy the opportunity to self-submit their work to Turnitin (before submitting for assessment). We also recognise that Turnitin Originality Reports will sometimes assist in the identification of plagiarised work submitted for assessment.

Our policy provides that a Module Leader may decide, in accordance with the policy of the appropriate School, that all student submissions for a particular component of assessment should be submitted to Turnitin, provided that the relevant Module Guide includes a notice to that effect.
Report Content and Format

Please remember that you are writing a business report and not an academic essay, and that you are writing it for a busy and intelligent manager. In particular:

Do not waste time and paper reproducing information from the case study. Take special care not to bore the client with a long history of the organisation you are studying. You should assume that they have read and understood everything in the case study. Your job is to add value to that information.

Remember that a report, like any other good piece of writing, tells a story in an interesting and coherent way. There should be a clear flow from one section of your writing to another, and each part of the report should draw upon what has gone before, and feed analysis forward to what follows.

Avoid jargon. There are no extra marks for using terms like core competence or paradigm just to show us youve read the textbook. Write simply and concisely, avoiding unnecessary use of theoretical terms. And if you must use them, make sure you use them correctly!

Avoid adjectives like huge, massive or disastrous. Use a number instead ?"15% growth per year, which makes your analysis seem more considered and credible.

Use appendices intelligently. They are not compulsory ?" some of the best (and most complete) reports we have read had no appendices at all. An appendix gives supporting information that reinforces the arguments in the main report ?" for example, extra economic or market data to reinforce what you have said about the crucial trends. If your appendix just contains the same key points than you have already included in the body of the report, plus a few others that really are not relevant to the industries or firms you are considering, then omit it.

Use separate appendices for separate issues or pieces of analysis ?" dont lump everything together in one massive appendix and then leave the reader to hunt for the relevant bit. And make sure tht you refer to your appendices at the relevant points in the report ?" not just in the contents page. If you do not ask us to refer to or see Appendix One, then we wont!

There is no set format for the report, but we do expect it to contain the following:
1) A contents page, with your student number.

2) An Executive Summary. This is, as the name suggests, a summary containing all the main findings and conclusions, so that a busy executive can get a flavour of what the report says and decide whether or not s/he needs to read it all. It is not to be confused with the Introduction (see below)

3) An Introduction. This sets the scene for what is to follow. It should contain:
the terms of reference or objective of the report
a description of the method the report follows to achieve this objective.

This can be thought of as a kind of annotated table of contents, e.g. In Section 1, we analyse the firms changing environment. In Section 2, we assess your capacity to respond to those changes. In Section 3, we assess the options at your disposal. In Section 4, we present our detailed recommendations and implementation proposals. This is called signposting and it shows the reader how the different sections fit together.

4) An analysis of the data in the case, a description of the findings and conclusions from the analysis (and your recommendations, if you are asked for them). This does not mean that we expect sections or chapters called Data Analysis, Findings and Recommendations. You may want to use more interesting and illuminating headings, and if you are dealing with two or three issues in one report, it may make sense to group the analysis, findings and recommendations on one issue together before tackling the next.

Please make sure that the pages are numbered; you are also strongly advised to number the sections in the report. This enables you to make cross-references from one part of the report to another, which can save you words by avoiding the need to repeat things in different sections. It also helps us when we give you feedback.

We encourage you to use appropriate charts and figures to summarise data and findings, and you may get extra credit for doing so.

HOWEVER:

Please make sure that your report makes sense as a stand-alone document. If you use a figure or a chart, make sure that its message is clear - or add some narrative to bring out the point
Make sure that you have explained how you reached any conclusions that you summarise in your tables or diagrams. Just plotting points on a matrix or diagram is not enough.

Don't use graphics for their own sake - a pretty chart that says nothing of importance will lose you time and probably marks as well. Simply plotting the firms sales or profit figures on an Excel graph rarely adds anything ?" why not pick out an interesting ratio, like profit margins or sales per employee, and use a graph to show how that has been behaving over time

Make sure you use the right kind of graphic for the job. Dont use a pie chart for a time series ?" use a line graph or a bar chart.

Flashy presentation is not a substitute for clear thinking. A nice cover and coloured charts may put a few marks on to the grade of a good piece of work, but will not rescue a poor one. Make sure that, above all, you give us work that:

o is intellectually thorough
o is well structured
o is coherently and logically argued, and grounded in the evidence in the case study
o answer the question!

There are faxes for this order.  more

Request for FAhumphry! No other writers take.

My previous proposal order ID: 21461 and the writer

was FAHumphrey.

I want copies of the sources used in the research

...work.





Format of the Report



Contents Page---Giving the section structure and page

numbers (have to be one or two pages)

Abstract--------An (one page) abstract of the work

that helps people to decide whether to read it and

gives an outline of important features for those who

do not.

Terms of Reference----- Stating what questions you set

out to answer, the deliverables you were going to

produce, and the justification for the work done.(two

pages)

Literature Review-----This should include a discussion

of the relevant research already done in the area.

Methodology--------The methodology chosen,problems

encountered, it''''s justification and the outcome. [How

you did it]

Results-------- findings, analyses, results of

calculations and experiments.

Discussion----- What your results mean and how they

can be interpreted pointing out strengths and

weaknesses of the results.

Conclusion------Where the problem is now, what has

been done and what should be done next.

Bibliography & works cited------A list in alphabetical

order by author of those items referred to in the

text.

Appendix------- Detailed technical material is often

best in an appendix so the main report can be read

without a break(two pages).

Evaluation------A one page personal statement, not

part of the report but about the effectiveness of the

work, and its usefulness.





Make sure:

? the document is complete and concise (i.e. it should

not include non-essential material);

? the material is well structured;

? value judgements are supported by logical arguments;

? factual information is supported by quoting original

references;

? all sources are clearly acknowledged and referenced

in the bibliography and works cited section;

? clear and restrained language is used;

? pages are numbered and referenced in the table of

contents.

? all tables and illustrations are clear, readable,

informative, numbered, titled and suitably identified

in the text;

? spelling and punctuation is correct.



Chapters/major sections should always begin on a new

page, and their titles should be capitalised in bold

and centred. Sub-section headings should be in bold,

left centred and only have initial capitals.



Citing the References





Articles in Journals/ Serial Publications



Author: Give the surname first followed by initials or

the full name if it adds to clarity. When there are

two authors both must be given. When there are three

or more, the first name only is sufficient followed by

"and others".When there are no authors, often the name

of the issuing department (e.g. a government body) or

a company can be given instead. A few things may need

to be classified as anonymous.

Title: in full With only the initial letter and

proper nouns with capitals. If the original is in a

language other than English this should be identified

or the title given in the original language.

Name of journal :There are internationally acceptable

title abbreviations which are to be used. Do not make

up your own abbreviations.

Journal reference:Volume number, part or month, year,

page range. The part number refers to the issue, so

the February issue is part 2 for a monthly

publication. Unpublished works or private

communications should be similarly referenced and

their status indicated.







Examples



Hull M. E. C. and O''''Donoghue P. G. O., Family

relationships between requirements and design

specification methods. Computer Journal, 36(2)

pp.153-168 (1993)



Lee A. S., A scientific methodology for MIS case

studies. MIS Quarterly, 13 pp33-50 (1989)

Wiseman C. and MacMillan I. C., Creating competitive

weapons from information systems. Journal of Business

Strategy, 5(2) pp.42-49 (1982)







Books



Author: as for journals, but if you are referencing a

part of a publication you need first to give the

author''''s title of the part concerned then "in ..."

followed by the author(s), title of the whole work,

edition.

Title: as for journals

Publisher:the full name and place of publication

usually the city, in America sometimes the state.

Date of publication the year

Location:The page range: (the page or pages that are

specifically referenced).N.B. different references to

the same publication will generally require separate

entries in the bibliography.



Examples:

Honeywell: COBOL reference manual, DD25, D8 D9,

Honeywell Information Systems, New York, 1975,

Microsoft, Excel: Function Reference (AB26298-0392),

p464, Microsoft Corporation, Washington 1992



Naughton M, Wisdom C, Hall N: Viewdata - The Business

Applications, pp 91-93, Communications Educational

Services, London, 1986, .







Electronic Sources



This section is provisional advice. The standard ISO

690-2 is not yet finalised. Some examples are given

but if you have emerging issues check the following

web sites:The international standard

http://www.nic-bnc.ca.iso Field Guide to Sources

http://www.cc.emory.edu/W



Author: as for journals (normally present)

Title: as for journals (if present)

Date of publication: the date given in the web page

URL:the full URL. (the uniform resource locator - the

web address)



Examples



Beckleheimer, Jeff. How do you cite URL?s in a

Bibliography? 26August 1994

URL:http://www.nrlssc.navy.mil/meta/bibliography/html



Arnzen, Michael A. Cyber Citation: documenting

Internet sources presents some thorny problems.

Internet world 1996 September; 7(9):72-74 URL:

http://www.internetworld.com/1996/09/cybercitations.html





Cross referencing (citations)



When you refer to an item insert the reference number

(the serial number of the alphabetical bibliography

listing) in brackets, in the main text. For example,

[3] refers to the third item in your bibliography.



If you need to refer to two sections of the same

publication in the same report you need not repeat all

the details in the reference list, just those details

that are different, usually the page reference but

possibly the volume number.



Remember not to repeat previously published

information merely to repeat background material -the

cross-reference is sufficient. Short quotations of

text are permitted in quotation marks and

cross-referenced. Please, Do not copy figures,

diagrams or tables.



Do not summarise or paraphrase others work. Cut out

this material and include the relevant citation only.

When you wish to make a comparison between alternative

views or to make a critical judgement then you need to

explain your sources. The distinction is that in the

second case it is the views you are presenting,

discussing and justifying not those of someone else.



Also find helpful the distinction between external

references or citations, which are to previously

published work and internal references, which are to

other parts of the work. It is important that the work

comes across as a coherent whole. One way to achieve

this is by reading forward or back to other parts of

the report. Never leave appendix floating unconnected

by cross-references to the body of the text.



Presenting the Work



Chapters/major sections should always begin on a new

page, and their titles should be capitalised in bold

and centred. Sub-sections headings should be in bold,

left centred and only have capital initials.

Good presentation standards including sound English

grammar, punctuation and spelling.







*** Very IMORTANT NOTES***



1.Make sure the Quotations should be at most a small

percentage of the work and they need to be cited. work

must contain quotations that make up less than 15

percent. Note that better research work consist of

less than 5 percent quotations and might have no

quotations at all.





2.outcome of the literature review should be set as

criteria which will be used to judge the aims

(forecasting & gaining competitive advantage) when you

come to do the case study, and this literature review

should include a discussion of the relevant research

already done in the area.



2.I do not want you to use the research articles and

materials which are not open to access, like the the

paid research articles or sort of company''''s internal

research papers, publications for which we need paid

subscription or paid membership sort of things.So

please make use of reference materials and case

studies which will have normal access.



3.I would like you to specifiacally refer from---



1.Business Intelligence journal(formerly journal of

data warehousing), available from

http://www.dw-institute.com/,

2.Journals available in Database:Business Source

premier,

3.The ACM Digital library

http://portal.acm.org/portal.cfm

4.Vidette poe,Patricia Klauer,stephen Brobst.(1998),

Buliding a data warehouse for decission

support,prentice hall, NJ, Upper sadler river.

5.Kelly, S. (1997). Data Warehousing in Action, John

Wiley & Sons, Chichester

6.Inmon, W.H. (1992). Building the Data Warehouse. NY:

John Wiley & Sons, 1992

7.Sam Anahory,Dennis Murray(1997), Data Warehousing in

the real world: A practical guide for building

decission support system, Addison-wesley,England.



4.I want all the copies of sources you have used for

the work, including the case studies undertaken. I

would like to cite the references (as I mentioned

above under three headings journals, books and

electronic resources).





I lookforward to recieving the e-mail of the concerned

writer, so that I can send additional materials, in

the mean time.I would like my work to be sent to my

e-mail ID, which is of 5MB. After including the copies

of sources, if it exceeds that limit, first send me

the research work and then the sources bit by bit on

the delivery date.



Thank you,  more

This research is for a Master's Level Capstone Project.

Following are the requirements:

?APA Style Research Paper to include the following:

1. Abstract
2.... Paper
? Introduction
? Statement of the Problem
? Background of the Problem / Literature Review
? Method Results
(ex. Significance of the Study Plan of the Study, Population and Sample Data Collection Instrumentation Data Analysis, Research Hypothesis Scope and Nature of the Study)
? Discussion
? Recommendations and Outcomes
3. References
4. Appendixes ? include any signed contracts

? The research paper is logically organized and contained appropriate heading titles
? Data and research must be timely and up-to-date (ex. Dept of Labor Statistics,etc.). Most recent data and information currently available.
? Grammar, Punctuation and spelling were appropriate and depicted writing of a graduate level.
? The paper was written according to 5th Edition APA format.
? The content of the paper reflected clearly the objectives of the project.
? A conclusion adequately summarized the body of the paper or provided sound recommendations.
? Literature review was a substantial part of the body of the paper.
? Bibliography was adequate for a paper of this type.
? The appendices were a relevant part of the paper.
? Data was objectively portrayed and analysis was accurate.

