Monday, December 30, 2019

The Diet of Worms 1521, Luther and the Emperor

When Martin Luther fell into disagreement with the Catholic hierarchy in 1517, he wasn’t simply arrested and carted to a stake (as some views of the medieval period might make you believe). There was plenty of theological discussion which soon turned into temporal, political and cultural considerations. One key part of this disagreement, which would become the Reformation and see the western church permanently split, came at the Diet of Worms in 1521. Here, an argument over theology (which still could have resulted in someone’s death), was fully turned into a secular conflict over laws, rights and political power, a vast pan-European milestone in how government and society worked, as well as how the church prayed and worshipped. What’s a Diet? Diet is a Latin term, and you might be more familiar with a different language: Reichstag. The Diet of the Holy Roman Empire was a legislature, a proto-parliament, which had limited powers but which met frequently and did affect law in the empire. When we refer to the Diet of Worms, we don’t mean a Diet that met uniquely in the city of Worms in 1521, but a system of government which was established and which, in 1521, turned its eye to the conflict Luther had begun. Luther Lights the Fire In 1517 many people were unhappy with the way the Latin Christian Church was run in Europe, and one of those was a lecturer and theologian called Martin Luther. Whereas other opponents of the church had made grand claims and rebellions, in 1517 Luther drew up a list of points for discussion, his 95 Theses, and sent them to friends and key figures. Luther wasn’t trying to break the church or start a war, which was what would happen. He was reacting to Dominican friar called Johann Tetzel selling indulgences, meaning someone could pay to have their sins forgiven. The key figures Luther sent his theses too included the Archbishop of Mainz, who Luther asked to stop Tetzel. He might also have nailed them up in public.Luther wanted an academic discussion and he wanted Tetzel stopped. What he got was a revolution. The theses proved popular enough for them to be spread around Germany and beyond by interested and / or angered thinkers, some of whom supported Luther and convinced him to write more in support of them. Some were unhappy, like Archbishop Albert of Mainz, who asked if the papacy would decide if Luther was in the wrong†¦The war of words began, and Luther battled by developing his ideas into a brave new theology at odds with the past, what would be Protestantism. Luther is Defended by Secular Power By mid 1518 the Papacy had summoned Luther to Rome to question him, and probably punish him, and this is where things began to get complex. Elector Frederick III of Saxony, a man who helped choose the Holy Roman Emperor and a figure of great power, felt he had to defend Luther, not because of any agreement with the theology, but because he was a prince, Luther was his subject, and the Pope was claiming clashing powers. Frederick arranged for Luther to avoid Rome, and instead go to the Diet meeting in Augsburg. The papacy, not normally one to concede to secular figures, needed Frederick’s support in picking the next emperor and in helping a military expedition against the Ottomans, and agreed. At Augsburg, Luther was interrogated by Cardinal Cajetan, a Dominican and a clever and well-read supporter of the church.Luther and Cajetan argued, and after three days Cajetan issued an ultimatum; Luther returned quickly to his home of Wittenberg, because Cajetan had been sent by the Pop e with orders to arrest the trouble maker if necessary. The Papacy weren’t giving an inch, and in November 1518 issued a bull clarifying the rules on indulgences and saying Luther was wrong. Luther agreed to stop it. Luther is Pulled Back The debate was about far more than Luther now, and theologians carried on his arguments, until Luther just had to return and he ended up taking part in a public debate in June 1519 with Andreas Carlstadt against Johann Eck. Driven by Eck’s conclusions, and after several committees analysing Luther’s writings, the Papacy decided to declare Luther heretical and excommunicate him over 41 sentences. Luther has sixty days to recant; instead he wrote more and burned the bull.Normally the secular authorities would arrest and execute Luther. But the timing was perfect for something else to happen, as the new Emperor, Charles V, had pledged all his subjects should have proper legal hearings, while the papal documents were far from ordered and water tight, including blaming Luther for someone else’s writing. As such, it was proposed Luther should appear before the Diet of Works. The Papal representatives were aghast at this challenge to their power, Charles V tended to agr ee, but the situation in Germany meant Charles dare not upset the men of the Diet, who were adamant they should play their role, or the peasants. Luther was saved from immediate death by a struggle over secular power, and Luther was asked to appear in 1521. The Diet of Worms 1521 Luther made his first appearance on April 17th 1521. Having been asked to accept that the books he’d been accused of writing were his (which he did so), he was asked to reject their conclusions. He asked for time to think, and the next day conceded only that his writing might have used wrong words, saying that the subject and the conclusions were genuine and he stuck by them. Luther now discussed the situation with Frederick, and with a man working for the Emperor, but no one could make him recant over even one of the 41 statements the Papacy condemned him for.Luther left on April 26th, with the Diet still afraid condemning Luther would cause a rebellion. However, Charles signed an edict against Luther when he had gathered some support from those who remained, declared Luther and his supporters illegal, and ordered the writings burned. But Charles had calculated wrongly. The leaders of the empire who hadn’t been at the Diet, or who had already left, argued the edict did n’t have their support. Luther is Kidnapped. Sort of. As Luther fled back home, he was fake-kidnapped. He was actually taken to safety by troops working for Frederick, and he hid in Wartburg Castle for many months converting the New Testament into German. When he came out of hiding it was into a Germany where the Edict of Worms had failed, where many secular rulers acknowledged the support of Luther and his descendants were too strong to crush. Consequences of the Diet of Worms The Diet and the Edict had transformed the crisis from a theological, religious dispute into a political, legal and cultural one. Now it was princes and lords arguing over their rights as much as the finer points of church law. Luther would need to argue for many more years, his followers would divide the continent, and Charles V would retire exhausted by the world, but Worms ensured that the conflict was multi-dimensional, vastly harder to solve.  Luther was a hero to everyone who opposed the emperor, religious or not. Soon after Worms, the peasants would rebel in the German Peasant’s War, the conflict the princes had been keen to avoid, and these rebels would see Luther as a champion, on their side. Germany itself would divide into Lutheran and Catholic provinces, and later in the history of the Reformation Germany would be torn apart by the multi-faceted Thirty Years War, where secular issues would be no less important in complicating what was happening. In one sense Worm s was a failure, as the Edict failed to stop the church dividing, in others it was a great success that has been said to have led to the modern world.

Sunday, December 22, 2019

Organ Procurement And Transplantation Network - 1321 Words

Presumed Consent in the United States In the United States alone, twenty-one people die each day while waiting for a donated organ to become available for transplant. The number of people in need of a transplant is growing much faster than the number of cadaveric organ donors: from 1988 to 2012, the number of people on the waiting list grew from 15,029 to 117,040, while, during the same interval, the number of deceased donors rose from 5,901 to a still inadequate 14,011 (â€Å"Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network†). In the United States, the cadaveric donation system is described as â€Å"informed consent,† under which organs can only be taken from cadavers who had given their consent to be a cadaveric donor while they were still alive (Abadie and Gay, 1). On the other hand, â€Å"presumed consent,† also known as an â€Å"opt-out system,† does exactly the opposite: those who do not wish to be organ donors upon death must register as a non-donor, a nd those who do want to be organ donors or are indifferent to the matter automatically become organ donors upon death, which would increase the number of organs available for transplant (Rippon, 344). The first thing America should do in order to fix the lack of donated organs is adopt a presumed consent system of organ donation. First, let us look to the reasons people may refrain from becoming a registered donor under an informed consent system. There are, of course, people who may have some kind of objection to donating their organs,Show MoreRelatedOrgan Procurement And Transplantation Network2065 Words   |  9 PagesWhat if your doctor told you that your time was limited to less than six months, unless a compatible donor came along? This is what many people go through every day. They are put in the â€Å"National Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network or OPTN† which is the transplant waiting list (Tara.B). Organs that become available through the OPTN are match ed with the recipients. Here is where most of the people will wait months, years, or even the remainder of their life for a compatible donor to becomeRead MoreOrgan Procurement And Transplantation Network2040 Words   |  9 PagesPulmonologist told you that your time was limited to less than six months, unless a compatible donor came along? This is what many people go through every day. Then they are put in the â€Å"National Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network or OPTN† which is the transplant waiting list (Tara.B). This is how organs that become available are matched with the recipients. This is where most of the people will wait months, years, or even the remainder of their life for a compatible donor to become availableRead MoreBioprinting Human Organs: The Past, Present, And Future.1488 Words   |  6 Pages Bioprinting Human Organs: The Past, Present, and Future Written by: Emmitt Mikkelson, Alexander Turnbull and John Wesley Table of Contents: I. Introduction II. History of Organ Transplants III. Development of Bioprinting IV. Current Bioprinting Processes V. Bioprinting Human Organs for Transplantation VI. Insurance Coverage for Organ Transplants VII. Ethical Considerations and Alternative Ideas VIII. The Future of Bioprinting IX. Conclusion Read MoreOrgan Transplantation Is The Removal Of A Healthy Organ1539 Words   |  7 PagesPiechowiak 2nd Period 8th Grade Accelerated Language Arts December 14th, 2015 Organ Transplants Organ transplantation is the removal of a healthy organ from one person and placing it into another whose organ has failed, or is injured. It is known to be life saving 80 percent of the time, but it is a major surgery that carries many me potential risks and complications- the biggest one being organ rejection. (WebMD) Organ transplants have quite some history. The first successful kidney transplant wasRead MoreEssay On Electronic Health Record1358 Words   |  6 PagesNational Organ Transplant Act in 1984, as a response to the national shortage of organ donation and need to improve the organ donation and matching process. The National Organ Transplant Act established the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN) to maintain a national registry for organ matching. The act also called for the network to be operated by a private, non-profit organization under federal contract (â€Å"History of NOTA,† hrsa.gov, March 14, 2017). In 1984, the United Network for OrganRe ad MoreOrgan Donation Essay1194 Words   |  5 PagesOrgan Donation Today in the United States there are thousands of people currently waiting for some type of transplant. If one were to ask a group of people if they have friends or family who have either had a transplant or are waiting for one, one would find that most people know at least one person who has had a transplant or is waiting for one. Transplantation is a great advance in modern medicine. The need for organ donors is much larger than the number of people who sign up to donateRead MoreEthical Aspects Of Organ Allocation1169 Words   |  5 Pagespractice of organ transplantation has grown by leaps and bounds over the last 50 years. Each year the medical profession takes more risk with decisions regarding transplants, how to allocate for organs, and most recently conducting transplants on children with adult organs. â€Å"An organ transplantation is a surgical operation where a failing or damaged organ in the human body is removed and replaced with a new one† (Caplan, 20 09). Not all organs can be transplanted. The term â€Å"organ transplant† typicallyRead MoreThe National Organ Transplant Act Of 19842229 Words   |  9 PagesAbstract This paper will discuss the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984. It will address the public need of the time and really see what was happening that congress felt that this was a needed piece of legislation. Along with the public’s need we will address the policy’s solution. Were we will see what the intended purpose of this act involved and see just how the government planned to help. It will also look at the some of the difficulties that this specific act faced then and now. We willRead MoreOrgan Donations : A Problem For The Transplantation Industry Essay1517 Words   |  7 Pages Organ donations stimulate positivity for the terminally ill despite all the challenges that has arisen from prior casual events. Through the correlation of persevering the gift of life to extend one’s life duration period, the organ shortage supply chain may not contribute much less withstands for unethical practice. The transplantation industry process may encounter various under goes for the supply of organs before having a divine outcome. Organ shortages have become a problem for the transplantationRead MoreThe Current State Of Organ Transplantation1503 Words   |  7 Pages2009, there were 154,324 patients on the waiting list for an organ in the United States. Because of the lack of availability of organs, the grim reality is that only 18% received a transplant and 25 patients per day died while still on the waiting list. To alleviate this situation, a nationwide policy of compensation and incentives for organ donation will be implemented. The problems plaguing the current state of organ transplantation are more multidimensional than numbers. Issues are present from

