The Judicial Branch Of The United States - 1515 Words

The United States of America has a very complex system of government through the use of checks and balances. The system we have in place allows for the three branches of government to control one another so that one branch could not be the most powerful. What makes the judicial branch different is that the decision brought by the Supreme Court is the final say and cannot be overruled. Along with that the election process for the legislative and executive branch is brought to by the use of a vote while those of the Supreme Court appointed by the president. The process of becoming a Supreme Court justice seems rather undemocratic and the power given and terms served also seem undemocratic. The Supreme Court serves as the head of the judicial branch and is made up of 9 justices, 8 associate justices and 1 chief justice. Unlike the other branches of government, the members of the Supreme Court are nominated by the President and approved by the Senate. The Judicial branch interprets the law though the use of court cases and has the power of judicial review where it can rule whether or not something is permitted under the constitution. Those chosen as Justices of the Supreme Court are selected by the President and approved by the Senate. They are not elected for terms by vote like the other branches of Government but instead appointed by the President and approved by the Senate for life. The reason for this is that the constitution states that justices â€Å"shall hold their OfficesShow MoreRelatedThe Judicial Branch Of The United States1376 Words   |  6 PagesWithin the United States government exists the Judicial Branch. The Judicial Branch is responsible for explai ning the laws that are created and determining whether or not they are constitutional. The Judicial Branch has the power to punish violators of these laws based on the severity of the crime. Matching a punishment to the crime is not as easy task. An issue within the Judicial Branch, and the United States as a whole, is the overcrowding of the prisons caused by high mandatory sentencingRead MoreThe Judicial Branch Of The United States Essay1681 Words   |  7 PagesThe United States government consists of three main branches: the legislative, the executive, and the judicial. Within the contents of this essay, the judicial branch will be examined. The judicial branch of the United States government oversees justice throughout the country by expounding and applying laws by means of a court system.1 This system functions by hearing and determining the legality of such cases.2 Sitting at the top of the United States court system is the Supreme Court. The SupremeRead MoreSystem of Che cks and Balances in America Essay1215 Words   |  5 PagesIn 1787 the United States of America Constitution, written by America’s forefathers, established a revised plan of government for the United States of America. The United States of America Constitution proclaims its purpose in its Preamble: â€Å"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordainRead MoreEssay about The Judicial Branch1512 Words   |  7 PagesThe United States government consists of three main branches: the legislative, the executive, and the judicial. Within the contents of this essay, the judicial branch will be examined. The judicial branch of the United States government oversees justice throughout the country by expounding and applying laws by means of a court system.1 This system func tions by hearing and determining the legality of such cases.2 Sitting at the top of the United States court system is the Supreme Court. The SupremeRead MoreThe National Government Of The United States1445 Words   |  6 PagesAbstract The National Government of the United States of America consists of three branches. These branches of government, which include the legislative branch, the executive branch, and the judicial branch, separate the government s power into a form of checks and balances. The system of checks and balances has been set in place to allow the three branches to limit the power of the other branches, this way, no branch is more powerful than the others. Each of these three branches of government willRead MoreSeparation Of Powers : A Principle Of The U.s. Government1528 Words   |  7 PagesPowers Separation of powers is a principle of the U.S. government, where powers and responsibilities are divided by the legislative branch, executive branch, and judicial branch. Each branch may choose to prevent action of the other branches through the system of checks and balances. The framers of the Constitution designed this system to make sure that no branch would gain too much power and that issues of public policy and welfare would be given consideration before any action was taken. The conceptRead MoreEssay about The Three Branches of the U.S. Federal Government997 Words   |  4 Pagesexecutive, the judicial, and the legislative. The executive branch consists of such people as the president, the cabinet, and the executive offices of the president. The executive branch is known for enforcing laws created by the legislative branch. The judicial branch entails the United States Supreme Court and the Federal Judiciary. The judicial branch must review the laws the executive branch is to enforce. There is also the legislative branch. This branch contains the United States House of RepresentativesRead MoreHow An Individuals Socioeconomic Status Can Affect The Justice Administered To Them by the Judicial Branch1248 Words   |  5 Pagesmoney, and or socioeconomic status can affect the justice administered to them by the United States judicial branch. The Judicial Branch of the United States government is an extremely important factor in the success of today’s society, without it, society would have no standard of order and things would be completely and utterly chaotic! As a matter of fact no country would be complete without a Judicial Branch or some type of government in place because it is mandatory in the successful and smoothRead MoreThe Supreme Law Of The Land949 Words   |  4 Pages The composition of the United States government holds many expressed, implied, and reserved powers that radiates vast roles and complexities throughout. However, through a system that checks and balances, power and roles within the U.S. government has been primarily placed within three (3) branches: The Executive Branch, Legislative Branch, and Judicial Branch. In order to offer a separation of power, each branch is responsible for their roles within the government. Aside from specific responsibilitiesRead MoreThe United States Legal S ystem970 Words   |  4 Pagesthrough the United States, the one program that has grown and learned from mistakes has been the United States Legal system. Ever since the original thirteen colonies became independent from the British Crown, the United States has had a legal system in place. While the United States grew, state by state, so have the regulations, policies, and laws that the legal system has created. The Articles of Confederation created a weak national congress and left the most power to the individual states. While

My Experience At A Nursing Home - 2652 Words

I remember during the first week when I started working at a nursing home, as a receptionist, we received an inspection from The Agency For Health Care Administration (AHCA), but at that time, I did not know how important these people were nor did I understand the meaning of them being there. Up until that moment, no one had told me that I was not allowed to screen telephone calls when AHCA was inside the building. I specifically remember that the director of nursing called me from her office and, in a very aggressive and rude tone of voice, she let me know that what I was doing was wrong and not allowed. At that moment what really bothered me, beside the way she addressed me, was the manner in which she did it. Additionally, I remember hearing other voices in the background and this lead me to believe that others were listening in her office to her abrupt and rude conversation. She really made me feel embarrassed and humiliated in front of my co-workers. To me, this was a very negat ive first impression of someone whom I had never met before. Honestly, her lack of professionalism and compassion left with no desire to know who the real person was on the other side of the phone. After a detailed evaluation of what I explained above, I would like to say that one of the theories that better describes my negative first impression of this person is the implicit personality theory. To better illustrate the latter, at that moment, I unconsciously assumed a person with that roleShow MoreRelatedMy Experience At The Nursing Home1742 Words   |  7 PagesI opened my eyes after a long, energizing slumber. At first, I dreaded the upcoming school day, but I soon realized that it was Saturday. The scent of pancakes and bacon was wafting up the stairs, my family’s normal Saturday routine. I climbed out of bed and got dressed in preparation for visiting my grandmother, another weekend tradition. I stumbled quickly down the stairs, shoveled pancakes and bacon into my mouth, and ran upstairs to apply my heavy coat of teenage make-up. I turned my head andRead MoreCross Cultural Solutions, Brazil1569 Words   |  7 PagesCAASAH, a support home for carriers of HIV/AIDS, and another at Alagados, a school support program serving the children of an impoverished neighborhood. Throughout the month, I enjoyed numerous cultural activities, including language classes, capoeira and samba lessons, and city tours and visits. Thanks to the support of the Advanced Study Grant, I was able to engage in an experience of cultural awareness and competence, while learning more about my role in our global society. In my original applicationRead MoreThe Definition Of Nursing And Share My Thoughts On What Makes The Ideal Nurse Essay1505 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction In this paper I will discuss the definition of nursing; and share my thoughts on what makes the Ideal Nurse. I will also focus on my pursuit into the nursing profession, and how I will be influenced by entering the profession of nursing. Nursing Definition According to the ANA, â€Å"nursing is the protection, promotion, optimization of health and abilities, prevention of illness and injury, facilitation of healing alleviation of suffering through the diagnosis and treatment of human responseRead MoreProject Leaders : Leadership Skills And Expertise1315 Words   |  6 Pagespaper will write about my project leader experience, and how I develop my goal for this project I chose a community service scheme. As a leader, I decided to volunteer in nursing home project, to help my community also to achieve my goal. One of my personal leadership development objectives is to develop interpersonal skill in my community. As an efficient leader, I need to have proficient individuals around me in order that I can achieve the set objectives of my projects. My assistances, employeesRead MoreMetaparadigms of nursing1071 Words   |  5 Pages My experience as a volunteer at the Holland Christian Homes Long Term Facility was very enlightening as a person and more so, as a nursing student. Initially, as a student I believed health was merely an absence of disease and that one could only enjoy good health if there was a complete absence of medical, diagnosable problems. With more education in the health field, experience in the health industry, there was a shift in my ideas to a socio-environmental model of health Watching elderly residentsRead MoreNursing Homes And Facilities Are Provide For The Medically Related Social Service931 Words   |  4 PagesAll nursing homes or facilities are required to provide for the medically-related social service needs of each resident. Medically- related social services assist the residents in maintaining or improving their ability to manage their everyday physical, mental, and social needs. Nursing home with more than 120 beds are required, effective October 1, 1990, to employ a qualified social worker on a full-time basis. On the other hand, facilities with 120 beds or less must provide services based uponRead MoreNew Experiences At The Nursing Home1261 Words   |  6 PagesSince my last journal entry, I have had the chance to have new experiences at the nursing home. Not only do we get to view the jail tomorrow, which I know that all of us in the clinical group are excited to experience, we get to do a med-pass, and we will get the chance to go to Hospi ce. Hospice is a place that I had heard about and briefly knew about before coming to Riverside, but I really didn’t know that much about it. Every nursing home that I have had clinical at or worked at has had residentsRead MoreMy Statement For Pursue Nursing As A Profession Essay1645 Words   |  7 Pagesearly elementary school, my kindergarten teacher gave her students a paper cutout of a little person that we were to take home and with the help of our family, transform the blank cutout into the person we wanted to be. We were allowed to glue on yarn for hair, cut out cloth for clothes and tape on any accessories our person needed. I remember some students making a firefighter, police officer or a teacher. I too made my cutout look like a teacher because that is what many of my classmates were choosingRead MoreThe Current State Of Public Pay Nursing Homes Essay1161 Words   |  5 PagesThe Current State of Public Pay Nursing Homes in the North Houston, TX Area The goal of this paper is to bring to light the issues regarding elderly care in Medicaid paid nursing homes in the northern area of greater Houston, TX. Due to my mother’s age and medical conditions, it became necessary to research Nursing Homes in the north Houston area. Finding an adequate facility where she would be treated with dignity, respect, proper medical, mental, physical, and hygiene care, involved visitingRead MoreNursing1636 Words   |  7 Pagesmake me always being cooperative with my co-workers and work with them toward a share goal. I graduated from Highline Community College last year with honor degree. Even though I already obtained my AA degree in Pre-Nursing, gaining my knowledge in the medical field is not enough for me. I want to gain more clinical patient experience and help people with all my heart. In order to strengthen my clinical experience, I also took the CNA class at Blossom Nursing Assistant Training School while studying

