Demand Analysis Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Demand Analysis - Term Paper Example Hence, gasoline prices will be a potential determinant of Toyota SUV’s future demand. Reports indicate that gasoline price is likely to fall by the middle of 2013 and therefore demand of Toyota SUVs would be further increased after one year. BP gasoline The BP gasoline has a good market demand currently. Undoubtedly, price of the BP gasoline is the major factor affecting its market demand. When the BP gasoline price increases, the product’s demand will decline and vice versa. In addition, the level of demand for fuel vehicles greatly influences the BP gasoline demand because this product is majorly used as a fuel in internal combustion engines. While analyzing the BP gasoline demand a year from now, it seems that the demand is more likely to be declined because modern people are turning towards electric vehicles. However, gasoline price projections for 2013 indicate a downward trend and this situation would in turn promote gasoline demand to some extent. 3D movies Deman d for 3D movies is very high in modern entertainment industry. According to a survey commissioned by the International 3D Society, nearly 74% of the participants opined that â€Å"today’s 3D movies are better than 2D movies†; and in addition, 30% was of the view that â€Å"3D movies are incredible† (BusinessWire). Weaknesses in the 2D technology and customer expectations on 3D movies seem to be the important elements promoting the demand for 3D movies. In addition, recent technological developments in the 3D movie sector also contribute to the demand. However, 3D movie ticket prices can have a direct influence on its demand in line with the law of demand. The demand for 3D movies may further rise after one year because the International 3D society survey indicates that the majority of the people are yet to see a 3D movie (BusinessWire). Obesity cures Obesity cures have an immense demand across the globe, especially in the Western countries like the United States . The prevalence of overweight and obesity is soaring in the US mainly due to people’s adverse lifestyle practices and unhealthy food habits. Nowadays, people are more concerned about their health and hence they are willing to pay more for healthcare services. Hence, individuals’ consciousness is identified to be the major factor influencing the demand for obesity cures. Since the US healthcare sector is still struggling to control obesity related issues in the country, demand for obesity cures is most likely to mount throughout next few years. Tattoos While evaluating the current market position of tattoos, is clear that the conventional social stigma concerning tattoos is rapidly disappearing and which in turn promotes the demand for tattoos; and it is observed that the increased use of tattoos by celebrities has greatly added value to the tattoo demand (BBC News). Undoubtedly, tastes and preferences of customers would probably affect tattoo market demands. In additi on, many marketers offer good quality and attractive tattoos at fairly low costs and therefore the cost effectiveness also promotes the demand for tattoos. There would be a higher demand for tattoos in a year from now because the social image of tattoos is positively changing. Furthermore, marketers are vehemently trying to offer more improved and variety tattoos at cheaper costs.

The Effect of Media on Young Girls

The Effect of Media on Young Girls The Effect of Media on Young Girls One of the most sensitive stages of a human being are their youth, whilst growing up one is faced with numerous transitions that transform one into someone mature. Our society has been swamped by endless media around us coming in different formats, i.e. magazines, newspapers, TV, Internet, etc. Each one of these has managed to flood dominating messages that put one’s self-image into question. Within the context of this essay, it examines the effect of media on young girls. The fact young girls are at a vulnerable phase they are most likely to be impacted by what they watch on TV, read in the magazines and get pumped by the current social media. Unfortunately the media has put a great deal of stress and pressure on the minds of sensitive young girls who are compelled to accomplish a so called ‘perfect image’. When we refer to the term ‘ideal image’, it directly includes supermodels, models, singers, actresses and icons who seem to be the ideal of young girls. Media is clearly responsible for promoting fake images of models who undergo an airbrushed and edited image of themselves when presented in magazines. Furthermore, these supermodels undergo strict and dangerous diets where their health suffers to an extreme. There are issues of self-image which are seen to be the biggest concern. Within self-image it results in three destructive effects, namely; depression (physical and mental) and eating disorders (Schlegel, n.d) York (2012) exposes the shocking figures from 2011 at 16% highlights there has been a boom in eating disorders. One of the biggest increase was mainly girls who were aged from 10 to 15 up at 69% in 2011. It could further be elaborated that eating disorders have the highest morality rates of any mental illness which were accounted at 20%. Interestingly, the depiction of the so called ‘ideal’ body kinds portrayed by Western media has been perceived as a major factor in inseminating eating disorders. It can be highlighted how social media has rapidly promoting these diseases. Shockingly, the research points out eating disorders were becoming widespread just like a virus due to social networks, whereas pro-anorexic websites would offer tips, guidance and an online community was designed for unhealthy weight management. One fine example demonstrating the widespread search conducted online on eating disorders and losing weight unhealthily is the case of Pinterest who have take n an initiative to put an end to search words, i.e. ‘thininspiration’ that would provide users a list of results which were linked to eating disorders. Pinterest offered users to read warnings that would refer to the dangers of eating disorders and how they weren’t a part of lifestyle choices but were simply a mental disorder which if they left untreated could possibly result in major health problems and even pose a major threat to one’s life. One of the other social networks that is notorious with promoting self-consciousness is Facebook. Facebook has been pro-actively promoting ‘self-consciousness as being an extremely important issue where body image and weight are center of attention. Maree (n.d) believes media has been compelling numerous youth to commit suicide, it has brought youth suicide to the front row where there has been a boom in youth depression that results in a high rate of suicide in the recent years. Maree refers to the statistics taken from the National Suicide Research Foundation (NSRF) back in 2011 which showed the suicide rates stood at four male to one female ratio. Furthermore, suicide amongst young girls was displayed in 2012 as a result of numerous tragic deaths. There were three major deaths that raised eye brows and outraged the public, the tragic deaths of Ciara Pugsley, Erin and Shannon Gallagher raised a very significant issue of why these deaths took place and scrutinizing the negative influence of media and promotion of self-image pushing these young souls to plunge to their own death. Their deaths resulted in organizations within the government along with the media instantly initiating work on fighting the lack of resources for the youth who were suffering from depression. It should be pointed youth depression has emerged due to numerous factors, where such a condition is simply complicated in nature. Self-esteem is said to be one of the main issues which emerge in youth depression. Unfortunat ely the media has been predominantly playing a negative role in promoting conflicting interest in itself also for the youth, where if bad exposure is restricted it can certainly make a major difference. The number of times the young girls view a super model, this makes them wonder if they could share a resemblance to their so called ‘media ideal’s and accomplish this by undergoing cruel diets at a tender age when their bodies are undergoing numerous kinds of changes. The fact the media is constantly flooding the TV channels, fashion magazines and social media with representing a so called ‘perfect woman’, this results in the creation of mental and emotional issues, this specially refers to the inability to remain joyful in their very own body. As per the comments by a counsellor, such a depiction clearly delivers a very impractical body image in the media which can have an extremely serious and deep impact on susceptible woman than one imagines. Sanders (n.d) emphasizes how media marketing has simply depicted a very fake image of models, actresses and icons that becomes an impossible objective for young girls to accomplish. The fact the youth are highly influenced by celebrities and pick up the latest fashion, hair-style and lifestyle trends from their ideals, this results in a trend of being a copy-cat where one is compelled to imitate their ideals and feel a sense of dissatisfaction if they are unable to do so. If one takes into consideration how popular media has been progressively promoting a thinner and thinner body image as the so called ideal for women, this has become more like a competition for the youth where they feel it is necessary to maintain a thin image. Being thin for today’s youth means being beautiful, here they are unable to distinguish between reality and what is digital editing in magazines, social media and online websites. Unfortunately, the youth are paying a heavy price at the expense of their health to be socially accepted by starving themselves on fad diets that will have a major side-effect on their health. In terms of self-confidence, the youth will feel out of place, lacking a sense of affinity and unable to confidently socialize if they do not fit the so called ideal criteria of being thin and beautiful. They feel their social group will reject them on basis of them being slightly fat or what is normal. There is this unpleasant bullying that comes into the picture where one is experiencing teasing from their counterparts on the basis of how they look like, i.e. fat. The fatter you are, the more unpleasant and disconnected you are from being a part of the popular group of girls. Heubeck (n.d) takes the example of American girls who are facing the burden of being model like thin which seems like a real aspiration for them, however this starts off at a very young age which is extremely disappointing. There are countless bombardments of TV adverts featuring models with perfect lips, body, hair-style and the entire attractive physical appearance that seems a must achieve for these young minds. Unfortunately these young girls seems to consider these celebrities as role models even if these role models have a cruel bad reputation. According to Renee Hobbs, EdD, Associate Professor of Communications at the Temple Univesity she found in her research the exposure an average teen gets to media is nearly 180 minutes with only 10 minutes of interaction with their parents on a daily basis. This view is shared by Elissa Gittes, MD- a pediatrician at the adolescent medicine at the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, she believes young girls are obsessed with imitatin g the ideal image they watch in media, they end up taking harsh and desperate measures. There has been an increase in the number of young girls who comment on how unhappy they are with their body and are working obsessively hard to change this image of themselves. As per the research conducted by Nancy Signorielli from the Kaiser Foundation, Nancy discovered one in every three articles in leading teen girl magazines also consisted a key focus on physical appearance, where majority of the advertisements (reported at 50%) used an appeal to beauty to market and sell their products. Furthermore, the TV adverts and commercials which were targeted at female viewers depicted frequently were regularly watched by young girls where beauty was seen as the central theme for product appeal. When examining the figures on eating disorders, it points how 1,000 women died annually as a result of anorexia nervosa. Nearly, five percent of adult women and adolescent along with one percent of men were suffering from binge eating disorder, anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. When comparing the figures on men to women suffering from depression and eating disorders, it clearly demonstrates it is young girls who are most affected and suffer from depression and eatin g disorders (Media’s effect on body image, n.d) It can be concluded from the findings within this essay popular media is certainly responsible for influencing young girls in a negative way by making them self-conscious about looking perfect. There has been an artificial imagery of icons created, flashed and swamped in different mediums of media that has caught the eye and attention of young minds who take it in a positive manner. The fact more and more young girls are driven towards looking like their ‘role models’ they take up unhealthy options to look physically perfect even if it means it is a life threatening one. The issue of self-image is an umbrella which entails issues of mental and physical depression along with eating-disorders that have multiplied and compelled young girls to commit suicide. More and more young girls are drawn to look perfect starting from as young as the age of 5. It is the responsibility of media, government, health organizations and parents to intervene and deviate these young girls from taking an extreme measure which would result in a complete chaos. There is a strong need to tackle this matter as the rapid flow of information available online and easily accessed by anyone at the click of a button, i.e. mobile device, tablet, etc., it is truly concerned as to how there is an endless amount of literature available that attracts more and more young minds to imitate their favorite celebrities, icons and become just like them. Governments and health organizations need to implement strict codes that would ban media from promoting an unrealistic picture of what is a perfect woman as these young minds are vulnerable and capable of believing what they see on TV. Parents should be actively involved in monitoring on the habits, patterns and changes in behaviors of their children. The fact we are living in a modern world has meant we are suffering greatly with a fabricated image of what is considered perfect by the media and what is truly perfect in the real world, which ob viously is a complete conflict. Schools and colleges should promote an awareness of accepting oneself rather hating one’s own image. Successful media campaigns conducted like the one by Dove was an impressive and attention grabbing one which demonstrated how beauty in women is not limited to any form of perfection of being thin but rather accepting oneself the way they are. It truly celebrates natural beauty and promotes this image by featuring a group of women in different colors, sizes, heights and empowers female beauty in a natural way. There is a strong need for more and more media campaigns similar to this that should be created and promoted to wash away the wrong image depicted of perfection into the young minds of girls.