Friday, December 13, 2019

Explore How Conflict Effects Those Not Fighting in the Conflict Poems Free Essays

In The Falling Leaves and Poppies, compare the effects conflict has on those not fighting. In Poppies by Jane Weir and The Falling Leaves by Margaret Postgate Cole both poets use a variety of methods to show effects conflict has on those not fighting. Use of structure and language is important in presenting these effects. We will write a custom essay sample on Explore How Conflict Effects Those Not Fighting in the Conflict Poems or any similar topic only for you Order Now This essay will explore both poems to analyse the effects of different methods as implemented by the poets. The structure used in the poems along with similes and metaphors to describe the soldiers in both poems give a sad, solemn tone, to show how the poet was effected by conflict. The use of enjambment in The Falling Leaves gives the sense of long pauses and broken thoughts and feelings of the poet showing that it saddens the poet to think of hundreds of soldiers losing their lives in war. In Poppies, â€Å"All my words flattened, rolled, turned into felt, slowly melting. †, is used to show that the feeling of her son leaving to fight in a war was hard to explain and that the words meant nothing as the feeling was too strong to explain in words. The emotion of the poet is clearly described in both poems. I resisted the impulse† and â€Å"I was brave, as I walked with you†. Both quotes from Poppies show that although the poet felt upset that her son was going to war, and that she felt he was too young, she allowed her son to do as he wanted. This shows realisation that he had grown up, that it wasn’t her decision to allow him to go and that she didn’t want to upset him by showing how she really felt. In The Falling Leaves, the poet describes her emotion through the weather. â€Å"like snowflakes wiping out the noon;† this shows that she was feeling saddened and upset from what she had seen. Both poems describe the soldiers as innocent. For example, in Poppies, the poet’s memories of her son were all those of his youth, showing that he was still an innocent child. In The Falling Leaves soldiers are compared to graceful, white snowflakes. â€Å"Like snowflakes falling on the Flemish clay†. White is purity, cleanliness, and innocence. This may be emphasising the idea that all soldiers were still children that needed guidance from their parents and were naive and were only killed as they had little guidance. This idea of innocence could show that the impact on those not fighting was much larger because the soldiers did not deserve to die in the eyes of the poets. However, the soldiers are also described as â€Å"brown leaves dropping from their tree†. This may give the impression that those fighting were not important, just as leaves aren’t important to a tree. The idea of the brown leaves may mean that they had completed their ‘service’ and were no longer useful but that it was not an issue as new soldiers would replace them. The amount of death is recognised in The Falling Leaves, the soldiers are described as â€Å"a gallant multitude†, generalising huge number of dead soldiers as one unit. This lessens the portrayed sorrow of those not fighting by making all soldiers faceless and identical. Whereas in Poppies, it is much more personalised, this creates a feeling of grief and shows that the poet thinks it may be harder to cope with the loss of those in war than is portrayed in The Falling Leaves. How to cite Explore How Conflict Effects Those Not Fighting in the Conflict Poems, Papers