Following is the subject, objectives and details of the research:

What:

This paper will explore the effects and issues related to the promotion and use of women and their skills into the American workforce. The paper will discover whether organizational systems are using their female workforces to their fullest potential. The paper will review literature written on the subject of how women can reach their potential before moving on to answering the following questions: When a transformation takes place from a male-led to female-led leadership, does it also influence the institutional culture? Another issue is whether or not any apparent changes in organizational culture such as financial solvency, level of stress, changes in duties, communication patterns and protocols, institutional practices and interaction between peers and across hierarchical lines are perceived as positive or negative by those most directly affected by such changes in gender leadership. This affects me personally because my personals goals are to advance within my corporation and I am hoping to discover ways to help me as a woman to advance and learn exactly what techniques will work in the business world. Some studies show that women are more likely than men to manage in an interactive style of management, encouraging participation, sharing power and information, and enhancing the self-worth of others which could impact an organization?s success.

There are two distinct topics here ? the difference in male and female leadership and the opportunities for promotion for females. Literature reviews will be needed on both topics and woven together as the paper is developed.

How:

Data and background information on both leadership style differences and on female opportunities should be available from several areas including the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, Trade Journals, government data (census), etc. I will also add my own survey, which will be sent to men and women in management to learn about their experiences regarding gender bias (see attached survey). I think the information obtained will be consistent with what has been written over the years regarding the lack of advancement of women in management in the corporate world. Women are entering the business world in greater numbers but barriers exist in the structure of work organizations, the structure of the educational and economic systems, and in the social order.

Why / Benefits:

Companies must find ways to keep talented women from quitting. Cultural change, flexible schedules, and training for leadership all may play a role. This means making changes in organizations that diminishes the glass ceiling in terms of wages, the job ladder, and career development. Organizations need to develop a culture that sees women as a resource and not a problem. By creating the right environment, companies may see a decrease in attrition or turn-over rate, an increase in productivity, and a workplace that encourages diversity which creates a more energetic and innovative workforce.

Please contact me at any time if you have any questions.

Thank you.  more

The Critique Essay
Writing Assignment #1 will be a critique essay.
Courses that fulfill the General Education Requirements (GERs) at UMUC all have a common theme?technological transformations.... In following this theme this semester in WRTG391, you will be critiquing an author on her views on online writing courses.
The critique essay asks you to look at a source with a critical eye and discuss its strengths and weaknesses. It will incorporate source material summary into its discussion but will also evaluate that source material.
Kiefer, K. (2007). Chapter 8: Do students lose more than they gain in online writing classes? In, Brave New Classrooms (pp. 141-151). Peter Lang Publishing, Inc.


Chapter 8
Do Students Lose More than They Gain in Online Writing Classes?
Why do we teach writing in relatively small classes? Certainly there are practical reasons with having to do with workload and classroom management issues, but most of our issues flow from pedagogical and theoretical concerns. Pedagogically, we know that students are likely to learn most effectively from multiple opportunities to practice with timely feedback on their effectiveness in writing. Even more important, the most influential theories of language use and development posit the situatedness of language?how it is shaped by and shapes its users and contexts of its use. Cultural, rhetorical, and sociocognitive perspectives all emphasize the construction of meaning in context. Our goals in teaching writing explicitly include helping students become aware of writing as situated communication. The rhetorical principles embodied in most widely used writing texts consistently encourage writers to adapt to the specific writing context. Contemporary writing theory and language theory (as well as much cultural criticism) develop in even greater detail the crucial roles of language in context: for identity formation, for cultural work, and for community building. Little wonder, then, that teachers of writing insist that students are best able to learn to write most effectively when they can create and respond to specific language contexts in small groups of students (15?25 students in the class as a whole, with smaller groupings of 2?5 students working on targeted collaborative activities).
Do these theoretical assumptions about language preclude teaching writing online? Proponents of online writing courses argue that textual interactions can immerse students more fully in situated writing than face-to-face courses in which few classroom interactions involve writing. But despite what could be an advantage, online classes often fail students precisely because all interactions are
142 Online Writing Classes
textual. Unless students are sensitive to or willing to examine the different functions of text in an online class, they can be trapped by their constrained understanding of writing and finish the course with less awareness of the contexts of writing than their counterparts in a traditional classroom.
Admittedly, my view of the potential shortcomings of online writing instruction is in the minority. In 1992, Gail Hawisher summed up a prevailing positive view of electronic discourses and their extension into virtual classrooms: ?As a result of our work with computers over the past decade, we can begin to imagine teaching and writing in a virtual age where a meeting of the minds might well occur without the physical presence of students and teachers.? Minock and Shor (1995) discuss at length an example of a curriculum that exploits all the positive elements of computer-mediated discussion, even for students in a hybrid class which typically meets in face-to-face settings for a few sessions, and at most once per week, during the term and functions as an online course the rest of the term. Similarly, Fey (1998) reports her research on a ?distance? collaboration that effectively paired college and high school students in a critical inquiry about gender roles, and Faigley (1999) offers an example of what he calls ?the best possible learning environment with technology? that shows ?students who use telecommunications across different geographic locations are more motivated and learn more? (138). In these instances, online textual interactions not only enhanced individual learning about substantive issues but also created opportunities for students to practice writing for specific rhetorical contexts.
Off-setting these positive results are concerns about flaming and other negative power differentials that emerge in some electronic conversations (among others, Faigley 1992; Janangelo 1991), crushing all possibility for positive student?student interactions. Furthermore, the work of Gaddis et al. (2000), who note that the online students in their study were more independent as learners and tended to value collaboration to a lesser extent than students in their on-campus classes, suggests that students may reject opportunities to interact meaningfully even when it might otherwise contribute to positive learning outcomes.
Despite this apparent lack of consensus among teachers and researchers about whether online classes can function as learning contexts equivalent to traditional classrooms for students, political and economic realities are pushing more and more students into online education. In many cases, questions about the efficacy of online education have been ignored in the face of pressures to offer a quick response to student demand and to attract the largest possible number of students to online classes. In some places, like in my state of Colorado as part of a Western Governors? initiative, legislative action is pending
Kiefer 143
to reward community colleges and four-year institutions that attract large number of online students. (The clear implication is that institutions with largely on-campus instruction might well suffer in future budget allocations from the state.) Yet we do not have large-scale, objective evidence that writing teachers can maintain key instructional techniques and values in the writing classes we teach online.
Our emphasis on the situatedness of writing has long moved teachers of writing beyond the immediate classroom context. Scholars as varied in their theoretical perspectives as Miller, Moffat, Elbow, and Freire have pointed out that writing instruction cannot succeed when students do not engage in writing for at least one of several non-academic goals?personal expression, social consciousness, post-academic writing in the disciplines or in a workplace, critical literacy, or lifelong learning. More recently, pedagogies that emphasize service learning or community action have continued this trend toward focusing on writing beyond the classroom. As a profession, our history in the last 50 years has emphasized the importance of engaging students in more than individual, iterated practice of formulaic academic responses. But when we move the classroom online, are we actually expanding the boundaries of the classroom to take advantage of the larger world of varied rhetorical contexts? Or does the focus of instruction in online courses differ so greatly from that of face-to-face courses that it diminishes the richness of interactions among class members?
Deficit 1: Classroom Support Software
Anyone who has taught a distance education writing course with widely available classroom support software knows that such software, WebCT and Blackboard, was not designed with writing teachers in mind. Rather, assuming that lecture courses were the norm for higher education, most classroom support software was designed to support lecture classes. WebCT, for instance, provides a number of ways for teachers to post lecture material?as readings, notes, PowerPoint slides, or links to other textual material or websites. Materials that are created within the electronic course can be ?released? to students with set starting and end dates and times so that students can be encouraged to stay on track with the syllabus. Similarly, teachers can use a test bank of questions to create randomized multiple choice quizzes and examinations that, again, are available to students for only a set amount of time. Students see only their own scores on quizzes and grades on papers or examinations. It is possible for online courses, then, to exist as individual tutorials in which students have no sense that the course exists for anyone else.
144 Online Writing Classes
Understandably, most online course designs transferred from lecture classes feature instruction that requires almost no interaction between students. Students can retrieve the assigned materials, read and study them, take online quizzes or tests, and even write a paper without engaging other students in the course in any sustained or significant conversation. The computer in this instance not only wipes out any sense that students in the course might be ?other,? but also that other students in the course even exist. Students have no way of knowing how many other students are even enrolled in the same course, unless they are savvy enough to count the number of students on the class email list or pay very careful attention to discussion forum postings, should any be required.
But assume that a teacher does not want to organize the class as a ?lecture? or a correspondence course with no interactions except those between the teacher and each individual student. The typical classroom support system modeled on lecture courses also includes a chat room, an asynchronous bulletin board or discussion forum, and an internal email system for communicating with all members of the course. Using the chat room requires that all students be able to log into the ?classroom? website at the same time, a remarkably difficult chore given constraints on students? time (see below). And the asynchronous bulletin board is not necessarily a friendly community forum for posting messages. In WebCT, for instance, the threaded discussions on the asynchronous bulletin board are difficult to negotiate. My students have told me that they are often confused about how to read postings, and they can respond to only one posting at a time because WebCT has no option for opening two screens at the same time to view multiple texts. As it was not designed for groups of students interacting about texts, lecture-modeled classroom support software can make student dialog or other textual interactions needlessly difficult.
Furthermore, although it is possible to work around the design of WebCT to create discussion forums for smaller working groups of students, the software provides no easy way for students to exchange drafts of papers except to attach the papers to forum postings or email messages. Email at least has the advantage of being private within most classroom support software. Only the designated recipient within the class can read the email, so students who use this method of exchanging papers can comment on each other?s work without worrying about who else might be reading their comments. Papers attached to bulletin board postings are available to all unless the teacher sets up privacy restrictions required for each separate bulletin board for a pair or group of students, an awkward solution at best.
Kiefer 145
Downloading from even the best classroom support software can be time consuming, moreover, if the school server is overloaded, as ours often is. Sometimes, our server is so busy that students cannot log on at the times they have available to work on a computer. At other times, the load on the server is such that any new request to the server takes a minute or more to execute (on a high-speed line on campus; access time is often tripled for students working at a distance over modems). Retrieving a paper attached to a forum posting or email can take students up to 20 minutes, often time that students do not have to sit staring at an unresponsive computer screen. So my students have tried to work outside WebCT by exchanging papers through other email programs. Almost all my students have discovered, at one time or another, that email programs have limits on the size of attached files. They try to send a draft of a paper to me or to a peer reviewer only to have the attachment deleted from the email because it exceeds size restrictions.
While it is true that some students experience stumbling blocks in our face- to-face classrooms and thus we should not assume that physical environments are all and always ?student-friendly,? the limitations built into lecture-modeled classroom support software make it much less welcoming than the worst physical space to students of writing. In short, many online classroom ?environments? work against the notion of a writing class as a nexus of situated interactions through and about writing.
Deficit 2: Students? Time Constraints
Students? situations differ, of course, but most of my students work full-time and take one or two online courses at a time. Due to the other commitments, my students tend to work on their courses on weekends, often only on Sundays. (When I first started teaching online writing courses, I did not realize this trend until well into the first semester. I have since revised my syllabus and work plans to accommodate this student reality.) I still advise students to work in smaller chunks of time, even if they have to do the week?s worth of reading and writing on the weekend, but students tell me they often only have one large block of time for completing the work on my course.
Imagine, then, the frustrations students face. First, they need to retrieve the assigned texts from their classroom management software?typically in my classes a short introduction to the week?s work, several student samples, and a specific writing task, sometimes to be completed immediately and sometimes to feed into a longer paper or portfolio collection. Students log onto the classroom support system, download the texts, and either save them to read on the screen or to print later. They log off to complete the reading and any preliminary


Considerations for this Essay:
You are taking WRTG 391 in hybrid format. You are involved significantly in online instruction in your class.
Kiefer argues in her essay that writing courses may not work well online. She provides various reasons for making her argument.
You might agree with her. Or you might agree with her on some points but question her on other points. Or you might disagree with her entirely. In this essay, you will evaluate her arguments and critique them.
In this essay, you will do the following:
? Introduce the topic and introduce the author and essay. Then state your thesis.
? Summarize the author?s argument or arguments. Your opinion is not included here. You simply summarize the author?s points.
? Critique the author.
? Evaluate the author?s argument or arguments.
? Respond to the author. Note what you agree with and what you disagree with. You will incorporate at least two other sources into this evaluation and response.
? Conclude the essay.  more

It is a technical writing paper that needs to demonstrate what it takes to manage technical operations.
Creating reliable feedback mechanisms for difficulties at all levels of enterprise Information Technology interface. This includes timely discovery of technology related issues, resolution of these issues, creating a culture of trust and dependence, informing staff of your activities, and developing strategic plans for reducing bottlenecks in the future.

Criteria:
Identify and analyze issues prevalent in a technical environment
Create a strategy for the management oversight of enterprise technology resources including the IT infrastructure reflecting best practices
Identify operational solutions to issues in a technical environment
Apply ethical principles when determining actions
Exhibit communication skills

(directions and further explanations are attached)

See resource file also.

In this first paper, the student is to research and summarize the communication requirements,
opportunities and challenges of a particular business or industry, us...ing the concepts presented in class
sessions 1-4. The paper should identify any weaknesses, deficiencies, shortcomings, or unexploited
opportunities in the organization's or industry's current telecommunications arrangements. The paper will
be evaluated based on the depth and breadth of insights into the communications requirements and
context of the business or industry.

If researching a particular company (preferred) the student should interview one or more knowledgeable
employees of the subject company. If researching an industry or industry segment, the student will need
to consult business, trade, or academic journal articles, white papers, etc. to collect the required
information. Be sure to cite your source(s)!