Herman Wouks The Winds of War How Should One Read A Book? :: Winds of War Essays

Herman Wouk's   The Winds of War  - How Should One Read A Book?      Ã‚  Ã‚   While reading Herman Wouk's classic tale, The Winds of War, I came across several passages describing a young man's vision of Germany. Although the author supplies me with his ideas, his desire and his provocative details on how this young Major views Germany at the time of the second world war, I still find myself wondering and questioning aspects of the written text before me. Apart from being drawn from my sub-conscious state to a more subtle and unconscious condition, several questions begin to from within my mind. Have I ever seen Germany before? What were the political conditions? What did the SS Stormtroopers look like? What did a concentration camp reveal? By triggering these sensors and somewhat emotional queries within me, the author has already caused a clockwork cycle to commence which will enlighten my reading and eventually create enjoyment and furthering interests with his novel. This is what Virginia Woolf focuses her composition about and emphasizes so very clearly      Ã‚  Ã‚   After reading her essay, I came to grasp and understand her theory that one is best not to accept advice from another on how to read literature, since the best advice is no advice at all. Woolf expresses the conception that when one begins to read literature he begins to enter different stages of interpretation that will ultimately improve his pleasure and satisfaction. It was obvious to me that I had in fact indulged in forms of interpretation when reading literature, but it had never dawned on me until reading Woolf's essay. Whenever I am subjected to something in literature that is not fully comprehensive, I begin to engage in several different forms of interpretation. The first stage would reflect much of the philosophy composed in the essay 'Against Interpretation' whereas I, the reader, would observe the content and then translate the form. Literature induces the reader to use his experience and memories to comprehend what a person, place or thing is and then interpret it. Th econd stage would involve translating where one begins a comparison sequence trying to link their past knowledge with the subject introduced by the author.

Interior and Exterior Concepts of Visual Merchandising Essay

Visual merchandising is the art of implementing effective design ideas to increase store traffic and sales volume. Visual merchandising is known to be silent selling, in the sense that the product should sell itself. It is all about delivering good customer service to enhance the experience in store. There are many tactics and techniques for visual merchandising which are all linked to the physiological ways of the consumer are buying behaviours. Visual merchandising is very important to retailers because it shows how well they know the consumer, it will increase their foot flow in store and their sales if they get it right. It is important because it’s about creating the right experience to make them want to come back and buy things when in store. I will be looking at visual merchandising of three stores. The three stores I have chosen are Bank, JD sports and Farm and Pet place. Bank: Bank has a target market of 15-25, they provide the latest branded fashion and the competitors are arcadia group. JD Sports: JD sells the latest sportswear for their target market of sports enthusiasts. Their competitors are JJB sports and Sports direct. Farm and Pet Place: Farm and Pet place provide farm and get goods to its target market of farmers and pet owners. Its main competitors are pets at home and wynnstays. Findings Location & Visual Merchandising There are three types of locations for retailers these are: * Primary * Secondary * Anchor As the primary location is the main, they are town or city, it is important the retailer makes the store stand out compared to its competitors. Retailers in a primary location usually have standard visual merchandising. The secondary location is the quieter area of the towns and cities far away from main facilities and amenities; this is why there is less foot flow than a primary location. There is normally not a lot of space for retailers to experiment with their visual merchandise and the retailers located in the secondary location usually have poor visual merchandising as they follow procedure instead of being creative as they don’t have a big budget. An anchor store is a store within a precinct or on a high street with large overheads it attracts well known retailers who have the pulling factor to bring other retailers to the area. An anchor store retailer will have a very large budget to be able to become creative with their visual merchandising this why they usually have very food visual merchandising. Bank store in Llandudno is in a secondary location, so is Farm and Pet place and JD sports. Bank and JD are both in outlet centres therefore they have a lot of foot flow even though it’s just a secondary location. I think that Farm and Pet place are situated in a place where there isn’t much foot flow; you’d go there because you knew about it. Purpose Built or Interior Buildings Whether a retailer has decided to buy a previously owned building or buy a purpose built building, it affects the visual merchandising as every building has a different shape. If retailers buy a purpose built building they will have an advantage as they’re much better for visual merchandising because of the shape and the height, it is more suited. The purpose built buildings have considered the needs of the visual merchandising. For the inherited buildings it is not as easy as some of them are listed therefore the shop front cannot be changed, so if a retailer wanted to have a fancy shop front they could not because the building cannot be changed. Also they are really narrow and long therefor it is really cramped spacing to visual merchandise; it limits how much you are able to do. Even though purpose built buildings are more costly they are more cost effective in the long run. Bank has a purpose built building, however they haven’t taken full advantage of it because they have a false ceiling which could be potential selling space but it’s been wasted because they rushed getting the store open. The Farm and Pet place also have a purpose built building which they too haven’t taken full advantage of as they have windows in their store except the glass in the entrance doors. JD has purpose built buildings and they have taken full advantage of their purpose built store as they have put everything to its use. It has two floors, one for clothes products and the upper level footwear selling space. Store Architecture The design indicates the size and prestige of the retailers operation. The use of materials will create different images and effects within the store. As I have mentioned in the above paragraph about listed buildings, retailers are unable to change them to suit the ways of their visual merchandising as they cannot be structurally altered. As all three of the retailers I have chosen have purpose built stores they should be able to store and suit their store to the type of visual merchandising they may have, it should work in their advantage however in these cases it seems to not work as an advantage as they have poor visual merchandising displays. Farm and Pet place have no windows even though there store is purpose built so they could change it they haven’t therefore they have window displays to encourage people to go into the store. Even though JD have ken full advantage of the space of their purpose built store they don’t use their window space properly as they have little displays and Bank haven’t used their second floor and aren’t very creative with their displays. Fascia The fascia of a store is what identifies the store and attracts attention from the public. They also are what able customers to identify the store, what is sold and where the retailer is located. Here are three types of fascia: * Straight Flat Format * Side Hanging Format * Raised Front Format The straight flat format can only be seen from the front of the shop I feel this this isn’t the best option for a fascia as it doesn’t stand out very well they usually use these formats in precincts. The side hanging fascia are usually used in high streets, they are quite affective as customers can see it from both directions, creating more attention. The raised front format is usually illuminated and can be seen from far away I feel this is good as it creates a lot of attention from people walking past or people passing in cars. Many retailers tend to take a safe approach to their logo for example just using a black and white colour scheme, this is not a good approach as the store doesn’t stand out and it may lose out to other competitors. It is replicated throughout the store. Bank and JD have raised front format but Farm and Pet place has a straight flat format, Bank stores sign lights up as does JD which makes it visible to customers in the dark but Farm and Pet Place don’t have a sign that lights up. As is their window isplays in Bank and JD they have timing for the lights to go on and off at appropriate times but because Farm and Pet Place don’t have any windows, as they are a warehouse, they don’t need timed lights. All three retailers have their brand displayed through the fascias. I think as a recommendation to them all they should invest in side hanging fascia this makes it harder for customers to overlook the store because they haven’t seen the sign. As a personal recommendation to Farm and Pet Place they should light up their sign and invest in windows to display their merchandise. The Importance of the Shop Format This is the first part of the store which the customers see, this is where they create there first impression therefore it is important to get it right. There are three recognised types of shop front these are: * The Straight Front * The Angled Front * The Arcade Front The straight front is for shops that run parallel to the street with small entrance; this is hard for retailers with visual merchandising as they have small spaces to work with to be able to make their shop front stand out. This makes it harder to compete with competitors. The angled front enables shops to create a more attractive and interesting front this helps direct customers into the store. It also creates a better viewing angle and can reduce the glare on the window making everything more visible. The arcade front is straight with several recessed window and entrances this provides the shopper with a protected area for window shopping drawing them in and creating a more relaxed atmosphere. The Importance of Window Displays The window displays an important part of visual merchandising as this is what entices the customer into entering the store. In order to pull the customers into the store is through window dressing, it needs to grab the customer’s attention it only takes 3 seconds for a customer to gain an impression. There are two types of window displays these are: * Simplistic * Artistic The UK retailers have tended to stick to the simplistic look for their window displays except for the bigger stores such as Harrods as they have a lot of money to spend. The purpose of the window displays is to represent a small sample of merchandise the store holds and to enforce their corporate image; they are also to be informative to the customers. Informative window displays provide information to customers for example as we have had the Olympics back in 2012, the theme of their window may be based around that theme. The fact that they were themed displays around the Olympics meant that they would be tackling two things at once because you are meant to display them in an informative way. As Farm and Pet Place don’t have a window they cannot display window displays and customers cannot see anything they see in store they actually have to go into the store this may put customers off as a lot of customers like to window shop. Bank fashion has a very simple window display, it shows what offers they have but they don’t show many products displayed in their window, so to improve they could think about extending the window space to display more products to show their range that they stock in store and be more creative. JD Sports don’t have a good window display, they display barely any products and a few pairs of footwear, it doesn’t look appealing to customers therefore they won’t go into the store because of the window display.