Thursday, December 5, 2019

The Changing Role of Strategic Human Resource Management

Question: What is changing role of strategic human resource management ? Answer: Introduction The role of human resource management is changing, as the globalization requires employees participation in decision-making and is engaging the employees in implementing the organizations strategy. In this respect, the HR assumes a strategic role in contributing to planning, development and implementation of organizational objectives. The HR has become the strategic partner by understanding the skill required of the employee and arranges training programs for the employees to develop and deploy that skill set. All the HR functions including selection, placement, job designs, and compensation programs play a critical role to build company's strategy so that the right employee can recruit for the right job at a right time to avoid wastage of time and money and to maximize competitive advantage. It will provide the best optimal solution to fulfill organizations goal. So SHRM plays an important part in controlling the planning, organizing, leading controlling function. After getting all the components, the HR designs a high-performance work structure to enhance the employee performance by fully utilizing the potential of the employee. To fulfill the changing role of the company the HR has become the strategic partner of the business to achieve the target of the organization. The HR function has gone beyond the payroll management and focusing more on employees contribution to enterprise's success (Grant, 2015). Discussion The strategic human resource manage resource management is not only related to HR department but all the managers and executive engage themselves in it since everybody works together collaboratively to achieve the competitive advantage. To achieve the goal the organization, it must value its employees and develop them in such a way to meet the requirement of a team, therefore, forwarding the workforce first to achieve success. The SHRM focuses on attrition, improving productivity and the overall financial performance of the company. A successful organization concentrates on the main key components such as providing job security, uses self-managed team, good pay structure, reduces conflicts, select the right candidate for the right job, give proper training to employees, focuses on decentralization and value on sharing the information (Budhwar Debrah,2013). When the organization develops the employee competency and motivates them to perform well in the organization to generate the pr ofit for the company and it also increases shareholders value in the market. The most successful organization considers HR as a strategic partner and evaluates the HR performance and to get the strategic advantage. The HR needs to gain knowledge and to prepare well to play the changing role in the organization. The HR should judge the competency level of the employee regarding knowledge, skill set, and capabilities to implement the strategy. Whether the company has the right standard to reward the employees and pay incentives to them to align people with the enterprise objectives. The HR should evaluate whether the company has the right structures, proper communication system, policies, and procedures to enhance the performance of the organization. Furthermore, the HR should be discerning enough to understand whether the enterprise has the learning capability and leadership quality to respond to the uncertainties and formulate the strategy to face changes and challenges of future (B ratton Gold, 2012). The organization's human capital comprises of its employees. The human resources in the organization is a series of skill sets that is developed by proper training and development programs that create value in the market. A company's human capital comprises of some attributes including innovativeness, energy, skill and knowledge as a whole it increases the significance of the organization to get a competitive advantage. Many HR focuses on the technical aspects rather than the strategic aspects though the second point has a deeper significance to get the organizational success (Jiang et al., 2012). Previously the HR managers used to focus on the compliance of law set by the Government. They used to focus on the number of employees hired in the organization and develop training programs for them. But the mew method concentrates on the outcome of the process and not restricted to only numbers and legal compliance. So it is more quantitative and measurable. Therefore, the HR must concern about how the employees are utilizing their skills and training to achieve the objective rather than how many hours they have devoted to training programs. A recent study has revealed that the HR manager should understand the goal and strategy first then impart training programs to develop employee skill. Many HR takes their initiatives without knowing how their decision will affect the organization. Therefore, many HR managers have explained that how they were facing talent management challenges and how they are overcoming the challenges as a part of a strategic business partner of the organization. As a result, they have outsourced contracts, for example, The Bank of America has done the outsourcing of its HR department to Arinso. Arinso will look after the payroll management, for 10,000 employees outside the U.S Europe, in 23rd August in 2006. To reduce outsourcing the HR department has to play a very active role and should ensure accountability regarding measuring the business outcome (Buller McEvoy, 2012). Beyond the basic need for compliance with the HR rules and regulation, four key elements need to be discussed to align the different component of HR system with the company goals. These are selection placement, Job design, reward and compensation system and adopting diversity management in the organization culture (Stone, 2013). While doing the recruitment, the HR manager must explain the technical competencies required for the job as well as the behavioral skills needed to meet the job requirement. The behavioral attribute focuses on giving value to the customers by the ability to show empathy and support to the client, time management that is an ability to complete the task within time with less error and the ability of the candidate to understand which area needs more training and guidance (Snell et al., 2015). Furthermore, the organization should highlight the culture and values to the employees and state the mission and vision of the business. For example, the company is looking for those candidates who can go an extra mile to bring the smile on customer's face. They want those candidates who can work hard to develop new code or the capability to build network to reach the chief of the company to increase sale. By sharing, the stories of business heroes with the potential candidates help the enterprise make them understand about the companys objective. It will also help the candidate to determine whether they will fit in the organization or not (Shields et al., 2015). According to Armstrong and Taylor (2014), job design includes bringing the various element to form a job keeping in mind that the organization and individual employees requirement are fulfilled with the significance consideration has given on health and safety issue. Proper training should be given to staff to develop a specific skill to perform the job ensuring authority and accountability of the employee. So job design refers to the content of the job, its duties, and responsibilities to perform the task and the method adopted to execute it that is the system, techniques and procedures while carrying out the job. It also focuses on the relationship exists between the superior and subordinate to get the excellent result (Berman et al., 2015). In this respect, the researcher has identified Motorola and the training programs adopted by it. As a global company, Motorola operates in many countries including China. Therefore, its hard to find the right and skilled employee in China. A recent survey conducted by American Chambers Of Commerce in Shanghai has revealed that 37% the US owned company operating in China faces the problem of skilled employees and the production suffers massively due to lack of qualified employees. The reason is that the Chinese universities do not embed the employees with proper training and skill development programs that the multinational companies are looking for (Tyson, 2014). Consequently, Motorola has developed that its training and development programs to reduce the gap. To keep this in mind Motorolas Chinese subsidiary developed management programs for local managers. Another program they have developed is Motorola's Management Foundation programs to train managers to improve their communication skills and develop their problem solving ability. As a result, Motorola has arranged MBA programs partnering with Arizona State University and Tsinghua University so that the working professional can earn an MBA to acquire more skill and knowledge. They have addressed the talent shortage in China and given the solution to utilize Chinese low-skilled and highly motivated employees to increase productivity ("The Changing Role of Strategic Human Resources Management in International Business", 2016). Incentives or reward is based on employee performance. When the company gives an award to its employee for high performance which is a result of training, development programs and achieved through teamwork, collaboration and increasing a sense of responsibility, it has some parameters to evaluate the employee. It helps an employee to identify new skills so that they can get higher pay. Compensation system includes incentives, profit-sharing, reward system based on skills and performance of the employees who learn new things to apply it to the organization to meet success. The employees who have undergone the broad range of training programs and acquired problem solving skills are more likely to grow in the company and get job satisfaction. The intensive training programs have made them one of the valuable assets in the enterprise which in turn helps them to gain rewards and ensure more commitment to the company. When the employee has the access to the information and more authority t o act on they feel more involved in the job and bears more commitment while making the decision on behalf of the company to further the organizations goals. Therefore, rewards need to be associated with the performance so that the employee will be motivated to pursue the outcomes and will help the business to grow (Alfes et al., 2013). Another key aspect of SHRM is its focus on diversity management and includes it in its work culture. Diversity refers to reducing discrimination against women employees minorities while recruiting them in the company. Today diversity means the different perspective and ideas that an employee brings to the workplace. Diversity increases the innovation and problem solving skills in the business. The more diverse the team is regarding age, gender; different cultural background the more efficiently the group can solve the organizational problem. A different team helps the company to come up with more innovative and efficient solutions (Renwick et al., 2013). Conclusion Many aspects of international human resource management differ from domestic HRM being a strategic partner the HR should focus on all these things to achieve the objective of the company. The IHRM is more complicated than the local ones because of the wider issues that it has. In the respect of MNC the international human resource manager has to consider many aspects such as cross-cultural difference, rules and regulations of the company, the pay norms and peoples expectations, the working conditions there, the problems that the expatriate members are facing in terms of meeting the requirement of the projects and the cultural issues that the expat is facing in the host country. The management should ensure all these aspects to ensure a good working relationship with the staff to be able to achieve the performance standard and the best result for the company (Vaiman et al., 2012). The company's success depends on how the human resource manager tackles the global stuff to become more successful in future. Minute details can create the considerable impact on the employees from the different cultural background as different cultures have different priorities and requirement. Keeping this in mind multinational companies should standardize the pay and performances standard for the employees. In addition to that when the firm enters into the country having transitional economy by buying local plants or establishing joint ventures creates significant HR challenges and will decrease the performance if not properly handled, So the Global firm needs to develop an appropriate HR strategy to fit with the changing role of the organization and to overcome the challenges ("Changing role of HRM - what is human resource ?", 2016). Reference List Armstrong, M., Taylor, S. (2014).Armstrong's handbook of human resource management practice. Kogan Page Publishers. Budhwar, P. S., Debrah, Y. A. (Eds.). (2013).Human resource management in developing countries. Routledge. Bratton, J., Gold, J. (2012).Human resource management: theory and practice. Palgrave Macmillan. Jiang, K., Lepak, D. P., Hu, J., Baer, J. C. (2012). How does human resource management influence organizational outcomes? A meta-analytic investigation of mediating mechanisms.Academy of management Journal,55(6), 1264-1294. Buller, P. F., McEvoy, G. M. (2012). Strategy, human resource management and performance: Sharpening line of sight.Human resource management review,22(1), 43-56. Stone, R. J. (2013).Managing human resources. John Wiley and Sons. Snell, S., Morris, S., Bohlander, G. (2015).Managing human resources. Nelson Education. Shields, J., Brown, M., Kaine, S., Dolle-Samuel, C., North-Samardzic, A., McLean, P., ... Plimmer, G. (2015).Managing Employee Performance Reward: Concepts, Practices, Strategies. Cambridge University Press. Berman, E. M., Bowman, J. S., West, J. P., Van Wart, M. R. (2015).Human resource management in public service: Paradoxes, processes, and problems. Sage Publications. Alfes, K., Shantz, A. D., Truss, C., Soane, E. C. (2013). The link between perceived human resource management practices, engagement and employee behaviour: a moderated mediation model.The international journal of human resource management,24(2), 330-351. Renwick, D. W., Redman, T., Maguire, S. (2013). Green human resource management: a review and research agenda*.International Journal of Management Reviews,15(1), 1-14. Vaiman, V., Scullion, H., Collings, D. (2012). Talent management decision making.Management Decision,50(5), 925-941. Tyson, S. (2014).Essentials of human resource management. Routledge. Grant, R. M. (2015).Contemporary Strategy Analysis 9e Text Only. John Wiley Sons.

Monday, November 25, 2019

Maya Angelou Essay Research Paper Example

Maya Angelou Essay Research Paper Example Maya Angelou Essay Paper Maya Angelou Essay Paper Essay Topic: Maya Angelou Poems Maya Angelo Maya Angelo born Marguerite Ann Johnson on April 4, 1928 and raised in SST. Lolls Missouri and Stamps, Arkansas Is an Author, great Poet, historian, songwriter, and much more. She was the first black woman director in Hollywood and she also delivered a poem at the inauguration for president Bill Clinton at his request called On The Pulse of The Morning. Maya Angelo also was a civil rights activist who was fortunate enough to be able to work with DRP. Martin Luther King Jar. She is also known for the many books she has written one of the greatest of all time Is l know why the age bird sings. (Www. Poets. Org) In my pollen Maya Angelo Is an all around great person I think she has Inspired us all in ma Poem 1 Is called Alone By Maya Angelo. The poem Alone is about it doesnt matter how much money or anything you have you cant do something alone. Its also saying that everybody needs help with something that you cant do everything by yourself eventually you will need somebody and their help. The poem begins to shift when in the first stanza at the beginning of the poem Its saying how she was trying to find her OLL a home basically saying she was alone to the third stanza where It says that even millionaires with money still need help with something they cant do it by themselves even though they have expensive doctors to cure their hearts and so forth. (Www. Poets. Org) Maya Angelo calls poem 2 Still I Rise. The poem Still I Rise is mainly about her saying that If you dont care for her she will not let that bring her down, and that the more you try and bring her down she will continue to rise. Shes also stating that she doesnt care what they think of her she will continue to be her while striving for the est. and talking about her and not liking her doesnt bother her she continues to keep going at whatever shes doing not mattering what you are trying to do to hurt or stop her or even bring her down. The poem beings to shift starting at the first stanza at the beginning of the poem stating that you can write her down in history with your bitter, twisted lies but still she rise which means you can do what you want to her shes not going to let It stop her to the second stanza where It says Does my gassiness upset you? Which basically she Is asking does the way she carries herself ND how and what she does bother them. (WV. Poets. Org) Critics say Maya Angelo uses too many past experiences when she writes her poems. Another critic says that she somewhat criticizes other poets work which they say Is a form an Inhumanity. They also say she discusses other writers social condition s. A very Interesting critic to me says that In her autobiography has a form of imprisonment because of her telling what happened to her in her childhood other girls who read it may grow up into women with that consciousness. But there were also some good critics saying that she tells the truth and that they like it also one more says that they like the sense of black-speech rhythms. (Www. Bookings. Com/ criticisms/Maya_Angelo). I dont agree with most of the critics and what they say about her I love Maya Angelo as a poet and her poems have Inspired me In many Deterrent ways. Me personally I dont tank any poem or anything can Inspire you good or bad unless you let it. I also agree with the critic who says she uses black-speech rhythms I absolutely love it.