Two Sides of Imperialism Free Essays

Imperialism in the 19th and 20th centuries began crumbling at its foundations. Small enclaves of ethnic and nationalist groups sprouted throughout their native countryside, binding their people together to rise against their enemies and oppressors. The thought of independence from the foreign rulers, from the class system they set up, and from the atrocities they committed to gain control of the land was more than enough to motivate the fellow countrymen to take action. We will write a custom essay sample on Two Sides of Imperialism or any similar topic only for you Order Now The foreigners, however, stood confused, wondering how such a great colony turned into such a massive conflict. The seeds of oppression and cruelty were sown year after year, and finally bore fruit. What these foreigners didn’t consider, however, was that there are many ways of creating an empire. The Roman Empire’s standard of conglomeration is a better method of imperialism than the exploitative approach employed by 19th century nations. The Roman Empire never fell by a revolution from its own people. Rather, many of its subjects lived life as either full-time or part-time citizens of the empire. Many of the conquered people were given some semblance of citizenship, as â€Å"provincials†. The Empire, however, did provide the newly-conquered the opportunity to become a citizen, provided they meet certain qualifications or expectations. In the study of Roman affairs, it is found that, †¦ the Roman government worked to maximize the number of persons to whom Roman ius civile, the law of Roman citizens, applied†¦ †¦ Beginning with the reign of the emperor Augustus (27 B. C. E. -14 C. E. ), institutionalized practices permitted provincials to become citizens, generally by serving either in the Roman army or on a city council†. While the Roman Empire continued its oppressive conquest of Europe, it continually sought to make conquered lands and their people a part of Roman life and economy. By providing the conquered a chance to someday become a Roman citizen, there was little incentive to rebel and revolt against the Empire. The Western stance on imperialism, however, was based off of an ideology much more different than the Romans. The general consensus many European countries shared was that Europeans were, racially speaking, superior to any other race, and as such, were predetermined to rule the rest of the world. One such instance is given in a speech given by Jules Ferry at the French Chamber of Deputies in 1883. At one point, Ferry states that â€Å"in effect, superior races have rights over inferior races†. When questioned about the rights of man, he promptly replies that, â€Å"if the declaration of the rights of man was written for the blacks of equatorial Africa, the by what right do you impose regular commerce upon them? They have not called upon you. † While the French were, like the Romans, interested in expanding, the justification by which they use extend themselves onto other lands are not the same. Ferry is of the opinion that because the French are a superior race, they should embark on a conquest over inferior races and makes them work for the benefit of the French Empire, without any of the same rights as a French citizen. The difference is that while the Romans implemented a system to someday incorporate their newly-conquered people, the French were only planning on exploiting their labor and commerce without ever extending to the people the same rights the French enjoyed. This exclusion did not go unnoticed among the French colonies, and would be a foundation for revolution in the coming years. But what about in colonies where there existed such a small opportunity for advancement? In colonies like India, there were chances for an Indian to learn like scholars, and as a result of such education, could communicate effectively with their ruling British counterparts. In fact, many of the Indians who had such education could see the flaws the colony had to address, and hoped to work with the British on fixing such problems. William Duiker writes that â€Å"members of the (Indian National Congress) did not demand immediate independence and accepted the need for reforms†¦ at the same time, they called for an Indian share of the governing process and more spending on economic development† The British however, still shared the same Western notion of racial superiority as the French, and as a result, remained convinced that British rule over India is still the best thing. Duiker states that the â€Å"British responded with a few concessions†¦but in general, change was glacially slow†3. Great Britain remained focused on keeping India’s resources, and giving Indians the same rights as British citizens was never part of the plan. Dissent grew over the imbalance of government, and the same people who were educated by the British were now starting to realize that there lay no future in pledging loyalty to British rule. One such man, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, spoke openly against Great Britain at the Indian National Congress in 1907. Pax Britannica has been established in this country in order that a foreign government may exploit this country†¦ We believed in the benevolent intentions of the government, but in politics there is no benevolence. Benevolence is used to sugarcoat the declarations of self-interest and we were in those days deceived by the apparent benevolent intentions under which rampant self-interest was concealed Great Britain’s biggest concern was for itself and its interests, and never intended to follow through on any plans benevolent to the Indian people. Even after being provided with an education, Indians still would never attain the same level of citizenship and respect that Britons night receive. The British Empire never expanded into India to make Indians a part of Great Britain; its textiles, teas, and labor were more than enough. With the chance to become fellow British citizens practically non-existent, many Indians soon turned to rebellion, boycotts, and a push for independence. Without the opportunity to ascend into British society, the Indians were left with no choice but to stay as loyal subjects of the British Crown, or call for independence. To conclude, the Roman Empire, while it may not have survived the test of time, used a method by which it kept its subjects content. The path for upward mobility in society was available to those who wanted it. The 19th century imperialist countries, however, such as France and England, felt that it was only necessary to implement brute force and harsh laws to get the same output from their subjects in distance colonies. Were it not for that sense of superiority, we might all still be loyal subjects of European nations. How to cite Two Sides of Imperialism, Papers