Questionnaire on fashion brands Essay

Factors Affecting Consumer Preference of International Brands over Local Brands Zeenat Ismail1âˆâ€", Sarah Masood2 and Zainab Mehmood Tawab2 1 Department of Social Sciences, Institute of Business Administration – Karachi 2 Students of Institute of Business Administration – Karachi Abstract: This study was conducted in order to determine the consumer preferences of global brands instead of local ones. It is also designed to find out the buying behavior patterns of young Pakistani consumers Consumer evaluates products based on information cues, which are intrinsic and extrinsic. A number of factors affect the consumer purchase decisions. The results suggest that most important factors that influence a consumer’s final decision are the price and quality of the product in question. Since the consumers usually associate the price of the brand with its quality, a brand priced too low is generally perceived as a low quality product. Similarly, a product priced too high may not be affordable by many. Other factors that have an impact on the consumer preferences are: consumer ethnocentrism, country of origin, social status, price relativity with the competing brands and family and friends. The research was conducted in Karachi and the samples selected included 200 people of age 16-24. The data collected for the research was through a questionnaire and was conducted in two popular shopping malls of the city and two universities since the target audience was largely the youth. Calculations were then analyzed and interpreted using a percentage of respondents and through frequency distribution tables and charts. Keywords: Consumer preference, International brands, Local brands 1. Introduction Globalization is an inevitable phenomenon that is leading the entire world towards becoming one market, a global village. Not only has the process of globalization aided immensely in the exchange of goods and services, information and knowledge through the reductions in international barriers, but it has also led the world into becoming a real single universal community comprising of people from different cultures, thus resulting in the shrinkage of the world. With the world becoming a single market, globalization has had a major contribution in enabling the organizations worldwide to step out of the restricted domestic markets and to set up their operations across the globe with confidence. This has largely led to a decline in the importance in national borders and a greater emphasis on what the consumers actually demand; be the consumers located in the very country in which the organization exists or an entirely different part of the world. Moreover, with the rapid increase in global competition, companies that strictly adhere to and cater to the needs of the local markets are finding themselves at a disadvantage and gradually loosing the competitive advantage that they so much strived to achieve. However, for some products and services â€Å"the tastes and preferences of consumers in different nations are beginning to converge on some global norm† (Holt 2002). From a consumer perspective, however, reactions to the prevalence of global brands seem to vary among the different customers. On the one hand, consumers seem to value and admire global brands and regard such brands as a status symbol. On the other hand, global brands are often criticized for threatening the local differences and imposing the western cultures on our society, leading to a loss of cultural identity. 2. Purpose of the study: âˆâ€" Email: zismail@iba.edu.pk Tel #:+92(333) 3775545 Fax #:+92(21) 38103008 54 This study is aimed at determining consumer preference of the youth of international brands instead of national or local brands in Pakistan. There are various factors which influence consumer purchase decision. Such as  Country of origin, price of the brand fashion, family and friends, brand name, availability, advertising campaigns, consumers’ ethnocentrism etc. The study is also designed to find out the buying behaviour patterns of the young Pakistani consumers, attitudes towards global and local brands and the preference for foreign brands. 3. Literature review Brands have been constantly reviewed and redefined in the marketing literature and there are numerous definitions for ‘brand’. A definition of a brand by The American Marketing Association (AMA) in the 1960s (Keller, 1998:2) is â€Å"a name, term, sign, symbol, or design, or a combination of them, intended to identify the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and differentiate them from those of competitors.† For consumers, when deciding between brands which are in the marketplace will include brands as an element to determine the qualities of the product rather than employing their time to enhance their knowledge of the product in information searching activities. Therefore, consumers use brands as cues to make decisions to purchase or try products (Ger et al., 1993). 4. Quality Perceived quality is defined as the consumers’ judgment about an entity’s (service’s) overall excellence or superiority (Zeithaml, 1988 and Rowley, 1998). Research also indicates that consumers value global brands especially for their assumed high quality and prestigious image (e.g., Nguyen, Barrett and Miller 2005; Steenkamp, Batra and Alden 2003). An internationally well-established brand name can act as a â€Å"halo† constructs that effects quality beliefs (Han 1989). If a brand is perceived as globally available, consumers are likely to attribute a superior quality to the brand, since such quality is thought of as a prerequisite for international acceptance. 5. Country of origin The country of origin effect has been defined as â€Å"the positive and negative influence that a product’s country of manufacture may have on consumers’ decision making processes or subsequent behavior (Elliott and Cameron, 1994). 1991). Infact in the words of Nagashima (1970), COE can be defined as  Ã¢â‚¬Å"the picture, the reputation, and the stereotype that businessmen and consumers attach to products or brands of a specific country. This image is created by such variables as representative products, national characteristics, economic and political background, history, and traditions†. The literature on country-of-origin effects is quite rich and covers the topic from different perspectives in different countries. Some studies have shown that country of origin also has symbolic and emotional meaning to consumes, and it plays an important role along with other attributes such as quality and reliability in shaping consumers attitudes toward products. Moreover, attitudes and perceptions of consumers toward brands and products will depend on categories, for instance, electronic goods from Italy may be perceived as a poor quality but Italian clothing would be perceive as fashionable and high quality (Bikey and Nes, 1982). This would be differently perceived with Japanese brands as Japanese electronic goods would be perceive with positive attitudes and Japanese clothing will be negatively perceived. 6. Price Researchers found out that once consumers perceive a price difference between local-owned and foreignowned brands, price dissimilarities begin to affect their preference for local-owned brands. Therefore, since price is also one of the most important extrinsic cues that consumers use when evaluating the product/brand (Hansen, 2005), we test the impact of price against consumer’s ethnocentric tendencies to determine at what point consumers are willing to forsake preference for local products for a greater price discount with foreignowned products. 7. Social status 55 Authors have stressed that consumers may prefer global brands because of associations of higher prestige (Schuiling & Kapferer, 2004; Shocker, Srivastava, & Rueckert, 1994; Steenkamp, et. al., 2003). Global brands may have a higher prestige than local brands due to their relative scarcity and higher price. Furthermore, global brands may also stand for cosmopolitanism. Some consumers prefer global brands because they enhance their selfimage as being cosmopolitan, sophisticated, and modern. Conversely, according to Ger (1999), local brands tend to be targeted and positioned based on a deep cultural understanding and therefore create â€Å"a sustainable unique value and offer the symbolism of authenticity and prestige†. Still, consumers have been found to have no intrinsic preference for global brands (De Mooij, 1998). 8. Friends and family Reference groups include groups or people whom one can look up for guidance and ask for opinion. These are important source of influencing the brand purchases. Reference group include friends and family who influence ones buying decisions due to special skills, knowledge, personality. If a friend had a bad experience with a product, it is more likely that one will refrain from buying it. However many studies found out that, knowledge that consumers obtain through direct personal experience will be perceived to be more trustworthy than information from other communications. This results in more strongly held beliefs (Swaminathan et al., 2001). 9. Research Questions The reasons for consumer preference of global brands over the local ones. The product attributes that are mostly considered by consumers when buying a brand. The demographic characteristic of consumers who buy foreign brands more frequently. 10. Research methodology This study is a descriptive study and more of a qualitative nature and was conducted to identify and analyze the reasons why consumers prefer international brands to national brands when purchasing consumer goods. The sample for this research included the 200 consumers whose ages ranged from 16-24 years from Karachi. Simple random sampling was used for this study. Questionnaires were used to collect primary data. The questionnaire included closed ended questions and Likert scale is used in most of the questions. These questionnaires were distributed to collect data from the students of  Institute of Business Administration itself as well as the students of Institute of Business Management. Apart from this, we also visited Park Towers shopping mall and The Forum, the two leading shopping malls in Karachi, with the aim of collecting data for our research from the shoppers there. 50 questionnaires were distributed to each of the universities and shopping malls in equal proportion to males and females. We mainly classified our population according to gender. Frequency distribution and bar charts have been used to evaluate the results. In addition to this, the means of different factors that influence consumers’ preferences of the local and global brands were used to determine which factors are considered the most by consumers when purchasing different brands. 