As a starting point, the student should identify answers to those questions which every communications
system must address: (as identified in Lecture #1)

1. What type of information does the company/organization need to send? To receive? (e.g. text,
documents, images, video, sensor data, etc.)
2. Who is (are) the sender(s)? Who is (are) the receiver(s)?
3. What shared set of symbols are available to communicate the information? (e.g. language, file
formats, symbol set, data code or code set)
4. Where are the sender(s) and receiver(s) located relative to each other? (e.g same or different
floor, building, campus, city, state, country?)
5. Approximately how much information is sent? How much is received?
6. How frequently is the information sent? How quickly does it need to be received? Is it time
sensitive? What is the effect on the business purpose if the information is not received on time?
7. What kinds of signals are used to transmit the information? (e.g. analog, digital)
8. What is used to link the sender(s) and receiver(s)? (e.g. circuits, media, connections)
9. Does information flow in only one direction, or in both directions between sender(s) and
receiver(s)? If information flows in both directions, how do sender and receiver agree on who
transmits when? (simplex, half-duplex, full-duplex transmissions; flow control; media access
control, etc.)
10. How is receipt of the information confirmed? (acknowledgment; reliable service)
11. What kinds of obstacles or environmental conditions may impede the exchange of information?
(e.g. buildings, terrain, weather, walls, heavy machinery, electronic devices)
12. How are less-than-perfect environmental conditions dealt with? (congestion; noise; error control,
detection and correction)
In addition, please inquire about organizational issues that we will consider later in the course:
13. What communications infrastructure already exists?
14. How constrained is the communications budget?
15. How many employees are involved in the management of communications infrastructure?
16. How proprietary is the information the organization sends and/or receives? Is any of it subject to
legal or regulatory compliance?
17. Are there ways that information is used by the company to gain a competitive advantage?


There are faxes for this order.

Customer is requesting that (bolavens) completes this order.  more

Hi,
I need a two page summery of the article below. It should focus on the paragraph below and answer this question.

What are the benefits arisen from information technology? How does it ...shape our companies organization?




According to CSC Index Research and Advisory Services, information technology is a powerful change agent in a growing number of industries. Information technology is redefining entire industries from banking and brokering to retailing and air transport. Regardless of the industry, however, many organizations are using their technology to both foster change?change in what they do, how they do it, with whom they do it, and the tools they use to get it done?and to improve operations, productivity, and performance. While such change can be beneficial, it can also be daunting and met with resistance. That is because, when organizations utilize technology for these ends, it affects much more than the technology itself?it can fundamentally change the nature, structure, and operation of the organization. These changes, then, must be understood within this context and dealt with accordingly.

The article starts below....

Karmarkar, Uday. (2004, August 9). Boot Camp for Service Operations. Harvard Business School. Retrieved June 19, 2005, from http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item.jhtml ?id=4308&t=operations

Boot Camp for Service Operations
August 9, 2004

Heads up: There?s a services revolution coming fast. Are you ready to realign strategy, redesign processes, and restructure your organization? An excerpt from Harvard Business Review.
June 27, 2005 Issue


Asian and American Leadership Styles: How Are They Unique?
The Potential Downside of Win-Win
People Power: How to Measure It
Summing Up: Is a "Level Playing Field" a Good Thing?





Easy Print
Send us an Email
Email to a Friend
RSS/PDA Options



by Uday Karmarkar
Pick up just about any major newspaper in the United States these days, and you'll find the "o" words somewhere on the front page. Articles about offshoring lament the movement of labor to foreign countries, and outsourcing headlines decry the loss of middle-class jobs to contractors. Of late, the "o" words have been conflated to suggest that a corporate cabal bent on "exporting America" has handed high-paying, white-collar American jobs to well-trained but less expensive workers in India and other locales.
The brouhaha over the loss of service jobs, which currently account for over 80 percent of private-sector employment in the United States, is not merely an American phenomenon. Service jobs are at risk in all developed countries. In the U.K., where some claim that as many as 50,000 jobs moved offshore in 2003, the issue is just as prevalent and just as contentious. Countries like Germany and Sweden are feeling political tremors as well.
Nor is any of the noise new. Protectionism raises its ugly, if discredited, head whenever economies undergo a major transformation. Sometimes, the political process plays out for good?as it did in the United States in the 1980s, when companies went into competitiveness overdrive and the economy rebounded brilliantly. Sometimes, it plays out for ill, as it did when the 1930 Smoot-Hawley tariff on imported goods exacerbated the Great Depression. Then, as now, society and business have no choice but to confront the economic facts on the ground.
In my opinion, the worry about outsourcing and offshoring distracts from the point. Even job loss is not the issue. As painful as it truly is for people who struggle to find work in a restructuring economy, the unemployment situation will eventually be taken care of by baby boomer retirements and job creation. (Fortuitously, many jobs opened by boomer retirement will not be subject to offshore movement.) The real issue then is the loss of service competitiveness. We are now riding a tidal wave of change that we can think of as the industrialization of services. Global competition is on the rise, and some service markets are being invaded by foreign firms and new entrants. Automation is also transforming the services sector. New hardware and software systems that take care of back-room and front-office tasks such as counter operations, security, billing, and order taking are allowing firms to dispense with clerical, accounting, and other staff positions. And self-service is having a major impact: Why use a travel agent when you can book your own flight, reserve a hotel room, and rent a car online? [?]
The R Words: Realign, Redesign, Restructure
The company that best understands and anticipates customer needs, delivers consistently high-quality service, and connects to the customer via the channel of choice wins. To meet those challenges, top managers must put themselves through competitiveness boot camp, revamping their company's strategy, operations, and organization in the process.
Realigning strategy. In attempting to link with customers directly, firms will need to overhaul their offerings, cost structures, and competitive platforms to align with the shortened information chain and with the changing demands and behavior of their customers.
Overhauling a traditional service design is no one-shot, onetime deal.
Consider the legal publishing divisions of Thomson, a global publishing giant. In the days before electronic publishing, the company printed and distributed paper-based information about U.S. court decisions, new bills, and amendments. As courts started to publish material electronically, the role of the publishing firm began to be called into question. Understanding that it did not own the legal intellectual property, Thomson redesigned itself into an information packaging and shipping company?an organizationally far-reaching and painful effort spanning a decade. Rather than operating parallel and distinct product lines, the company chose to focus its operations around central electronic document databases; software systems took over tasks from indexing to citation. As a result, a whole slew of new specialized products could be sliced, diced, and priced out of the database. While Thomson reduced its need for lawyers and legal professionals, it added to the ranks of technologically savvy and operationally oriented managers. Today, Thomson is positioned as one of the world's dominant electronic publishers of legal, tax, and accounting information, as well as being a leader in scientific and technical data, learning, and assessment.
In this example, we see what happens as new technology changes the relationship between sources, services, channels, and customers. In Thomson's markets, speed trumps professional knowledge and processing. Many tasks shift to the customers as self-service. Professionals lose status and control. Operations and technology become more centralized, at least temporarily. And as the service becomes commoditized, competition intensifies, and differentiation grows vital.
Redesigning processes. As the services revolution proceeds, not only will all companies have to understand their information work processes, but they will also want to examine each stage of the process: Should it be performed at headquarters or in the field, nearby or offshore, in-house or in some far corner of the globe? Processes, in other words, will need to be much more specific and carefully managed than ever before. In most cases, processes will need to be closely synchronized with those of other firms as well as with customers, who may routinely collaborate and participate in producing output.



Choosing Your Industrialization Strategy






Los Angeles-based IndyMac Bank, a pioneer in electronic banking, is becoming an online mortgage "factory." The company views the back-room loan origination process as one of information assembly followed by credit analysis, underwriting, approval, and closing, in which some fifteen discrete parts are brought together into a finished product. IndyMac has distributed some of these processes to different points in the United States; some customer contact processes are slated to move to call centers abroad. Other back-room processes, such as credit analysis, are partially automated. More complex and judgment-based aspects of analysis, such as underwriting and acceptance, remain with experts in the United States. All these processes are sewn together on the back end. On the front end is an automated, rule-based platform called e-MITS, which allows customers and brokers to apply for mortgages online and automates certain tasks of application evaluation, risk-based pricing, and rate-lock guarantees. [?]
An adept firm like IndyMac looks quite different from the traditional service firm in terms of people, processes, and procedures. But overhauling a traditional service design is no one-shot, onetime deal. Because technological and infrastructure changes, competition, and industry restructuring are ongoing, service companies need to constantly experiment and fine-tune their systems if they are to negotiate these changes in a sustainable manner.
Restructuring the organization. Reorganization of processes necessitates organizational change. Already, online banking and ATMs have displaced tellers, and e-tickets and automated check-in machines are forcing travel agents and airline counter personnel to find new jobs. But such automation just substitutes technology for people. Deeper changes are necessary, and leaders will need to constantly redesign their organizations to adapt to new conditions, while ensuring that the customer does not get lost in the process.
How can a service company dealing with industrialization realistically create such an adaptive learning organization? [?] A radical, but more sustainable, approach is to build the organization around the restructured information and value chain. The front office takes responsibility for the customer experience; the back room handles internal processes invisible to the customer; and a third organization is responsible for dealing with partnerships (suppliers and coproducers). All three are likely to be in constant flux. Most important, these three groups can and should overlap; flexibility and constant communication among them are critical. Like task forces, these groups have to be able to live with some fuzziness in their task definitions and be willing to share responsibilities with other groups.
The more flexible the manager, the better his or her chances of survival.
What kinds of new skills will companies most need? First, they will want to make sure they understand the impact of new technologies, strategies, and channels on customer behavior. Management teams may need to include skilled managers in new areas?a chief experience design officer, a director of experience engineering, a chief of global service delivery, and so on. Second, technology experts will need to be distributed throughout the organization, rather than concentrated in a separate IT group. Third, managers of vendor and partner relationships will have a significant place in the new structure and will need to learn to deal with new global allies and organizations. Finally, because the employees of the new service company may be spread across the globe, management will have to adapt to a more diverse workforce. Some of this is not new to multinational companies. But it may well be very new to traditional service organizations.
Service firms will want to consider hiring executives capable of dealing head-on with the increasingly rapid change that the sector will experience. Managing changes in the executive ranks will be painful, however, since experience can become a liability when the future is likely to be far different from the past. Many senior managers will be slow to relearn how their industries work and will find themselves sidelined. The more flexible the manager, the better his or her chances of survival. One suggestion is to hire executives from global manufacturing companies who wear the scars of the competitiveness wars, as banks and utilities did when they tapped managers from deregulated firms.
Excerpted with permission from "Will You Survive the Services Revolution?" Harvard Business Review, Vol. 82, No. 6, June 2004.
[ Buy the full article ]
Uday Karmarkar is the LA Times Professor of Technology and Strategy and is the research director at the Center for Management in the Information Economy at the Anderson School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles.  more