Analysis of Niche Marketing-Free-Samples-Myassignementhelp.com

Question: You are required to Identify three Nicher's firms and/or brands. Answer: Introduction This essay is based on the niche marketing concept related to the marketing activities that are undertaken by an organization for small markets and for the people who have some different desires from the particular market. The niche marketers aim at small groups of people rather than larger ones. The strategy of the niche marketers is to channelize all the efforts regarding marketing towards a small group of the population. The niche strategies do not exist in the organization; however, the marketing managers make these strategies by identifying the needs of the customers (Aufderheide, 2013). Niche marketing strategy is technique that is used with the aim to select a specific or unique segment of the market. The identification of the wants of the customers and their specific needs helps in the creation of niche market segments. The niche marketing strategy helps the organization to deliver the best possible solution to the customers based on his or her needs. The companies that are taken into consideration for this analysis are, Dropee, JY Aquaculture Resources and Mii FoodService Pte Ltd. Dropee provides a platform for B2B market for the retailers as well as the wholesalers. The retailers can have access to more than thousands of products of the wholesalers and grow their business accordingly. Dropee promotes many branded products of the categories including, office and stationery products, dining and kitchen related products, bath and bed related products. The products also include housekeeping and cleaning related products and personal and health care related products as well (Dropee.com, 2017). The second company that is taken into consideration is JY Aquaculture Resources, which is active company that works in filtration system of household water. The company aims at providing direct services to the customers to save the costs related to the agents (Jyaquacultureresources.webs.com, 2017). The third company that is taken into consider ation is Mii FoodService Pte Ltd. This company works in the field of supplying equipment to the hotels and restaurants used for the purpose of cooking. This company is new in the market and is based in Singapore. They provide food equipment to the restaurants in Singapore (Miifoodservice.com, 2017). The analysis related to niche marketing is based on these three companies and the different aspects of the business related to niche marketing. Discussion The three companies that are considered for this essay have followed the niche marketing strategy. The first company is Dropee, which connects the suppliers and the retailers. This website makes it easy for the retailers to establish contact with the wholesalers. The organization has an interactive website that provides the link between the manufacturers or suppliers with the retailers and the wholesalers. The website provides opportunities for the retailers to purchase the products in bulk quantities directly from the wholesalers and making the payment through the website itself (Dropee.com, 2017). The website also provides credit facilities for the retailers on the approval of the suppliers. This company has almost zero level of competition in the market as there are not many companies that provide these facilities to the consumers. The customers who are concerned in this case are the retailers and the wholesalers as well. The direct platform that is provided to them by the website helps in decreasing the costs related to the middle men of the supply process (Boons et al., 2013). The company has maintained good relationships with the suppliers and the retailers by providing them with facilities of making payments of the purchased goods through the website itself and making the credit facilities available for the retailers. The website of the organization provides the facility of easy returns and refund (Toften Hammervoll, 2013). The defective merchandise that maybe found in the shipments can be returned to the company within fourteen days of purchasing. Some of the products are exceptions in this case. The refund policy of the organization is also strong and it emphasizes on the satisfaction of the customers regarding the products. The organization promises direct reimbursement of the money for the retailers in this case (Bressler, 2012). Dropee also ensures the returns of the goods that are purchased from the third-party sellers or the suppliers who are reg istered with Dropee. The return and refund policy of Dropee is clean and transparent. The company encourages in the return of the products based on some criteria which include, the damaged or defective prodcts, wrong products or products that not delivered in time. The transparent return and refund policy of the organization helps Dropee in maintaining healthy and fruitful professional relationships with the suppliers of the organization as well as the retailers who purchase the goods. The payment process of Dropee is also secure and safe, which helps the new users in trusting the organization. The company has its own efficient logistics team which aims at delivering the products safely to the retailers. The registration process of the website is also quite user friendly and fast and the instructions are provided clearly regarding the registration of new members in the Dropee website (Cronin-Gilmore, 2012). The organization aims at providing the business opportunities to the retaile rs who wish to purchase their products directly from the wholesalers. The group of target customers is small in this case. The reason is that the organization is targeting the wholesalers and retailers in this case and not the consumers directly. This is helping the organization in providing the best service to the target customers. Instead of targeting a large group of people or customers, the organization is targeting a small group and trying to fulfil the needs only of that particular group. This has helped the organization in going strong since its inception. The organization has followed the niche strategy of marketing and has gained huge advantage due to this. Dropee does not face much competition in the same industry, because there are not many companies that provide these facilities to the retailers and suppliers (Gupta, Seetharaman Raj, 2013). The service provided by Dropee has also proved to be effective in this case, as this service in huge demand among the retailers of Malaysia. Purchasing the products from the Dropee website helps the retailers to buy those products at much lower rates as the middle men are eliminated and further, the retailers can gain much more profits by selling these products. The second company that is considered for the niche market analysis is JY Aquaculture Resources, which is an organization that actively supplies filtration system for water used for household purposes. The company aims at supplying the filtration systems to the houses without involving the agents in between. They source the items directly from the factories and thereby supply them for household purposes (Jyaquacultureresources.webs.com, 2017). This helps them in providing the goods for much lower as compared to the prices that can be provided by involving the agents in the process. This organization also provides the best quality of services after sale of the products to the customers (Herweg Herweg, 2017). The company aims at providing the filtration services for the water used for household purposes and they also try to provide the best level of customer satisfaction as well. The company has an interactive website and it has a variety of products that are showcased in the website. The company provides filtration techniques for alkaline water, which is a type of water that is suitable for health related purposes. There are many advantages of alkaline water for the health of an individual. The alkaline water helps in managing the pH level of the normal body of a person. Alkaline water has many other advantages which includes the reduction of blood sugar level, blood pressure and cholesterol level as well. The company has a variety of products in its web store that is showcased with all details in the organizations interactive website (Ibrahim, 2015). The products include the Yamada 389-20 hot or warm or cold alkaline water filtration, the 4 stage k-pro series alkaline water filter (p.h8.5), the Yamada 389-17(hot and cold) alkaline water filtration. The other products include, Water Dispenser NWD389-16, Yamada WDYLRZ-01A Water Dispenser WITH 4 stage alkaline filtration system. These products are available in the website of JY Aquaculture at much lower rates as compared to the market. The reason being that the company sells the products directly from the factories to the consumers. The organization is one of a kind in the field of water filtration and it has almost no competition in this field. The organization is dealing with a small group of people, which includes the water filter companies and their customers. JY Aquaculture acts as a connection between them and supplies the goods to the customers without involving the agents which leads to the reduction in prices. The low prices of the products help in attracting the customers towards the company and thereby increasing the customer base (Kivimaa Kern, 2016). The company aims at a small group of customers and tries to provide the highest level of satisfaction to these customers. The niche strategy is useful for the organization because the organization becomes successful in providing the best of services to the small group of people. The company is focussed towards only the water filtr ation products and does not aim at providing any other type of products to the customers. This helps the organization to concentrate on the products that they are manufacturing and thereby providing the best products to the customers at the lowest prices (Sun et al., 2012). The company aims at building strong relationships with the customers so that they can understand their needs and demands. The interactive website of the company has options that provide the opportunity to the customers to interact with the company by filling testimonial forms and submitting it to the company (Kumar Reinartz, 2012). The forms will help the company to get the feedback of the customers and thereby act upon this feedback and improve their products and offerings as and when required. The organization has a stable business since the time of its establishment and has been providing valuable service to the customers as well. The company has a different concept altogether and this is the reason why they have no competition in the market. The third company that is considered in this essay is Mii FoodService Pte Ltd. The company was founded in the year 2015 and it has an innovative concept of supplying food based equipment to the restaurant and hotels. The company aims at supplying tailor-made solutions for the professional kitchens of the restaurants and the hotels. The goal of the company is to find out the suitable and best fit solution for the kitchens (Miifoodservice.com, 2017). The company is creative in nature and has fruitful partnerships with the manufacturers of the products by understanding the needs and demands of the market. The vision of the company is to provide the easy to use, within budget, safe and hygienic products to the restaurants and the hotels as well (Suliyanto Rahab, 2012). The organization is focussed towards developing its brand and maintain a good relationship with the customers (Lechner Gudmundsson, 2014). The approach of the organization is friendly in nature and that is the main drivi ng force towards the innovative approach of the company. The team of the people working in the organization have over 10 years of knowledge about the kitchen products and have immense experience in the field of commercial cooking. The company has its headquarters in Singapore itself and the food service stations are located in Malaysia and Kuala Lumpur. The organization has tie-ups with many brands which provide kitchen equipment including, Frylow, Vitamix, Zumex, Peel Master, The Spade, Frontline International, NaOCLean, Lincat, XLR Rail. These companies work in the field of providing technology based kitchen equipments for the restaurants and hotels. Frylow produces equipments that are used for frying purposes (Lee, Shin Park, 2012). The device is photo-catalytic in nature and is used in the deep fryers. The technology helps in extending the life of the oil used for frying by around 400% and the period of changing the oil is longer. The other company producing technology based ki tchen devices is Vitamix which specializes in the production of mixing or blending machines which reduces the preparation time of the cooking process and increases the cooking precision as well. Another process that is important in the professional kitchens is the peeling of fruits, this is taken care of by the Peel Master company who are specialists in designing tools that are used for the purpose of peeling fruits. Mii FoodService sources the kitchen equipments from all these companies and supplies them to the hotels and the restaurants. The company acts as a business partner for the restaurants and hotels where they supply food. The equipments are user friendly and the warranty of the equipments are also ensured (Martens, Matthyssens Vandenbempt, 2012). The organization provides the facility of leasing the equipments, renting the equipments and they also have qualified project managers who can help the restaurant in any aspect of the business. The company has little competition in the market as it is a newly established organization and their field of work is also innovative and different. The organization always aims at building and maintaining strong relationships with the customers and look after their needs, desires and problems as well. The organization acts as a partner in the business of their clients and not only as a supplier of equipments (Rosli, 2012). The company is new in the market, however it is evident that they working quite well in the field of the management and supply of food equipments. The organization has many happy users including, Hyatt hotels, Tobys Estate, Yum, Swensens, Marina Bay Sands, Singapore, Starbucks Coffe, Sofitel Singapore, Amakase burger, Montreux cakes, One Farrer Hotel and Spa, Mc Donalds, Highlands Coffee, Dunkin Donuts, Burger King and many more. The list of the satisfied customers of the company in such less time proves that the company has become quite successful and it has built its own position in the market ( Shaw, 2012). The market is also not quite large as the type of company providing these facilities is not much. The organization is serving a concentrated market of the restaurants and hotels and trying to provide the best of services to these customers. This will help the organization in maintaining good relationship with the restaurants and hotels and trying to increase their business in the sane sector. Conclusion The analysis of the three companies that is, Dropee, JY Aquaculture and Mii FoodService Pte. Ltd. proves that niche marketing is a useful way of marketing the products and services of a particular company. Niche marketing mainly refers to the strategy made by the marketing managers to promote the products of a particular company to a small group of prospective or potential customers. The organization concentrates its marketing and promotional activities towards a segment of customers. This results in effective marketing of the products and the highest level of customer satisfaction. The companies that apply these strategies are small in size and they do not have a high level of competition in the market as well. The organizations aim at a specific group of people with their marketing activities and take sufficient measures to satisfy the needs and wants of that group. The three companies that are chosen for this analysis apply the same technique, as these companies are different and innovative in nature and they concentrate on a particular group of customers and target their activities according to their needs. This essay can be concluded by saying that niche marketing is a useful strategy for small companies. References Aufderheide, P. (2013). Niche-Market Culture, O? and On Line.The electronic grapevine: Rumor, reputation, and reporting in the new on-line environment, 43. Boons, F., Montalvo, C., Quist, J., Wagner, M. (2013). Sustainable innovation, business models and economic performance: an overview.Journal of Cleaner Production,45, 1-8. Bressler, M. S. (2012). How small businesses master the art of competition through superior competitive advantage.Journal of Management and Marketing Research,11, 1. Cronin-Gilmore, J. (2012). Exploring marketing strategies in small businesses.Journal of Marketing Development and Competitiveness,6(1), 96. Dropee.com. (2017).Dropee.Dropee.com. Retrieved 14 November 2017, from https://www.dropee.com/about-us Gupta, P., Seetharaman, A., Raj, J. R. (2013). The usage and adoption of cloud computing by small and medium businesses.International Journal of Information Management,33(5), 861-874. Herweg, A., Herweg, G. (2017).radios niche Marketing revolution FutureSell. Taylor Francis. Ibrahim, A. B. (2015). Strategy types and small firms' performance an empirical investigation.Journal of Small Business Strategy,4(1), 13-22. Jyaquacultureresources.webs.com. (2017).JY Aquaculture Resources.JY Aquaculture Resources. Retrieved 14 November 2017, from https://jyaquacultureresources.webs.com/about-us Kivimaa, P., Kern, F. (2016). Creative destruction or mere niche support? Innovation policy mixes for sustainability transitions.Research Policy,45(1), 205-217. Kumar, V., Reinartz, W. (2012).Customer relationship management: Concept, strategy, and tools. Springer Science Business Media. Lechner, C., Gudmundsson, S. V. (2014). Entrepreneurial orientation, firm strategy and small firm performance.International Small Business Journal,32(1), 36-60. Lee, Y., Shin, J., Park, Y. (2012). The changing pattern of SME's innovativeness through business model globalization.Technological Forecasting and Social Change,79(5), 832-842. Martens, R., Matthyssens, P., Vandenbempt, K. (2012). Market strategy renewal as a dynamic incremental process.Journal of Business Research,65(6), 720-728. Miifoodservice.com. (2017).About Us | Mii FoodService | Singapore Malaysia | Vitamix | Zumex | PeelMaster | Frylow | Tre Spade | Quality kitchen equipment | Good Food Services Consultancy.Miifoodservice.com. Retrieved 14 November 2017, from https://www.miifoodservice.com/about/ Rosli, M. M. (2012). Competitive strategy of Malaysian small and medium enterprises: an exploratory investigation.American International Journal of Contemporary Research,2(1), 93-105. Shaw, E. H. (2012). Marketing strategy: From the origin of the concept to the development of a conceptual framework.Journal of Historical Research in Marketing,4(1), 30-55. Suliyanto, S., Rahab, R. (2012). The role of market orientation and learning orientation in improving innovativeness and performance of small and medium enterprises.Asian Social Science,8(1), 134. Sun, X., Zhao, Y., Zhu, Q. (2012, October). Understanding the niche strategies adopted by social commerce websites. InInformation Management, Innovation Management and Industrial Engineering (ICIII), 2012 International Conference on(Vol. 1, pp. 418-421). IEEE. Toften, K., Hammervoll, T. (2013). Niche marketing research: status and challenges.Marketing Intelligence Planning,31(3), 272-285.