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Conflicts and challenges in Philadelphia Coursework

Conflicts and challenges in Philadelphia - Coursework Example This supports by proper data and scientific evidences that is relevant nowadays. The method which uses is particularized examination of a literature together with the critical summarizing and personal inferences on the topic. â€Å"Of course I actually know no more about Philadelphia in 2009 than does anyone else† – write Bacon in his famous essay (Knowles, 2009), still he makes a try to elaborate a new urban form and planning trajectories for his lovely city. Edmund Bacon has occupied post of the director of the Philadelphia City Planning Commission for more than twenty years and tries to use all his knowledge and resources to restore the city plan and contribute a new vision of modern urban area. Bacon argues under the Philadelphia rising from â€Å"post-Depression, post-war inertia – from the old industrial city† (Knowles, 2009). This man has intentions to reconstruct his place of birth and make this city pleasant and renovated. Edmund Bacon has his own special and sometimes contradictory preferences in city construction. His main idea regards in transformation the city into â€Å"a model of humane urbanism† (The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia, 2014). After the World War II, Philadelphia has appeared as a place of outworn infrastructure and household deficiency. Deindustrialization course has remained notable and achieved popularity in that period (Knowles, 2009). Bacon suggests the ideas for growth of urbanization and city development as a perspective area. He elaborates a new mega-structure idea due to the perspectives of Philadelphia city peculiarities, but federal government’s Bicentennial planning commission refuses this project due to the high cost of implementation (The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia, 2014). Hence, the most prominent reason for incomplete realization of Bacon’s plans is a lack of financial resources. Still, the changes accomplish in some perspective, and

Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Marketing Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 37

Marketing - Essay Example The section below discusses three major television commercial undertaken by Toyota, Coca-Cola and Samsung Companies. Toyota Company advertisement involved a Toyota Highlander, a brand that is highly demanded in the international market. Based on the high quality brands that Toyota manufactures, the company has benefited from strong customer loyalty in the local and in international markets. The Toyota Highlander advertisement aimed at creating strong customer awareness of the new third generation Highlander that was manufactured in 2013. The advertisement involves a Highlander brand moving at a steady speed in a very smooth road. Based on the attractiveness and neatness of the inside part of the brand as displayed in the advertisement, the brand has been highly demanded in the international markets including Japan, US and Europe. By introducing Highlander in the market, Toyota targets at the high income earners who highly value the make of their vehicles (Goldstein 27). Being a mid-size SUV that is similar to Jeep Grand Cherokee and lexus RX, Highlander is also highly demanded by executives workin g in big companies. The effectiveness of the Highlander adverts in creating strong customers awareness is indicated by the high demand of the brand both locally and internationally. As a potential customer, I would buy the Highlander brand. This is due to its high technology and modern design that makes it comfortable to drive. For example, the product has a touchscreen display audio system, powertrain trims and front-wheel drive among others. Additionally, Highlander is made to offer high level of safety to the driver as well as other passengers. Coca-Cola Company advertisement involved young basketball players who stop to pray once they see their friend passing by drinking sprite, one of the major brands of the Coca-Cola Company. The company, which is the largest producer of soft drinks in the world, has greatly

Monday, November 18, 2019

Finance (Analysis) Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Finance (Analysis) - Essay Example However using discounted payback period, the company would be able to recover its initial outflow of the project in 3.47 years. The discounted payback period gives more accurate picture of the project feasibility because it takes present value of the future cash inflows (Trahan, and Gitman, 1995). Considering the investment required, the project should be accepted using the payback period technique. Net Present Value The Net present value of the project is $71,467,984. The value shows the difference between the initial outflow and present value of future cash inflow (Shapiro, 1978). Therefore, the management should undertake the project as the NPV is positive and very high so the project would increase the profitability of the company. Internal Rate of Return Internal Rate of Return of the project is calculated as 25%. This is the rate at which the net present value of all future inflows would be equal to the initial outflow of the project. It means the project is beneficial for the company because IRR is greater than the cost of capital which is 10% and therefore the project should be accepted. ... Modified Internal Rate of Return The MIRR gives more accurate and realistic picture of the cost and profitability of the project because this technique assumes that the positive cash flows will be reinvested at cost of capital i.e. 10% in this case. The MIRR of the project is 18% which is also greater than the cost of capital. Thus, the project should be accepted. Recommendation The company should accept the project because all the project appraisal and capital budgeting techniques used to evaluate the feasibility of the project are showing positive results and therefore the project should be accepted. If company undertakes the project, it would be able to recover its initial investment in 3.47 years (inflation adjusted) which is beneficial for the company. After 3.47 years the project will give additional future cash inflows till the end of the project. NPV of the project is also favorable and is showing the healthy earning for the company. IRR and MIRR of the project are greater th an the cost of the capital and indicating positive sign for the company to undertake the project. Profitability index of the Project is greater than 1 hence also supporting the project. Thus, the project should be accepted. MODEL DESIGN REPORT The model is prepared in Excel and it has been divided into three sections which are input, calculation, and output. All the information has been included in the input section by the user. Using input, calculation has been done through formulas and commands. The calculated result is then produced in the form of output. INPUT The model allows the user to enter the information as input in the excel sheet. The input section has been divided into seven areas. The production part comprises of price of product, units of