Published by Soundview Executive Book Summaries, P.O. Box 1053, Concordville, Pennsylvania 19331 USA
?2002 Soundview Executive Book Summaries ? All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part i...s prohibited.
The Discipline of Getting Things Done
EXECUTION
THE SUMMARY IN BRIEF
Organizations face many challenges in today?s shaky economy ? competitive
battles, increased costs, decreased margins, and a host of other
internal and external forces. In order to shore up their companies? responses
to these factors, today?s leaders must be able to take the goals they set
for their organizations and turn them into results. Unfortunately, too many
companies struggle to bridge the gap between goals and results ? they create
solid, logical, even bold plans, but are unable to execute properly.
Honeywell CEO Larry Bossidy and management advisor Ram Charan
contend that the reason for this gap is that businesspeople do not think
about execution as a discipline or a cornerstone of a business? culture ?
and they must. From middle management all the way up to CEO, a company?s
leaders must recognize execution as the most important collective set
of activities in which they can engage. No more is there room for leaders
who rely merely on their vision to get from goals to results; to survive, they
must get more involved in the details of execution. There is much work to be
done, and Execution shows you how to do it.
Concentrated Knowledge? for the Busy Executive ? www.summary.com Vol. 24, No. 12 (2 parts) Part 1, December 2002 ? Order # 24-29
CONTENTS
Why Execution Is Necessary
Page 2
Building Block 1: The
Leader?s Seven Essential
Behaviors
Page 3
Building Block 2: Create the
Framework for Cultural
Change
Pages 3, 4
Building Block 3: Have the
Right People in the Right
Place
Pages 4, 5
The People Process: Linking
Strategy and Operations
Pages 5, 6
The Strategy Process:
Making the Link with People
and Operations
Pages 6, 7
The Operations Process:
Making the Link with
Strategy and People
Pages 7, 8
By Larry Bossidy and
Ram Charan
FILE: LEADERSHIP
?
What You?ll Learn In This Summary
? Why Execution Is Necessary. Leaders simply are not taught the discipline
of execution; more time and scholarship are given to strategic thinking
and management techniques. Neither mean much to a company, however, if
its leader cannot take an idea and make it reality.
? Seven Essential Behaviors. From following through on commitments
to rewarding those employees who produce results, if you are serious about
execution and leadership, you must exhibit these key behaviors.
? Creating the Framework for Cultural Change. The culture of an organization
is the sum of its shared values, beliefs and norms of behavior. Leaders
who want to foster an execution-supporting culture must focus on changing
the beliefs within their company that influence specific behaviors, since
behaviors are what ultimately deliver results.
? The Three Core Processes of Execution. Many organizations treat their
people, strategy and operations processes as separate, independent entities,
when in fact they are interrelated ? and must be treated as such in order to
ingrain the discipline of execution into the corporation.
Why Execution Is Necessary
While there exists an enormous amount of scholarship
and research on management techniques and strategic
thinking, hardly anyone speaks of execution in the same
terms. To understand execution, you must keep three
things in mind:
1. Execution Is a Discipline. No worthwhile business
strategy can be planned without taking into account how
to execute it. Execution is a systematic process of rigorously
discussing hows and whats, questioning, tenaciously
following through, and ensuring accountability.
2. Execution Is the Major Job of a Business
Leader. Many business leaders like to think that the top
dog is exempt from the details of actually running
things, that setting strategy from the mountaintop is
enough. In reality, only a leader can make execution
happen, through deep personal involvement.
3. Execution Must Be a Core Element of a
Business Culture. Execution must be embedded in the
reward systems and in the norms of behavior that everyone
practices.
The Forgotten Skill
Every truly great leader has an instinct for execution,
but that instinct is not typically cultivated in the selection,
training and development of leaders. A high proportion
of those who actually rise to the top of an
organization make their mark as high-level thinkers,
uninterested and (as a result) uninvolved in the ?how?
of getting things done. Many do not realize what needs
to be done to convert a vision into specific tasks.
The crucial component of dialogue between leaders
and those subordinates who help them execute a strategy
is typically lacking. Leaders don?t know to involve
people from all affected areas of a strategic plan?s outcome
in the initial shaping of the plan. They don?t think to
ask those people about the hows of the plan?s execution.
As a result, leaders never set milestones for the progress
of the plan, nor do they put contingency plans into place
to deal with unexpected issues.
In other words, when leaders are allowed to remain
detached and rendered incapable of developing skills
and experience related to execution, efforts at creating
and running an execution strategy will fail, from the top
down. ?
EXECUTION
by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan
? THE COMPLETE SUMMARY
The authors: Larry Bossidy is Chairman and former
CEO of Honeywell International. Ram Charan is an advisor
to CEOs and senior executives and author of What the
CEO Wants You to Know and other books.
From EXECUTION by Larry Bossidy and Ram
Charan, copyright? 2002 by Larry Bossidy and Ram
Charan. Summarized by permission of Crown Business, a
division of Random House, Inc. 278 pages. $27.50. 0-
609-61057-0.
For more information on the authors, go to:
http://my.summary.com
Published by Soundview Executive Book Summaries (ISSN 0747-2196), P.O. Box 1053, Concordville, PA 19331
USA, a division of Concentrated Knowledge Corporation. Published monthly. Subscriptions: $195 per year in U.S.,
Canada & Mexico, and $275 to all other countries. Periodicals postage paid at Concordville, PA and additional offices.
Postmaster: Send address changes to Soundview, P.O. Box 1053, Concordville, PA 19331. Copyright ? 2002 by
Soundview Executive Book Summaries.
Available formats: Summaries are available in print, audio and electronic formats. To subscribe, call us at 1-800-
521-1227 (1-610-558-9495 outside U.S. & Canada), or order on the Internet at www.summary.com. Multiple-subscription
discounts and Corporate Site Licenses are also available.
Soundview
Executive Book Summaries?
ROBERT L. SMITH ? Senior Contributing Editor
CHRIS D. LAUER ? Managing Editor
DEBRA A. DEPRINZIO ? Art and Design
CHRISTOPHER G. MURRAY ? Editor-in-Chief
GEORGE Y. CLEMENT ? Publisher
2 Soundview Executive Book Summaries?
Compaq Vs. Dell ?
Execution Made the Difference
Former Compaq CEO Eckhard Pfeiffer had an ambitious
strategy ? before any of his competitors, he
saw that the so-called Wintel architecture (the combination
of the Windows operating system and Intel?s
constant innovation) would serve for everything from
handheld computers to linked networks of servers.
Pfeiffer broadened Compaq?s base through numerous
acquisitions in an attempt to serve all the computing
needs of enterprise customers. He moved at breakneck
speed on his bold strategic vision and, by 1998,
was poised to dominate the industry.
In the end, though, the strategy failed to achieve
such stellar results. Integrating the acquisitions and
delivery on promises required better execution than
Compaq was able to achieve. In addition, neither
Pfeiffer nor his successor pursued the kind of execution
necessary to make money as PCs became an
increasingly commodity business.
Michael Dell, on the other hand, understood that
kind of execution. His direct-sales and build-to-order
approach formed the core of his business strategy,
and stands as the chief reason Dell passed Compaq,
both in market value and as the biggest maker of PCs.
For a comparison of execution to Six Sigma, go to:
http://my.summary.com
Execution doesn?t just happen. Essential building
blocks must be in place in your organization. This section
of the summary looks at three of the most important
of those building blocks. ?
Building Block 1: The Leader?s
Seven Essential Behaviors
What exactly should you as a leader who is in charge
of execution do? How can you keep from being a
micromanager, caught up in the details of running the
business? The answer is to exhibit the seven essential
behaviors of successful execution management:
? Know your people and your business. Leaders
have to live their businesses. In companies that don?t
execute, the leaders are usually out of touch with dayto-
day realities. The bulk of information that reaches
them is filtered ? presented by direct reports with their
own perceptions and agendas.
? Insist on realism. Many organizations are full of
people who try to avoid or shake reality, because it is
uncomfortable, or too revealing of mistakes made. Yet,
realism is the heart of execution, and must be made a
priority in every organization.
? Set clear goals and priorities. Leaders who execute
focus on a very few clear priorities, for a number
of reasons: 1) focusing on fewer (three to four) priorities
will produce the best results from the resources at
hand; and 2) people in contemporary organizations need
a small number of clear priorities to execute well.
? Follow through. Clear, simple goals mean little if
nobody takes them seriously. The failure to follow
through is widespread in business and a major cause of
poor execution. Leaders must surface conflicts that
stand in the way of achieving results, and create followthrough
mechanisms, such as follow-up meetings, to
ensure everyone will do what they?re supposed to.
? Reward the doers. If you want people to produce
specific results, you must reward them accordingly.
Many corporations do such a poor job of linking
rewards to performance that there?s no correlation at all.
When companies don?t execute, chances are they don?t
measure, don?t reward, and don?t promote people who
know how to get things done.
? Expand people?s capabilities. One of the most important
parts of a leader?s job is passing on his or her experience
and wisdom to the next generation of leaders, thereby
expanding the capabilities of the entire organization.
? Know yourself. Everyone pays lip service to the idea
that leading an organization requires strength of character;
in execution, however, it is absolutely critical. Without
such emotional fortitude, you can?t be honest with yourself,
deal honestly with business and organizational realities,
or give people forthright assessments. This emotional
fortitude is comprised of four core qualities: authenticity,
self-awareness, self-mastery, and humility. ?
Building Block 2:
Create the Framework
For Cultural Change
When a business isn?t doing well, its leaders often
think about how to change the corporate culture. While
they are correct in their assertion that the beliefs and
behaviors of their people are at least as important as the
strategies they execute (or, in some cases, fail to exe-
3
Execution? SUMMARY
Soundview Executive Book Summaries?
(continued on page 4)
THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF EXECUTION
Jack Welch?s
Hands-On Management
In the mid-1990s, a friend told Jack Welch, General
Electric?s CEO, about a new methodology for making
a quantum increase in inventory turns in manufacturing
operations. It was thought that GE could generate
cash if it could increase its inventory turns across the
company. The leading practitioner of the methodology
was American Standard, whose plants had achieved
as high as 40 inventory turns per plant, compared to
the average of four at most companies.
Welch wasn?t content to just get the concept, or to
send some of his manufacturing people out to investigate
it. Instead, he paid American Standard CEO
Emmanuel Kampouris a visit, in order to understand
the workings personally. He also accepted an invitation
to speak at the company, and spent the better
part of one evening?s dinner querying two successful
American Standard plant managers about the details
of their respective operations ? the tools, the social
architecture, and how they overcame resistance to the
new methodology.
By involving himself deeply and personally with the
subject, Welch learned what it would take to execute
such an initiative at GE, and was able to get the necessary
changes rolling quickly throughout his huge
company. By the time of his retirement in 2001,
Welch saw GE?s inventory turns double.
For Larry Bossidy?s comments on confronting issues realistically,
go to: http://my.summary.com
cute), most efforts at cultural change fail, in part
because they are not linked to improving the company?s
outcomes. Cultural change gets real only when your aim
is execution.
A New Way of Thinking
There?s an adage that holds true in this discussion ?
we don?t think ourselves into a new way of acting; we
act ourselves into a new way of thinking.
This begins with demystifying the word culture.
Stripped to its essence, the culture of an organization is
the sum of its shared values, beliefs, and norms of
behavior.
Some who endeavor to change an organization?s culture
often start with the intention of changing its values ? its
fundamental principles and standards, such as integrity or
respect for the culture. What they should instead focus on
changing are the beliefs within a company that influence
specific behaviors,
things that are
conditioned by
training and experience.
Behaviors
are beliefs turned
to action, the
things that deliver
results. To deliver
better results, start
with examining whether your organization?s ingrained
beliefs are helping the business perfect its execution.
Change Behavior by Changing Rewards
A business? culture defines what gets appreciated,
respected, and, ultimately, rewarded; those rewards and
their linkage to performance are the foundation of
changing behavior. If a company rewards and promotes
people for execution, its culture will change. However
your organization determines rewards, the goal should
be the same ? your compensation and reward system
must have the right yields. You must reward not simply
on strong achievements on numbers, but also on the
desirable behaviors that people adopt. Over time, your
people will get stronger, as will your financial results.
The Importance of Dialogue
Another cultural factor to recognize is the importance
of robust dialogue. You cannot have an execution culture
without such a dialogue ? one that brings reality
to the surface through openness, candor, and informality.
Your people must enter into such a dialogue with
open minds, uncluttered by misconceptions or propaganda.
Everyone must be open to speaking candidly,
and to receiving the real opinions of others as well. ?
Building Block Three:
Have the Right People
In the Right Place
An organization?s workers are its most reliable
resource for generating excellent results year after year;
their judgments, experiences and capabilities make the
difference between success and failure.
Yet, the same leaders who exclaim that ?people are
our most important asset? usually do not think very hard
about choosing the right people for the right jobs.
Typically this is because they?re thinking too much
about how to make their companies bigger or better
positioned globally. Over time, however, it?s choosing
the right people that creates competitive advantage.
Why, then, are the right people not in the right jobs?
Here are some of the reasons ? and what you can do
about them:
? Lack of knowledge. Leaders often rely on sometimes
fuzzy or prejudiced staff appraisals when placing
people into positions. They should, instead, define the
job in terms of its three or four nonnegotiable criteria ?
things the person must be able to do to succeed.
? Lack of courage. There are innumerable cases of the
wrong person being kept in the wrong job, simply because
the person?s leader doesn?t have the emotional fortitude to
take decisive action, confront the person, and make a
change. Such failures do considerable damage to a business;
indeed, if the non-performer is high enough in the
organization, he or she can be particularly destructive.
? The psychological comfort factor. Many jobs are
filled with the wrong people because the leaders who
promote them are comfortable with them, and the
employees are loyal to those leaders. However, if that
loyalty is based on the wrong factors (social reasons,
rather than professional, etc.), it could be damaging.
Often, breaking free of this comfort factor is exactly
what a leader must do to bring about change.
When Reginald Jones ? a cerebral, well-spoken
person ? selected Jack Welch ? a blunt, irreverent,
from-the-gut leader ? to replace him as CEO of
General Electric, many questioned the move. Jones,
however, knew GE had to change, and that Welch possessed
the right kind of personality and professional
approach to get the job done. Jones broke free of the
comfort factor, to the benefit of the company and its
shareholders. ?
Execution? SUMMARY
4 Soundview Executive Book Summaries?
For Ram Charan?s comments on fuzzy staff appraisal,
go to: http://my.summary.com
Building Block 2: Create the Framework
For Cultural Change
(continued from page 3)
To deliver better results, start
with examining whether your
organization?s ingrained
beliefs are helping the business
perfect its execution.
The heart of execution lies in three core processes:
the people process, the strategy process, and the operations
process. Every business and company uses these
processes in one form or another; more often than not,
however, they stand apart from one another like silos,
and are performed by rote and as quickly as possible.
What many leaders miss is the fact that these processes
are where the things that matter about execution need to
be decided, and as such, they should be prosecuted with
rigor, intensity and depth.
The processes should be tightly linked with one another,
and the leader of the business and his or her leadership
team must be deeply engaged in all three. They are
the owners of the processes, not the strategic planners
or the human resources or finance staffs. ?
The People Process: Linking
Strategy and Operations
The people process is more important than either the
strategy or operations processes; if you don?t get the
people process right, you will never fulfill the potential
of your business. A robust people process does three
essential things:
? Evaluates individuals accurately and in depth.
? Provides a framework for identifying and developing
the leadership talent the organization will need
to execute its strategies in the future.
? Fills the leadership pipeline that is the basis of a
strong succession plan.
A robust people process provides
a powerful framework for
determining the organization?s
talent needs over time, and for
planning actions that will meet
those needs. It is based on four
building blocks: 1) linkage of
people to strategy and operations;
2) development of the
leadership pipeline; 3) dealing
with nonperformers; and 4) linking
human resources to business
results.
Linkage of People to Strategy
and Operations
The first building block of the
people process is its linkage to
the strategic milestones (see
example at right) over the near (0-
2 years), medium (2-5 years) and
long terms, as well as the operating plan targets. Business
leaders create this linkage by making sure they have the
right kinds and numbers of people to execute the strategy.
Be prepared to make tough decisions. The strategic
milestones you set might necessitate a reevaluation of
your leadership team, should you determine that the
skill sets required to meet your near-, medium- and
long-term goals will be beyond the reach of your current
staff. This is a difficult social process ? no one
wants to tell good people they aren?t capable of moving
to the next level ? but it must be done.
Development of the Leadership Pipeline
Meeting medium- and long-term milestones depends
largely on having a pipeline of promising and promotable
leaders. To determine the ability of current staff to take
on larger responsibilities, you must conduct an assessment
of their skills. This will reveal the adequacy of your
leadership pipeline in terms of quantity and quality.
Analyzing succession depth and retention risk analysis
is the essence of talent planning and building a leadership
pipeline of high-potential people. The retention
risk analysis looks at a person?s potential marketability,
as well as the risk a business faces if he or she leaves.
Succession depth analysis determines whether the company
has enough high-potential people to fill key positions.
It also looks at whether there are high-potential
people in the wrong jobs and whether key people will
be lost if a job is not unblocked for them.
Such analysis helps an organization avoid two dan-
Execution? SUMMARY
5
(continued on page 6)
Soundview Executive Book Summaries?
THE CORE PROCESSES OF EXECUTION
NEAR TERM
(0-2 YEARS)
MEDIUM TERM
(2-5 YEARS)
LONG TERM
(5+ YEARS)
? Expand beyond existing
product line toward selling
solutions
? Launch new initiative to
expand services to installed
base
? Secure new expertise in
technology
? Further expand penetration
in existing customer segments
? Develop intermediate
approaches to selling solutions
to new customer segments
? Evaluate and engage
alliance partners
? Become pioneers of
leapfrog technology
? Build more useful alliances
? Develop low-cost sourcing
ideas
Strategy Milestones
gers: organizational inertia (keeping people in the same
job too long) and moving people up too quickly.
Dealing with Nonperformers
Even the best people process doesn?t get the right
people in the right jobs 100 percent of the time; likewise,
it can?t make everybody into a good performer.
The final test of a people process is how well it distinguishes
between those who have been promoted beyond
their capabilities and need to be moved to other positions,
and those who simply must be moved out.
Linking Human Resources to Business Results
Human Resources has to be integrated into the business
process. It must be linked to strategy and operations,
and to the employee assessments, across the
enterprise. This is a different approach than many companies
have taken in the past. At one time, managers
might assign HR personnel to recruit or execute specific
elements of a strategic plan, such as negotiating with a
union if a plant would need to be shut down.
In today?s execution-minded companies, HR is different.
Personnel within the department are expected to
have a point of view about how one achieves a business
objective or strategic plan, just like any other participant
in the management process. HR people must not only
be well trained in how to develop and retain people ?
they must also possess the business acumen, critical
thinking skills, and ability to link strategy and execution.
In other words, they must have the same tactical
skills as any business leader. ?
The Strategy Process: Making the
Link with People and Operations
A good strategic planning process requires the utmost
attention to the hows of executing a strategy. A robust
strategy is not a compilation of numbers, nor is it a
?crystal ball? forecast of extrapolated numbers for the
next ten years. It must be an action plan that business
leaders can rely on to reach their business objectives.
You need to identify and define the critical issues
behind your strategy. You need to question the assumptions
on which your strategy is based, and determine
whether you have the organizational capability to execute
the plan. You also need to link your strategy to
your people process (to determine whether you have the
right people in place to execute the strategy) and to your
operating plan (to get your organization properly
aligned to move forward).
Key Questions
A strong strategic plan must address several key questions:
1. What Is the Assessment of the External
Environment? Every business operates within a shifting
political, social and economic context. Your strategic
plan must explicitly deal with those external forces and
the assumptions they generate.
Examine everything from economic and demographic
trends to new technologies and alliances between competitors,
in order to anticipate changes that can affect
your business.
2. How Well Do You Understand Existing
Customers and Markets? People tend to look at their
businesses from the inside out, choosing to focus so
strongly on making and selling products and services
that they lose awareness of the needs and buying behaviors
of their customers.
Who makes purchasing decisions for your customers?
It?s likely different from customer to customer. In large
companies, for example, purchasing agents might do the
buying, while at smaller companies, your buyer might
be the CFO. Each requires a different approach, which
you can only take if you have that intimate customer
knowledge in hand.
3. What Is the Best Way to Grow the Business
6
Execution? SUMMARY
Soundview Executive Book Summaries?
(continued on page 7)
For information on tools to gauge the quantity and quality of your
leadership pipeline, go to: http://my.summary.com
GE?s Talent Domino Effect
In the mid-1990s, when it had become clear that
GE was the world?s best producer of leadership talent,
its division presidents were all retention risks, targeted
by top headhunters to take their experience and
expertise to other companies. GE?s people process
provided a forum for how to retain these valuable
people by both garnering data and providing financial
rewards, such as stock grants that could not be
cashed until retirement.
When a key person does leave, however, the
process almost always provides a needed replacement
within 24 hours. For example, when Larry
Johnson, the president of GE?s appliance division,
announced in spring 2001 that he was leaving to
become CEO of another company, GE named his successor
on the same day. The organization was also
able to announce ? on that same day ? who would
fill all the positions created by the domino effect of
related promotions.
The People Process: Linking Strategy
And Operations
(continued from page 5)
Profitably? What are the obstacles to growth? Does
your business need to develop new products or does it
need to take existing ones into new channels and to new
customers? Does it need to acquire other businesses to
meet key customer needs?
Finding your best growth opportunities is key to
building on successes and staving off failure.
4. Who Is the Competition? Sometimes businesses
miss the emergence of new competitors who have more
attractive value propositions for their customers.
Most often, companies underestimate the responses of
competitors, or are so consumed by dealing with one set
of competitors, they fail to see new competition come
on the scene. Sometimes, however, they have the opposite
problem ? they overestimate the competition
because they haven?t asked the right questions, and they
miss valuable opportunities to gain advantage.
5. Can the Business Execute the Strategy? An astonishing
number of strategies fail because leaders do not
make a realistic assessment of whether their organization
can execute the plan. That won?t be a problem if you?re
intimately involved in your business? three core processes.
You should also be listening to your customers and
suppliers, and encouraging your leaders to do the same.
6. Are the Short Term and Long Term Balanced?
Strategy planning needs to be conducted in real time,
connected to shifts in the competitive environment and
the business? own changing strengths and weaknesses,
which means you must define your company?s mission
in the short to medium term, as well as the long term.
By breaking down the plan in this manner, you bring
reality to the plan and give your business an anchor for
continued growth.
7. What Are the Critical Issues Facing the
Business? Every business has a half dozen or so critical
issues ? the ones that can hurt it badly or prevent it
from capitalizing on new opportunities or reaching its
objectives.
8. How Will the Business Make Money on a
Sustainable Basis? Every strategy must lay out clearly
the specifics of the anatomy of a business ? how it will
make money now and in the future. This means understanding
several key pieces of information ? the drivers
of cash, margin, velocity, revenue growth, market share,
and competitive advantage. What pricing model will you
follow, and are customers willing to pay a premium for
your goods? How much cash do you require for working
capital? What will your competitors? reactions be? ?
The Operations Process:
Making the Link with Strategy
and People
The strategy process defines where a business wants
to go, and the people process defines who will get it
there. The operating plan provides the path for those
people, breaking long-term output into short-term targets.
An operating plan includes the programs (product
launches, marketing plan, sales plan, etc.) that your
business will complete within one year to reach the
desired levels of such objectives as earnings, sales, mar-
Execution? SUMMARY
Soundview Executive Book Summaries? 7
(continued on page 8)
The Strategy Process: Making the Link with
People and Operations
(continued from page 6)
Dell Addresses
The Future of the PC
In 2001, Dell Computer was beginning to face its
critical issue ? the dim long-term outlook for PCs. No
matter how much market share Dell stood to gain, the
market itself had no foreseeable heady growth. Initially,
the company formed an alliance with EMC to market
EMC?s storage equipment. An even stronger option
was to expand into the adjacent segment ? servers ?
where the growth potential dwarfs that of PCs.
But the question remains ? can Dell?s low-margin,
high-velocity model, which works so well for PCs, be
effective with more technologically sophisticated
servers? The jury, at this time, is still out.
Cross Pens and
Market Segmentation
One way to effectively find your best growth opportunities
is by mapping your market segments. To
illustrate, consider A.T. Cross? segmentation of the
luxury pen market. A simple map of Cross? market
segments identifies three different consumers:
? The individual who wants to buy such a pen for
him- or herself
? The person who buys a pen as a gift for another
individual
? The corporation that buys thousands of pens,
with its logo on them, for use as institutional gifts
For each market segment, the product is essentially
the same, but demand is different, as is the strategy.
Each requires Cross to deal with different competitors,
channels, economics and pricing.
For Ram Charan?s comments on overestimating the competition,
go to: http://my.summary.com
gins, and cash flow. The assumptions on which the
operating plan is based are linked to reality and are
debated among the finance people and the line leaders
who must execute. Indeed, while the leader must be
intimately familiar with each of the processes involved
in executing the strategy, he or she is not the only one
who must be present and involved in operations planning;
all of the people accountable for executing the
plan must help construct it.
The starting point in creating an operating budget is a
robust dialogue among all the relevant business leaders,
who sit down together to understand the whole corporate
picture, including all of the relationships among its
parts. All leaders and their direct reports have been
given the initial cut of the budget, as well as the
assumptions for the external environment, competitor
analyses, and targets for the year.
The plan is then built roughly as follows:
? Those present focus on the roughly 20 budget lines
that typically account for 80 percent of the impact on
business outcomes, such as product mix, operating margins,
manufacturing costs, and so forth. Each function
represented presents its action plans for meeting the
proposed budget.
? With each presentation, the leader questions the
assumptions to test their validity and asks how each
action plan will affect the other businesses.
? After every function has its say, the group breaks up
into subteams. Each subteam discusses alternatives and
the effects other plans will have on their operation.
? The groups reconvene and load all their information
into a common spreadsheet program. They can then see
a picture of the budget, what makes sense, and what
doesn?t, as well as how each component synchronizes
with all the others.
? The group repeats the process again, to reshape and
refine information and alternatives, until the basic budget
and operating plans are complete. Typically, it
requires four such cycles to come up with a winner.
As you go through the process above, keep in mind
two important issues:
? Synchronization. All the moving parts of the
organization must have a common understanding of the
external environment and other crucial factors ? in
other words, the left hand must know what the right
hand is doing. Synchronizing includes matching the
goals of the interdependent parts and linking their priorities
with other parts of the organization. That way,
when conditions change, synchronization realigns the
multiple priorities and reallocates resources.
? Assumptions. An operating plan addresses the critical
issues in execution by building the budget on realities.
How well your business leaders understand these
realities is a key factor in the success of your plan.
Debate on underlying assumptions is one of the most
critical parts of any operating review ? you cannot set
realistic goals until you have debated the assumptions
behind them.
Once you?ve built an operating plan, you must then
monitor its outcomes over the course of the year. One
outcome of the operations process is identifying targets
that clearly and specifically reflect not only what a business
wants to achieve, but what it is likely to achieve ?
because they are based on the most realistic assumptions
and on the hows of achieving them.
In addition to establishing clear targets, you can learn
a lot from building an operating plan. When you participate
in such a review, you debate the very guts of your
business. All involved parties get to see the company,
both as a whole and as a collection of independently
moving parts. They also learn how to allocate and reassign
resources when the environment changes. ?
8
Execution? SUMMARY
The Operations Process: Making the Link
with Strategy and People
(continued from page 7)
Soundview Executive Book Summaries?
GM?s Synchronized Response
To September 11
The events of September 11, 2001, created real
concern in Detroit that demand for vehicles would
significantly decrease. In response, Ron Zarella,
General Motors? vice president for North America,
conceived of zero percent financing, and implementing
it put demand into high gear. His timing was perfect
? in November, the Federal Reserve reduced
interest rates to a 40-year low of 1.75 percent.
Consumers were able to refinance and gain cash for
down payments, which sent demand skyrocketing.
The move required an operating plan to reprogram
and reallocate resources to synchronize GM?s various
moving parts, helping the company determine what
kinds of vehicles to build, in which plants, and where
to send them, how much advertising money the company
should spend, where they should spend it, and
on which products. Synchronizing production and
advertising was crucial ? with margins cut by the
zero percent financing, an imbalance between production
and advertising would both lose sales and raise
costs.
As it turned out, the program opened up a big
opportunity for GM. Though other automakers joined
the financing bandwagon, GM?s swift execution and
pinpoint synchronization gave the company an immediate
boost in market share.  more