Stasiland by Anna Funder Historical Context Essay Example

Stasiland by Anna Funder: Historical Context Essay Stasiland by Anna Funder: Historical Context 1. Post-War Germany: a. Watch the film on World War I embedded in the Prezi next to the heading ‘World War I’. List between 3 – 5 important facts you learn about the war, especially facts relating to Germany. 1- During WW1, the British spared the life of a wounded soldier by the name of Adolf Hitler We will write a custom essay sample on Stasiland by Anna Funder: Historical Context specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Stasiland by Anna Funder: Historical Context specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Stasiland by Anna Funder: Historical Context specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer 2- It took so long for Germany to pay off the Treaty of Versailles that there final payment was in 2010 3- Germanys debt from ww1 was the equivalent of 96000 tons of gold 4- Germany lost many neighbouring countries after the war b. Copy the sentences below and fill in the blanks: At the end of WWI, Germany was found to be ‘guilty’ of causing World War I and was ordered to pay compensation of 132 billion gold marks(Germany currency) The compensation was to pay for civilian damages caused during the war. Germany also had to give over land to neighbouring countries such as Poland, France and Belgium. Germany’s armed forces were also reduced to 100,000 men. c. How might the people of Germany have reacted to the high cost of reparations and to the suffering caused to them by the Great Depression? The German people would have felt mistreated and was seen as a national humiliation, the great depression would have help build resentment amongst the people against the allies. d. Nazism, as a political force, with Hitler as its leader, grew out of Germany’s humiliating loss of WWI and the economic suffering caused by the Great Depression. Why did these factors cause the rise of Nazism? The rise of Nazism was due to German resentment against the allies for causing a great depression in Germany therefore Germans were in need of a strong leader to lead them out of the ‘dark ages’and Hitler’s powerful public speaking and promises he made to end the suffering helped grow his support amongst German people. e. Watch the embedded film on WWII. List between 3 – 5 important facts you lea

4 Rules for Setting Designations off with Commas

4 Rules for Setting Designations off with Commas 4 Rules for Setting Designations off with Commas 4 Rules for Setting Designations off with Commas By Mark Nichol Where do commas go in the vicinity of references to city and state names, or when identifying a date? Is a comma necessary before Jr. or II after a person’s name, or between a corporate name and a tag like Inc.? The rules for use of such functional punctuation follow: 1. City-and-State Designations In a city-and-state (or city-and-nation) construction, the state is set off from the city by a pair of commas: â€Å"A point near Rugby, North Dakota, is the geographic center of North America.† However, when describing an address, no comma appears between the state name or abbreviation and the ZIP code: â€Å"He listed his address as 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, DC 20500.† (Note that DC, like all other abbreviations consisting of two or more uppercase letters, requires no punctuation. Also, all the letters in ZIP, an acronym for â€Å"Zone Improvement Plan,† should be capitalized.) When should you list a state or nation in addition to the name of a city, and which cities are familiar enough that their location does not need to be further specified? The distinction is arbitrary and based on context: A local newspaper need not identify the state in which an obscure nearby town is located, but a publication with national distribution should provide more information about the community’s location; the approach for a book depends on whether the setting is local or the text refers to a variety of locales. Companies and organizations that regularly publish content featuring references to geographic locations should establish, as part of a style guide, a list of names of cities that stand on their own and those that should be accompanied by the name of a state or nation. 2. Month-Day-and-Year References In a month-day-and-year phrase, set the year off between commas: â€Å"Children born on February 29, 2012, will have to wait four years for their next birthday party.† If only the month and year are used, no punctuation is necessary: â€Å"Precipitation levels in April 2012 were nearly double those recorded last year during that month.† The same rule applies for holidays with years: â€Å"The caption identified the occasion as Christmas Day 2012.† No punctuation is used in the day-month-year system: â€Å"The next sample will be collected on 1 May 2012.† 3. Generational Suffixes Though those who append Jr. or Sr. (Jnr. or Snr. in British English) to their name may choose to use one or two commas (depending on whether the designation is at the end of a sentence or in its midst) to set the element off, this style is outdated and seldom applied anymore. For the sake of consistency, always omit such punctuation. Also, this usage is not, and never has been, correct in association with II, III, and the like to denote use of an identical name down through successive generations. 4. Legal Endings Likewise, Inc., Ltd., and other designations of corporate structure are variously treated according to a particular company’s preference, but the dictates of consistency overrule such choices. Of course, if you work for a company that deliberately sets the element off with punctuation, follow that style, but the importance of consistency necessitates that in your employers’ publications or documents, you refer to any other company according to the same rule even if the other company omits punctuation in its treatment of its name. (But what if that other company is a strategic partner, and you feel the urge to honor its style? Resist I won’t tell if you don’t tell.) Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Punctuation category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Writing a Reference Letter (With Examples)Latin Plural EndingsHow to Send Tactful Emails from a Technical Support Desk

The Great Depression and American isolationism affect on FDR's desire Essay

The Great Depression and American isolationism affect on FDR's desire to take an active role in international affairs in the manner of TR and Wilson - Essay Example According to Michael Leigh, FDR never made any attempt to persuade US public regarding ending of isolation. He also says that FDR had enormous preoccupation with the public opinion. (http://www.foreignaffairs.org/19950501fareviewessay5045/paul-johnson/the-myth-of-american-isolationism-reinterpreting-the-past.html ). This view contradicts the famous fireside chats of FDR to some extent, because he was a humanitarian and the Nazi killings must have worried him. At the same time, he moulded the public opinion towards participation in the war. Initially, that is before the Pearl Harbour, Roosevelt did value the American public opinion which was combined with the caution of Great Depression and American belief in isolationism. "Domestic political problems in the summer of 1937 had made Roosevelt particularly reluctant to risk anything in foreign affairs. The Court fight and the failure to break a series of sit down strikes have seriously ended his middle class support," Datlek (1979, p.14 7). Isolationists thought that alliances could be unsettling, and destabilizing. In President Hoover's opinion they were 'provocative actions' that have 'hitherto always cracked up in war itself'. The horrors of the First World War, Versailles treaty, fear of getting drawn into another war, Great Depression, scare of losing uninhibited decision making were a few causes of isolationism. Isolation had many more reasons and excuses: "Belief that the depression had been caused by W.W.I Belief that Europe was unworthy of our support Pacifism-people who hated and abhorred war Belief that arms manufacturers, bankers had caused war Belief that W.W.I had been a tragic mistake for the U.S " http://www.sagehistory.net/roosevelts/wwii/1920WWII1940.htm FDR initially was more engrossed with the domestic problems and his refusal to peg the value of the US dollar wrecked the International Economic Conference of 1933, to be held in London, which was partially encouraged by Hoover. FDR, instead, maintained Good Neighbour Policy and Pan Americanism and in Buenos Aires Conference, he demonstrated that America was uninterested in domineering weaker nations and he continued economic nationalism and cooperation both. Still, there existed a certain stalemate between an internationalist president and an isolationist congress. He recognised USSR, increased foreign trade hoping to alleviate depression, and his Neutrality Act of 1937 famously hurt Spain and made US a 'silent accomplice of Hitler'. His Quarantine speech in Chicago was intentional; but Americans were too wrapped up in isolationism and events like Panay, plight of China, and even the armament need of Britain and France did not move the Congress, despite President's efforts, though h e eventually succeeded in persuading Congress to send armaments to Britain, which is called America's 'first line of defence'. did not end till the onset of Second World War and the fear of it had slowed down America. FDR had to face this inertia, even though he wanted

Financial Statements Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Financial Statements - Essay Example However, the different groups use the various financial statements for different purposes. This essay focuses on the four types of financial statements identified above and their importance to internal users such as managers and employee as well to the external users such as investors and creditors. All the financial statements are useful since to individual as well as organizations whose decisions are affected by a company. The financial statement act as an indicator of how a company is performing. Moreover, the statements can be used to predict the future of a company. Balance sheet, which is also, referred as the statement of financial position acts as an indicator of the financial status at a given time. Balance sheet assesses the assets (economic possessions possessed by the entity) and the liabilities (sources of financing) as well as ownership equity. The assets possessed by a company are either classified as current or fixed assets. Current assets can be converted into usable cash easily and include cash, marketable securities, inventory, and prepaid assets. Fixed assets are not easily converted into cash and are awarded historical cost. Fixed assets include buildings, machinery, equipment, and land. Liabilities are those assets owed to creditors (Drake, Fabozzi, & CFA, 2012). Liabilities are categorized as current and non-current liabilities. Current liabilities include notes payable, interest payable, accounts payable, wages payable and taxes payable. On the other hand, non-current liabilities include bonds payable and mortgages payable. Equity is the proprietorship, partnership, shareholders, or stakeholder’s equity in a corporation. Equity owners are claimants of the residue equity after creditors have been paid. Therefore, balance sheet acts as a record of resources owned by an entity and acts as a crucial tool used to evaluate the capability of a firm to meet long-term obligations. Comparative balance sheet is an example of balance sheet (D rake, Fabozzi, & CFA, 2012). Creditors are involved in offering credit, which is a risky practice. Therefore, balance sheets are important to creditors since they use them to assess the wealth possessed by individuals or firms and determine their capability of paying for liabilities incurred. Creditors make use of other financial statements when providing loans to companies. In case companies file bankruptcy, the creditors make use of the information obtained from the various items to recover their money by liquidating the company’s assets (Drake, Fabozzi, & CFA, 2012). Income statement is another important form of financial statement that indicates the net income of a firm. The net income is calculated by subtracting the operating expenses from the revenue or fees earned. Therefore, income statement is reflective of the company revenue or income as well as expenditure. Revenue is the inflows that a company obtains from its operations while expenses are the outflows that a co mpany uses to create revenue. Net income of a company is obtained by adding the revenue to the gains less the losses and expenses. Income statement is thus indicative of the performance of a business (Drake, Fabozzi, & CFA, 2012). Statement of cash flows is a record of a company’s cash flow activities such as the investing, operating and financing undertakings. Statement of cas