Friday, November 15, 2019

How Social Media Contributes To Retailing Marketing Essay

How Social Media Contributes To Retailing Marketing Essay The retailing industry has found itself constantly evolving and transforming in the past two decades. Globalization and advanced technology developments have a very big impact on the retailing landscape. One of the major reasons for this process is the drastic increased growth of the internet and social media. The concept of social media has existed since the days of cave paintings but the internet has made things possible on a whole new scale. In this era, social media is one of the best opportunities available for a brand to connect with its customers. Social media is hot and it is the trend. Globally, customers that are buying the items that they wanted via virtual media had increased drastically. Traditional customer relationship management is not sufficient for a company to interact with customers. Social media has definitely changed the way big companies communicate with their customers. This study explains how social media contributes to retailing. Besides that, this study wil l also describe about the impacts social media have on customer relationship management. Keywords: social media, customer relationship management Introduction Internet is now one of the most important channels of distribution right after high street retailing ever since its commercial launching about fifteen years ago and it is one of the major sources of empowerment and also customer information (Constantinides, Romer and Boria, 2008). The recent developments of internet, information technology and some other Web services had created a bigger area of opportunities in businesses especially retailing. The Internet has changed our lives forever and it  allows  us  to  communicate  in  ways  unimaginable  only a  few  years  ago (Leary, 2008).According to Borges (2009) it is said that commercial internet started to have a huge boom in about mid-1990s to 2001 and it his highly related to the peoples ability to absorb online information and having the choice to buy online product via ecommerce. In this era of globalization marketing and retailing are slowly embracing social media. The social media had given customers the c hance to have more control, information and power over the market process, posing retailers with a number of important dilemmas and challenges according to Constantinides et al. (2008). We often turn to the Internet for encouragement, entertainment, knowledge and advice. Advice on what to buy, where to buy it and who to buy it from (Leary, 2008).Besides that, in the recent years there is rapid growth of marketing strategies that involve in the circle of customer relationship (Pietro Pantano, 2012). Social network which is now widely used by people around the world and it does have a big effect on the systems of customer relationship management and a new way to CRM is coming out as an ideal platform for using social network in the systems of traditional CRM (Pietro, Pantano Corvello, 2012). According to Divol, Edelman and Sarrazin (2012) it is stated that thirty nine percent of companies that they have surveyed have already started using social media as their first choice of digita l tool to reach out to customers. In about four years, the percentage is estimated to rise to forty seven percent. The way organizations are capturing benefits from the internet technology in the enterprise nowadays is totally different from the past where they attend to other enterprise information systems (De Hertogh, Viaene Dedene, 2011). Overview of Social Media What is social media? The term social media is made up of two words that have its own meaning. In general, the word media means to have advertising and communication of information and ideas with channels and publications while the word social implies to the interaction between a group of people or a community (Sisira,2011). According to Sisira (2011) any kind of website that allows its users to have the authority to share the content, views, personal opinion and encourages interaction can be considered and classified as social media. The worldwide users of social media are over 1.5 billion. Social media is now an evolving wave in retailing. Examples of famous social media sites are Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, Blogger and Scribd. There is also Flickr or Snapfish which emerged as support storage, to share digital photos and an organization (Stefanone, Lackaff Rosen, 2010). Boyd and Ellison (2007) illustrate a better definition of social network site is that it serves as a web-based s ervice which allow people to build a profile within a system whether it is public or semi-public and to connect with a list of people which they have connection to like their family and friends. Social networking had given us a chance to interact with far more people in numbers comparing to our ancestors (Dunbar, 2012). Social network like Facebook and Twitter has the advantage to able to get and win the heart of its customers because social media can connect to them at a very deep level. Now, it seems like a new social network launches every week. To add on to all these famous networks, location-based social networking such as Foursquare and Facebook Places are on the rise (Kidwai Imperator, 2011). Out of hundreds of social networking site in this era, Facebook is undeniably the worlds largest social network. Facebook initially started in February 2004 and it is originally meant to be a social networking site only for Harvard University students (Brothers, Dewland, Hahn Martin, 2011). Somini (2011) states that Facebook has already reached 800 million users worldwide as of as of September 23, 2011 and the users of Facebook press the like button or comment more than two billion times each day. Besides that, they upload a shocking 250 million photos each day too. Twitter is the second leading social networking site after Facebook. Wasserman (2012) said that twitter has already reached 140 million users as of March 22, 2012. According to Anderson (2011) Twitter is actually a place where its users talk about their daily doings, have a gallery to expose photography and as a platform for famous celebrities to be sure that they are part of their fans lives. Twitter is often described as a micro-blog where individuals publish short and personal message about themselves (Brothers et al., 2011). Before the digital revolution, gathering a large amount of crowd is unthinkable but with Twitter, it is now possible (Dunbar, 2012). Social medias contribution to retailing The use of social media occasionally begins in public communication, marketing and retailing department or other department that have direct connection with stakeholders and customers whether it is in business or non-profit organizations (Evans McKee, 2010). There has been a dynamic change in the retailing industry in this 21st century. It is all because of the rapid growth of the web and social media. Generation Y are putting a greater emphasis on networking by using social media because they approaches work in a different way from their progenitor (Karen, 2009). If you are a marketer or building a brand, do not be worries that your company has missed the boat on taking advantage of social media because the majority of social media programs are actually fighting with each other too (Taylor, 2011)..According to Burby, Atchison and Sterne (2007) social media allows super fast and easy communication with billions of customers in a short amount of time and have certainly raised the spe ed where company and its brand can be created, have more exposure and grow. Social media has an enormous potential and capability for companies to engage with customer, thus increasing revenue and efficiency of the company (Baird Parasnis, 2011).The change in this industry does not depend on the size or a big idea of the company it is now nevertheless more focused on customer demand. The information about weaknesses, the good or bad and how can the product have further improvement can be analyzed within a week now compared to older days where much more time is needed to do so (Yazdanifard, Obeidy, Yusoff Babaei, 2011). Decision makers are trying to find ways to enable firms to earn profit by making use applications such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Wikipedia (Kaplan Haenlein, 2010). Social media users have the opportunity to offer feedback and feel more involved with a brand when the profiles status is update with positive information and challenges. It enables organizations to increase customer loyalty while at the same time getting feedback from customers and discovering what changes they want (Friedman Friedman, 2008). According to an eMarketer study in 2008, nearly six out of ten United States users now communicate with businesses and believe that the businesses must interact with their consumers and deepen the brand relationship via social networking website (Abedniya Mahmouei, 2010). According to Gilbert (2010) social media cost may be low but there is a need to invest time and energy in it to be successful. For example, if a retailers want to start a blog or Facebook page, they need to update it regularly or no one will return to see the content (Gilbert, 2010). Simply creating a presence on a popular platform like Facebook or Twitter does not guarantee that customers will be attracted to a firms page and engage with the firm and other customers (Culnan, Mc Hugh, Zubillaga, 2010). This is also because the use of social media by customers are v oluntary and interaction among members need time, organizations need to take great steps in order to build communities and learn from the interactions (Culnan et al., 2010). Figure 1: The Social Feedback Cycle (Burby, Atchison Sterne, 2007) As we can see in Figure 1, it is the social feedback cycle. The word of mouth is important as we can see in the figure. According to Brown, Broderick and Lee (2007) a big part of online customer interaction is word of mouth communication and it influences on a persons evaluation and will to purchase a product. With social media, retailers can get data from their customers opinion or talk and use it as a consideration to enhance their product. As retailers and marketers, brand and business are very important and activity that they do need to have a return on investment, whether it is by increased sales, market share or brand recognition and social media that changed the way people interact with one another have a significant help for marketing, retailing, business and also branding (Drury, 2008). How do retailers turn this potential into real business opportunity and how does social media contributes to retailing? As an example, we can take a look at the best practices of some company in the retail sector. Take a look at IKEAs Social Catalogue, their objective is actually to raise awareness of a new IKEA store with almost no media budget at all. According to Shercan (2010) IKEA is the worlds largest furniture retailer that is held privately and sells accessories and ready to assemble furniture. In the late 2009, IKEA had a Facebook campaign where the idea is contributed by Forsman and Bodenfors to promote a new IKEA store to be launched in Malmo and it was claimed to be a social media campaign that have the most innovation in Facebook (Shercan, 2010). The approach of this campaign is to upload photos of the rooms in the ikea showroom to Facebook, then they allow people to tag themselves against an item of furniture for the chance to win it in real life (Lindsay, Matthew, Jamie, Eveline Chris, 2011). When a person is tagged in a photo on Facebook, their friends will automatically receive an up date that shows the photo. This simple competition will make people have the desire to get free stuff which also meant that this campaign had received a huge amount of public relations. With this, IKEA can increase their companys revenue. Dunay and Krueger (2010) also said that Facebook offers unique ways to communicate with customers such as the Facebook Ads as it can be bought on a cost per click basis and it is very popular as it let company to reach the audience that they desire whether it is narrow or wide. Besides that, there is also Starbucks Mayor Offer where mayor of Foursquare in Starbucks at any local store gets to buy a frappuchino at only one dollar (Keath, 2010). This is special as it is the first national special for mayor using Foursquare. In this situation, customers get value from the discounts and they will have a sudden ego boost to become the mayor of their favorite Starbucks or the one nearest to them. Starbucks will of course get popularity in a form of word of mouth and they are able to identify its top customers. On top of that, there are small businesses that use social media as a real business opportunity. As an example is Wrigleyville, a small company that sell sports related clothing in Chicago and Pittsburgh. Wrigleyville has build a Facebook page for three years and now has twenty two thousand likes and the company tracks sales and marketing efforts from Facebook. They also had contest on Facebook on Mothers Day for visitors to upload some picture of Mom demonstrating why shes the biggest fan of Chicago Cubs (Doug, 2012). Social medias impact on customer relationship management (CRM) Customer relationship management is a combination of technology, business processes and people that want and seek to understand a firms customers and it focus on the incorporation approach on relationship development and customer loyalty (Chen Popovich, 2003). The premise of CRM is that is is a process of relationship building and dual creation of value between firm and its customers, to create win-win situations, enhance customer life time value and increase profitability ( Nguyen Mutum, 2012).According to Jayashree, Pahlavanzadeh and Shojaee (2010) customer relationship management is the collection of processes, people and technology that seeks to find costumers of organizations and CRM develops customers retention and relationship.Progress in Information Technology and organizational changes in customer-centric procedures have positive effect in the development of CRM. Organizations which implement CRM successfully, will gain customer loyalty and profitability (Jayashree, Pahlav anzadeh Shojaee, 2010). All employees in a firm are managers of customer relationship, whether you are the receptionist who answers the phone or customer service operator, and everyone in the company handles customers in the departments (Ronald, 2001). CRM focuses on the integration of customer information, knowledge for finding and keeping customer to grow customer lifetime value and it also has an important role to help organizations to keep their customers and to make them loyal. Organizations should know the reasons of leaving customers and finding the ways of keeping them (Ramakrishnan, 2005). With billions of people having access to a variety of social media, the ability of the word to share and connect is infinite and from a business point of view, companies are now allowed to create a customer experience never before done in the past. Traditional CRM was born in the early 1990s and customer behavior is in a very different phase today (Rich, 2010). According to Vissing (2011 ) CRM is one of the most fundamental elements in any organization because of the emergence of social media in the industry. According to IBM research, there is a large perception gap between what the customers seek via social media and what companies offer (Baird Parasnis, 2011).It is important to master online communication in order to know the people that can influence a particular market. Retailers today are working in a challenging era but they are now able to get closer to their customers and engage with them with a timely and relevant manner (Green Starkey, 2011). Together with CRM, social media can achieve a higher financial benefits to companies and it does not matter which sector they are in (Green Starkey, 2011). What does this change mean for CRM and how this social media phenomenon change the way firms interact with their customers? To engage with customer by using social media will definitely fail if conventional CRM approaches remains the same (Baird Parasnis, 2011). CRM has slowly moved to become social customer relationship management (SCRM). A more strategic and holistic approach that combines social media with more aspects in businesses improves the rate of consistency in achieving success (Leary, 2012). Social CRM is often called CRM 2.0 and it grew because of the empowerment of customers that each customer has the experiences, tools and products with the company that satisfy their personal desire (Mosadegh Behboudi, 2011). Social CRM had pulled the world of customer relationship management into sticking with social media and it results in a very unique and interesting way of working (How do you think, 2012). Social CRM is about joining ongoing conversations customers and prospects that are already engaged in while trying not to control them and it is also about understanding where and what kind of people you want to do businesss by hanging out on the Internet (Leary, 2008).Social CRM is now a new paradigm in combining social networking into traditional CRM systems (Askool Nakata, 2011). At the same time, the interactions between buyer and seller can now be effortlessly stored in a CRM database system for the benefit of the marketer and retailers (Nguyen Mutum, 2012). This interactive era has not only increased collaboration between firm and customer but coupled with continuing technological advances, a marketer has now the ability to track and store customer information optimally, in order to customize offerings to suit individual customer needs and desires (Nguyen Mutum, 2012). Kaftalovich (2010) claims that social media allows company to go into their customers social network and enable them to connect with the customers in an informal way. She also men tion that social media is its own lead generation machine and at Luxor CRM, they found that Twitter is extremely effective because they can gather customers curiosity, opinions and interest in the products as well as gathering about the audiences preferences and buying behavior. According to Green and Starkey (2011) SCRM can deliver insight, which will help drive real customer centric innovation. However, what is sometimes proposed is nothing more than the refreshing of old ideas such as one-to-one communication, relationship marketing or customer engagement applied to social media.  Such thinking actually misses the crucial main point that social media is about people interacting with each other (Ang, 2011). To develop a good social media strategy, it is important to realize that technologies are now allowing people to quickly connect, converse, create and collaborate with each other (Ang, 2011). Besides that, the impact of social media on CRM is the raise of customer centricity. In the world of CRM, the enhanced emphasis is being placing focus on the developing measures that are more customer-centric and that give manager a much well rounded idea about how their CRM is performing (Russell, 2001). This growth of social media had an indirectly result to the growth of much more and better customer centric companies. With social media, it does not matter how much revenue you invest but it is the time, knowledge and patience that you offer in order to satisfy customers (Kaftalovich, 2010). The comparison between traditional CRM and social CRM is that traditional is more data driven and process centric while social CRM is more content driven and conversation centric (Leary, 2008).With social media nowadays, people does not really care about companies that kept promoting themselves, instead individuals are seeking companies that can actually provide them with value. According to He ckadon (2010) if brands want to succeed in social networks environment then marketers must keep content fresh and relevant and the information in social networks must be easy to understand and share. In order to become successful in todays retailing world retailers need to understand about people opinion on their brand in the social sphere. Smart retailers will take a look at their social CRM from the public relations, customer support, product development to maximize connection with customers (Bush, 2011). Retailers can help a brand create top-of-mind awareness by responding effectively to user communications (Heckadon, 2010). Retailers should alsofrequently update their brands social networking profiles and status, and establish RSS feeds so followers can subscribe and obtain updated content on their computers and mobile devices (Heckadon, 2010). Besides that, one of the biggest advantages social CRM has over offline CRM is that social CRM can have a much bigger volume of real-tim e data and it can be used to personalize experiences of the company (Bush, 2011). The growth of more customer-centric companies had resulted in social media being a new wave of customer service and it is all about maintaining long term relationship and partnership with their customers and this is not just a business deal. The development of customer centric firms and lead generation definitely is the impacts of social media on CRM. Discussion As conducted and explained earlier, the purpose of this study is to explore the contribution of social media towards retailing and its impact on customer relationship management. The world of retailing is changing rapidly as time pass. Trends and major development in social media is one of the causes for the rapid change in retailing industry. This paper shows an overview on social media from Facebook, the worlds largest social networking site to Twitter, Foursquare, Youtube and so forth. Then, it can be observe that major networking sites really helps a lot in the retailing industry. Many companies limit their employee to have access to social media sites because of their concern on their employees productivity (Karen, 2009). Social media allows company to communicate with a wide amount of customers much faster and efficiently. Retailers will also know how to further develop their product as they can get data about customers opinions, preferences and talk through the word of mouth a bout their product in a short amount of time. This would eventually make the retailers produce what the customers want. Besides that, social media had helped retailers to have more real business opportunities. Firstly, there is IKEA who launches the Social Catalogue and is able to raise awareness with zero media budget. They focus on the desire of human being to get free stuff and consequently they get a huge amount of public relations. Then, we have Starbucks that have the Starbucks Mayor Offer on the Foursquare application. With this, Starbucks is able to gain popularity and also revenue. This shows that creativity does pay off in social media marketing campaign. Social media has definitely contributes to retailing with unique strategies in getting to know more about companys own product and also improving their sales and revenues. Furthermore, it can be observed by reading this paper that social media also have an impact on customer relationship management. We know that all employees are important in managing customer relationship in a certain company and that social media had changed traditional CRM in a more holistic way and soon it became social CRM. The two major impact social media has on CRM is the growth of customer centricity and social media has become its own lead generation machine. Social CRM also enable company to promote and grow their brand through social media tools like Facebook. There has been a shift in power that can be observed when reading this paper as customers are being given much more priority compared to older day where seller or company had the power. Companies that implement a successful CRM will get the rewards in obtaining customer loyalty and long run profitability. Conclusion There is no way to escape social media these days whether it is for individuals or business companies. It is almost impossible to draw a line separating online world from social media. There are many reasons that social media rapidly gain usage in this era of globalization. The ability to achieve news and information through social media is one of the reasons. Companies are changing and rethinking about their traditional retailing and marketing strategies. This shows that social media is contributing to the retail world. Social network is free and is available for everyone to access and it is generating a mass amount of data which is a big help to marketers and retailers. By carefully understanding the importance of customer relationship management, companies can target their customers more specifically as they have the data of their preferences and opinions. This is the impact social media has on customer relationship management. This is the time where every business takes social me dia seriously and adopts it in their departments. It is now a baseline requirement that whether you are a small or large corporation there is need to have online presence and prolonged conversation with customers. Different retail brands will have different needs and they have to adopt different approaches with different customers. It is very interesting to see how the retailing world will be affected by Facebook and Twitter in the upcoming years.

Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Television Violence Essay -- TV Ratings System

I went to pick up my daughter from preschool today only to find out that she punched a little girl. She also kicked the teacher. I sat down with her and asked her why she hurt them. She said, "I didn't hurt them I was using my powers." I wondered where she might be getting the idea that she had powers, and that it didn't hurt anyone when she used those powers. I thought back to the last few nights. The only different thing in her life was the new show Power Puff Girls. It was then I realized that this new cartoon show she had been watching at home just might be the cause. Children learn behavior through examples. Television is a major influence. One area of concern is the violent content in children's television and their access to other inappropriate programming. The government has the ability to rule and regulate stations both nationally and locally. Exposure to violence on television can affect the way children behave toward their environment. This creates an additional responsibility for parents and teachers to not only protect children from violence but to also teach children to resist violence. Because of the negative influence of violent television programming for children, and their easy access to other violent programs; the government, teachers, and parents need to educate and protect children against violence. Thanks to technology, we have many more opportunities available to us. This expands the world of education to many who would otherwise not have it. However, this advance of technology has also allowed our children to be exposed to inappropriate programming on television. The violent content is not only on regular programs that children are allowed to view, but it is also a main theme in shows geared to young children, especially in cartoons. I asked Jean Cobb, a Child Care Provider at The Children's Center, "What type of programming has the most violent influence and why?" She said, "Cartoons have always been around but the violence hasn't been brought to our attention until recently. There aren't many cartoons that don't have violence." Children learn a lot of their behavior through the examples set on television. These behaviors appear while interacting with other children. I have observed children fight, hit, bite, spit and use many mean words to other children. The same behavior is commonplace on children's programming. This can... ...side affects of the violent behavior. Parents must be wary of the programming that children are viewing. In combining our efforts government, teachers, and parents can teach children to act and react appropriately and responsibly. Cobb said, "I think everyone in their daily lives and all of society have stressful times. Adults need to learn to handle their emotions so that we can be role models for the children. We need peers to use as a sounding board to keep our frustrations in tact." In order to teach, we need to be teachable. In order to protect, we need to be informed of dangers. Protecting, educating, and teaching resistance to violence are some ways to help improve children's behavior. Works Cited "Child and Family Canada" Television Violence: A Review of the Effects on Children of Different Ages http://www.cfc-efc.ca/docs/00001068.htm Cobb, Jean. Child Care Provider USI. Personal Interview. 17 Nov. 2011. "Factsheet" Chronology of Main Events & Initiatives Undertaken Related To The Issue Of Television Violence   Ã‚  2010 http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/info_sht/tvle.htm "A Family Guide to TV Ratings" A Family Guide to TV Ratings http://www.ncta.com/guidelines.html Television Violence Essay -- TV Ratings System I went to pick up my daughter from preschool today only to find out that she punched a little girl. She also kicked the teacher. I sat down with her and asked her why she hurt them. She said, "I didn't hurt them I was using my powers." I wondered where she might be getting the idea that she had powers, and that it didn't hurt anyone when she used those powers. I thought back to the last few nights. The only different thing in her life was the new show Power Puff Girls. It was then I realized that this new cartoon show she had been watching at home just might be the cause. Children learn behavior through examples. Television is a major influence. One area of concern is the violent content in children's television and their access to other inappropriate programming. The government has the ability to rule and regulate stations both nationally and locally. Exposure to violence on television can affect the way children behave toward their environment. This creates an additional responsibility for parents and teachers to not only protect children from violence but to also teach children to resist violence. Because of the negative influence of violent television programming for children, and their easy access to other violent programs; the government, teachers, and parents need to educate and protect children against violence. Thanks to technology, we have many more opportunities available to us. This expands the world of education to many who would otherwise not have it. However, this advance of technology has also allowed our children to be exposed to inappropriate programming on television. The violent content is not only on regular programs that children are allowed to view, but it is also a main theme in shows geared to young children, especially in cartoons. I asked Jean Cobb, a Child Care Provider at The Children's Center, "What type of programming has the most violent influence and why?" She said, "Cartoons have always been around but the violence hasn't been brought to our attention until recently. There aren't many cartoons that don't have violence." Children learn a lot of their behavior through the examples set on television. These behaviors appear while interacting with other children. I have observed children fight, hit, bite, spit and use many mean words to other children. The same behavior is commonplace on children's programming. This can... ...side affects of the violent behavior. Parents must be wary of the programming that children are viewing. In combining our efforts government, teachers, and parents can teach children to act and react appropriately and responsibly. Cobb said, "I think everyone in their daily lives and all of society have stressful times. Adults need to learn to handle their emotions so that we can be role models for the children. We need peers to use as a sounding board to keep our frustrations in tact." In order to teach, we need to be teachable. In order to protect, we need to be informed of dangers. Protecting, educating, and teaching resistance to violence are some ways to help improve children's behavior. Works Cited "Child and Family Canada" Television Violence: A Review of the Effects on Children of Different Ages http://www.cfc-efc.ca/docs/00001068.htm Cobb, Jean. Child Care Provider USI. Personal Interview. 17 Nov. 2011. "Factsheet" Chronology of Main Events & Initiatives Undertaken Related To The Issue Of Television Violence   Ã‚  2010 http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/info_sht/tvle.htm "A Family Guide to TV Ratings" A Family Guide to TV Ratings http://www.ncta.com/guidelines.html

Monday, November 11, 2019

How would you describe Akio Toyoda’s leadership style?

Leadership is the process of directing the behaviour of others toward the accomplishment of some objective. Leadership style is the behaviour a leader exhibits while guiding organization members in appropriate directions. Today leaders are often eliminate unnecessary levels of organization and introduce work teams in order to enhance organizational decision making and work flow. In this case study, Akio Toyoda’s prove himself as today’s leader by making few necessary changes in organization to boost his way to make Toyota as number one auto maker in the world. Entrepreneurial leadership Akio Toyoda can be categorized in entrepreneurial leadership because of his critical role in Toyota. Toyota must have global outlook, interact with environmental changes to make its way to the top. Akio Toyoda as a senior managing director and was appointed as head of china business, when it was joint venture with troubled firm. He is impatient to see faster growth of business in China, work hard for a year to complete the merging of Toyota with a larger, more aggressive local firm by convincing top management and government officials to approve the deal. Once he succeeded, Toyoda’s next step was to revamp the management structure. Transformational leadership Akio Toyoda also can be categorized in transformational leadership by studying his action toward management structure he created. In China’s country department under his leadership, departmental heads will only answering to headquarters executives which isolated the managers and complicated coordination. This method making way for them to work closely with each other and report to an executive vice president who can make decisions for the China business instead of waiting for the corporate approvals. ) Where on the continuum of leadership behaviour would you place Yoshi Inaba, and why? Continuum of leadership behaviour that emphasizes decision making can be arranged into 7 type of behaviour: 1. The manager makes the decision and announces it 2. The manager â€Å"sells† the decision 3. The manager presents ideas and invites questions 4. The manager presents a tentative decision that is subject to change 5. The manager presents the problem, gets suggestions and then makes the decision 6. The manager defines the limits and asks the group to make a decision 7. The manager permits the group to make decisions within prescribed limits Yoshi Inaba helps Toyota managers grapple with decisions about balancing market share and profitability. He can be placed in and as the manager, who permits the group to make decisions within prescribed limits in the continuum of leadership behaviour. Yoshi Inaba can be characterized as a leader who makes decision by exercising little control and allowing subordinates much freedom and self-direction. He is becoming an equal member of problem solving group which is allowing his managers to fact finding some solutions in balancing market share and profitability, bring it in discussion and finding the best achievable solutions. The best example in this context is when an official from the U. S division described about competitive price cuts and warn him about the sales and profits which could be affected if he couldn’t give discounts for the rental car companies that buy in volume. He participates in discussion and suggested alternate solution by selling to businesses that buy in volume which contribute to higher profit opportunities. â€Å"Maybe we lose in terms of total volume,† but that’s acceptable because â€Å"it’s all about return† this quote explain to us of his participation and his way of acted as equal member in finding solutions.

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Impact of the Expansion of Islam in North and West Africa essays

The Impact of the Expansion of Islam in North and West Africa essays The Islamization of Africa started around the seventh century with the military conquests in Egypt led by Arabic armies and spread over the western part of the continent during the next five hundred years, reaching Morocco. Islam brought major changes at all levels of society in North and West Africa, at first, and to the the rest of the continent along the centuries, till today. Christian Egypt was the first country that knew islamization, after the death of Mohammad, around 639 C E, through the Arab armies and also through the Arab merchants that brought along scholars. These were wise men that taught the newly conquered people the Arab language and also gave advice to their leaders. They needed guidance in economic and political related matters and the Arabs came with their knowledge and organization due to the new faith that also established new rules and forms of governing. The faith of Islam was successful in conquering the people in Egypt and further, during the next five centuries, in Maghreb because it was not just a new religion intended to replace these populations beliefs but it came with new sets of rules and political knowledge. The followers of Mohammed were united by a faith that sought justice and unity for its faithful and it appealed to the people of North and West Africa by the way it applied to everyday life and its practicality. Some authors think that the fact that it permitted men to have more than a wife, unlike the Christian religion, might also have been considered more appealing to the nomadic tribes in the Western parts of Africa. The Arabs had the advantage of not merely imposing their own new religion to the newly conquered territories, but also of bringing with them a set of rules and a system that helped them teach through their scholars and clerics the rules that guided their own home society and proved successful in organizing them and bringing them together. Mohammed was aware ...

Wednesday, November 6, 2019

Firewalls essays

Firewalls essays Everyday millions of people around the world use the Internet for corporate use, research, and personal uses. If each person uses one computer to access the Net at any one time, that is trillions of bytes of data. People are in danger of being infected or hacked easily by brilliant hackers. What can a person do? The solution is to protect your computer using firewalls. Basically, a firewall is a barrier to keep destructive forces away from your computer. A firewall is simply a program or hardware device that filters the information coming through the Internet connection. If incoming information is unusual by the filters, it is not allowed through. Firewalls use one or more methods to control traffic flowing in and out of the network: - Packet Filtering: Packets (small bits of data) are analyzed through a set of filters and then let through into the computer or to be discarded later - Proxy Service Information sent from the Internet is retrieved by the firewall and then sent to the requesting system and vice versa - Stateful Inspection The firewall examines certain key parts of information that is suitable to allow into the computer. There are two levels of network policy that directly influence the design, installation and use of a firewall system. The higher-level policy is an issue-specific, network access policy that defines those services that will be allowed or denied from the restricted network. The other network policy is the lower-level policy describes how the firewall will actually go about restricting access and filtering the services that were defined in the higher-level policy. Firewalls often implement service access policies that allow some user access from the Internet to selected internal hosts, but this access would be granted only if necessary and only if it could be combined with advanced authentication. ...

Monday, November 4, 2019

Periodontal disease and community health Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Periodontal disease and community health - Essay Example Non surgical diagnosis and treatment involve scaling to remove the accumulated tartar, root planning to smooth the loosened gum tissues for preventing further tartar accumulation and probing the pocket depths to thoroughly clean the bacterial colonies in the sub-gingival layer, that is, the gaps between the root and the gum tissues. This review attempts to provide a critical analysis of the paper presented by Daniel van Steenberghe, Peter Garmyn, Lut Geers, Elke Hendrickx, Marina Marechal, Karin Huizar, Ann Kristofferson, Karin Meyer-Rosberg, and Guy Vandenhoven on the basis of a multi-centered investigation in order to understand the extent of pain in fixed numbers of both first timers and recall patients during instrument based diagnosis and routine non-surgical treatment of the condition. The importance of the investigation not only lies in the common occurrence of the disease affecting a major part of the adult population in the United States of America, but also in its two-fold risk, including an imminent damage of the oral area and its association with much more severe physiologic conditions, like cardiac arrest, stroke, atherosclerosis and increased blood glucose levels. (Journal of American Dental Association, 2000) The study analyzed the findings obtained from a survey carried out on the experiences in volving pain and discomfort of two different groups of patients during diagnosis and treatment with non-surgical periodontal instrumentation. The principal objective of the analysis was to run a trial test for establishing the hypothesis indicating the existence of discomfort during periodontal diagnosis based on observations from earlier rudimentary investigations. Another important aim of the study was to compare and contrast the discomforting experience for patients under instrumentation for diagnosis both in hospital environment and in clinics during private practice. The secondary objective of the investigation was to standardize and corroborate a set of earlier formulated survey questionnaires for assessing the past experience of patients with previous diagnostic sessions of scaling and pocket depth probing by periodontists that can be used for future assays on patient responses after administration of topical anesthetics during treatment. A nested case controlled analysis was performed with the two groups of individuals, one composed of first timers for non-surgical treatment and diagnosis and the other being the recall patients who had earlier undergone primary SRP (Scaling and Root Planning) and probes for PD (Pocket Depth). The first timers who constituted the primary study group formed the basis of the investigation and were subjected to either PD or SRP or both. They were compared with recall patients constituting the comparison group, who were subjected to cohorts being exposed to either PD or SRP, thereby together constituting the control group. The best part of this longitudinal study population was the formation of the nested control group to minimize the recall bias, which is the misleading influence due to the memory of past treatments on the experiences of the individuals from the recall group. The longitudinal analysis was performed with both the respondents and the non respondents in the study and the

Friday, November 1, 2019

Sustainable Aviation Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Sustainable Aviation - Essay Example The fuel used for the aircrafts like kerosene and others are often complained of emitting harmful gases like Nitrogen Dioxide into the atmosphere thus leading to an increase of air pollution in and around the regions surrounding the airports. It was however found that reduction of the combustion capacity of the engines led to the increased emission of Greenhouse gases like Carbon Dioxide into the air. Scientists and environmentalists around the world are endeavouring to find means for deriving a sustainable fuel source for the aircraft engines which in turn would reduce the atmospheric pollution (Azapagic and Perdan, 2011, Ch. 15). However it is often held that the endeavour to produce a sustainable fuel for the aeroplanes is not feasible in the technical and ethical sense. It is observed that most of the efforts conducted to produce a sustainable fuel often does not confirm the carbon footprint test and also happens to render increased stress on the engines thus hampering its produc tivity (Daggett et al., 2007, p.1). Hence the above efforts to produce a sustainable aircraft fuel suffer from lack of technical and ethical feasibility. Sustainable Fuel for Aircraft Engines The term sustainability refers to protecting or sustaining the environment in order to meet the needs of the present population without compromising on the needs of the future generation. Sustainability thus concerns a holistic network of environmental, social and economic policies aimed at sustaining the scarce resources. These policies must be measureable and again must also be lend for evaluation to help it met the demand of different periods (Wohlmeyer and Quendler, 2002, p.198). 198). Aviation fuel has long depended on products like kerosene to help ignite the motor engines. However the practice is found to have contributed largely to the polluting of the atmosphere through the emission of large volumes of nitrogen dioxide. Thus to reduce the content of greenhouses gases and other harmful gases into the atmosphere the need for a sustainable fuel resource is greatly emphasized. Research unto generating a feasible sustainable fuel for the aeroplanes is under process with introduction of fuels generated from biomass or fuelling of liquid hydrogen into the air engines. The research of generating a sustainable fuel source for aircraft engines is gaining patronage from many nations owing to its help in protection of fossil resources and the atmosphere from being polluted (Evans, 2007, p.162). Sustainable fuel generation for aircraft engines appears to be the new challenge for it signifies taking resort to alternative sources of fuel other than that related to diesel, petrol and kerosene. Production of alternative sources of fuel can be conducted through the use of biomasses derived from large amounts of bio waste products and algae masses. Again use of liquid hydrogen and other cryogenic materials like use of ethane and methane gases in the liquid state is also being recommended for the fuel generation of aircraft engines. Thus the use of considerable amount of biomass and cryogenic liquids for the production of aircraft engine fuel is considered a sustainable means for generation of aircraft fuel. Use of such energy resources are observed to help in reducing the combustion temperature of the engines which in turn led to the production of low or no amounts of carbon dioxide. Further research is enabled to derive natural gases from both natural bio mass and other synthetic sources with also enhancing the dependence on gases like Ethane derived from natural gases for production of sustainable fuel for aircraft engines (Daggett et al., 2007 , p.1). Technical and Ethical Feasibility of Efforts in Production of Sustainable Aviation Fuel The current

Wednesday, October 30, 2019

DQ1 Problem Response, and conclusion, DQ Payouts to Shareholder w9DB Essay

DQ1 Problem Response, and conclusion, DQ Payouts to Shareholder w9DB - Essay Example In a situation where the managers know that the correct value of their shares is $14.50, the best thing they should do to raise $500 million is by borrowing the money. This is because the investors will know that the price of the share is underpriced and will not be willing to buy equity. This can be explained as follows: We know the cost of borrowing is $ 0.20 per share and if the firm sells 37 million shares at a discount of $1 per share ($14.50 - $13.50), they will have to bear the cost of $37 million or, $0.27 per share (Putra, 2008). Therefore it will be advisable to issue debt in such a scenario. According to my personal opinion, if the firm has no distress costs and only tax benefits, it will issue equity only if it is overpriced. However the investors will try to buy the shares of the firm at the lowest possible price since they know that the equity is overpriced. This will result in declining the market price of the equity and the firm will not benefit at all. So it would be better for IST to issue debt in such a scenario as it will only enhance its market price. Putra. (2008, September 12). How are Earning Per Share (EPS) calculated? In Accounting Financial and Tax. Retrieved from http://accounting-financial-tax.com/2008/09/how-are- earning-per-share-eps-computed/ Repurchase Tender offers – This approach is generally used in large equity purchases. In this approach, a firm fixes the specific price at which it wants to purchase back the shares, the number of shares it wants to buy back and the time period for the offer. It further invites the stockholders who are willing to surrender their shares for repurchase by the firm (Putra, 2009). Open Market Purchases – This approach is primarily used for smaller repurchases. In this method, the firm has the liberty to decide the number of share it wants to buy back and also the time of repurchase. In this approach, the firm buys back the shares from the market itself but at the

Monday, October 28, 2019

Examining Government Regulations Essay Example for Free

Examining Government Regulations Essay To briefly describe the current government regulations or standards I researched about kid’s having a single parent that does not get the additional cash assistants that they need to help support their family would be if a kid happens to be born in a family that happens to get additional cash assistants they are normally turned down to get any more. In the state of Ohio the percentage of kid’s with a single parent is at 31% witch is the highest it has ever been. A list of Agencies that will help a single parent with rent and other things that will help them raise their kid’s. â€Å"1. Local Non Profit Agencies Every county has designated agencies that are established to help individuals in times of distress. Local non-profit agencies are equipped to assist single mothers with rent, utility bills, daycare assistance, food, clothing and other necessities. Because they will base the amount of your grant off of your assets and other personal criteria, you will be required to meet with a caseworker who will discuss their program and input your information, including your earned income, proof of residence, past due bills and dependent information. Local non-profit agencies include: Department of Human Services, Department of Social Service Provides WIC, food stamps, daycare assistance and health care assistance such as Medicaid and Medicare, Transportation Assistance, Soup Kitchen, Rent assistance, Free or reduced meals for school-aged children. 2. Local Food Bank. Food banks are commonly found in all areas across the nation and can be accessed by anyone in their time of need. Donations come from grocery stores, wholesalers, restaurant owners and individuals. Once the food is brought in, volunteers sort and pack food kits for families in need. Single mothers can apply with their local food bank to receive assistance with obtaining food. In many cases, single mothers who make too much money to receive additional state or federal benefits are able to receive food donations from food banks. 3. Community Churches and Religious Organizations. Some community churches and temples have organized programs to help single mothers and individuals with low incomes. While the requirements may not be as stringent as local organizations, some churches may still want applicants to show documentation to receive assistance. Local churches often have programs in place to help women with shelter, rent payments, utility payments, clothing needs and food attainment. In addition to local food banks, many churches also have food pantries for members of the community that are in need. 4. Federal Assistance Organizations. When you have exhausted your options on a local level, or simply require further help, there are a variety of federal programs designated to help low-income families and single mothers. Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) A federal assistance program that provides temporary cash assistance and food stamps to single mothers and low-income individuals, showing a need. Low Income Housing Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) A federal assistance program that provides assistance with energy-related costs, including paying utility bills, weatherization procedures and/or energy-related home repairs. 5. Grants for Single Mothers There are a variety of grants available to single mothers who are the primary head of household. Some grants have been established for single mothers furthering their education and others are available to all single mothers meeting necessary criteria. While loans must be paid back, grants do not need to be repaid. Institutional grants, The Womens Opportunity Awards, Sunshine Lady Foundation.† There are only a few obstacles that would prevent me from meeting the needs of my target population and those would be the lack of funding the state provides as well as the huge number of people who need the help. Every year more and more people need help with and the funding as well keep’s going down more and more every year as well. Some of the things that need to be considered for change to the social policy that may be necessary in order for my issue to be resolved or for my target population to have its needs satisfied would be for that state to come up with another way to make funding to help those who need the help. Another way would be for that to hold a fun raiser to donate the money to the groups that help those in need.

Saturday, October 26, 2019

Our Church Choir :: Personal Narrative Essays

Our Church Choir Last year our church choir was preparing for its twenty-seventh spring concert, and I was in charge. No, I was not president of the church choir, I was the "musician's representative!" I had not an inkling what that meant, but, sure enough, my ignorance would not linger. I was to be in charge of organizing all things musical, from equipment to musicians. The musicians seemed almost ready. The choir still had three songs to learn, but with rehearsals every night and impromptu performances in the dining halls, on the shuttle buses I felt generally confident. As a rule, when you are putting on a performance and feel "generally confident" one week before show time, begin panicking. The first disaster struck close to home: our drummer's grandmother passed away. Apart from the tremendous blow this tragedy dealt both him and the choir, we needed to find another drummer. Then, like an ominous slinky, the rest of my carefully laid plans fell one on top of the other. Our directors took ill. The music was taking too long to teach. Our pianist, gone. Our strongest soprano's voice, history. And I broke a bass string. I could do nothing but laugh . . . and cry. I managed to do that quite a bit. But just when Murphy's Law seemed martially imposed, things got miraculous. The night before the concert, an old church choir drummer stopped by to learn all two hours of the music. The choir learned the rest of the music that same evening and, when we finished, the room glowed with harmony. We were rough, but overall, the evening returned my general sense of confidence. (See above rule.) When I arrived the next evening, a troubling sight greeted me: a cart with none of the sound equipment I had ordered. We had no microphones. We had no speakers. I had already lost my wits by this point, and now I was inches from losing hope. A group assembled to see what could be salvaged from the situation and was mildly successful. But with all these distractions, the choir could not possibly be . . . Brilliant! The choir was brilliant. I have never been part of such a beautiful musical experience. But what is the point of this story? This story explains how our church choir operates: by grace of God and family.