The purpose of this Paper is for you to understand the potential scope and dimensions of the changing nature of American higher education and to do research on contemporary issues that affect academic libraries.

Prepare a paper assessing one of the current issues facing academic libraries and the institutions they serve. Identify one issue that you find compelling and discuss it. You can put it in an historical context, in the context of a particular type of institution or student, or in another framework that suits the issue particularly appropriately. The paper should include historical background and an argument concerning the topic as it relates to the various topics such as library collection, scholarly communication, faculty research and teaching, e-jounal pricing/delivery model and resolving the serial crisis considered throughout the course. You should have a clearly identifiable thesis statement or line of argument!

Your paper should be double-spaced (12-point font), numbered in the lower or upper right-hand corner.

Customer is requesting that (Christiew) completes this order.

National Broadband Policy and Spectrum - Objective - Determine what constitutes privacy in the legal arena via its constitutional underpinnings, explore the history of privacy policy & law, and ev...aluate the perceptions of privacy after 9/11 and in light of information proliferation.

In 8-10 pages, analyze the FCC?s role in broadband regulation as it relates to its constitutionality. How does this affect the privacy of U.S. citizens and how does it play a role in the net neutrality debate? Support your position with evidence from the required readings and be sure to cite diligently. Describe real-world examples that help support your position.
Grading Criteria:
- Clarity of discussion of the FCC?s role with a focus on its constitutionality (20%) Thorough and original discussion of the FCC?s role with a focus on its constitutionality, including examples.
- Clarity of discussion on how the FCC?s role in regulating broadband spectrum affects the privacy of U.S. citizens (25%) The discussion of how the FCC?s role in regulating broadband spectrum affects the privacy of U.S. citizens is thorough and complete.
- Clarity of discussion on how the FCC?s role in regulating broadband spectrum affects the net neutrality debate (25%) Author presents a thoroughly developed and logical discussion on how the FCC?s role in regulating broadband spectrum affects the net neutrality debate. Arguments are clear and persuasive.

This module introduces Spectrum Analysis. You will learn the history of highly relevant spectrum policy, leading to and learning current spectrum policy. You will also learn about the role of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in allocating spectrum for broadband usage. We will discuss the nature of spectrum as a natural resource and also as a Commons. Spectrum auctions and their economics and externalities will be covered through a discussion on privatization of spectrum vs. governmentally controlled monopolies (or oligopolies). Google?s recent attempt at purchasing spectrum will be analyzed as well. U.S. broadband penetration will also be covered through an economic approach. We will end the module with a discussion of the digital divide and the positive social welfare aspects of increasing broadband penetration.

Topics covered include:
-- History of the Telecommunications Policy
-- Telecommunications Act of 1996: Important Provisions
-- Understanding Network Effects
-- Concept of Net Neutrality
-- Pros & Cons of Network Neutrality
-- Spectrum Auctions: Background
-- FCC Spectrum Auctions

Atkinson, R. D. (2007, June). The case for a national broadband policy. Retrieved from http://www.itif.org/files/CaseForNationalBroadbandPolicy.pdf

Hundt, R. (2003, December). Reforming telecom policy for the big broadband era. Retrieved from http://www.newamerica.net/publications/policy/reforming_telecom_policy_for_the_big_broadband_era

Reardon, M. (2011, January 27). FCC takes steps to free up wireless spectrum. C-NET. Retrieved from http://news.cnet.com/8301-30686_3-20029841-266.html

United States. Department of Commerce. (2010, December 16). Commercial data privacy and innovation in the Internet economy: A dynamic policy framework. Retrieved from http://www.ntia.doc.gov/files/ntia/publications/iptf_privacy_greenpaper_12162010.pdf

United States. Department of Commerce. Economics and Statistics Administration. (2010, November). Exploring the digital nation: Home broadband internet adoption in the United States. Retrieved from http://www.ntia.doc.gov/files/ntia/publications/esa_ntia_us_broadband_adoption_report_11082010_1.pdf

United States. National Telecommunications and Information Administration. (2003, October). United States frequency allocations. Retrieved from http://www.ntia.doc.gov/osmhome/allochrt.pdf

Wu, T. (2007, February). Wireless net neutrality: Cellular Carterfone and consumer choice in mobile broadband. Retrieved from http://www.newamerica.net/publications/policy/wireless_net_neutrality

Acquisti, A. (2004, February). The economics of privacy. Retrieved from http://www.heinz.cmu.edu/~acquisti/papers/acquisti_privacy_economics.ppt

Electronic Frontier Foundation. (2009). FOIA: Social networking monitoring. Retrieved from https://www.eff.org/foia/social-network-monitoring

Hirshleifer, J. (1979). Privacy: Its origin, function, and future. Paper presented at the Economics of Law and Privacy Conference, Chicago, IL. Retrieved from http://www.econ.ucla.edu/workingpapers/wp166.pdf

Schwartz, P. M. (2009). Warrantless wiretapping, FISA reform, and the lessons of public liberty: A comment on Holmes's Jorde lecture. California Law Review, 97(2), 407-432. Retrieved from http://www.californialawreview.org/assets/pdfs/97-2/09Apr_Schwartz.pdf  more

Preferred Writer: A. West

Scenario: You are the manager of the IT Department of Online Technical University. A university providing its classes over the Internet.

Write a five page paper describing the method you use to prioritize the IT project portfolio for the university?s Information Systems (email, databases, Web servers, etc.).

As a MINIMUM, the paper will include:

1. The goals of the IT department for its Information Systems
2. Support plan for both office and customer functions
3. Communication methods
4. Personnel and training requirements
5. Application and function priorities

Strategy for prioritizing the IT projects. All major projects for the organization will be evaluated by the following criteria:
1. The project drives (or creates) more revenue for the corporation.
2. The project cuts the cost of doing business.
3. The project is mandated by Federal, State, County, or local laws or executive orders.
4. The competitor has undertaken a similar project.

A list of pending projects, including an evaluation of each project against the above criteria. (A scoring system may be developed by ?weighting? each of the four above-listed criteria. In some IT projects, all four criteria may/may not apply.)

Use strict APA format. Be sure to properly cite and reference all sources used.

EXERCISE 6- 1: CULTURALLY SENSITIVE COMMUNICATIONS Complete the following exercises to become more aware of the nature of your speech and language patterns. 2 1. Imagine that you are working in an age...ncy that provides a wide range of psychosocial services including individual, family, and group counseling. You are about to meet for the first time with a prospective client who remains unemployed after losing a long- term job; is now deeply in debt; and is about to lose his apartment. The client differs dramatically from you. If you are female, pretend that the client is male or transgendered. If you are white, imagine that the client is a person of color. If you are heterosexual, assume that the client is homosexual or bisexual. If you are tall, assume that the client is of shorter stature. If you are highly educated, imagine a client with limited formal education. If you are middle class, pretend that the client is virtually penniless. If you have a residence, presume that the client is homeless. If you believe in a god or higher power, you might imagine that the client is agnostic or atheist; or if you are Christian, assume that your client is Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist. If you have normal hear-ing, imagine that your client is hearing- impaired. If you are sighted, assume that your client is blind. If you are able- bodied, imagine that your client uses a wheelchair to get around. Now, use a recording device ( for example, audio or video) to capture yourself as you express the words you would say or sign as you begin work with this prospective client. Introduce yourself, describe something about the kinds of services your agency might be able to provide, and ask this imaginary person some of the questions you would like to ask. Continue this imaginary introduction for approximately 2 minutes. Replay the recording and review your language usage. Examine the words you said and consider them from the point of view of the imaginary person you have created for this exercise. Use the space below to discuss how your prospective client would likely experience the words and language you have chosen to use? Consider how people who differ from you in terms of age, gender, skin color, sexual orientation, educational background, socio-economic status, ethnicity, religious beliefs, physical appearance, and physical or mental ability might experience you, your speech, and your language. Finally, identify one or two aspects of culturally sensitive communication that you would like to strengthen in preparation for your roles and functions as a professional social worker.


2.2 Access the Internet and use a search engine to first locate a list of ethnic groups in the world and then a list of racial and ethnic groups in the United States. Alternately, you could go to your university or library to locate books or other print material containing such lists ( Levinson, 1998). Recognize that various sources may use different definitions of ethnic group or ethnolinguistic group. For example, if you search the online version of The World Factbook of the U. S. Central Intelligence Agency using the keywords ? field listing ethnic groups? you should find a tabular list of ethnic groups by percentage of population in the world?s nations ( Central Intelligence Agency, 2012). If you use the keywords ? lists of ethnic groups? in a search engine such as Google, Yahoo, or Bing, you would prob-ably locate the Wikipedia entry by the same title ( Wikipedia, 2012). If you conducted a similar search using the keywords ? Fact Sheet for a Race, Ethnic, or Ancestry Group,? you would probably access the American Fact Finder website of the U. S. Census Bureau. That site permits you to search for demographic data related to a particular population group in the country as a whole, by state, or by city/ town. You might notice that the list of racial, ethnic, and ancestry groups used by the U. S. Census Bureau differs somewhat from those used by other organizations. Once you have gained a sense of the hundreds of ethnic groups throughout the world and the country, select one that interests you and about which you know little. For example, you might decide to learn about the Hmong or perhaps the Navajo, the Amish, or the Druze, Persian, Armenian, Kurdish, Sikh, Haitian, or Bantu ethnic groups. Once you have made your choice, conduct a library, bibliographic, or Internet search to identify three or four cultural ? do?s and taboos? in verbal or written communication style or approach with members of that ethnic group. Be sure to include at least one ? do? that conveys respect and at least one ? taboo? that suggests disrespect ( Axtell, 1998, 2007).
Use the space below to list the ? do?s? and ? taboos? and to cite the source of the informa-tion. Finally, remember that members of a particular racial, ethnic, linguistic, cultural, or national group or tribe are not ? all alike.? Indeed, variations within groups might some-times be greater than those between groups.
3. Access the Internet and use a search engine to locate the ? Say Hello to the World? proj-ect of the Internet Public Library ( 2009). Use the following space to write how you would say ? Hello, my name is ( your name)? in each of the following languages: ( a) Arabic, ( b) Cherokee, ( c) Chinese, ( d) Hindi, ( e) Spanish, and ( f ) Swahili. Also, look to see how the phrase ? Hello, my name is? appears in Braille and in American Sign Language.
4. Suppose you were about to meet with a family that recently entered the United States from another country. Because of a preliminary telephone call, you know that they are interested in learning about immigration laws and procedures for obtaining a ? Green Card? ( Form I- 551). Access the Internet and search for the ? Lawful Permanent Resi-dence? (? Green Card?) section of the U. S. Citizen and Immigration Services ( USCIS) website ( 2009) to become familiar with key requirements. Use the following space to outline what is involved in qualifying for green card status.



EXERCISE 6- 2: NONVERBAL COMMUNICATIONS AND BODY LANGUAGE 1. Recruit a friend or colleague to join you in a few nonverbal experiments. 4 After you have completed them, use the space provided to summarize your observations, discoveries, preferences, and questions. Make note of your partner?s as well.
a. Maintaining eye contact, slowly move toward your partner, who remains in position, until it becomes uncomfortable for you. Then stop. Observe the approximate distance between you. What were your thoughts, feelings, and sensations as you moved closer and closer to your partner? What did your partner experience as you approached?

b. Position yourself face- to- face with your partner at a distance of approximately 4 feet. Look directly into his or her eyes until you become uncomfortable. When that occurs, simply avert your eyes. Now, move to 3 feet, then to 2 feet, each time looking directly into your partner?s eyes until you experience discomfort. Then turn away. Share your reactions with each other. Now, experiment with different kinds and degrees of eye contact within a 2- to 4- foot range. For example, try looking at your partner?s cheekbone or mouth instead of directly into her or his eyes. Share your reactions. Experiment further by looking into your partner?s eyes for several seconds and then slightly change your focus so that you look at a cheekbone for a few seconds; then return your gaze to the eyes. Follow that by looking at your part-ner?s mouth for a few seconds, and then return to the eyes. Share your responses to this manner of eye contact.
c. Place two chairs squarely facing one another ( front to front) approximately 2 feet apart. Be seated. Share your thoughts and feelings as you sit face- to- face and knee-to- knee. Is it comfortable for both of you, for only one, for neither? If it is uncom-fortable, alter the distance until it becomes comfortable. Ask your partner to do the same. Finally, compromising if necessary, move the chairs until you arrive at a mutually comfortable distance. Change the placement of the chairs so that in-stead of directly facing one another, they now are side by side in parallel position, approximately 6 inches apart. As you and your partner take your seats, share your respective thoughts and feelings. Now increase the angle so that the chairs form a 90- degree angle. Share with one another your reactions to this arrangement. Now increase the angle an additional 45 degrees. Share your reactions to this position. Which arrangement does your partner prefer? Which do you?
d. Based on the results of your experimentation, place the chairs in the position and at the angle that is reasonably comfortable for both you and your partner. Some compromise may be necessary. Now, maintaining a more or less neutral facial ex-pression and without saying a word, try to show through your body language, but without changing your facial expression, that you care about your partner and are interested in his or her thoughts and feelings. Continue to experiment with three or four different body positions, attempting to demonstrate concern and interest, for approximately a minute each. Following each position, seek verbal feedback from your partner concerning her or his reactions. What did you learn from the exercise?
e. Assume a position that your partner indicates reflects caring and interest. Now ?begin to experiment with different facial expressions. First, let your face become re-laxed in its more or less usual state. Retain this facial expression for about a minute while your partner experiences the effect. After a minute, seek feedback from your partner about his or her observations and reactions. Then experiment with other ?facial expressions through which you hope to express silently, in turn, affection, compassion, joy, sadness, disappointment, disapproval, fear, and anger. Hold each facial expression for a minute or so while your partner tries to determine the feeling you are trying to express. Share your experience, observations, and discoveries.