Buddhism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 3

Buddhism - Essay Example Thus, Buddhism is a philosophy that can also be a religion. One of the passages that relates to personal ethics is this: â€Å"Wakefulness is the way of life†¦How happy he is! For he sees that wakefulness is life!...† (from the Dhammapada translated by Byrom as qtd. in Kornfield 1). When I am wakeful, I am aware of who I am and what I am doing in relation to the effects of my actions to others and my environment. Wakefulness is important to being mindful of my impacts on others. In addition, this passage is related to professional and public ethics: â€Å"A person of wisdom should be truthful, without arrogance, without deceit, not slanderous and not hateful† (adapted from the Sutta-nipata translated by Saddhatissa as qtd. in Kornfield 3). This is related to professional ethics because it emphasizes the importance of truthfulness in doing our jobs. It reminds people of the wisdom in being honest in all our roles and responsibilities as professionals. It is also related to public ethics because public employees should serve without malice and deceit. They should do their jobs with honesty and integrity. The moral framework of Buddhism works within some of our public topics because it highlights moral responsibilities for truthfulness and mindfulness that are important, such as when voting and public policy. For example, we have to be mindful when voting and be critical of whom we are selecting as our public officials because they are going to make important decisions with our taxpayers’ money and the power we give to them. Public policy also needs truthfulness in being sincere in serving people’s real needs and mindfulness in being aware of how every decision impacts different stakeholders. The moral framework of Buddhism can help citizens and politicians become more aware of their roles and responsibilities and how they can work together in solving social Buddhism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 4 Buddhism - Essay Example Buddhism, as a few people know, is not as much a religion as it is a meditative inner power of sorts. Contrary to other religions, Buddhism does not bestow upon its followers a doctrine or set of instructions that one must follow if they do not want to be banished to eternal hellfire. In fact, Buddhism’s primary principles are based on the human psychology, something many people can and do relate to. Unlike a god that cannot be seen and that must be envisioned as being eternally powerful, Buddhism’s mantra revolves around inner finding, and inner peace with oneself (Hanh, pp.4 – 11). This lack of external factors incites people to come towards it and share in this belief. As it is human nature to be alpha dogs of society, this is ultimately the perfect combination of belief and human psychology since now man is satisfied that there is no factor outside his influence as far as life is concerned, and that, crude as it may sound, is a proposition that brings about s atisfaction to man today. The secret to Buddhism’s success lies within its principles; most ideas that conflict with man’s autonomous nature have been discarded by Buddhism. For example, Buddhism by and large rejects the tedious existence of God, angels, heaven and hell. So now, instead of feeling confined, forced and, in a way, threatened to believe in a religion, people are told that if they follow, they will be doing so only for their inner peace, and that equation settles well with most cynics and rebels of society. This lack of ultimatums makes man feel less violated and less forced; in short, it is a religion that actively allows man to practice according to his free will. In addition, thus, as a progressive religion that adapts to man’s nature, it has done pretty well in terms of acceptance on a global level, as can be seen from its increasing numbers. Transformation of consciousness is one of the primary aims of a Buddhist. In America, freedoms of