11. Findings and Discussion 11.1. Question 1: Do you use international brands products? 56 According to the data collected, 72.5% of the people used international brands of which 60 were male and 85 were females. 18.5% of the people questioned claimed to use international brands occasionally, whereas, 9.1% of the people claimed not to use global brands at all. As indicated in the pie charts above,18.5% of the people who used the global brands sometimes included 28 males and 9 females, and those who did not use the global brands consisted of 12 males and 6 females. 11.2. Question 2 If an international brand and a national brand are priced same, would you prefer the international brand? The purpose of this question was to evaluate and discover how important a factor such as price is in determining whether the consumers would go for the domestic brand or stick to the global one if both the products were in  the same price range. The results found out that 76% of the consumers would go for the international brands whereas 24% would still purchase the domestic ones. 11.3. Question 3 Do you consider where a product is manufactured when purchasing it? F r e q u e n c y d i s Responses This question was asked to discover how much importance the youth lay on the country of origin as a factor when making a purchase. The results revealed far different results compared to what had been stated by the review of previous researches done. As indicated in the graph, the youth was found to be mailnly ignorant of the country in which the brand was manufactured. Majority of the consumers (76% males and 88% females) did not consider it as significant a factor as to affect his or her purchase decision. 11.4. Question 4 It is said that people buy international products so that they can be accepted in a particular social group. Do you agree? 57 The results to these two questions confirmed the general perception that exists in our society, that is, the global are purchased as a status symbol. The youth mainly bought foreign branded products to be able to fit in a particular social group. This occurs largely because peer pressure tends to be high at this age, and most of the people find themselves being victims of inferiority complexes. The results to the first of these questions indicated that on average 75% of the youth (71 males and 79 females) purchased the international and local brands as a status symbol. These results were further enhanced by the results to the next question, which showed that 72% of the males and 68% of the females did, infact, believe that the people purchased the international brands to be able to fit in a particular social group. The table above compares the means of the different factors in influencing consumer preferences of the global brands over the local ones. The means, expressed in percentages, indicates that amongst all the factors, the quality of the branded product was considered the most important factor in shaping the consumers’ purchase decision. The current trends and fashion were found to be just as important, but the price of the product was not found to be more important than the prevailing fashion and styles. The reason why 85% of the people decide to buy a particular brand was mainly because it was reflective of the ongoing fashion and there were only 5% people on average, who did not give importance to the ongoing fashion when purchasing a product. The results revealed that price was rated as the third most important factor in influencing consumer choice, whereas the quality of the product was considered the most significant, followed by the current trends and fashion. Mean number of people ( in percentages) Yes Sometimes 76% 16.5% Price of the product 4.5% 13.5% Country of origin 87.5% 7.5% Quality of the product 75% 15.5% Status symbol 85% 10% Current fashion and trends 64.5% 17.55% Family and friends 60% 20.5% Ethnocentrism No 7.5% 82% 5% 9.5% 5% 18% 19.5% Country of origin, as a factor in influencing consumers’ choice of the brand was hardly a significant factor, since 82% of the people, on, average claimed that they did not consider which country a product is manufactured in when making purchase decisions. Only 4.5% people, on average, claimed that they do consider the country of origin when purchasing a brand. The ethnocentrism factor was considered by 60% of the people questioned. This indicates that most of the people believed that as a Pakistani we should buy our local brands rather than giving preference to the global brands, however, this was what they believed to be the ideal scenario. In practice, our people, especially the females were found to be extremely prone to the global brands. According to our findings, 78% of the females were not willing to even substitute the global brand with a domestic if the foreign  brand is not available. The males, however, were not found to be that prone to the foreign brand. The results also show that status symbol is also perceived to be a major factor in shaping consumer purchase decisions. The above table reveals that 75% of the people linked the branded product with their social status when actually purchasing it. The table provides a summary and ratings of the factors influencing consumer preferences of the national or international brand. 12. References 58 [1] Balabanis, G., Diamantopoulos, A., Mueller, R. and Melewar, T.C. (2001), â€Å"The impact of Nationalism, patriotism and internationalism on consumer ethnocentric tendencies†, Journal of International Business Studies, Volume 32, pp. 157-75. [2] Batra, R., Ramaswamy, V., Alden, D.L., Steenkamp, J.-B.E.M., Ramachander, S., 2000. Effects of Brand Local and Nonlocal Origin on Consumer Attitudes in Developing Countries. Journal of Consumer Psychology 9 (2), 8395. [3] Bilkey, W.J. and Nes, E. (1982), â€Å"Country-of-origin effects on product evaluations†, Journal of International Business Studies, Volume 13, pp. 89-99. [4] Crawford, J. and Lamb, C. (1981), â€Å"Source preferences for imported products†, Journal of Purchasing and Materials Management, Volume 17, Winter, pp. 28-33. [5] De Mooij, M. (2004). Consumer behavior and culture. Thousand Oaks: Sage. [6] Elliott, G.R. and Camoron, R.C. (1994), â€Å"Consumer perception of product quality and the country of origin effect†, Journal of International Marketing, Volume 2(2), pp. 49-62. [7] Han, C. M., 1989. Country Image: Country Image: Halo or Summary Construct? Journal of Marketing Research, 26(May), 222-229. [8] Hansen, T., 2005. Perspectives on consumer decision making: An integrated approach. Journal of Consumer Behaviour 4 (6), 420-437 [9] Heslop, L.A. and Papadopoulos, N. (1993), â€Å"‘But who knows where or when’: reflections on the images of countries and their products†, in Papadopoulos, L.A. and Heslop, N. (Eds), Product-Country Images: Impact and Role in International Marketing, International Business Press, New York, NY, pp. 39-75. [10] Heslop, L.A., Papadopolous, N. and Bourk, M. (1998), â€Å"An interregional and intercultural perspective on subcultural differences in product evaluations†, Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences, Volume 15(2), pp. 113-127. [11] Keller, K., (1998), â€Å"Strategic Brand Management†, Prentice-Hall, New Jersey. [12] Kinra, N. (2006), â€Å"The effect of country-of-origin on foreign brand names in the Indian market†, Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Volume 24 (1), pp.15-30. [13] Lantz, G. and Loeb, S. (1996), â€Å"Country of origin and ethnocentrism: an analysis of Canadian and American preferences using social identity theory†, Advances in Consumer Research, Volume. 23, pp. 374-8. [14] Mazumdar, T., Papatla, P., 2000. An Investigation of Reference Price Segments. Journal of Marketing Research (JMR) 37 (2), 246-258. [15] Nagashima, A. (1970), â€Å"A Comparison of Japanese and U.S. Attitudes Towards Foreign Products†, Journal of Marketing, Volume 34, January, pp. 68-74. [16] Netemeyer, R.G., Durvasula, S. and Lichtenstein, D.R. (1991), â€Å"A cross-national assessment of the reliability and validity of the CETSCALE†, Journal of Marketing Research, Volume 28, pp. 320-7. [17] Nguyen, T., Barrett, N., Miller, K., 2005. Perceived Brand Globalness: Antecedents and Out-come – The Case of Vietnamese Consumers. Proceedings of the 34th EMAC Conference, 24-27 Mai 2005, Università   Commerciale Luigi Bocconi, Milan, Italy. [18] Shocker, A. D., Srivastava, R. K., & Ruekert, R. W. (1994): Challenges and opportunities facing brand management: an introduction to the special  issue. J. Marketing Res., 31(2), pp. 149-158. [19] Steenkamp, J-B., Batra, R., & Alden, D. L. (2003): How perceived brand globalness creates brand value. J. Int. Bus. Stud., 34, pp. 53-65. [20] Summer, W.G. (1906), Folkways: The Sociological Importance of usages, Manners, Customs, Mores and Morals. New York: Ginn & Co. [21] Wang, C.K. and Lamb, C.W. (1983), â€Å"The impact of selected environmental forces on consumers willingness to buy foreign products†, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Volume 11(2), pp. 71-84. http://amcy5.com/projects/marketing/amcy20.htm

Saint Dominic Quotations

Saint Dominic Quotations Born in 1170 and founder of the Order of Friars Preachers, Domingo de Guzmn lived an austere life, traveling and spreading the Gospel. He was also good friends with Saint Francis of Assisi. Here are some quotations attributed to Saint Dominic. On Austerity and Charity Arm yourself with prayer instead of a sword; be clothed with humility instead of fine raiment. These, my  much loved  ones, are the bequests which I leave to you as my sons; have charity among yourselves; hold fast to humility; keep a willing poverty. We must sow the seed, not hoard it. I could not bear to prize dead skins, when living skins were starving and in need.- After selling books inscribed on parchment (sheepskin) and giving the money to the poor. Other Saint Dominic Quotes I would tell them to kill me slowly and painfully, a little at a time, so that I might have a more glorious crown in Heaven.- After being asked what he would do if caught by his enemies. A man who governs his passions is master of the world. We must either rule ​them, or be ruled by them. It is better to be the hammer than the anvil. You are my companion and must walk with me. For if we hold together no earthly power can withstand us.- Upon meeting Francis of Assisi.

Passing Comparison Essay

Passing Comparison Essay Passing Comparison Essay The novel Passing examines racism. But this isn’t the ordinary racism, the book explains racism between darker toned black people and the lighter toned African Americans who are more accepted into the environment. The characters in this book can be easily described. Each character is introduced and within the next few paragraphs you can tell what type of character the will be in the book. The protagonist, Irene, differs much from Clare. But aside from both being African American, they relate in different ways also. Irene is the main character in this story. She is introduced as a woman, a mother of two boys who is shopping for their gifts. It’s a hot summer day and she has gone through the trouble of going to three different places looking for a gift that she can not find anywhere. I was given the impression from this paragraph that Irene is a dependable person because she did not give up on finding her son’s gift. When she arrived on the Drayton hotel and ran in to Clare, there was an awkward staring moment because she wasn’t sure if it was Clare or not. Clare gave her direct eye contact and Irene would just avoid the eye contact and look away. This made me think that Irene is more of a diffident and conscious person in contrast to Clare who is more confident. Later on after the meeting between Irene and Clare, Irene declared that she did not want to see Clare Kendry again after being disgusted by the fact that she would consider passing. I acknowledged that Irene is a dignified woman because she is loyal to her black roots. But the author also reveals that Irene isn’t the most dexterous person because when she received the phone call from Clare, she accepted the invitation to her house for tea. I sensed jealousy in Irene when she discovers later in the book that Clare actually gets along well with the black community. Clare Kendry was introduced in the first chapter as a sellout. She was introduced in the unexpected meeting with Irene which she then explained how she has decided to pass as a White woman. Not only has she passed as a white woman, but she has also married a white man. Clare can be described as inconsiderate. She put Irene and her social class as well as her self in danger.

How to Start Investing in Your 20s

How to Start Investing in Your 20s When it comes to making plans, long-term savings and investments might be the furthest thing from your mind. â€Å"I’m a millennial,† you say. â€Å"I have plenty of time to deal with that!† And while this is may be true, technically, it’s totally in your interest to take a hard look at what you can do to get started. â€Å"I have plenty of time† turns into â€Å"Meh, I’m busy, I’ll deal with it later,† which turns into â€Å"Yikes, where did the time go?† Personally, I remember sitting in a standard 401(k) seminar at work, where younger employees were advised to start saving as soon as possible. The guest investment advisor trotted out a horror story of a sweet old lady who retired with grand plans of freedom and travel, only to find $12,000 in her investment account. The tone and implication were similar to those stories that high school health teachers tell you to scare you away from†¦ well, everything, but it was an effective tactic. Knowing myself, I’d keep putting off big financial investment decisions until â€Å"later,† until I was that sweet old lady with no savings. The story may or may not have been true, but it hit the mark.And the numbers are persuasive. Finance site Betterment lays it out pretty clearly:Consider this: If you start saving just $1,200 a year- a mere $100 per month- starting at age 25, by age 65 you’ll have about $185,700 (assuming a 6% return).If you put off investing in your 20s, you’re potentially leaving a lot of money on the table. According to Betterment.com’s example, someone who waits 10  years longer loses almost half of that total nest egg. Plus, you’ll have to answer to 65-year-old-you, too.Why Start Investing Now?If you’re in your 20s, entry-level salaries and the costs of living out on your own can make investing seem like an impossibility. Sure, a healthy retirement account would be great to have, but w hat about rent/food/phone bill in the meantime? Even though it may sound counterintuitive, budget-wise, it’s actually the right time to start down the investment path.Time is on your side. Like the old Rolling Stones song, time really is on your side here. The same reason you might be giving to put off investing in you 20s (â€Å"plenty of time†) can be tweaked slightly to justify a more proactive approach: â€Å"plenty of time†¦for my investments to grow.†You can afford to be aggressive. As you get older, you might be more hesitant to make aggressive or risky investments- after all, you’re getting closer to the time where you’ll want to have access to the money you’ve earned through your investments. When you’re in your 20s, though, it goes back to point #1: you have time to absorb short-term losses, or make higher-risk investment choices that could yield higher rewards. Let’s not forget that investing means buying into t he stock market, which always incurs some degree of risk.There’s no magic time to start, so why not now? This whole process is on you- it’s your money, and your timeline. If you’re thinking of having a family (however eventually) or buying a house, you’ll become even less likely to think about extra financial matters like investing when you’re busy getting through the day-to-day. If you get started now, making investing a part of your financial routine, it’s one less New Thing to add later when there are extra stresses on your budget.You never know what will happen later. Job losses, illnesses, financial curveballs- all of these can happen to any of us. Working on your investments and savings now can help you manage surprises and losses down the road and prevent you from losing more long-term ground than you would if you hadn’t done any saving and investing.How to Get StartedSo now you have the reasons to start investing in your 20s- now what? Let’s look at the things you should start doing ASAP to start making progress in your financial plans.Pay off your student loans.If you’re one of the 70% of people who graduated with student loans in the past few years, you know that this is not a little task for you as you start out in your career and in your post-college life. It’s a huge part of your financial picture, and it can seem like a dark, looming mountain that you can’t possibly chip away. Business Insider recommends coming up with a personal spending plan that allows you to pay off those loans as soon as you can, so that you don’t have that debt looming over your future longer than it needs to be there. Do what you can do, as you can do it.Come up with a budget.A real and realistic budget of what you have coming in, what you need for essentials, and what you can spend on non-essentials and financial future planning. If you’re not already budget-inclined, it can feel li ke a pain- especially when it might not allow you to do/buy some of the extras you really want. Once you’re serious about creating a budget you can stick to, there are lots of tools that can help you do it.Set your goals and start saving toward them.Want to have a down payment on a house in five years? Take a deluxe trip to Europe for your 30th birthday? Think about some of the big-ticket items you want to have in your future. Once you have those in mind (and an approximate price tag), set a savings schedule.Sign up for your employer’s 401(k) program.A 401(k) is a retirement investment account where your contributions are taken out of your paycheck pre-tax. So you’re not only putting your money into an investment account that will chug along under the guidance of investment professionals, but you can decide how hands-on or hands-off you want to be in those investments. Plus, there’s a huge benefit if your company has a policy of matching employee contribu tions. That, my friend, is free money for your future.Or sign up for a Roth IRA.If your workplace doesn’t offer a 401(k) program or you don’t want to go that route, you can also opt for a Roth IRA account. This is also an investment account where you can set automated contributions, but unlike a 401(k), the money in this account is not taxed when you pull the money out for retirement. However, there are also yearly caps and income requirements, so if you go this route, it’s important to understand the benefits and the drawbacks.Don’t go too crazy.There’s risk that leads to greater rewards, and there’s risk that leads to a series of bad decisions and a wiped-out investment account. Especially if you’re just starting out in investing, Nerdwallet recommends investing in index funds, a.k.a. exchange-traded funds. In these, you’re buying into a portfolio that includes a number of investments, instead of buying specific numbers of sh ares of specific companies or commodities. These funds are managed, and save you the hassle of having to choose, monitor, and shift specific stocks on your own.Get help.You’re not in this on your own- there’s an entire industry of financial professionals who can help you navigate this process. If you’re investing through your company’s 401(k) or Roth IRA program, that program will have an administrator and advisor who can help you at every stage of the process. Also, since this is the future, you can also turn to robo-advisors to help you manage your investments. (No flying cars, but for now we’ll take robot advisors.) Unless you’re an expert on the stock market and investment options, get expert opinions to guide you before you put your hard-earned cash into any investments.Increase your contributions when you’re able.While much of the heavy lifting in investing is involved in the process of getting started, this isn’t somethi ng you should just forget once your investments are up and running. Review your investments frequently, and revisit your investment budget whenever you have an income change (a raise, a promotion, a new gig with a higher salary, a side hustle that’s paying off). Make sure you’re increasing your investment contributions as much as you can, when your budget allows.And the most important next step of all: don’t be afraid. As a twentysomething, you have the luxury of time and long planning to support your investment decisions. No matter what your salary and your budget are, it’s worth it to move past your reservations and start investing what you can. Starting small can have lead to rewards later, so why not start now? Future You will thank you, from that comfortable retirement chair.