worker. All women are not the same; nor are all men, all people of color, all children, all gay or les-bian people, all social workers, or even all professors. Be sensitive to and carefully consider factors of gender, class, ethnicity, ableness, sexual orientation, religion, and cultural affiliation but also recognize that, despite our nearly identical DNA, each individual person is unique. Each person differs, at least to some extent, from common characteristics of the ? average? member of his or her class or group. As an interview proceeds, you may attempt to match the client?s language mode. Some peo-ple favor words associated with hearing; others prefer those identified with seeing; still others like words that indicate sensing or touching. For example, if you use words such as hear, sound, noise, loud, or soft with people who favor an auditory language mode, you enhance the likelihood of mu-tual understanding. Your potential value may also increase. A similarly favorable reaction is likely if you were to use see, view, and perceive with people who prefer a visual language mode, or feel, sense, and touch with those who favor tactile language ( Bandler & Grinder, 1979). In general, try to adopt a speaking style that is moderate in tone and speed of delivery. Through your speech, convey that you are truly interested in what the client has to say ( Ivey, 1988, p. 22). Sometimes, however, you may deliberately increase or decrease your rate of speech to match the pace of the client. On other occasions, you may purposely slow your pace to lead a fast- talking client into a slower speaking mode. In some circumstances ( for example, when working with a client with some loss of a client with some loss of hearing), you may lower the pitch of your voice to be more audible. Generally, when you speak or write, active voice is preferable to passive voice, and each unit of speech should not be so long or complex as to impede understanding. Short messages and single questions are easier to comprehend, as are single questions. Multipart questions can confuse others. In written communications, adopt a professional attitude consistent with the qualities and characteristics of professionalism discussed in earlier chapters. Badly written, poorly formatted docu-ments that contain spelling and grammatical errors, logical fallacies, and fail to reflect critical thought, a scholarly perspective, or the universal intellectual standards are likely to be dismissed by recipients. In general, write in relatively short sentences. Use active voice, get to the point, provide a ra-tionale for or evidence to support your position and, when needed to strengthen a position, include one or more illustrative examples. Gear your language to your audience. If you are communicating with other helping professionals you may use relevant jargon to capture complex phenomena that are best described through sophisticated terminology. In other contexts and for other audiences, avoid jargon altogether. Use succinct, descriptive, and businesslike language. Unless your purpose requires an evaluation or professional judgment, avoid speculative language. Distinguish opinions and conclusions from observations and facts. Organize your document in an orderly fashion. You may use actual section headings or simply con-ceptualize each paragraph or two as a section so that the heading is implied. Obviously, there are many various documents that social workers prepare. These include notations made as part of case records ( written or, increasingly, electronic), agendas and minutes of meetings, formal position or ? white papers,? grant applications, business plans and, of course, a seemingly endless number of e- mail messages. In addition to case records, the most commonly prepared documents are probably letters, memorandums, and e- mails. Professional letters are organized in ? business letter? fashion. If you prepare letters as part of your role with an organization, use the agency?s letterhead paper. How-ever, if you are not writing as a representative of your agency but rather from your perspective as a professional social worker, use your personal letterhead paper? or include your name followed by earned credentials ( for example, Sue Wong, MSW, LSW indicates that Ms. Wong has earned a Master of Social Work degree and is currently a Licensed Social Worker). Along with your name, place your address, center- justified, at the top of the first page. As you prepare a professional letter, keep its purpose in mind. Ask yourself, ? What do I hope to accomplish through this letter?? Once answered, outline the steps needed to accomplish it. ?Typically, the first paragraph contains a succinct summary of your purpose and, when needed, a brief introduction of yourself. The remaining paragraphs may be used to elaborate upon that ?purpose by, for example, summarizing factual information about the nature and extent of a prob-lem or issue along with an illustrative example or two to provide a ? human face? ( without risking privacy or violating confidentiality); providing a rationale as to why action is needed; identify-ing a few reasonable approaches and then discussing the advantages and disadvantages as well as potential risks and potential benefits of each; and then recommending the approach you prefer. A ?concluding summary often helps to reinforce the message. As in all professional documents, carefully edit and reedit the letter; be sure to credit sources, avoid plagiarization, and double check for spelling, grammatical, and logical errors. Avoid unusual fonts. Instead use a traditional font? such as Times New Roman? in 12- point size. Left justify all text ( with the exception of your name and address which is centered at the top). Most professional letters reflect a structure similar to that illustrated in Box 6.3.

BOX 6.3
Professional Letter Format: Example
Sue Wong, MSW, LSW
1 Long Drive Indianapolis, Indiana 46260

[ Date ( e. g., July 27, 2012)]
[ Recipient?s Personal Title, Name, and Credentials if applicable and known ( e. g., Mr. Curt Blank, BSW)]
[ Recipient?s Position if known ( e. g., Director of Homeless Services)]
[ Name of Organization if applicable ( e. g., City of Indianapolis)]
[ Street Address ( e. g., 3611 County Square Building, Suite # 152)]
[ City or Town, State or Province, and Postal Code ( e. g., Indianapolis, Indiana 46202)]
[ Country, if needed ( e. g., USA)]

[ Salutation and Name followed by a colon ( e. g., Dear Mr. Blank:)] [ Introductory Paragraph( s)]
[ Main Paragraph( s)]
[ Summary or Concluding Paragraph( s)]
[ Closing followed by a comma ( e. g., Sincerely yours,)]


[ Signature ( e. g., Sue Wong]
[ Your Printed Name ( e. g., Sue Wong, MSW, LSW)]
[ Your Professional Title ( e. g., Licensed Social Worker)]

EXERCISE 6- 3: TALKING 1. Imagine that you are serving as a social worker in a community outreach program. The program seeks to locate homeless people in the area and inform them of com-munity resources that might enhance their lives and well- being. Several services for homeless individuals and families are available. These include: temporary housing and food ?preparation; medical and dental care; job training and placement; and ongoing counseling. Use a word- processing program to prepare a preliminary ? script? to help you prepare what you might say to homeless people in introducing yourself and the services you can provide. Reflect upon the script and then revise as needed. Familiarize yourself with the script? but do not memorize it. Then, without reading the script, make a 2- to 3- minute audio recording of what you might say when you first meet a homeless person that you find living in a small wooded section near a downtown river and seek to intro-duce yourself and describe the services provided by the program. 6 Replay the recording and review your language usage. Examine the words you said and consider them from the point of view of a person who has not sought your company. Reflect upon your speech and tone of voice. Use the space provided below to respond to the following questions: What might they suggest about your approach and attitude toward the person? Do your voice and speech convey the qualities of interest, respect, confidence, and hopefulness? Identify one or two aspects of verbal and nonverbal com-munication that you would like to strengthen in preparation for your roles and functions as a professional social worker. Following that, imagine that you are that homeless person. A stranger approaches and begins to speak to you. You do not know the identity of the stranger nor the purpose for the visit. How might you experience the stranger?s body language and movement, nonverbal expressions, speech, voice, and language? As a homeless person, how would you like to be approached, addressed, and engaged?

3. As you know, the ? talking? skills also include written as well as verbal forms of com-munication. Use a word- processing program to prepare two professional- quality docu-ments: ( a) a letter and ( b) a memorandum. As a topic for both documents, select a social problem that has recently been the subject of local, national, or international news and also interests you. For example, you might be concerned about human trafficking, or the illegal procurement and sales of human organs, or perhaps injustices associated with application of the death penalty. You might question the practice of stoning or caning women accused of adultery, the forced marriage of girls to adult men, or the practice of female circumcision. You might be concerned about drought, famine, hunger, and starvation in parts of the world or perhaps about the social impact of climate change. As social workers, we are well aware of a seemingly infinite number of major social problems. Choose one that engenders passion and energy. Then, draft either a ? letter to the editor? or a letter to your legislative representative. You do not have to mail the let-ter. View the exercise as an opportunity to practice your written communication skills. In the letter, use a paragraph or two to introduce the nature and scope of the prob-lem, and provide an illustrative example. Use the remaining paragraphs to suggest some ?action? ?perhaps in the form of a policy or program, legislation, or steps that other con-cerned people might take. Prepare the document in the form of a business letter. After you edit and finalize the letter, prepare an alternate version in the form of a memorandum to colleagues. To do so, make an electronic copy of the letter that you prepared and then edit it so that it appears in the form of a memorandum. Label the word- processed documents ? Draft Letter 1? and ? Draft Memo 1? and include them in your Social Work Skills Portfolio.
EXERCISE 6- 4: LISTENING Recruit a friend or colleague to join you in a listening exercise. Indicate that the purpose of this exercise is to help you become a better listener. Ask your partner to identify a topic of interest that the two of you might discuss for approximately 10 minutes. As the listener, your tasks are to en-courage your partner to discuss the subject; to hear and comprehend what she or he communicates; and to remember what was said and done. Keep in mind that your partner?s perspective is para-mount. Withhold your own opinions; refrain from judgments or evaluations in both speech and thought. This is your partner?s time. Let the discussion proceed in whatever way and direction your partner wishes. Encourage him or her to communicate freely and fully, and try not to interfere with the flow of expression. As your partner talks, listen attentively and observe carefully. At the end of the 10- minute period, thank your partner and proceed with the following:

1. First, ask your partner to reflect upon her or his experience of the exchange. Then, ask your partner to give you truly honest feedback about how well you listened. Say that you sincerely want to become a better listener so that genuine feedback is needed. You might also say that whatever your partner says, your feelings will not be hurt because this is a practice exercise and you plan to improve. As you seek feedback from your partner, explore nonverbal as well as verbal factors. For instance, ask about eye contact, facial expressions, body positions and movements, physical gestures, tone of voice, rate of speech and its audibility in terms of their relationship to listening. Did your partner feel you were interested in what she or he had to say; that you understood and remembered what was said; and you were non- judgmental about her or him and what she or he said? Ask about points at which your partner felt that you listened especially well as well as those when you did not. Finally, ask your partner for suggestions about what you might do to improve upon your listening abilities and become a better listener. Thank your partner again and say goodbye. Reflect upon the exercise and your partner?s observations, then use the space pro-vided to: ( a) summarize your partner?s comments and suggestions; ( b) identify aspects of your listening skills that you would like to strengthen; and ( c) outline brief plans by which to become a better listener.



EXERCISE 6- 5: ACTIVE LISTENING In the spaces provided, write the words you might say in active listening to the following statements: 1. CLIENT: My husband thinks I?m an alcoholic. I?m here because he made me come. Sure, I drink. I drink a lot. But he?s the reason I drink.
2. CLASSMATE: I?ve missed the last three classes and don?t know what?s going on in here. Today is the day of the midterm exam and I know I?m going to flunk. I?m so ?uptight, I can?t think straight.
3. WOMAN WHO LOST HER 12- YEAR- OLD CHILD TO GANG VIOLENCE: I never wanted to live in this cesspool. We just couldn?t afford to move to another neighborhood. There are gunshots almost every night and the police rarely come by? that is, until after someone?s been killed. Drug dealers and street walkers are everywhere. I feel so guilty that my lovely daughter had to live and to die here. It?s just so unfair. If you don?t have much, you have to live where you can and that means somebody, sometime is gonna die.
4. SUPERVISOR: I am disappointed that you did not follow up on the Sanchez case. You know those children are at risk and I expected you to visit them again last week.
5. PROFESSOR: I wonder if the match between your personal values and those of the social work profession is a good one. From your comments in class and the papers you?ve written, it seems to me that your views differ quite a bit from those of most social ?workers.
6. SOCIAL WORK COLLEAGUE: I am working with a family that is driving me up the wall. I know I have a problem here. I get so angry at the parents for being so passive. I work so damn hard and they don?t do a thing!
7. CHILD: Sometimes my mommy?s boyfriend is mean to her. He hits her and she ends up crying a lot. I don?t like him at all. 8. COMMUNITY LEADER: I appreciate your offer to help with our community organi-zation and development efforts. However, the social workers we?ve had before have never worked out.  more

Hi,
could you please answer the questions according to the marketing ch13 summary below. Also, I would be very happy if you can send it asap the deadline for the assignment is actually today at 11...:30pm would be great if you can finish it earlier.
thank you!

Supply Chain Management
You must read chapter 13 and express your opinions about the following topics:

1. Discuss the benefits of supply chain management. How does the implementation of supply chain management result in enhanced customer value

2. Discuss the concept of supply chain integration. How does it result in better customer-related outcomes?

3. What are some of the likely outcomes of a firms failure to embrace one or more supply chain integration types.

4. What are the key processes in supply chain management, and who performs them? How does each process lead to increased satisfaction on the part of the customer?



Ch13summary

automatic replenishment program a real-time inventory system that triggers shipments only when a good is sold to the end user
build-to-stock a production method whereby products are made in advance of demand based on forecasts and are stored until customer orders arrive
business processes bundles of interconnected activities that stretch across firms in the supply chain
customer relationship management (CRM) process allows companies to prioritize their marketing focus on different customer groups according to each groups long-term value to the company or supply chain
customer service management process presents a multi-company, unified response system to the customer whenever complaints, concerns, questions, or comments are voiced
demand management process seeks to align supply and demand throughout the supply chain by anticipating customer requirements at each level and creating demand-related plans of action prior to actual customer purchasing behavior
demand-supply integration (DSI) a supply chain operational philosophy focused on integrating the supply-management and demand-generating functions of an organization
distribution resource planning (DRP) an inventory control system that manages the replenishment of goods from the manufacturer to the final consumer
electronic data interchange (EDI) information technology that replaces the paper documents that usually accompany business transactions, such as purchase orders and invoices, with electronic transmission of the needed information to reduce inventory levels, improve cash flow, streamline operations, and increase the speed and accuracy of information transmission
electronic distribution a distribution technique that includes any kind of product or service that can be distributed electronically, whether over traditional forms such as fiber optic cable or through satellite transmission of electronic signals
fourth-party logistics company (4PL or logistics integrator) a consulting-based organization that assesses anothers entire logistical service needs and provides integrated solutions, often drawing on multiple 3PLs for actual service
inventory control system a method of developing and maintaining an adequate assortment of materials or products to meet a manufacturers or a customers demand
logistics the process of strategically managing the efficient flow and storage of raw materials, in-process inventory, and finished goods from point of origin to point of consumption
logistics information system the link that connects all the logistics functions of the supply chain
manufacturing flow management process concerned with ensuring that firms in the supply chain have the needed resources to manufacture with flexibility and to move products through a multi-stage production process
mass customization (build-to-order) a production method whereby products are not made until an order is placed by the customer; products are made according to customer specifications
materials requirement planning (MRP; materials management) an inventory control system that manages the replenishment of raw materials, supplies, and components from the supplier to the manufacturer
materials-handling system a method of moving inventory into, within, and out of the warehouse
nearshoring the transfer of an offshored activity from a distant to a nearby country
offshoring the outsourcing of a business process from one country to another for the purpose of gaining economic advantage
order fulfillment process a highly integrated process, often requiring persons from multiple companies and multiple functions to come together and coordinate to create customer satisfaction at a given place and time
order processing system a system whereby orders are entered into the supply chain and filled
outsourcing (contract logistics) a manufacturers or suppliers use of an independent third party to manage an entire function of the logistics system, such as transportation, warehousing, or order processing
postponement a hybrid production method whereby basic units of a finished good are manufactured in advance of actual demand and held in strategic form or location until demand occurs, when final customization takes place
product development and commercialization process includes the group of activities that facilitates the joint development and marketing of new offerings among a group of supply chain partner firms
returns management process enables firms to manage volumes of returned product efficiently while minimizing returns-related costs and maximizing the value of the returned assets to the firms in the supply chain
smart RFID an inventory handling and tracking system that employs radio-frequency electromagnetic fields to transfer and read product data via an electronic tag
supplier relationship management process supports manufacturing flow by identifying and maintaining relationships with highly valued suppliers
supply chain the connected chain of all of the business entities, both internal and external to the company, that perform or support the logistics function
supply chain agility an operational strategy focused on inducing inventory velocity and operational flexibility simultaneously in the supply chain
supply chain integration when multiple firms or business functions in a supply chain coordinate their activities and processes so that they are seamlessly linked to one another in an effort to satisfy the customer
supply chain management a management system that coordinates and integrates all of the activities performed by supply chain members into a seamless process, from the source to the point of consumption, resulting in enhanced customer and economic value
supply chain resilience the ability of a supply chain to return to its ideal operational state after being disrupted
supply chain risk any potential disruption that threatens the supply chains efficient and effective operations
supply chain security efforts made by companies to protect their in-transit inventory or value-transforming assets from external or internal threats
supply chain team an entire group of individuals who orchestrate the movement of goods, services, and information from the source to the consumer
sustainable supply chain management a supply chain management philosophy that embraces the need for optimizing social and environmental costs in addition to financial costs
third-party logistics company (3PL) a firm that provides functional logistics services to others
three-dimensional printing (3DP) the creation of three-dimensional objects via an additive manufacturing (printing) technology that layers raw material into desired shapes  more

The company that has been approved for my topic is Verizon.

For this research assignment, you will research the global marketplace and then analyze one global company of your choice. You will:

1. Discuss the apparent major drivers of globalization in the global marketplace and the apparent drivers for this company.

2. Analyze the economic and financial forces that affect international business and apply your findings to your business.

3. Analyze the physical and environmental forces that affect international business and apply this to your business.

4. Analyze the sociocultural and labor forces that affect international business and apply this to your business.

5. Analyze the political and legal forces that affect international business and apply this to your business.

Sources - Use print or electronic books, research journals, periodicals, and electronic database references. Select no more than one non-juried/non-refereed Internet site (a site that contains material that has not undergone professional peer review).


Customer is requesting that (jonsmom2) completes this order.

Organizational Behavior Terminology and Concepts Paper

Write a 900- word paper in which you explain the following key concepts and terminology:

Organizational culture and behavior
Diversity
Communication
Business Ethics
Change Management

Describe the observable aspects of each of the above.
Provide a brief analysis of the culture and behavior of your organization or an organization with which you are familiar.
Cite your references. If you used an electronic source, include the URL.
Format your paper using APA standards.


There are faxes for this order.

TYPOGRAPHY RESEARCH

You are to research the history and development of typography. Begin from the earliest forms of written communication and take us through to the current digital era. Discuss how technology has influenced type design. Highlight significant events in printing and typographic developments. Mention notable typographic designers and discuss their influence.

Open to all writers!!

Below are 5 essay questions in parentheses. below each essay question is my own research, pay no attention to my own research write 5 new essay questions in your own wor...ds. please add at lease one reference per essay question.
also please write 1 page per essay question.


1.(In what ways, if any, are American domestic terror groups and international terror groups forging common ties? Who are their common enemies? Please provide examples to support your answer. Also, you are encouraged to draw from
independent sources to construct your answer.)


The American domestic terror groups and international terror groups are forging common ties through what some experts call seamless terrorism where the line between foreign and domestic terrorists operating in the United States may become
unclear (Sloan 1997: 10). As the twenty-first century unfolds, we are witnessing a new merger of extremist ideologies from young people on both the extreme left and
and extreme right of the political spectrum who believe their world views overlap in several areas (Bolden, Olson-Raymer, Whamond, 2001). The creation of sophisticated communications networks via the internet that are linked to like-minded but geographically dispersed groups. The U.S. government policies or US involvement overseas and representations throughout the world are the enemies. The
music scene has become a link to spread racist lyrics of a type of music called oi, which deals in white power and another type called Black Metal music, which sings
about anti-Christian themes. Militant Islamic extremist have established extensive networks throughout the United
States and the vast improvements in modern technology make it easy for them to stay in contact with each other this has a potential to a reaction to U.S. policies and actions
in the Middle East (Bolden et al. 2001).

2.(To what extent has the internet become a tool for domestic terror groups? Where would you strike the balance between freedom of speech and communication via the
internet and inciting and organizing violence? How aggressive should law enforcement authorities monitor the activities of suspected domestic terror groups on
the web (i.e. what should they do)? Would your position remain the same if you knew that federal authorities would then be empowered to enhance their monitoring of you?)


The internet has opened up a new potential threat to the United States called Cyberterrorism. The main weapons in this new threat were computer viruses, programmed to damage software. Logic bombs, which are set to detonate at a certain time and destroy or rewrite data. High energy radio frequency guns that disable electronic targets through high powered electromagnetic impulses affecting all
electronic components in the vicinity (Laqueur 199:75).
With the increasing use of computers by everyone computer hackers continue to use the internet to break into sensitive American military and civil systems. The internet
by being a collection of computers connected through networked communications has allowed an individual to reach a large dispensed audience with information. Its low cost of entry and relative ease of internet publishing help to expand the number of lesser-known individuals espousing an extremist message (Bolden et al. 2001). It has become a platform for them to communicate to each other and recruit
members. The number of people who use the internet is expected to increase and it is very likely that the Web will become an increasingly important information source.
Consequently, ADL expects that it and the rest of the internet will become an even more significant part of the propaganda arsenal of extremist groups. (Source: Schwarts 1996; SPLC Summer 1999). I would strike the balance between freedoms of speech and communications via the internet with inciting and organizing violence by collecting data on known terrorist members and their groups. At this time in our
history we have to give on the individual side to reduce action that could endanger or cause large numbers of causalities by protecting the whole. I do not like the chose, because this is a very sensitive area because giving federal authorities more means to monitor me is also empowering someone to have the potianal to abuse that power.
There would have to be a very strong set of checks and balances to reduce that human factor of an individual or individuals using this in an abusive manner.

3. (Explain how domestic terror organizations rely heavily on common criminal activities to conduct their business. What are some of the common crimes most associated with domestic terrorism? Please provide examples.)


Domestic terror organizations rely heavily on common criminal activities to conduct their business through committing mail fraud, racketeering, robbery/burglary, and violations involving machine guns and destructive devices.
These are used because all terrorist organizations require money, material, transportation, identity documents, communication systems and safe havens to accomplish their aims. Domestic groups are most successful at acquiring false identity documents, manufacturing illegal firearms, armored truck and bank robbery, and murder. An American terrorist cell known as the Aryan Republican Army (ARA). The ARA was a gang of white supremacist who ziggagged across the Midwest, hitting bank after bank for a period of two years (1994-95). In all, the ARA robbed twenty-two banks, netting some $500.000. Those proceeds were used to support a series of terrorist attacks that included armored truck heist attempted assassinations, and bombings. The purpose of all this, as incredible as it may sound, was to overthrow the government (Hamm, 2002a). An American terrorist cell known as The Order raised money through counterfeiting, bank robbery, and a spectacular armored truck heist that netted the group $3.6 million (Flynn and Gerhardt, 1989). According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the money
was allegedly distributed to white supremacists across the country (Stern, 1996, pg 55). In November 1994, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols broke into a Kansas limestone
quarry and stole dynamite, Tovex sausages, detonator cord, and blasting caps. Theses explosives were later used in the Oklahoma City bombing (Hamm, 1997)

4.(Describe the most significant findings or information contained in the Hamm report. What is significant about the findings you have identified? What implications
for the criminal justice system are embedded in the findings you have identified? Explain.)

The most significant finding in the Hamm report was the level of crimes being treated as a business of destruction. They have become privatized and self sustaining. The criminal justice system has implications in determing if it is now a crime or an terrorist act now being committed. The report was very enlightening in its report of the
decline in state sponsored terrorism that has caused many terrorist organizations to resort to an alternate means of support through criminal activity. The criminal analysis of the international jihad groups and the domestic right wing
groups and description and use of criminal skills and opportunities were very informative. The main findings of the study was the education on the most successful
method of both detecting and prosecuting. cases of terrorism through the pursuit of conventional criminal nvestigations. The report read more like an education on how we are still learning how they operate and how to stop them. This has been accomplished through the most successful methods of both detecting and prosecuting cases of terrorism is through the pursuit of conventional criminal investigations. The report shows that we have only scratched the surface and continue to learn as we go following each case.

5. (Based on information learned in this course, as well as other courses you may have taken and other sources of information available to you, please explain which is the United States: domestic terroris or international terrorism. In your explanation, compare and contrast domestic and international terrorism. Also, please indicate whether either type of terrorism is subject to defeat. Or, in a free society such as ours, must we simply learn to live with the annoyance and tragedies of ideological, political, and/or religiously-motivated violence?)


Domestic terrorism has been a problem in our past and will continue to be one in our future. The bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City is undeniably the worst terrorist incident in U.S. history. But the real horror is that the bombing is only a warning shot fired by those who wage civil war in America. There are thousands of people all across the country, armed and ready for this conflict, spreading a message of hate and fear. They are all part of the American militia movement (Stern 1996). When you have a group or individual who has a problem or want to change the government or induce fear on a certain group in our borders we domestic homegrown

terrorism. International terrorism is the greater threat to the U.S. right now and they will continue to be the greatest threat in the future. The international terrorist influence will also have the potential to increase domestic terrorism. The bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City at the time one of the most significant and devasting acts of domestic terrorism in the 1990s. What made this event even more troubling for many was the fact that the perpetrators were individuals with ties to international terrorist who wanted to retaliate against the United States for perceived wrongs to Islamic fundamentalist interest ((Bolden et al. 2001). The United States support of Israel and its role as peacemaker in that region has
generated much of the terrorism against American facilities overseas now on American soil. The United States has been viewed as an appropriate target for Islamic militants due
to its support for their enemies. Islamic fundamentalist ideology assumes that the very existence of the secular West is an insult to Islam ((Bolden et al. 2001). Militant Islamic extremist have established extensive networks throughout the United States and now pose the greatest threat of domestic terrorism in the United States
(Emerson 1998). Domestic terrorism is when persons use, or threaten to use, political violence either to undermine or overthrow existing governmental policies or structures, or
to intimidate individuals and groups they perceive as threatening to the social, political,
economic, or ideological status quo (Olson-Raymer, 2001, p 12). International terrorism that members in two or more nations with the intent to affect two or more nations
(Merriam-Websters, 2000). I do believe both are subject to defeat, but not to the extent that we will be rid of them. It is a very hard and slow process to combat an ideological
movement. You must find the source of fuel for this hatred and start there. Our free society will never to live with the annoyance and tragedies of this ideological, political
and religiously-motivated violence. We will have to do a better job in using the tools that we have and how and when to apply them. Until we change our own mind set of
thinking to get in tuned with that of our enemy we will continue to make mistakes, which only embolden them.  more

Hi. Please find the assignment details below. Basically I need to write a report/business proposal for a company. The academic level is Year 3, BSc Computing Undergradute course.

Assignment...r> You work for a senior consultancy specializing in providing "clicks and Bricks" ecommerce solutions for traditional companies. Generally your approach is to examine all aspects of companies business such as industry and company value chains, approaches to marketing and promotion, competitors, customer segmentation and current operations. Following this you then write a proposal describing the solution you propose and detailing how the company can implement this solution.

Your company as recently been asked by "PZE Puzzles" A company specializing in the production of crossword puzzles for newspapers and
magazines

For this company you must write a business proposal containing the following
information:

1. A comparison of three companies who have existing ecommerce presences. Describe the electronic commerce business processes of three companies
who have similar business models to the company you have chosen and that
you feel your company could learn from. As you work to identify these
business processes, remember that you may be able to observe specific Web
site features that are results of such processes. You may also be able to infer
the existence of business processes by reading statements that these
companies make on their Web sites. Explain how you would adapt each
process to meet the needs of your chosen company.
(NOTE FOR ESSAY TOWN: THE THREE COMPANIES DISCUSSED MUST BE ENGLISH, BASED IN ENGLAND, NOT UNITED STATES)

2. A Novel and original proposal for a new web presence for the company
you have chosen.

3. A proposal for implementing a effective web presence, including
technical infrastructure, costing and design.

Produce a design specification for your company's lnternet presence. Such a
design specification must include: hardware and software servers,
connections, database technologies and any other lnternet technologies your
proposed systems architecture requires. Produce a full costing for your
proposed solution. This costing should also include the costs of employing
personal required to complete the implementation of the new web presence.
(NOTE FOR ESSAY TOWN: THE COSTING SHOULD BE IN POUNDS STERLING)

4. Marketing and Promotion strategy for the launch of the new website.
List ways in which your company could market and promote the new web
presence. Ensure that you include in your answer the role of link exchange
centres, banner severs, email marketing and web portals as ways of driving
customers to the web site.

There are faxes for this order.  more