The Nestle Internal Documents Management Essay

The Nestle Internal Documents Management Essay The research process followed in this study is outlined in Figure 1, it began with a review of the literature related to BPM and BPIs with a particular focus on researches that tackled Innovation and particularly Packaging Innovation in Food Industry. The literature review revealed a significant gap with regard to both the integration aspect of BPM and BPIs and the application of this integrated framework in the specific field of Packaging Innovation which led to formulate the RQ. In order to identify and describe the impact of the proposed framework on the Packaging Innovation Process a Case Study methodology has been adopted as a research strategy. This is because it is considered suitable to address the research question: How and why an integrated framework of Business Process Management and Business Process Improvement could improve the Performance of Packaging Innovation Process of a multinational company? This is also in accordance with Yin (2009, Loc 453) who confirms that à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦how and Why questions are more explanatory and likely to lead to the use of case studies..as the preferred research method. Furthermore, the focus on the contemporary events of Packaging Innovation Process in its real-life context and not requiring the control of behavioural events were additional reasons for choosing the case study method (Yin, 1981; Yin 2009, Loc 310). All the 3 conditions highlighted by Yin (2009, Loc 310) are met in order to adopt the case study as the most appropriate method. Once again Yin (2009, Loc 310) argues clearly à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ case studies are the preferred method when how or why questions are being posed, the investigator has little control over events and focus is on a contemporary phenomenon within a real-life context. Case study design An embedded single case study design has been selected in this research. According to Yin (2009, Loc 740) there are four major types of case study designs. Placed in a 2ÃÆ'-2 matrix these relevant designs are: single case versus multiple case designs, then holistic with a single unit of analysis against embedded covering a multiple units of analysis. The aim for selecting an embedded single case design is to investigate a representative or typical case in order to capture the circumstances and conditions of an everyday or commonplace situation (Yin, 2009, Loc 1205). Embedded designs (multiple units of analysis) often add significant opportunities for extensive analysis, enhancing the insights into the single case (Yin, 2009, Loc 1215). Accordingly, this embedded single case is about packaging innovation process improvement in the context Business Process Management and Improvement and specifically the integration of both BPM and BPI disciplines. This involves as well several units of analysis which consist in baseline events and validation through an innovation project. In the baseline events one main illustrative project has been reviewed in order to understand the critical reasons that make a packaging innovation project fail. Then in order to assess the impact of a poorly designed packaging on the operation, twelve factories across Europe and Asia have been visited through a waste Audit methodology (Muda Hunt).The twelve factories have been chosen as subunits for this investigation because they were widely spread geographically across Europe and Asia and were using different packaging materials and technologies for various product categories. With this case study design, the emphasis is global touching the packaging innovation process and not on individual factories or on a specific packaging material or a product category. Yin (2009) stresses that a major drawback in an embedded single case is focusing only on the subunit level for example the individual factories and failing to return to the larger unit of analysis in this case the packaging innovation process improvement. On the other hand, a single case study has limitations in particular to its rigor of research and in relation to the scientific generalization of the findings and conclusions (Yin, 2009, Loc 554). Nevertheless, single case studies permit a precise analysis of cotemporary evidence in context and are generalisable to theoretical propositions (Yin 2009, Loc 573). Finally the systematic adoption of embedded case study as a research methodology using three unit of analysis gives more rigor as well, Furthermore, the validation of the proposed framework though a real packaging innovation project (Embedded unit of analysis # 3) enhances the quality output of the research and confirms its managerial implications. Data collection The data were primarily collected at Nestlà © Head Office, RD centres and affiliate markets and factories. Worldwide leader in Food and Wellbeing industries, Nestlà © uses a wide range of more than 177000 packaging materials and more than 66000 different packaging specifications in 450 production sites across the globe. Moreover, Nestlà © is also interested in improving its Packaging Innovation Process and attracted by exploring the new integrated framework which combines both BPM and BPI. Therefore the access to Nestlà © internal data and employees has been made relatively easy. Using Nestlà © posed no research bias since it gives total independence and full autonomy to conduct the whole research in order to avoid any influence neither on the research process nor on the outcome. Thus, Nestlà ©s internal documents review and semi-structured interviews with a group of concerned employees have been used in this research to collect data. To complement the second-hand data, waste audits in twelve factories have been carried out combined with a visit and interviews of tree key suppliers. The use of multiple sources of evidence, combined with key informants who have reviewed draft case study reports, helped to establish construct validity (Yin, 2009, Loc 734, 1057). All data were stored in a process Map using the BPM software Nimbus Control in accordance with Yins (2009, Loc 734, 1057) recommendations for establishing reliability. Internal documents and interviews Nestle internal documents were the first source of data collection for this investigation. These include corporate documents (General Instructions, Policies, RD and business reports, best practices library) produced by process owners, functional departments or experts. The process owners have mapped processes and issued instructions on how to implement and execute their processes. Having access to Nestlà ©s internal documents and employees helped to rely on a vast amount of relevant data. For the baseline review of a major Packaging Innovation project, semi-structured face-to-face interviews were carried out with 37 stakeholders and 3 key suppliers involved in the development process. An interview lasts between 2 to 4 hours, with a flexible schedule, according to availability of the individuals invited. The semi-structured questions were defined following a clear Process flow and Project Phases: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Project Inception / Initiation à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Project Brief Objectives à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Project Organisation Planning Development à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Project Execution, Management, Reporting and Steering Committee à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Packaging Design / Specification Quality à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Supplier Selection, Technical Qualification Approval Performance à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Business Impact, Supply and Cost. Interviewees received a clear description with scope and objectives of the review as well as relevant questions before the interview. Participants were invited to comment on any phase with regard to their own experiences and learnings together with any recommendations they might have for improvement, as well as present copies of any relevant documentation that can support the review. The principle aim of the review and Gemba walk was to capture the learnings from all employees involved and who were encouraged to freely give any comments they might have related to the following questions: What happened? Why did it happen? How, and at what stage of the design / development phase of the project, could we have avoided these failures? How should we change our development / deployment approach as a result of these learnings? What went well? What did not go so well? What could have been improved? What could have been done differently? What Key Recommendations could you offer to improve the process in the future? All comments and feedbacks were grouped into a series of transcribed Notes following Miles and Huberman (1994) recommendation. The transcription is grouped by Function and Location with a summary of the inputs that were mapped in the BPM tool: Nimbus Control. This allowed an easier analysis and quicker understanding of the whole picture and piece together the complex interfaces between all entities involved in the Packaging Development Project called 24K. Field observations To collect first-hand data field observations were made using waste audits (Muda Hunt) approach in 12 factories across Europe and Asia. The concept of MUDA hunt is meant to provide awareness to obvious waste as well as none Value Added activities at the shop floor. The application of the Lean Six Sigma tools such as DMAIC methodology will help afterwards to reduce or eliminate the identified waste. Field observations in scope: Packaging areas of main production lines; Material flows in packaging areas; Packaging materials waste; Labour utilization, packaging material usage on the lines; Space utilization on the floors, storage inventory. Field observations Out of scope: Processing of raw materials; Production lines (mixing, moulding, ) The relevant filling and packing lines were selected for Muda Hunt if they are strategic to the Business and depending on their capacity utilisation, their Efficiency and Performance as well as their material waste level. All Mudas were mapped in a prioritisation matrix (see example below) depending on their impact High or Low and their effort to implement Easy or Hard. The proposals are then listed in tables as first priority in green colour and second priority in orange colour for actions planning. Limitations of Lean programs The origin of Lean goes back to the Toyota Production System which has been created more than 40 years ago. For R. Suri (Suri, 2010) a new ground cannot be forged by focusing only on refining and implementing 40-year-old approach. Based on studies with more than 200 companies during the last 15 years, he listed few limitations related to Lean. For Suri, Lean is designed originally for production system with relatively high-volumes. Organisations that are offering high variety or customised products could not see how to implement Lean principles. According to Atkinson (Atkinson, 2010), [] LEAN must grow with the culture and not be imposed upon it. The author highlighted that too much attention is focused on the technical aspect of Lean, rather than the ambition to build a real self-sustaining Lean culture. Atkinson has listed seven misconceptions regarding Lean; first, Lean is frequently considered as a toolbox of techniques and methods that are pushed down to the organisation, rather than pulled and tailored to it. Second, Lean is not a cost reduction exercise to remove unnecessary cost out. Third, Lean concepts often are not applicable to processes and functions beyond operations. Forth, Lean often doesnt impact the design and the innovation processes. Fifth, Lean is to frequently be sold, surrounded by all the exotic terminology, as Japanese approach for improvement. Sixth, Lean does not necessitate a culture of continuous improvement and finally Lean is less concerned by the culture change. In his research of the top reasons for the failure of the major Lean initiatives, Lucey focused on the other dimensions as leadership, employees engagement and communication. Atkinson on the other hand highlighted the importance of the organisational culture that decides the success of Lean or any other improvement initiative and demonstrated that applying lean principles and tools is certainly not enough to achieve business excellence. For Treat, organisations practicing BPM may apply common Business Process Improvements (BPI) initiatives for certain improvement; nevertheless the usage of these BPI tools does not mean that the organisation is devoted to the effective application of BPM. In the same context, Hammer underlined in his process audit framework the crucial importance of applying two defined groups of characteristics that are necessary for business processes to continuously improve and sustain. These characteristics as described in the first section of this research are ba sed beside process management, on people Leadership, culture, knowledge skills and behaviours. Hence its evidently crucial to compare BPM and BPI approaches not only according to the MEM but as well from the Management perspective looking at how these approaches tackled the issues of Leadership, Culture Change, Process Management, and Continuous Improvement. Leadership Management: This factor is related to the role of top leaders and their behaviour in driving the organization towards Performance and Continuous Improvement. This central role has been accepted by experts and researchers as one of the major success factors for reaching Business Performance. Management in general is more concerned about controlling, problem fixing and making short term results and Leadership is more about the ability of giving directions, developing a vision and setting strategies to achieve this vision (Kotter, 1993, Kotter, 1996). In few words, leaders foster change and transformation in the organisation. Engaging leaders and top Mangers is the key first step for a successful implementation of Process Business Excellence. Culture Change: The ultimate Culture Change objective is to drive performance across the whole organisation in order to exceed customer expectations and therefore to win in the market place. A robust culture would promote effective performance only when it contains values and norms that helps to engage people, manage the change and the shifting to a competitive environment (Atkinson, 2010; Kotter, 1993). Literature supports Kotter and states that this kind of culture will impact positively on the productivity and performance of the organisation. As an illustration, there is a clear parallel between people engagement and the sustainability of lean initiatives (Lucey et al., 2005). The research literature shows that engaged workforce can have a huge impact on growth, profitability and competitiveness (Lucey et al., 2005) therefore a measure and monitoring of this engagement is crucial for sustaining any continuous improvement process. Process Management: Businesses are driven by a multitude of various processes, but concentrating on the core and essential ones either in operation or beyond will improve the organisation Performance. Core Processes have to be continually reviewed, measured and improved and employees should focus on defining the perfect process, eliminating any unnecessary phases, challenging the lead times or the base costs. A Performing organisation is where processes are mapped, measured and improved for all core business activities. The development of a new business process is also one of the key activities affecting Business Performance and competitive abilities. The association between cause and effects, inputs and outputs of a process must be the guiding principles to applying BPI methodologies. Efforts and resources spent other than on managing processes and changing the culture to achieve strategic objectives is waste (Atkinson, 2010). Therefore getting the processes right first is a prerequisite for achieving Performance objectives. Finally processes have to be visualised and communicated in a way that each employee can see and understands the process. Visual systems should allow everyone to have the capability to answer the question, if everything is flowing the way it should be and if we are on time to customer demand? BPM helps to create a current state map of an existing flow, then develop and implement a future state based on BPI principles. Continuous Improvement (CI): As mentioned in the introduction, organisations make efforts to implement Business Process Improvement programs to improve operational performance and achieve Business Excellence. Some of them try to move from episodic process improvements to building and sustaining their ability to improve processes continually. BPI methods help these organisations to understand and implement the concept of Continuous Improvement. But according to Brad Power (Power, 2011), if an organisation tries to institutionalize continuous process improvement based on just one approach, it will run into trouble because no single method has all the elements for sustaining continuous process improvement. Therefore Power emphasises the fact that if organisations want to keep their processes up to date continually, they need to be able to use many approaches to embedding improvement in their management systems. TQM started applying first the principle of Demings cycle Plan-do-check-act (PDCA) to continuously improve the quality, achieve customer satisfaction and reduce costs. While Six Sigma supporters claim that if you train enough people (belts..) and you measure performance, you achieve the cultural transformation toward continuous improvement. According to Hammer, advises organisations to continually assess their processes against his model of process maturity (Hammer, 2007). He advised to put in place the governance and the infrastructure to track end-to-end process performance and finally install the right culture of process centricity and continuous improvement. On the other hand Lean approach aims to cascade strategic objectives into implications for process improvements to have people aligned behind the same direction. To ensure continuous improvement attitude Lean philosophy trust executives to act as coaches, helping people at the front-line to understand the importance of waste elimination and problem-solving. Power underline that the few companies who succeed in sustaining their process improvement have actually selected and used the best from each of BPM and BPI approaches to embed continuous improvement in their organisation. This fact supports further the need of streamlining BPM and BPI approaches and extract the essence of each methodology hence the relevance of this research. Combining BPM and BPI approaches Mandatory elements of a method (MEM) Before digging further into the integration of BPI and BPM approaches, its relevant to describe the MEM elements used by Zellner to evaluate the methodological degree of BPI approaches. In order to have continuity and the same benchmark system the MEM five mandatory elements (Zellner, 2011) has been used as well in this research. First element is the Procedure model that consists of defining the order of activities to be completed when deploying the approach. Second element refers to the Technique which supports an activity to generate specific results. Third element is the Results as such which the output produced by an activity. The element number four is defining the Roles of who is carrying out and responsible of an activity. Finally the fifth element is the so-called Information Model which involves the above-mentioned components and their interactions. According to Zellner a good systematic approach should embody all MEM at the best. By explaining how the MEM can support the act of improving a business process, Zellner underlines the need of a structure model that can define clearly hat to do step by step, which activity has to be performed and by who and which result is expected in an improvement project. The only thing that without referring explicitly to BPM, Zellner was describing the fundamental elements of BPM: Defining and mapping step by step the process, affecting to each activity a role and responsibility or more precisely a RACI matrix (who is Responsible and Accountable and who has to be consulted or informed). Then the inputs, outputs and instruction are defined. Finally the process map will be the Information Model described by Zellner to describe the relationship with all elements and represent the results. The following table summarises the main factors identi ¬Ã‚ ed from literature search based mainly on the findings of Zellner regarding BPI approaches taken and adapted in table # 1 and then completing these findings by integrating Lean, Six Sigma and BPM. The aim of this comparative study is to have a systematic and holistic approach to develop the mentioned integrated model with relevant constructs that will answer therefore research question RQ2. Lean and Six Sigma vs. BPM Lean and Six Sigma principles are now being applied to business processes. From one side Lean philosophy and Six Sigma techniques address performance improvement by reducing wastes and process variability while BPM provides the platform to implement this performance and to sustain it on an on-going basis across the whole organisation. With ERP system, most companies find it very difficult to implement Lean programs. This is because ERP systems have been focused around transactions and not processes (Nayak, 2007). Automated business processes are a complex set of system transactions requiring human and machine interfaces that make the changes difficult and time consuming. In this context BPM is an enabler for driving business process improvement in Lean and Six Sigma (Nayak, 2007). BPM tools provide the capability for monitoring, documenting, improving processes therefore are imperative for fulfilling the objectives of Lean principles. The following table benchmarks the key characteristics between BPM, Lean and Six Sigma. BPI BPM in Innovation Before concluding this literature review section and preparing the next chapter of the cross-case study on Innovation process, it is essential to review the literature regarding how BPI and BPM tackled specifically the innovation issue. Literature shows actually that BPI initiatives were focused mainly on operations where link to product, customers or consumers is obvious. The interest of operation management lay in production, material handling and wastes, cost efficiencies, planning, etc. and all activities related to things and logic but less with people, behaviours and interfaces. BPI beyond the operations is therefore quite novel and organisations have great opportunity for improving as well non-operational processes such as RD, HR, Finance or other Support and Management processes. With BPI and BPM, organisations have great opportunity for improving processes beyond operations. Much of waste in processes beyond operations is viewed as minor in nature and therefore ignored. Despite the impressive results that BPI techniques can achieve at operational level, many organisations failed to grasp its potential benefit for their processes beyond operations such as in RD, Management or Support processes. The difference between manufacturing and other areas beyond operations is that the employees introduce intrinsically variability into their activities. Therefore the challenges become quite different from those occurred in manufacturing environment. Conventional approaches to reduce waste: In order to eliminate or reduce wastes from processes beyond operations, companies can take the four typical actions, the first action is to reduce processing failures and activities that dont add any value to the customer; then to eliminate superfluous and inconsistent controls. The third action is to speed up the processes by decreasing lead times and complexity and final action is to ensure a constant effort on detecting perfections that customers really want. Innovation process is one of the core processes which are key facture for insuring sustainable growth and Profit. This process will be considered in this research in next Chapter of a cross-case Study. From the literature review and the research conducted by IBM Institute for Business Value in 2006 looked at number of companies that used BPI approaches as Lean-Six Sigma to improve performance and succeed broad-based innovations. Researchers from IBM identified four distinguishing elements of approaches that set some organisation apart from those keeping a traditional operational improvement mind-set. These characteristics are first having an innovation vision based on accurate customer and market insights, then a committed Leadership to permanent innovation; third having an alignment across the whole company and finally setting up organizational capabilities that made innovation a routine way of working. Gartner stated in 2010 regarding Innovation Process that a [à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦] successful innovation needs a disciplined management to transform novel ideas into business value and Innovation management requires a clear strategy, a business focus and a defined process model. According to Gartner, generation of revenue will increase and operational effectiveness will also improve if Companies succeed to manage properly their innovation programs. Design for Six Sigma (DFSS): Through DMAIC methodology organizations were able to make great improvements in reducing number of defects and therefore quality costs. However the quality level of Five Sigma (233 defects per million opportunities) is hard to exceed. The only way to improve further and achieve the ultimate level of Six Sigma is to redesign completely the process, product or service using Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) methodology (Antony 2002). According to Antony DFSS is a powerful approach to designing products, services and processes in a cost effective way to meet customer expectations. The aim of DFSS is not to substitute the NPDI (New Product Development and Introduction) process but to make it more robust, cost effective and capable to achieve high performance in meeting customer expectations (Antony 2002). Antony listed several benefits that could be gained by adopting DFSS: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Reduced time to market for new products development or renovations à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Reduced products life cycle costs à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Better understanding of Customers needs and expectations à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Reduced number of design changes and hence prototypes à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Enhanced quality and reliability à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Improved ability to manage risks in designing products services or processesà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ Methodology and tools of DFSS The methodological process of DFSS starts with Customers needs as an input and ends with high quality products, services or robust processes as an output. One popular DFSS methodology is the DMADV. It remains the number of characters and stages, and the general feeling the same as in the DMAIC acronym. The five phases of DMADV are defined as follows: Define the project goals and customer requirements (internal and external), Measure and determine customer needs and specifications, Analyze the process options to meet customer needs. Design the process to achieve customer needs. Verify the design performance and ability to meet customer needs. Another methodology of DFSS named IDOV is a known design approach especially in the manufacturing sector. The abbreviation is defined as IDOV: Identify customer needs and specifications (CTQs), Design to translate the customer CTQs into functional requirements and alternative solutions. A selection process selects the list of solutions to the best solution, Optimize uses advanced statistical tools to predict and model the performance or calculate and optimize the design or performance and Validate to confirm means and ensure that the design which is developed reaches the customer CTQs. Lean product development LPD or Lean Design as the name indicates, draws on ideas from Lean Production as described above in chapter Background of Business Process Improvement which condensed Lean thinking into five principles: specify value, identify the value stream, make the value flow, create pull in the process and pursue perfection. Although lean production can be described at various levels, Shah et al. (2008) argue that the dominant view rests on a set of practices and tools used in eliminating waste. They also present the four main features of lean production as being quality management, pull production, preventive maintenance and human resource management. In the early stages of lean thinking, the focus was on the area of production. An exception, although not using the LPD label, is Kennard (1991), who uses six characteristics to summarise the Japanese approach to product development processes: information-intense, continual learning, constant customer contact, phases overlap, adaptability and spe ed/accuracy in execution. Another early describer of Japanese product development efforts is Funk (1993), who emphasised multifunctional problem-solving, close relationship with customers and suppliers, incremental improvement and learning. Karlsson and Ahlstrom (1996) specified later on the applicability of the Lean principles in product development by defining LPD as follows: Lean product development comprises numerous interrelated techniques, including supplier involvement, cross-functional teams, concurrent engineering, integration of various functional aspects of each project, the use of a heavyweight team structure, and strategic management of each development project. Another aspect associated with LPD is that the leaner way of working will eventually speed up the development process. However, as advocated by Crawford (1992) accelerated product development is associated with risks such as trivial innovations driving out break-through innovations and mistakes happening when skipping steps that did provide necessary information. Finally, Yang and Cai (2009) point out that LPD does not directly support the issues of quality, reliability and robustness in the product design. Combining BPM, DFSS and LPD The main potential seen in merging BPM, DFSS and LPD is to achieve improvements in quality by reducing unwanted variation (as advocated in DFSS), while at the same time being able to increase flow and speed in the development processes (as focused in BPM and LPD) (Chang and Su, 2007; Jugulum and Samuel, 2008). As summarised by Yang and Cai (2009, p. 97) DFSS improves product value and product quality, whereas LPD improves product development lead time, efficiency, flexibility and product development cost. BPM will provide the right platform to map, enhance and manage the whole process. One challenge pointed out by Jugulum and Samuel (2008) is the differences in implementation of Six Sigma initiatives and lean. The latter being broad in focus (looking at end-to-end processes and launching improvement events therein) while Six Sigma works with in-depth projects focusing on a small improvement area within a process. To some extent the integrated approaches proposed appear to be rather standard DFSS approaches with the addition of LPD tools. In contrast, authors like Karlsson and Ahlstrom (1996), Haque and James-Moore (2004) and Morgan and Liker (2006) emphasise the importance of viewing LPD as a system rather than as a set of tools, which impacts working methods throughout the organisation, such as seeking supplier involvement and cross-functional integration. BPM, LPD and DFSS have different focuses, such as improvement, innov