The best of intentions Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

The best of intentions - Case Study Example If Cynthia offers the job to Steve, the company has a very high chance of losing their customers and if this happens, then it means they will all be out of work. This is a dilemma as Steve is the most qualified candidate and can take their company to the next level but he also prevents the growth of the company in that region where discrimination is still high. Letting him go is the best decision for everyone. If Steve is hired, it means that he cannot carry out his job to avoid losing the customers which simply impedes his growth in the company and the end result either way will be to let him go. It is better to not hire him and give him false hopes but simply let him find a better place without discrimination where he can exercise his potential. I would not take the job for the simple reason that I would be a hidden employee who is not at liberty to meet the customers whom I am supposed to work with. I would not want to be an invisible employee because invisible employees have no room for growth. Growth in nay organization requires being on the limelight showcasing one’s work but since appearing in the limelight will drive away the white customers, and then it is better not to take the job than have regrets years later. Steve should look at his goals and what he wants to achieve in the next several years. If he wants to expand his career and develop, or if he has big dreams for his future, then he should not take the job as the dream and goals will not be achieved. The parties need to sit down and draw of plan on how best Steve can be fruitful to the company while at the same time not anger and drive away their customers if they are to remain in business. The will need to find the best position for Steve in the company, one which will not hinder his development and impede his future growth while still providing his best skills and abilities to the

Political systems and economics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Political systems and economics - Essay Example The society is viewed as a mesh of different people vying for different interests, that the art of reasoning, ruling and governance among the others, is essential to unify the society to act to a common vote, to pursue a certain interest. It explains how the governing political body and its directives affect the collective behavior of the players in the society Economics' parameters are set on scarcity, the use of incentives, the application of efficient economic tools and models, all to satisfy and suffice human's current and future wants and needs. Economics lies on maximizing and making sound decisions to make efficient use of existing scarce resources. Nothing in life is free, as explained by the concept of opportunity cost. Opportunity cost is the value foregone in pursuit of another activity or good of interest. Everything individuals do has a tradeoff. An individual's Economic decisions are motivated by incentives, a mechanism which motivates decisions and activities. Economics is different from political systems in the sense that, economics could go on forever without laying a hand on it to make it work; and in its continuity, it is only susceptible to its own natural dynamics. Politics now depends on the intervention and control of men. While economics seeks to explain occurrences through long-wearing principles, politics is just mainly an experimental, temporary tool in human affairs. "One (economics) is amoral, the other (politics) is moral" ("Economics versus Politics"). Both political science and economics acknowledges the participants in the society's selfish interests, that, control of which is delivered by laws and punishment in lieu of political science, and motivated by incentives and disincentives in lieu of economics. Economics, unlike political science though, is tackled like one of the exact sciences through the use of models, equations and numerical treatment to explain or forecast the situations governing and a society. ("Economics versus Politics") The book chapter is posing the challenges of the economic environment, and such may be seen as problems to solve, to outwit. QUESTION 2: Feudalism is a socio-political system wherein land and land-based assets determine an individual's social status. Land ownership entitles the owners of the manors-now equivalent to villages-exclusive rights to their lands, spending decisions with their money and other assets and administering homage for their serfs and vassals ("Feudalism and Medieval Life"). Serfs, peasants, vassals and landlords are the primary movers in the social structure and the king played only a representative role in the society. Serfs are the tenants sustained by the landowners. They are at the foot of the social structure. They serve their landowners who are responsible for their sustenance. He's devoid of tangible property and his marriage is subject to the landowner's permission ("Feudalism and Medieval Life"). Vassals are the more privileged than serfs. They have a certain amount of freedom although they live poor lives. They comprise 10-60 families living on a community. Landlords or barons ruled the manors, which pertains to the villages during the Middle Ages. The landlords serve as the local administrator of their lands and numerous serfs and vassals serve and protect him, as he is also accountable to them. Due to the Black Plague, The hundred year war and the

The problem with evil Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

The problem with evil - Essay Example Just as strong the God is, the existence of evil is also strong because the world is imperfect. God only permitted the best possible world so that creation could be improved. According to the Natural Law Theodicy by Bruce Reichenbach, God created a world in accordance with the natural laws to achieve higher good even if there are moral and natural evil (Evans, 11). Argument from the natural evil states that evil exist as a punishment for our sin; thus, this proves the existence of God as evil is necessary for certain types of goodness to occur. Swinburne claimed that God allow the existence of evil as an omnipotent being (can do anything possible logically) because he wanted to bring out the logically necessary condition of goodness such as compassion and bravery (Sovik, 23; Frances, 9). On the other hand, argument from moral evil states that man is created by God with freedom. The existence of evil does not disproves the existence of God as evil actions were the result of man’s abused of freedom (Sovik, 23). Lastly, the argument from unbelief supports the existence of God by using the concept of Divine hiddenness and faith as valuable tool. Evans supported this argument from unbelief stating that atheist does not believe in the existence of God not because of the lack of evidence but the inability and unwillingness to appreciate the evidence (74). To sum it up, God is an omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly good God because He allowed evil in an imperfect world to bring out the goodness among people or to remind people of their sins through punishments and to bring out faith from Divine

Risk Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 5

Risk Management - Essay Example This data is often the first input to decision makers to gage whether risks should be avoided and the most suitable and cost-efficient risk management procedure. Risk analysis involves the identification, evaluation as well as management of various risks (John n.d.). The type of risk in an organization depends on the industry to which the organization operates (John n.d.). Financial risk assessment and management is of economic worth. This is especially to firms using financial tools in managing exposure to risks. Other financial risk may include inflation and volatility risk (Andersen 2012). Just like general risk management, the financial risk management necessitates identification of its sources, its measurements, as well as plans to avoid them in future. Financial risk analysis, assessment and management can both be quantitative and qualitative. Financial risk management emphasizes on the time and the means to evade the financial risks by using the specific financial instruments used in managing costly exposures to risk. In the finance sector, the Basel Accords is an instrument that has been adopted generally by internationally banks for tracking, recording and revealing the operational risks, credit risks and market risks (Andersen 2012, p. 7). Financial risk management usually assist in clearing profits through cost evasion, cost inhibition and time savings. An inclusive financial risk management platform can avert wastefulness and replication that decreases needless costs, increases productivity, and enables reliability and communication. An integrated system often permits several departments to accumulate information and cooperate amongst themselves. This can help in communication and understanding, thus reducing and containing risk while cutting costs and adding process consistency (Andersen 2012, p. 15). The first step in financial risk analysis is the inherent risk assessment, which involves assessing the financial statement

Learning and Development (HRM) Managing Training Operations in Essay

Learning and Development (HRM) Managing Training Operations in Training Department - Essay Example By employing this kind of method for training, the training department can cut down costs of hiring an external trainer to do so. The coaching/mentoring method that is being used here is one of the most efficient and easiest of imparting training to the employees, while having no loss faced by the usual traffic of work. In this method a trained senior officer is attached to the trainee, this way the trainee can get hold of his own mistakes and learn from the teachings of the trainer. In this case study, we can see that the intended trainee is attached with the senior trainer, who ends up getting those technical courses. This is although a slow method, but it produces better results than other kind of training. Through this kind of training the trainee grasps the ropes of the trade far more easily and as well as realistically because the person is attached to the experts and there can learn very easily as you are getting the training through practitioners themselves. In this case the trainees gain a hand on experience as to what is right and what is wrong, what should be avoided while imparting training and what tactics and techniques to be used to make the training more affective. The best way to learn about anything is to learn through the practical application of the thing and here the trainers get that experience by being attached to a senior trainer, this will help them observe the way they are giving out training and help them in realizing the key points, that should be taken care of while giving the training. This method is a slow method of training personnel, but in this case it is the most suitable method that the company can use. The other types of training methods are case study method, briefing, in basket training, job instructions training and the job rotation. All these training methods are very subjective sort of methods, while coaching and mentoring can prove to be quite helpful as it would be by far the most practical approach to guide the train ers to be trained for the more technical courses. Such practice will also help create a level of equality among the trainers with respect to the choice of courses and the freedom to select any course that they want rather than doing the one that is left for them. This method is also cost effective as the company does not need to hire extra trainers or other equipments that will facilitate the training process. The coaching and mentoring method will prove to be more useful because the trainees will be able to get hold of the subject quite easily. It is mentioned in the case that the trainees are handed over the materials in advance so that they can prepare for the class. They are given three days to prepare and apply their own learning as trainers to look for innovative ideas, The training that is being imparted here is in-house and work-specific, which means that the training is being done to improve the skill sets of the employees and to enhance the level of understanding. Work spe cific training are usually skill up gradation techniques as the trainees here possess skills to impart training the only thing that they lack is the prowess to handle the technical training course which was generally avoided by them. Word count: 597 1.1 How are different learning styles taken into account? According to the case the model that has been applied is the learning style model by David Kolb, the approach that

Human Resources And Their Importance For Organizations Research Paper

Human Resources And Their Importance For Organizations - Research Paper Example The survey would be conducted on the human resource challenge and the respondents will be employees whose feedback would be the base for solving such problems. The first question of the survey is – â€Å"Do you feel that human resource management is able to retain employees? If yes then how and if no then why?† This question will be asked to analyze the retention strategies adopted by the human resource manager and to identify the areas due to which experienced employees could not be retained. The major advantage of this question is that it would help human resource managers to avoid high turnover rate and motivate employees towards performing well and increase their job satisfaction level which in turn would enhance the level of retention. The next question for the survey will be – â€Å"what form of reward motivates you the most?† This question is essential in order to address the problem which forms the basis of this human resource survey. Identification of the type of rewards such as appraisals, monetary rewards, etc., will help in concluding as to which factor motivates employees the most. The feedback on this particular question will help managers to frame strategies accordingly so that productivity of existing employees can be maximized. It is important to analyze the degree of inclination of employees towards reward scheme so that appropriate rewards can be offered to deserving employees. The third question that would be asked to employees is – â€Å"apart from monetary rewards or appraisals what are the other ways you feel can help management to retain employees?† This is a direct question in relation to the problem which has been identified in the field of human resource. It can be stated that this question was asked so as to understand the different ways through which employees can be retained in the system.

Learning and Development (HRM) Managing Training Operations in Essay

Learning and Development (HRM) Managing Training Operations in Training Department - Essay Example By employing this kind of method for training, the training department can cut down costs of hiring an external trainer to do so. The coaching/mentoring method that is being used here is one of the most efficient and easiest of imparting training to the employees, while having no loss faced by the usual traffic of work. In this method a trained senior officer is attached to the trainee, this way the trainee can get hold of his own mistakes and learn from the teachings of the trainer. In this case study, we can see that the intended trainee is attached with the senior trainer, who ends up getting those technical courses. This is although a slow method, but it produces better results than other kind of training. Through this kind of training the trainee grasps the ropes of the trade far more easily and as well as realistically because the person is attached to the experts and there can learn very easily as you are getting the training through practitioners themselves. In this case the trainees gain a hand on experience as to what is right and what is wrong, what should be avoided while imparting training and what tactics and techniques to be used to make the training more affective. The best way to learn about anything is to learn through the practical application of the thing and here the trainers get that experience by being attached to a senior trainer, this will help them observe the way they are giving out training and help them in realizing the key points, that should be taken care of while giving the training. This method is a slow method of training personnel, but in this case it is the most suitable method that the company can use. The other types of training methods are case study method, briefing, in basket training, job instructions training and the job rotation. All these training methods are very subjective sort of methods, while coaching and mentoring can prove to be quite helpful as it would be by far the most practical approach to guide the train ers to be trained for the more technical courses. Such practice will also help create a level of equality among the trainers with respect to the choice of courses and the freedom to select any course that they want rather than doing the one that is left for them. This method is also cost effective as the company does not need to hire extra trainers or other equipments that will facilitate the training process. The coaching and mentoring method will prove to be more useful because the trainees will be able to get hold of the subject quite easily. It is mentioned in the case that the trainees are handed over the materials in advance so that they can prepare for the class. They are given three days to prepare and apply their own learning as trainers to look for innovative ideas, The training that is being imparted here is in-house and work-specific, which means that the training is being done to improve the skill sets of the employees and to enhance the level of understanding. Work spe cific training are usually skill up gradation techniques as the trainees here possess skills to impart training the only thing that they lack is the prowess to handle the technical training course which was generally avoided by them. Word count: 597 1.1 How are different learning styles taken into account? According to the case the model that has been applied is the learning style model by David Kolb, the approach that

CMG 301 MOD SLP Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

CMG 301 MOD SLP - Essay Example The insured must insure at least 90% of the total value of the insured property and pay a premium accordingly in order to recover based on the full value of their loss. If the insured fails to do so they will self insure proportionally. For example, if only 50% of the property value is insured and a loss of $100,000 is suffered the claim will be based on insurance limit carried divided by insurance limit required times the loss, that is $1,000,000 divided by $1,800,000 times $100,000 equals $55,555.55. the insured may and indeed is required to take immediate steps to protect the affected property from further loss or damage before the arrival of the adjuster. Any reasonable costs incurred will be included in the insured’s claim. In the event of a claim under this policy which results from the negligence or deliberate action of a third party the insured agrees that upon payment of the claim, the insurer may pursue recovery against the responsible party in the insured’s name. The insured may join the insurer to pursue recovery of any uninsured loss. Any recoveries and costs involved will be shared in proportion to the parties’ financial interests. The insurer pledges to investigate all claims thoroughly and promptly after notification and to pay all valid claims within 30 days of receipt of the insured’s properly completed Proof of Loss. In the event the insurer denies the claim or disagrees with the insured’s quantum calculation, the insured will be advised in writing within 30 days of receipt of their Proof of Loss and provided with a full explanation of the insurers’ position 3They must co-operate fully and with complete honesty the insurer at all times the policy is in effect. When requested they must allow the insurer to inspect the premises and provide any information required by the insured material to it’s assessment of the risk. Included in the premium is

Requirement Model For Student Monitoring Systems

Requirement Model For Student Monitoring Systems The focus of this study is to get a good requirement model for Student Attendance Monitoring Systems (SAMS) in secondary school. It is aimed at system designer who want to know how to design an efficient SAMS. At the end of this study, a SAMS prototype will be designed based on the requirement model and also analyze user acceptance of this system. A generation ago, either in principle or in practice, attendance was not optional. Today, often in principle and almost in practice, it is optional (Romer, 1993). According to Lim, Sim and Mansor (2009), most educational institutions administrators are concerned about student irregular attendance. Shendell et al. (2004) defines it can affect student in overall academic performance. Romer (1993) found that attendance did contribute significantly to the academic performance of students. There are a slightly stronger relationship between attendance and performance. Also, Durden Ellis (1995) conclude that attendance does matter for academic achievement. Thus, it makes student attendance mandatory in schools (Romer, 1993), (Woltz, 1955). Yet, almost everyone noticed that attendance in schools is far from perfect (Romer, 1993). There have a lack of school attendance data and a lack of consistency in the definition and measurement of non-attendance (Bourke, Rigby Burden, 2000). Large schools are more likely to have problems with student attendance than small ones (Epstein Sheldon, 2002). Everyday, school staffs spends much time to handle students attendance. There are many problems when recording data manually (Richard, 2005). Sometimes, the attendances record books were missing. In real situation, it is hard for school staffs to search students record by looking at attendances record books one by one. School staffs usually spend much time to find the students record especially when there are many classes in the school. Furthermore, parents may miss to get any information or letter from schools when their children didnt attend to school. According to Epstein Sheldon (2002), high school staffs communications with parents about attendance can increased student attendance and reduced chronic absenteeism. Hence, by creating school attendance system is one of the best solutions to address this problem. The system should help school staffs to take attendance for student especially in secondary schools. It must make the process of taking the attendance easier, faster and secure as compared to conventional method. The conventional method of taking attendance by calling names or signing on paper is very time consuming, inefficient, and insecure (Ervasti, Isomursu, Kinnula, 2009), (Lim, Sim Mansor, 2009). It is a one way that helps teachers or school staffs reducing the taken time to carry out routine processes and enable them connected with parents by sending real-time information on their childrens attendance immediately if students are not-attended to school more than the limit. Thus, teacher have more time for teaching. (Ervasti, Isomursu, Kinnula, 2009). Problem Statement In schools, attendance is important and mandatory. Nowadays, due to enlarge of information technology environment, it is efficient to use School Attendance Monitoring System (SAMS) to manage attendance in secondary schools. In recent years, system designers have expands many ways and characteristics in design a good system. The problem of this study is to identify important characteristics to design a good SAMS, set up a requirement model, and build a prototype for testing user acceptance. The requirement model must meet the user needs, goals and constraints in order to determine the important feature, relations and design implications. The requirement must be specify clearly about what and how the SAMS should perform. Objectives To create a SAMSs requirement model for secondary school. To design and build a prototype of SAMS. To help other system developer within related area. Scope The study will be conducted within the Kampar district, Perak. All schools chosen for survey will be secondary schools only. Similarly, there are nine secondary schools in Kampar district (sample size). People who manage secondary school organizations are the only respondents of the study. The population is between 15 to 25 or more school staffs. The particular focus areas of the study would include attendance system which is already used in secondary schools. LITERATURE REVIEW According to Epstein Sheldon (2002), reducing the rates of student chronic absenteeism has been and continues to be a goal of many schools and school systems. In 1999, a student tracking system involving a database is being trialed in government and non-government schools Western Australia (Bourke, Rigby Burden, 2000). The student tracking system involved a set of processes, procedures and systems which can identify and monitor the location of students. In the Torres Strait schools, they used a system called Student Information Management System (SIMS). The SIMS provides a good quality data regarding student attendance. This computer-based system collates individual class attendance records on a weekly basis (Bourke, Rigby Burden, 2000). The relationship between staffs and parents was seen as vitally important by parents and principals. The student survey results indicated that attendance levels were significantly higher among students when teachers got in touch with their parents to talk about how they were going at school (Bourke, Rigby Burden, 2000). Therefore, in schools where students have attendance problems, school staffs may need to go beyond the school building to involve parents in reducing absenteeism (Epstein Sheldon, 2002). Hence, student attendance monitoring system should help school staffs and parents easy to communicate. There are varieties of opportunities for implementing IT in management education. Technology can be used to facilitate the display of information, to increase access to external explicit information, and to increase the sharing and construction of knowledge (Leidner Jarvenpaa, 1995) but some of the use of this technology is not yet widespread, efficient and practical for implementation of data management (Wayman, et. al., 2004). Implementation of an application system can present many unforeseen challenges. The first step toward implementing a student data analysis system should be to thoroughly assess the data, needs, and resources available to a school or district. The successful implementation is important for the long-term development of a data based decision-making climate (Wayman, et. al, 2004). Fig. 1 shows the model for integrated functional requirement which has been explained by Malet et al. (2007) Figure 1: Model for Integrated Functional Requirement In Fig. 1, functions can be linked with specific processes. The technical realization of functions takes place in these processes. Functions can also be related to specific positions in the product structure. As a result of linking the requirements with functions, functions to processes and the product structure, an indirect relation between requirements, processes and the product structure has been established (Malet et al., 2007). There are many views of softwares development or development process though that has evolved over the years. What follows is a brief discussion of the theories of the software development process that recently used today. The first formal description of the software development process model is published in 1970 by Winston W. Royce. Below is one of the software development processs model: Figure 2: Conceptual model of software development process According to Royce (1970), firstly, developer must analyze user requirements. After that, make requirement specifications by clearly set out necessary features of system based on user requirement. Then, developer can design a suitable solution and do implementation by develop the proposed solution. In addition, developer must test the system to ensure that the solution solves the original problem and works in context. Lastly, developer must maintain the system. METHODOLOGY Fig. 3 shows the requirement modeling process which has been explained by Malet et al. (2007) Figure 3: Requirement modeling process The first step is elicitation of requirements. The requirements will be based on collected data. The sites are the secondary school managing departments. The sampling frame will be based on the list of the secondary schools within area of Kampar district, Perak. The sample size will be nine secondary schools. The population is between 15 to 25 or more employees including principal, clerks, and teachers. The method of data collection is by questionnaire and interview. According to Creswell (1994), measurement instrument can helps in get a quantifiable data. A questionnaire will be given to each employee within the sampling to get employees personal details, personal experiences of using any school attendance system, problem with existing attendance system and an opinion or suggestion for the future systems developer. The purpose of the study and how to answer the questionnaire will be explained to the employees under study. During interview session, the informants will be selected ind ividuals within the sample employees who had an experience of using any school attendance system. The second step is analyzing the requirements. All user requirements will be investigated. The data will be analyzed and displayed using SPSS 16.00. The percentage, the mean and statistic formula (ANOVA) will be used when describing the data. It will be interpreted and translated into a form that suitable for other developer (sequence diagram, activity diagram, class diagram etc.). A requirement specifications model will be defined by clearly set out necessary features of SAMS. The third step is managing the requirements. In this step, a prototype of SAMS will be design and built based on user requirement model by using several types of tool such as Dreamweaver CS4, Photoshop CS4 and etc. The programming language that will be used for building the system is PHP. During this system development lifecycle, requirements might be change and evolve. These changes need to be tracked and traced (Malet et al., 2007). Lastly, the fulfillment of requirements needs to be validated with virtual or physical tests. A product is deemed successful (by means of satisfying the customer) if all requirements are fulfilled (Malet et al.,2007). SAMS will be tested to ensure that the solution solves the original problem and integrate the system to make sure that the solution will working in circumstance. The user acceptance testing will be done by choosing user randomly within the sample. Requirements modeling takes place in all phases of product development. More emphasis needs to be put on later development phases such as usage, recycling and maintenance. The knowledge gained in these phases, once included in the development process, can accelerate the development of new products (Malet et al.,2007). EXPECTED FINDINGS At the end of this study, the requirement model can help any system designers to design good SAMS for secondary schools. They will know how to design useful, usable and desirable SAMS such as in the system should contain the right functions, secure and must be user friendly. SAMS should contain all these basic needs of attendance system. Below shows the flow of Students Attendance Monitoring Systems (SAMS): 1 Record attendance 2 Check attendance 3 Process data 4 Save data 5 Send email Figure 4: The flow of Students Attendance Monitoring Systems (SAMS). SAMS should helps school staffs records students attendance, checks either student is present or absent, process the attendance data, save it and send an email to the parents if student was absent more than three days. SIGNIFICANCE The aimed of requirement model for Student Attendance Monitoring System (SAMS) is to help system designer in designing a good attendance system and also conduct them to develop the attendance system in the future. Attendance system are important because can gives many benefit to schools such as security on attendance, reduce work time on taking attendance and create connection between school staffs and parents. CONCLUSION There is no comprehensive and generally accepted manual on how to design good human factors into computer systems (Shackel, 1984) but there are a lot of guideline on how to design a system. However, this requirement model can guide any system designers who want straightly focus to design Student Attendance Monitoring System (SAMS). Creativity and innovation are required to make a great SAMS. The system should be usable. Usability consists of many pieces such as system performance, system functions, user interfaces organization and so on. REFERRENCES Bourke, C. J., Rigby, K., Burden J. (2000). Better Practice in School Attendance: Improving the School Attendance of Indigenous Students. Commonwealth of Australia. 1-62. Creswell, J. W. (1994). Research design. Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage. Durden, G. C. Ellis, L. V. (1995). The Effects of Attendance on Student Learning in Principles of Economics, The American Economic Review, Papers and Proceedings of the Hundredth and Seventh Annual Meeting of the American Economic association Washington, 85(2), 343-346. Epstein, J. L., Sheldon, S. B. (2002). Present and Accounted for: Improving Student Attendance Through Family and Community Involvement. Educational Research and Improvement. 95(5). 308- 318. Ervasti, M., Isomursu, M., Kinnula, M. (2009). Bringing Technology into School NFC-enabled School Attendance Supervision. ACM 978-1-60558-846-9 09 Leidner, D. E. Jarvenpaa S. L. (1995). The Use of Information Technology to Enhance Management School Education: A Theoretical View. MIS Quarterly: Special Issue on IS Curricula and Pedagogy, 19(3), 265-291. Lim, T. S., Sim, S. C. Mansor, M. M. (2009). RFID Based Attendance System, Symposium on Industrial Electronics and Applications (ISIEA 2009), 2, 778-782. Maletz, M., Blouin, J. G., Schnedl, H., Brisson, D., Zamazal, K. (2007). A Holistic Approach for Integrated Requirements Modeling in the Product Development Process. The Virtual Vehicle-Research Center, Graz, Austria. 1-10. Richard, L. (2005). Handling Qualitative Data: A Practical Guide. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage. Romer, D. (1993). Do Students Go to Class? Should They?. Journal of Economics Perspectives, 7(3), 167- 174. Royce, W. W. (1970). Managing the Development of Large Software Systems. Proceedings IEEE WESCON. 1-9. Shackel, B. (984). Information Technology: A challenge to ergonomics and design. Behaviour and Information Technology. 3. 263-275. Shendell, D. G., Prill, R., Fisk, W. J., Apte, M. G., Blake, D. Faulkner, D. (2004). Associations between Classroom CO2 Concentrations and Student Attendance in Washington and Idaho. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory: LBNL Paper LBNL-54413. Retrieved from: http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/88r0924r Wayman, J. C., Stringfield, S., Yakimowski, M. (2004). Software Enabling School Improvement Through Analysis Of Student Data. Research on the Education of Students, 67. Woltz, C. K. (1955). Compulsary Attendance at School. Law and Comtemporary Problems. 20(1), 3-22.

Romeo and Juliet: The Movie Essay examples -- Movie Film comparison co

  Ã‚  Ã‚   William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is fully summarized in Shakespeare's prologue:   "Two households, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona where we lay our scene.   From ancient grudge break to new mutiny where civil blood make civil hands unclean.   From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, a pair of star crossed lovers who take their life" (Universal, 1996).   This movie is a masterful culmination of the director's phenomenal ability to create a powerful introduction, to select a realistic, but surreal setting, to choose realistic actors, and to enact specialized dramatic effects.   Sitting in the theater, watching this movie for the first time, I heard static break in to interrupt the beginning credits.   A newscaster, sounding serious, came on the screen in a special report.   I sat up to pay attention.   She was reporting a tragedy that had recently happened in some place called Verona.   I was pulled in thinking it to be a true special report.   Ah-hah!!   It was a trick.   A trick to get people to do just what I did.   Trained are we to listen to newscasts, our life-line in present day society, where we receive a lot of our information.   A trick, and I fell for it--so did everyone else--how clever.   Then the sound of crying, chorusing angels screaming angry chants echoed around the theater (great surround sound effect).   Images (clips from the movie) flashed sporadically on the screen.   A dark, sinister voice retold Shakespeare's prologue given in the telecast moments before.   The angels were still screaming, and then, sil ence.   A big truck flashed on the screen and gave a hearty engine growl.   The truck sped loudly down the road.   Stringy electric guitars and booming drums thump a loud vengeful beat.   The Montague bo... ...that I know would make Shakespeare himself blush to see how his story has touched so many, so positively in the near twenty-first century. Works Cited Streisand, Betsy.   "Looking for Mr. Good Bard this fall."   U.S. News and World Report.   11 Nov. 1996.   <http:Hcallisto.gsu.edu:4000/CGI:html> (5 May 1997). Lyons, Donald.   "Lights, Camera, Shakespeare."   Commentary.   Feb. 1997.   <http://callisto.gsu.edu:4000/CGI:html> (5 May 1997). Rozen, Leah.   "William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet."   People Weekly.   11 Nov. 1996.   <http://callisto.gsu.edu:4000/CGI:html> (5 May 1997). Johnson, Brian D.   "Souping up the Bard."   Maclean's.   11 Nov. 1996.   <http:Hcallisto.gsu.edu:4000/CGI:html> (5 May 1997). Luhrmann, Baz, dir.   William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.   With Leonardo DiCaprio and Clare Danes.   Universal Pictures Production, 1960.