Essay --

Arts and Culture Elective assignment Name: Nishant Sharma Stream: Radio Roll no: PGDJ-13091 National School of Drama The national School of drama is considered to be of the foremost theatre-training institute in the world and one of its kinds in India. Every year hundreds of students apply for NSD and only 26 are selected. The school has produced some very fine actors like Pankaj Kapur, Anupam Kher, Naseeruddin Shah, Irrfan Khan and Surekha Sikri. Recently the hard work of one of the alumni of NSD also turned fruitful and that is Nawazuddin Siddiqui. It took him around 12 years to finally make his entry in Bollywood. The list of successful alumni’s of NSD is very diminutive. Every year NSD recruits 26 students for its 3 year course and their future still remains in dark. What role does institutes like National School of drama play in a country like India? How institutions like these are helping to expand the scope of theatre within the country? Before we delve into the shortcomings of NSD, let’s understand NSD and what all initiatives it takes to encourage theatre as an art form within the country. NSD was set up by Sangeet Natak Academy as one of its important units in 1959. Initially the school was situated at Nizamuddin West, and was called 'National School of Drama and Asian Theatre Institute, whose first batch passed out in 1961. But in 1975 it became an independent entity under the Ministry of Culture. The kind of Training that is imparted at NSD is considered to be highly intensive and is based on a comprehensive syllabus covering every aspect of theatre- Theory and practical. Students are also required to produce plays during the curriculum. These shows are then performed before the public. So Theory and practic... ...g to English daily also mentions that that nowhere in the world can one make a living out of theatre alone. According to him NSD should train actors for television, radio and films. He said â€Å"It would be fantastic if they could bring the kind of intensity generated in theatre training to other forums†. Also teaching theatre as an art needs to move and develop with time. There hasn’t been much change in the curriculum of NSD since its inception. They train people but they themselves have no clue about what’s next after the training. NSD should expand its wings and should open up more repertories in the country. The thing is NSD should not only hold workshops and festivals in Delhi but also in other parts of the country in order to promote the art form. The more it will reach out, the more people will show participation. It should not just be restricted to one place.

Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of DSM-IV TR Essay

DSM-IV TR, which stands for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th edition), Text Revision was published by the American Psychiatric Association in 2000 and serves as a guide book for many health professionals to diagnose a patient with a mental disorder. It also helps health professionals to determine what types of treatment could be carried out to help the patient. The latest DSM is widely used, especially in the USA and many European countries.1However, it may not be completely followed by health professionals as they know that there are some weaknesses of the latest version of DSM as well. This essay will discuss the strengths and the weaknesses of the latest DSM and new changes for the DSM-V, which is expected to be published in May, 2013. DSM’s strength would be that it standardizes psychiatric diagnostic categories and criteria2, making the diagnosis of a mental disorder relatively easier than it was in the past. It allows health professionals to diagnose a patient, use the DSM to give them possibly the best treatment and overall, help them to cure the patients if the disorder is curable. DSM also has statistical data such as the prevalence of a certain disease in different genders, age of onset of diseases, etc. This allows health professionals to have a very wide range of knowledge which may be very useful for diagnosis and treatments. Besides, the DSM allows a common language for discussing diagnosis. It provides clear criteria for certain disorders so that every clinician would come up with the same diagnosis. This makes sure that a person is not diagnosed with different types of disorders in different clinics.Thus, treating patients more efficiently. Compared to the older versions of the DSM, the latest DSM also has more subtypes and specifiers which increases the diagnostic specificity. As I mentioned before, this increases the chance of diagnosing a patient with the same disorder in different clinics, assuring that they are diagnosed with the correct disorder as misdiagnosing them could possibly lead to serious damage. For some disorders, such as bipolar disorder, there are severity indicators such as mild, moderate and severe as well. This helps clinician to decide the course of the treatment according to the severity of their disorder. This is one of the strength of DSM as using the same treatment for different severity of the same disorder will not be very appropriate or efficient. However, this severity indicator is absent in some disorders such as manic episodes which is one of the weaknesses of DSM-IV TR. These were some of the strengths of DSM-IV TR. However, we know that another edition of DSM, DSM-V is expected to be published soon. This is obviously because there are some, or many weaknesses in the current DSM with which people are not satisfied. One of the major weakness of the current DSM and probably all the older editions is â€Å"Cultural Bias†. DSMs are mainly published by anglo-Americans and most of the behaviour that is considered as â€Å"normal† in the DSM is actually what is considered normal by the anglo-Americans. That is, some of the behaviour that is considered as abnormal in the DSM might be considered as normal in other cultures. For example, in some cultures, people tend to put a lot of emphasis and values filial piety and due to that, they would behave in a way that might not be considered as normal by the anglo-Americans. Would that classify them as abnormal? What exactly is normal anyways? According to the DSM, it it, I believe, what is considered as normal by the anglo-Americans. This is one of the weaknesses of the DSM which is well-known and I think it is because of this reason that DSM might not be as popular in countries where the culture is much different compared to countries like the USA and many European countries. Another weakness would be that DSM promotes a mechanical approach to mental disorder assessment. The clinicians may focus excessively on the signs and symptoms of mental disorders and they might not put much emphasis on a more in-depth understanding of the clients/patients problems. This problem have improved but it is still a problem caused by the DSM. DSM-IV TR also does not consider patients subjective experience of a disorder. That is, the  approach is not a dimensional approach as there is no first-person report but rather, observations are usually carried out which may neglect the more somatic and psychological processes that underlie the symptoms (Flanagan, Davidson & Strauss, 2007).3 Also, DSM causes most clinicians to be primarily concerned with the signs and symptoms of a disorder rather than the underlying cause by giving a list of certain criteria for diagnosis. Another weakness and debate about the DSM is that it is an unscientific system and it is the opinion of a few powerful psychiatrists. This has raised a lot of questions and have caused people to question the validity and reliability of the diagnostic categories as well. The validity and reliability were especially questioned after the Rosenhan experiment in the 1970s in which it was concluded that the sane could not be distinguished from the insane in psychiatric hospitals. Thus, even though the reliability and validity has improved now when compared to the 1970s, it is still a weakness which I believe could not be entirely fixed. However, validity problems of the diagnostic criteria especially arise when children or adolescents are involved. For example, the DSM-IV TR criteria for bipolar and manic disorder were originally developed for adults but right now, after a few changes, it is used for children as well. This increases the chance of misdiagnosing children with bipolar disorder. This information is supported by the fact that in the last 10 years, there has been a 40%4 increase in the number of children diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It is believed that there is not a sharp increase in the number of children with bipolar disorder but rather that the clinicians have been applying the diagnostic criteria (which were originally developed for adults) much more aggressively to children.5This is one of the weakness of DSM-IV TR that needs to be improved in the future as the effects could be devastating. One of the weakness, which I believe is not very significant but still is a problem and which is actually questioned by people is the definition of the mental disorder. This was also mentioned in the lectures. According to DSM-IV TR, a mental disorder is â€Å"associated with present distress or disability or significant increased risk of death, pain, disability and important loss of freedom†. This raises the question.. what about those  individuals who engage in activities that threatens their lives but they actually enjoy it? Such as mountain climbers, scuba divers, etc. Obviously they are no considered as abnormal but according to the definition of the DSM, they are considered as having a mental disorder. But we know that this is not correct. Thus, there is a problem with the definition of the word ‘mental disorder’. There are many other weaknesses as well such as with Personality Disorder diagnosis. It is believed that the description of symptoms is very broad. This means that patients diagnosed with the same disorder could actually have very different clinical presentations. For personality disorders, DSM uses a categorical approach6. However, it would be better to use a dimensional approach so that the different types/ degree of disorder could be distinguished and thus, could be given different and more efficient treatments. Another major weakness of the Axis II personality disorder is that there is a very high degree of overlapping or co-occurence with each other. This is also a problem for Axis I mental disorders.7 There are many other weaknesses with specific disorders of DSM especially about the diagnosis criteria and some other issues such as whether ‘Paraphilias’ should be included or not. Most of the major ones has been discussed above. Now, the new changes for DSM-V will be discussed. There are many new changes for the DSM-V. I will mainly mention those that are related to the weaknesses mentioned above. However, the new changes are discussed, the 4 principles behind the current process for revising DSM should be discussed. (Obtained from APA DSM-V Development’s official website) 1) Clinical Utility- the manual should be useful to those who diagnose and treat patients with mental illnesses 2) Recommendations should be guided by evidence 3) DSM-V should maintain continuity with previous editions whenever possible 4) No priori restraints should be placed on the level of change permitted  between DSM-IV and DSM-V From these 4 principles, it becomes clearer to us why DSM-IV is being revised and what changes should be expected. One of the changes is that in order to better assess the severity of symptoms, a dimensional assessment will be included. For example, other factors such as sleep quality, mood, etc will be considered regardless of the diagnosis. This will help to reduce the problem of â€Å"mechanical approach† as mentioned before. They will also help to address symptoms that are not included within the diagnostic criteria for specific illnesses (e.g. the problem of insomnia for patients diagnosed with Schizophrenia). DSM-V might also include something that could solve the problem of how to handle patients with co-occuring disorders, which is a major weakness of DSM-IV TR. Besides that, DSM-V will also have improved diagnostic criteria that are not precise in DSM-IV TR. Also, a few words would be changed as well in the new DSM. For example, the word â€Å"Mental Retardation† would be changed to â€Å"Intellectual Disability†.   Another change that would also be included would somehow, indirectly address the problem of cultural bias. In the new DSM, careful consideration would be given to the gender, race and ethnicity. This, I believe could help to lessen the severity of the cultural problem as mentioned before. Besides that, another ‘proposal’ is that, the criteria should be more stringent for the diagnosis of bipolar disorder in children. This also addresses one of the weakness mentioned earlier. This is a very important proposal as I believe it is not very humane to misdiagnose children with â€Å"Mental Disorders†. It could affect their life significantly. Another major changes is in the assessment and diagnosis of personality disorders. As mentioned before, a dimensional approach will be used rather than a categorical approach. This can help to determine the different severities of disorders and determine the ‘subtypes’ more accurately. Overall, it would make the diagnosis much more accurate and thus, more  efficient treatment could be used. These changes were mainly in response to the weaknesses mentioned above. Other changes include creating a new category called â€Å"Behavioural addiction†. This category is solely based on gambling. Internet addiction was also proposed. However, due to the lack of research in that field, it was rejected. This shows that they somehow followed principle 2 which emphasizes on the importance of evidence. Another category called the â€Å"Risk Syndromes† is also being considered. This will help clinicians identify earlier stage of mental disorders. The category of substance abuse and dependence will be removed and it would be replaced by a new category called â€Å"Addiction and Related Disorders†. This is done to help clinicians distinguish between similar types of disorders more easily and lower the chance of misdiagnosis (e.g. dependence is often confused with compulsive drug-seeking behaviour addiction). 8Another change is that the criteria for some eating disorde rs such as Anorexia Nervosa has been improved. Overall, the diagnostic criteria for many disorders has been improved and a dimensional approach is being used in DSM-V rather than the categorical approach used in the previous editions. All of these changes, together with many other minor ones, aim to improve the diagnosis process and thus, ensures that people are saved from misdiagnosis (which could lead to devastating effects) and so that they can receive better treatment which would increase their chances of being cured (if the disorder is curable). Bibliography Berman, J. (n.d.). Understanding the DSM-IV TR. Retrieved on 15th March, 2013, from http://www.ceuschool.com/librarydocs/SOC222.pdf Dombeck, M., Hoermann, S., Zupanick, E.C. (2011). Personality Disorders: Problems with current diagnostic system. MentalHelp. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=569 Flanagan, E., Davidson, L. & Strauss, J. (2007). â€Å"Issues for DSM-V: Incorporating Patients’ Subjective Experiences.† Am. J. Psychiatry, 164(3), 391 – 392. Kleinplatz, P.J., Moser. C. (2005). DSM-IV-TR and the Paraphilias: An Argument for Removal. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://www2.hu-berlin.de/sexology/GESUND/ARCHIV/MoserKleinplatz.htm Kronemyer, D. (2009). Phenomenological Psychology. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://phenomenologicalpsychology.com/2009/06/how-can-dsm-iv-be-improved-as-it-transitions-to-dsm-v/ American Psychiatric Association. (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th ed., text rev.). Washington, DC. Bipolar Disorder in Children. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipolar_disorder_in_children Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders DSM-5. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 13 from http://en.wikipe dia.org/wiki/DSM-5 DSM-5 development: Frequently Asked Questions. American Psychiatric Association.Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://www.dsm5.org/pages/default.aspx Rosenhan Experiment. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment