Demand in Life

Life is not just about being happy and being able to enjoy what we love to do. We all have a lot of things that we need to get done, but many of us have absolutely nothing to do with what is truly important in our lives with so many demands on our time. For this reason, it is easy to feel like we are losing control in our life. Time itself will not going to slow down and demands on our time will not go away too. If we want the situation to be change, it is going to be up to us to change it. Time management is the best tool that we can use that can will help us to accomplish our demands in life. There is only one life to be able to spend my lives in my own way. So, I am setting my priorities to achieve my demands in life. Whatever I do in my life is essential to make my life easier. It is important that I can manage to face the challenges that come in my way that will take a huge amount of my time such as hobbies, job and family. Generally, many of us let go some of our interest and hobbies to meet our demands in life. My hobbies help me release my stress. I know that stress can destroy me and it can also drain my mental and physical energy. In my case, I am rather being with my son’s baseball practice and games instead of going to the gym and work out. I don’t want to miss any important event in his life. I want to be there to support and cheer him up. Likewise, I also gave up my hobby as a dance choreographer to be able to spend quality time with my family especially weekend. Furthermore, my job takes lots of my time because I need to make my handmade creations and sell it online. Each and every one of us has different aspect in life. I make decision based on the situation that demands my priorities. Therefore, I know that demand in life will takes lots of time to reach my goals. For instance, working at home as an entrepreneur risks my time, but I need to work to support my school and family expenses. Even though the risk is high but I still successfully establish my own business that gives me the opportunity to have full control over it. Finally, how do I fit roles such as a mother, a wife and a friend into my hectic schedule? Since, time is precious for me and there’s one life to live, keeping a balance between my career and family can be challenge. As a mother, a wife, a student and a businesswoman takes up a huge amount of time from doing my school obligation. Family demands more attention and devotion because they are my priority. I believe that being a mother is the most expensive job in the world. In these instances, support from my family has to be there and understanding. Additionally, when my son is involved, I need to adjust my lives so I can have time to spend quality time with him. As a mother and a wife, it is my responsibility to make sure that they have delicious and healthy meal on the table, clean clothes to wear and most of all a happy, clean and relaxing home to stay. Therefore, the biggest challenge that I am facing is how to balance the demands of my hobbies, job and family. I have to make sacrifice in order to achieve my aspirations. In addition, doing the thing I love will have the opportunity to explore new challenges. It also helps me grow as individuals and learn new things about myself. I believe that my life is a gift and I want to treasure every moment of it to live my life to the fullest.

Why Fast Food is Unhealthy

In todays age of convenience, fast food needs no introduction. Everyone from a two year old to a sixty year old seems to be enjoying it. Why not? It's delicious, it's filling, it's affordable, and available Just any time of the day. What more can you ask for when you are living life in the fast lane? Well fast food all good tastes, except that it is not nutritionally balanced and, therefore, unhealthy in the long run if consumed on a regular basis.Even though some people say that eating fast food is healthy because hey get certain types of fast food like salads or chicken, it not the real stuff. They make it seem like it is but its not. They also choose fast foods because it is inexpensive than most other food choices. Fast foods contain lots of calories, sugar, sodium and unhealthy fats substances that increase your risk of obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease. Increased health risks are directly associated with increased consumption of fast foods.Yet, as prices for fast foods increase the consumption and health risks decrease. Eating healthier foods may reduce your health risks and your costs. (Roizman) On the McDonalds website if you get 1 Big Mac, 1 Double Cheeseburger, 1 Large Fries, and 1 Large Coke you would get 1,770 Calories, 77 grams of fat, 1,430 milligrams of sodium, and 219 grams of Carbs for all about $9 which is not healthy if consumed on the daily basis. (McDonalds) In the short reading by Eric Schlosser Why the Fries Taste Good Fast food increases your weight.Body Mass Index(BMl) is an indicator of body fat that is measured according to your weight and height. The higher your BMI, the higher your risk of obesity and chronic diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, gallstones and cancer. Research by the Department of Economics and Institute for Health Research and Policy in 2009 found the price of fast food is statistically associated with BMI of teenagers, particularly among fami lies in low to middle socioeconomic status. The low cost of fast food influenced weight gain, the report showed.Consuming fast food may increase your risk of type 2 diabetes. Scientists estimate the popularity of type 2 diabetes will increase 300 percent in the United States in the next 40 years, from 10 percent to 33 percent of the population. Research by scientists at the Department of Nutrition at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill in 2010 discovered that increasing the price of fast food items by $1, reduced the amount of calorie intake from these foods, decreased weight gain and lowered insulin resistance, risk factors for obesity and type 2 diabetes.The research suggests the US government should consider policies aimed t altering the price of fast foods to steer Americans toward eating healthier foods and reducing the risks of chronic diseases. The total annual health care cost to treat diabetes is estimated at $174 billion. Fast food restaurants use processed foods with high amounts of sodium to flavor your meals. Sodium is a risk factor for high blood pressure and stroke, the third leading cause of death in the United States. Scientists at the University of Michigan predict that the treatment of strokes will cost the UnitedStates $2 2 trillion by 2050 unless Americans change their eating habits and maintain normal blood pressure. Fast food restaurants predominantly serve meals in big portion sizes with higher amounts of calories than you need and contain additive ingredients such as preservatives, flavorings, sweeteners, sodium and colors. Many restaurants are increasing the costs for fast foods with prices as high as $10 per person and over $30 or $40 for a family of four in some locations. Purchasing healthy food ingredients and preparing meals at home can save you money.

The correlation between organisational culture and security Essay

The correlation between organisational culture and security - Essay Example The extent to which organisational culture determines nature and perceptions of the security environment is both of practical relevance and theoretical interest. A highly typical scenario exists when choices about security have to be made by the management as an opportunity cost principle (Fennelly, 2003, p.364). The primacy and immediacy of such choices lie in the fleeting background of real and perceived threat perceptions by the organisation. Thus organisational culture converges on the logical premise that hidden threats to its own existence could be physical and real or/and perceived and unreal. The extent to which these conceptualisations will determine the response of the organisation depends on the organisational culture. When organisational culture is based on "a set of shared values and beliefs among a community or people", then perceptions about security and threats become more formidable because such perceptions acquire a larger dimension in the organisational context, including a costs versus benefits evaluation (MacCrie, 2007, p.230). Above all organisational culture is a theoretical construct with implications for the security of the organisation beyond the definable limits.Organisational culture presupposes a pattern of behavioural tendencies on the part of both internal and external stakeholders (Driskill and Brenton, 2005, p.12). Mutually beneficial behaviours and a system of corresponding rights and obligations presume that the organisation progresses through a complex network of sub-cultures that seamlessly integrate into a value-centric system. Internal and external relationships that exist at each level and layer, are presumably influenced by the quality and quantum of communications. This in turn has an impact on the organisation's security perceptions. An analogous situation exists in group relations where groups of individuals bound by their own internal rules, rights and obligations will still seek to establish contacts with others. At the individual organisational level this behaviour is subject to a renewed concern for security and an ever increasing awareness of threats. As Schein puts it, "Culture is an abstraction, yet the forces that are created in social and organisational situations that derive from culture are powerful" (Schein, 2004, p.3). Mullins, on the other hand, states that an organisation pursues its goals based on an underlying ideology or philosophy, based on beliefs, values and attitudes. Within the organisation, culture is a pervasive influence over people's behaviour and actions, and reflects in the performance of work - what is not acceptable and what behaviours and actions are encouraged and discouraged. It can also include traditions, values, beliefs and attitudes (Mullins, 2007, p.531). Mullins places emphasis on the objectivity of culture influence and also attributes some ideological characteristics to it. Finally organisational goals,

Placement report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Placement report - Essay Example Chalayan’s vision in his design work is to tell stories through his creations, providing a narrative within the framework of each piece. Most of his art design connects closely to the human body in some manner and there is a subtle undercurrent of sexuality, along with occasional fetishes relating to power, domination, and restraint (Burley, 2013). As in his graduate collection, Chalayan likes to design with clothes that can tell or imply some type of story, where the clothes appear to have gone through an event or action. His choice of materials, wood, metal, mirrors, were also distinctive and it has been part of his goal to always find new ways of saying something different and unique (Violette, 2011). Indeed, his most iconic show may be that of SS07, in which he presented a line of morphing animatronic dresses, which changed into another era of style during the modelling walkway process. One dress started out as a sculptured Victorian-styled dress that morphed into a 1920s flapper dress by using hidden mechanisms. The last dress on the walkway, actually disappeared, leaving the model as totally nude (Burley, 2013). â€Å"Boredom is a big thing for me. As a child, I remember being worried that I’d be bored in Cyprus (home), which is an isolated island, so I had to really create my own world to keep myself going. I think probably a lot of my worldview stems from the fact that boredom is a big thing.† (Burley, 2013). In another fashion show that Chalayan created, the focus was on wooden furniture in a living room. The models walked around the furniture and removed fabric covers off each piece, put them on, and wore them as dresses. The last piece left was a wooden table. A model walked over, removed the centre piece, then stepped into the opening and pulled the piece up to her waist. It became the layered wooden skirt, seen in figure 1 above

Data analysis Speech or Presentation Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

Data analysis - Speech or Presentation Example Teachers report using many of the reform strands almost every day or several times a week. The reforms most used (by at least 70% of the teachers) were constructivism, learning styles, thematic approach, alternative assessment, equity, STS, technology, and science subject matter. Alternative assessment (90%), equity (88%), and technology (83%) were the most used reform strands the teachers reporting using it â€Å"almost every day† or â€Å"several times a week†. Classroom management stood out among the reform strands least implemented in the classroom. Only 45% of teachers reported using classroom management almost every day or several times a week. Less frequently used reform strands (used once a week, less than once a week, or never) by over 30% of teachers include classroom management (55%), cooperative learning (42%), hands-on/minds-on activities (37%), and nature of science (30%). Considering all items measuring the necessity of the reforms to be an effective science teacher are equal, a new variable â€Å"belief† was formed. Similarly, a new variable â€Å"implementation† was formed by adding all items in implementation of the reform in teacher

Should Animals Be Used In Warfare Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Should Animals Be Used In Warfare - Term Paper Example This paper makes a conclusion that the use of animals for warfare is normally a contentious issue. Proponents of the debate argue that the use of animals for warfare helps to save human lives. They state that human lives are more important than animal lives. Hanson in his defense for the use of animals used the clichà © ‘save people, not pets’ to show the significance of animals in warfare. Due to their well-developed sensory and respiratory systems, animals perform various functions. Some of the common roles or duties performed by animals include the detection of bombs or landmines, and sniffing out the enemy. On the contrary, opponents of the debate cite the concept of animal cruelty as the main reason why they oppose the move. Since there are no laws that protect animals used for war, they are often mistreated. For instance, the American army starves dolphins by tying their mouths. This prevents them from eating food or other fishes. Also, dogs are left behind by tro ops or killed after a war ends because they pose a danger to civilians. In conclusion, animals should be used for warfare because they help save the lives of soldiers and people. When compared to animal lives, human lives are more precious. Furthermore, animals such as dogs have been used for rescue missions to locate lost soldiers or pilots. The use of animals for war fare is contained in the national security exclusions. This gives the military the power to use the animals in any way they like.

Product Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Product - Article Example It is important to know why prices of petroleum products make a random up and down movement in price line. Being a product of global petroleum market, its supply chain participants’ list is complex. Although its supply is not short but demand of gasoline is likely to grow. To fulfill the demand side, its production and imports needs to be increased if the public is to be served with a constant price line. Petroleum companies’ lenient attitude in strengthening the supply line creates temporary shortage of gasoline; it affects the price. Market for petroleum goods reacts to the dynamics of supply/demand. Any supply imbalance created takes some time, so the price of gasoline gets increased for some time only; as soon as supply is replenished, balance in demand and supply pulls down the hike in price. Market mechanism works to provide the speedy and the most effective answer to the supply disturbances (National Petroleum Council, 2004). In the U.S. gasoline prices have seen wider fluctuations. People have spent millions of dollars extra on gasoline during 2004 and 2005. Some areas have been affected sharply than others. In the spring of 2005, gasoline national weekly average prices at the gas stations after including taxes increased $2.28 per gallon. This hike in gasoline prices was steep but temporary and was felt throughout the U.S. It is also observed that sometimes gasoline prices in some particular areas are higher than rest of the market. According to the Federal Trade Commission Report (2005), since the mid nineties, the West Coast consumers, especially the Californians have paid more dollars for gasoline than rest of the U.S. states. Other than the dynamics of demand and supply, federal, state, and local regulations also affect the price of gasoline. Policy makers need to analyze to select the right strategies to counter the hike in gasoline prices. Price hike in gasoline is closely associated with antitrust issues, as analyzed by the

The Causes of the Development of Antimicrobial Resistance Essay

The Causes of the Development of Antimicrobial Resistance - Essay Example The former class includes antibiotics like the ÃŽ ² lactams (penicillin, penicillin derived antibiotics, carbapenems, cephalosporins, vancomycin) and most aminoglycosides especially against Gram-negative organisms but not against Gram-positive and anaerobic micro-organisms. The other class of antibiotics, the microbiostatic, include antibiotics that prevent the micro-organisms from multiplying by interfering with their protein production, DNA replication, and other metabolic pathways. Tetracycline, sulphonamides, trimethoprim and most microbicidal antibiotics at low concentration are few examples of the microbistatic group. The first antibiotic to be discovered was penicillin derived from the Penicillium mold. It was discovered by Alexander Fleming in 1928. Later on, the development of synthetic penicillin broadened the spectrum of activity and at the same time enhanced the efficacy of these drugs. However, with the emergence of resistant bacterial strains, the usefulness of penicillins have been limited in the recent years. Methicillin is a narrow spectrum ÃŽ ² lactam antibiotic which was developed in 1959 by Beechman in order to treat penicillin-resistant Gram-positive organisms like Staphylococcus aureus.  In the 1960s and 1970s, it proved so efficient against Staphylococcus aureus that it was extensively used and even sprayed in the wards of hospitals to control Staphylococcal infection in newborn. ( Elek SD, Fleming PC. A new technique for the control of hospital cross infection. Lancet 1960;ii:569–72). Methicillin-resistant isolates though present were not notably troublesome because of the emergence and prevalence of microbial resistance especially MRSA( methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) in hospitals. The major antibiotic-resistant pathogen associated with nosocomial infection.

Current School Finance Issues Paper [w5d7-i] Essay

Current School Finance Issues Paper [w5d7-i] - Essay Example If the State acknowledges the bid, then a private school can start receiving funds for their transport costs. Bidding renewals are to be done annually. However, to every rule, there is an exception. If a school happens to have vehicles owned by their District, then there is no need to renew their bid. Additionally, some schools may have opted to enter into a joint agreement with another. This implies that one school may apply on behalf of another. Similarly, some schools may be part of a coordinated transportation agency as asserted by Say student (2008). The Board of education is also given the mandate to reject applications for transport financing in the event that applications are made poorly. On the other hand, there is a maximum student number that can be covered by and district board. This implies that when the optimum number has been reached then all other applications will be rejected. Additionally, in the event that a private school is applying for transport funding yet it only deals with special children, then the board of education is mandated to reject their application. Similarly, if a school provides only vocational training or it provides only technical skills, then they are not eligible for state funding. When student's residential areas are over twenty miles away from the school, then they may not necessarily get access to State funds. Federal States also require that children meet certain age criterion in order to enroll for the program. For instance, in the State of New Jersey, children who are between kindergartens and age twelve are eligible for transportation services provided by the District in elementary schools. It should be noted that it is not mandatory for private schools to receive funding from their respective District school boards. But they have the option of utilizing other options available for them. For instances, it is not mandatory for a private school to receive funding in the event that their residents are located beyond two and a half miles and two miles for high schools and elementary schools respectively. There are also cases in which a school is located out of State but may wish to get funding from a school district Board. This is only permissible in the event that the school is located in a county with a third class rating. Additionally, funding may also be granted to those individuals who are found in counties that have a population greater than eighty thousand. However, this population may not exceed one hundred and twenty thousand people as put forward by the Toronto Catholic District School Board (2007). . Some private schools may be not for profit organizations. Such schools are also not mandated to receive transport funding, but may gain access given the fact that most of them are have tax exemption status. However not for profit institutions are usually required to display solid evidence bout their status. This is done by bringing an affidavit that will act as a form of evidence. There area also cases in which some schools have met all other criteria enlisted above but happen to be located twenty miles away from their schools. The legislature normally examines such schools on an annul basis. Once they find that these people meet the right criterion then they may

Impact of technology on patient care Research Paper - 1

Impact of technology on patient care - Research Paper Example Also, most cooking can be done in a matter of minutes with microwave technology. Our means of transportation has improved over time; cars now run on solar and even electric energy. Likewise, one could not discount the innovation in mobile technology. Now, people could not only call and receive messages from another person at the same time; but also see the person one is conversing with despite expansive geographical distance. Recently, a CNN report about the improvement in Twitter revealed that individuals chat with followers while viewing real time activities and instantly commenting on the account page. As such, advancement in technology has impacted most aspects of life; not leaving behind the area of health and patient care. Among the most noted technological advancement in this field include the application of the electronic health record, telemedicine, wireless communication, sensors and wearable technology, portal technology, mHealth, as well as other advanced medical tools, d rugs, and equipment (Jayanthi, 2014). As a result, the delivery of patient care has been noted to be more efficient as interventions are tailored to the unique health needs of culturally diverse clientele. In this regard, the current discourse hereby aims to present the impact of technology on patient care. The paper would initially provide a review of previous studies made on the subject; specifically how technology relates to patient care, how technological advancement impacted patient care, as well as the areas of patient care impacted.

Construction of a runway Essay Example for Free

Construction of a runway Essay A runway is a defined as a paved or clear land or strip prepared for landing and take-off of a plane. Majority of the runways are built but some are natural surfaces. Reckless construction can lead to a number of losses, putting human lives at stake and even damage of property. The construction of a runway is important and steps and procedures should be followed to ensure successful construction. Some of the important steps include; the length of a runway and the marking and lightings. The length of a runway is manly affected by the types of plane that use the runway and the altitude. Larger aircrafts such as passenger planes require longer runways and smaller ones such as private jets can be accommodated by shorter runways. At a higher altitude these runways are designed to be longer due to the reduced density of air which decreases the engine power. If it’s a fully operational and international airport it would require a longer runway that would accommodate the number of planes that would be constantly streaming in and out. CITATION Jef l 1033 (Jeffrey Price) The markings and lightings of a runway are important since they enable operations at night or when there’s low visibility. The lighting systems such as strobe bars or light bars are installed at the far end of the runway or synchronized flashing lights installed at each side of the runway path. These would aid the pilot in landing and help him not to sway from the main landing path. CITATION Je f l 1033 (Jeffrey Price) After full consideration and implementation of some of these procedures, one can be able to successfully construct a functional, efficient and manageable runway Reference 1033 Jeffrey Price, Jeffrey Forrest. Practical Aviation Security: Predicting and Preventing Future Threats. n.d. www.bomag.com//construction-equipment-dictionary-airport-construct Source document

Top Glove Business Case Study: Manufacturing Processes

Top Glove Business Case Study: Manufacturing Processes Introduction: Top Glove (TG) is the largest rubber glove manufacturer in the world and it started to operate in Malaysia since 1991. Initially, there is only one factory in 1991 with three production lines, but the company has expanded and grown dramatically to become the worlds largest rubber glove manufacturer where is it today with the following position: The Worlds Largest Rubber Glove Manufacturer Top Glove is a listed company in year 2001 in Bursa Saham Kuala Lumpur, and on a short span of slightly more than a year Top Glove Corporation Berhad listing has promoted successfully from the second Board to the Main Market of the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange on May 16, 2002. The company now has a shareholder fund of RM846 million or USD247 million with an annual turnover of about RM1.53 billion or USD447 billion as at 31 August 2009. It is also one of the component stocks of the FTSE Bursa Malaysia (FBM) Mid 70 index, FBM Top 100 index and FBM Emas Index. Philosophy The Business Philosophies of Top Gloves are they work for their Customers; Their take care of the interest of their Shareholders; They ensure that their Employees continue to contribute positively to the company and their take good care of the welfare of their employees and lastly, they work closely with their Bankers, Suppliers, Business Associates, and Government Authorities and Friends. The corporate Mission of Top Glove is to be a World Class Glove Manufacturer Providing Top Quality Products with Excellent Services through Continuous Improvement and Innovation. While the Slogan We strive to be the worlds Leading Manufacturer with Excellent Quality Glove Products and Services That Enrich and Protect Human Lives is the guide for Top Glove Moving toward their Vision. Top Gloves Business Directions is to Approach to produce consistently high quality gloves with efficient low cost and to earn two healthy dollars by spend one efficient dollar. In Top Glove Quality Policy, The way they doing business is emphasis on Quality and Productivity, with the duties to Continuously Improvement and Innovation, and the target towards Zero Defective in their production. Top Glove Corporate emphasis the value of increasing Global Customer Satisfaction, as they are doing the thing right at the first time and on every time; with Integrity and Total Commitment to their corporate, customers, and the community around the worlds. Besides that, Top Glove desired to produces the products that are Excellence in Quality and Competitiveness nevertheless, without ignoring the environment and keeps doing their corporate social responsibility. Addition, Honesty, Integrity and Transparency are Top Glove business Ethics. Lastly from the words by Top Glove Chairman-Tan Sri Dato Sri Lim Wee Chai: Our business rules are, We do not lose our Shareholders money; do not lose our health; do not lose our temper; and do not lose our customers. Principal activities Top Gloves Principal Activities are base on manufacturing and trading of High Quality Latex made Gloves. In depth, their companys Principal Activities are from producing and selling concentrate latex, manufacturing of gloves, trading of glove, provision of management, Property investment, investment holding and trading of machinery. Addition, the country of incorporation is majority wherein Malaysia and the others are in the Peoples Republic of China, United States of America, Thailand and Singapore. In Top Gloves Annual-report stated in Directors Report. The principal activities of the company are investment holding and the provision of management services. Besides, the principal activities had described in Note 12 to the financial statement. Where, there have been no significant changes in the nature of the principal activities during the financial year. Strategy to compete Customers satisfaction is the focus of Top Glove and it had placed a lot of emphasis in Research and Development to produce a wide and diversified range of high quality and value-added glove products in order to fulfill the expectation of their customers. The company also collaborates closely with the government agencies and Ministries to keep itself abreast of the latest development in rubber research technology. The company also uses state-of-art high technology and efficient automatic glove manufacturing machine to obtain the most products manufacturing yield and to remain as one of the most cost-effective and highest quality producer in the industry. With all these advantages and strategies, the company is able to compete with the competitors and stand out in the industry. Production Processes of Top Glove(TG) Company: One of the successful reasons that TG Company can succeed in their business is because they have a strong and good production process in their latex glove making. They believe that they must have the most modern and advanced glove manufacturing machineries if they wished to be continuing as a world-class cost effective glove manufacturer. They have invested substantially in the machineries that are needed to ensure that they can fully adopt the latest manufacturing techniques for all their production lines. Other than that, they to ensure that they can consistently produce high quality latex gloves are also using a continuous engineering process. Competent and experienced personnel also contribute in smooth production line and consistency in quality of the latex gloves even though they have modern machineries. In addition, an on-line quality control measures have been instituted throughout the manufacturing processes to ensure the highest quality products. The latex is a white, milky liquid that comes from rubber trees, which is either from native or hybrid trees. Mostly, TG gets its latex from buying through the rubber market while the remaining latex is from their own rubber plantation. The latex will be harvested from rubber trees when the trees trunk is swollen and also every day, after the rain has stopped during the rainy season. The latex is a natural product and it will coagulate easily, therefore it needs to be harvests from the rubber trees as soon as possible and then send to TG factory to be manufactured. When the latex is sent to the TG factory, the latex will be manufactured with a standardized method that is set by the company itself. The flow of the production process of latex glove in TG Company is former cleaning, coagulant dipping, drying, latex dipping, leaching, beading, vulcanizing, post leaching, slurry dipping, stripping, tumbling, and quality control. Former Cleaning Before the latex can be process to the coagulant dipping process into hand-shaped, the glove formers need to be cleaned before it can be used to form hand-shaped latex gloves. A quality production of exam gloves includes the environment of latex glove factory is clean. This also means glove formers must be cleaned to ensure there is no dirt or debris anywhere because it will affect the final product to possibly have defects like holes. Firstly, glove former must be dipping into an acid bath and then rinse with clean water. Secondly, an alkaline bath is used by dipping the glove formers in them to neutralize the acid and again rinsed in clean water. Lastly, an important step that is the glove formers are brushed to ensure the surface of the glove formers is consistent and eliminate pinholes on the latex gloves after it form. TG factory have multiple production lines that produce batches of disposable gloves. If there is any dirt or debris on the glove former, it can result in the manufacturer being forced to trash the entire batch of latex gloves. This reason shows the importance of glove formers that must be regularly inspected and cleaned before the molds are dipped into coagulant tanks. Coagulant Dipping After the glove former is cleaned, it will be coated with coagulant (eg. calcium nitrate) and be dipped into the coagulant bath to help the latex mixture adhere to the formers and to help ensure the latex is distributed evenly. The glove formers are dipped into the coagulant tank under TG workers control to extract the protein from the previous glove dipping and this dipping is done once for every production cycle. Drying Drying is one of the stations in production process of latex gloves manufacturing whereby the coagulant converts the liquid latex film into a wet-gel on the glove formers and will eventually travel through a series of ovens to dry the gloves and end the coagulation process. In brief, it is a process of drying the gloves from wet to readymade gloves. Latex Dipping Latex dipping is one of the stations in the production process of latex gloves manufacturing and the tank is filled with compounded latex. A latex layer will be formed on the glove former after it goes through this tank. The thickness of the latex glove is determined at the coagulating and dipping stage. The longer the time the glove former travels in the coagulant tank, the thicker the latex gloves will be formed. TG Company will ensure that the latex gloves that produce is high quality and safe to be use. Leaching This leaching stage can called as the pre-vulcanization leaching. It also known as wet gel leaching. Residual chemicals and proteins on the surface of the gloves are put into the leaching process to be removed after the drying of latex mixture. A longer leaching line can wash out latex proteins more effectively. Besides that, the water must be hot and fresh enough to make the proteins dissolve better. This step is a critical step to minimize the occurrence of latex sensitivity. The water temperature, process duration, and water exchange rate will affect the effectiveness of the process. Good leaching line can result in a good and quality latex glove. Beading Beading is a process whereby up to a dozen chemicals are added to help in next manufacturing process of latex gloves. The chemicals added are antioxidant that prevents deterioration of the rubber molecules in the final product by heat, moisture, and ozone. Chemical accelerators are also added to help control the next vulcanization process. Vulcanization One of the discovery key in manufacturing rubber is the vulcanization process. It is a curing process in the production process of latex gloves whereby the latex particles are modified by adding in accelerator chemicals to it. When all the materials are heated, sulfur atoms are chained with the rubber molecules to form a cross-link that gives strengths and elasticity to the physical properties of the rubber. This process ensures the rubber will not be torn and melt easily. Post Leaching This process is similar to the wet-film leaching previously, but it is a little different whereby it is carried out on the dry/vulcanized latex film. Therefore, it is also known as dry-film leaching. Time and temperature is the most important element to ensure effectiveness in the process of water extractives reduction. Latex gloves may be leached up to 24 hours to ensure its effectiveness. Slurry Dipping This stage is also known as wet even powdering. The slurry tank containing the cornstarch solution can prevent latex gloves from sticking in the tank. The slurry is also referred to as wet powder. The benefit of this powder is acting as preservation of the latex gloves and to assist in the latex gloves donning process. TG Company has followed the international method in the specific stage whereby the latex gloves will go through more ovens for further drying and additional rinsing cycles where the powder will be removed. The process of removing the powder is to avoid latex allergic reaction. Stripping At this stage, the latex gloves are stripping from the glove formers. There are two types of methods, which are manually or automatically stripping the latex gloves from the glove formers. TGs latex examination gloves are stripped by fully automated stripping machine. By using this fully automated stripping machine, TG can increase the quality and safety of the latex gloves they produced. The latex gloves will be sent to the next phase of the latex glove manufacturing process for final drying. Tumbling The tumbling process at latex gloves manufacturing process is to remove excessive powder on the gloves. The latex gloves are putting into the commercial dryers to ensure that the powder is more evenly distributed and excess powder can be removed. Powder-Free Gloves Powder-free gloves stage is a technology to prevent stickiness of gloves by avoiding powder usage completely by going through chlorination or polymer coating process. This is one of the important technology processes in manufacturing latex glove nowadays because most of the glove makers are producing the latex gloves with powder-free. Top Glove produces latex powder and powder-free gloves. Basically, the powder-free latex gloves are transformed from powdered gloves when the powder is removed. Before the latex gloves dried, the powder helps the latex gloves give uniformity as well as to prevent the latex gloves from molding together. The tackiness on the glove surface can be removed by rinsing the latex gloves in water. Then it is placed into a chlorine bath to transform the powdered latex gloves to powder-free latex gloves. The glove is turned inside out and the process is repeated. The powder-free gloves are placed back into the dryers when the bathing process is completed. Quality Control TG carries out its quality control in total quality management system. In total quality management system, the process includes regular testing of raw materials, close monitoring the manufacturing process, continuous improvement on quality control, maintain regular quality control, complying with stringent quality standard, target for zero defects, good instructional labeling, efficient work standardization, continuous improvements in packing and loading, close monitoring of production process, tensile strength machine, innovative auto-stripping system, visual air pump test, water tight test, physical dimension test, protein test and powder test in their manufacturing process of latex gloves. The visual air pump test, water tight test and physical dimension test will be carried out in this quality control stage while the other test will be carry out during each manufacturing process of the latex gloves. The air pump test serves to check for holes and visual defects in gloves while th e watertight test serves to check for pinholes rate on the latex gloves. Each country will have their own acceptable quality level (AQL) in allowing the company to export product to their country. For example, the companies that want export their gloves to United States, a 2.5 AQL in the watertight test or better. The physical dimension test is used to measure the dimension of the gloves whether to know the measurement does meet the inspection level of 4.0 that set in AQL. Packing Packing is the final stage in the manufacturing process of latex gloves. TG packs their latex gloves in flat and efficient layer-by-layer to ease the dispensing of gloves in order to avoid latex gloves difficult to dispense from each gloves later. This type of packing method can reduces waste and makes latex gloves easier to take out from the box. For example, we can dispense tissue from a tissue box easily and the idea is applied to the latex gloves box dispensers. This layered technique is often use by all glove manufacturers. Lastly, when all production processes are completely carried, the latex gloves will be keep in TG warehouse for labeling and then send to their particular customers. In addition, the latex gloves are also being exported to other countries. The production processes of Top Glove are repeated for all the production lines and to ensure the latex gloves that are produced are in high quality and safe for use. Strength of the Production Process: The machine technologies that TG used to make their production processes of latex gloves are result in superior quality and it is safe to use by all consumers. The production process in TG adopts the latest manufacturing techniques by using the modern machineries. Other than that, the production processes in TG helps their company to increase precision and productivity in their latex gloves production. This is due to the advanced and modern technology that applied in the production processes. In addition, the production processes also increase the flexibility in producing latex gloves. The production processes will also increase the process stability during the manufacturing process of latex gloves. It is because the production processes are carried under a systematic production processes. The products will be produced gradually by following specific production processes and to ensure the product is high quality produced. The efficient production processes is able to help TG in saving a lot of production cost. It is because the efficient production processes can ensure that they can produce latex gloves effectively and efficiently. Then, the production processes also helps TG in reducing the number of workers. This is due to most of production processes are fully operated by the machine technology. This helps TG to save cost in the workers. Weaknesses of the Production Process: TG needs to invest heavily in buying the modern machineries and need to hire more experienced personnel in their production process. TG uses modern technology in carrying out their production processes to make latex gloves. The machineries that bought were extremely expensive. Thus, the maintenance of the machineries is expensive and if there had any minor or major accessories spoiled; it will be costly to the company to repair it back. It is because the accessories that are used in the machines are not for common use by other manufacturers within the same field area or other field areas and it is difficult to look for substitutes for that specific accessories. TG always checks and maintains the effectiveness of their machineries to prevent it from being spoiled. In addition, TG also needs to hire more experienced and skilled personnel with higher salary to operate the specific machineries and carry researches. Some machinery needs special skilled and experienced personnel to take charge and TG does not simply hire a worker to operate the manufacturing machineries. The experts for such operations in the latex industry are much fewer in other fields. Thus, TG needs to spend more money to hire those experts that operate their operations. Facility Layout: The layout of a company is very important because it establishes an organizations competitive priorities in regard to capacity, process, flexibility, cost, as well as quality of work life, customer contact, and image. An effective layout can help an organization achieve a strategy that supports differentiation, low cost, or response. The objective of layout strategy is to develop an effective and efficient layout that will meet the firms competitive requirements. Layout design has the following purpose:- Higher utilization of space, equipment, and people Improved flow of information, materials, or people Improved employees morale and safer working conditions Improved customer/ client interaction Flexibility (layout need to be change from time to time) TG is a company that used work cell layout to produce its products. Work cell layout means an arrangement of machines and personnel that focuses on making a single product or family of related products. A work cell reorganizes people and machines that would ordinarily be dispersed in various departments into a group so that they can focus on making a single product or a group of related products. Once the work cell has the appropriate equipment located in proper sequence, the next task will be staff and balance the cell. Normally it involves two steps. First, determine the takt time, which is the pace (frequency) of production units necessary to meet customer orders: Takt time = Total work time available/ Units required Second, determine the number of operators required: Workers required = Total operation time required/ Takt time By doing so, the company can increased equipment and machinery utilization due to better scheduling and faster material flow. Diagram below shows the layout of Top Glove company and the description of the components inside the layout:- http://turnkey.taiwantrade.com.tw/En/DB/layout%284%29.jpg The space of the layout is 80m (length) x 50m (width) x 8m (height) which can be categorize as a big company. Waste water- All the unwanted or wastewater will stored in this area. Latex storage- This is the place to store latex that use to produce latex gloves. It place near to the dipping line and chemical dispensing compounding ball mills because it easy for mixing work which need to combine other raw material and chemical substances with latex to produce the latex gloves. WC- This is the place for workers to refresh themselves. Tools/Maintenance- Places that put or keep the tools and equipments that used to produce the glove and for maintenance purpose. All the tools and equipments will be keeping in a specific place that easy the workers to find it. Chemical storage- All the chemical substances, which are dangerous, will keep here to avoid any accident happen and make sure the workplace is safety. This room is just nearby of the chemical dispensing compounding ball mills to make sure that the compounding work can be carry out smoothly. Dipping line- This is the place where machine is design for examination and surgical latex gloves, which include the process of auto washing, coagulants agents dipping, latex dipping, drying, and beading, fore leaching, vulcanizing, post-leaching, wet powdering, cooling, and stripping. Chemical Dispensing Compounding Ball Mills- The place that carry out the work of compounding or mixing of the raw materials, chemical substances, latex and many other to produce the gloves. Chlorination- A process of producing powder free gloves by treating these gloves with chlorine. It also removes the first layer of protein to an acceptable level. Tumbler Dryer- It is a machine that tries to dry up the gloves after all the compound mixed together. Sterilization- The place that sterilizes the gloves using Gamma irradiation to eliminate all microbial life, including highly resistant bacteria spores. Worker Canteen- Places for workers to have their meals. Plant Officer- This is the office for plant officer who supervise the production work of the company. Q.C Room- All the finished gloves will send to this room for checking before send to customer. The workers will checked the gloves one by one and see whether there are any rejected glove that do not meet the quality standard of the company. Lap Testing- Lap for chemist to test for new formula or compound that can improve the existing glove or testing for new products. This is good for the company to fight with his competitors however; some cost may be incurred for the research and development work. Packaging Area/Material- All the gloves that have go through Q.C checking will send here for packaging before sell to the customers. There are sufficient machine and material prepared for packaging work so that the glove will be pack nicely and keep in a good condition. Show Room- Room to display the products of the company. Customers who interested in the products of the company can take a look on the sample that show in this room. Company Office- Main office of the company where all the admin work of the company will carry out here. Finished Product Storage- The finished products will be stored here and waiting to send to the customers by the trucks. Strength of the Facility Layout: Top Glove used work cell layout as their strategy to produce their products to utilize the capacity of the company, which may bring a lot of advantages to the company. First, it can reduced work-in- process inventory which means there is less inventories or equipments needed to link up the work that is in different process because the work cell is set up to provide one piece flow from machine to machine. Second, less floor space required because less space is needed between machines to accommodate work-in-process inventory. For example, the tumbler dryer is place closely with the process of sterilization that uses to sterilize the gloves bacteria. Thus, it saves a lot of space between these two processes. Next, when the employees work in this kind of layout, it will heightened the sense of employees participation in the organization and the product which will encourage them to add responsibility toward the product quality because they directly associated with the products in their ow n work cell. For example, the employees who work as an operator in dipping line will feel motivated and carry out his work carefully when the manager empowered him to look after the machine or participate in any work that related to the dipping process. Lastly, increased equipment and machinery utilization is also one of the advantages because of better scheduling and faster material flow. When the glove is being chlorinate immediately it will proceed to the process of drying and after this it will go through the process of sterilization immediately as well. The fast material flow show that it utilize the machinery and equipment effectively. Weaknesses of the Facility Layout: However, there are still some weaknesses in this layout, which is the straight-line work cell layout as we can see in the dipping line. The workers in the dipping line are arrange in such way that sometime they will find that it is hard to divided their work evenly and more worker is needed compare to the U-shape work cell layout. This may cause social loafing in the workplace, which means some worker may work less as compare to his colleague. This is not good to happen in the workplace because it will lower down the morale of other worker who works hard but he just gets the same pay as his colleague who is lazy. Next, from the layout of the company, we also notice that there is only one main gate for exist and entry but no other emergency or back door in the layout. This is also a weakness of the company because there is no other emergency door for workers to escape if any accident happens. Goods and Service Design: The other strategic of this company is goods and service design. Top Gloves main productions are rubber gloves, synthetic gloves and surgical gloves. Top glove producing more latex glove as compare others glove, since latex gloves is a better choice of protection. The reasons are the latex is the main material in rubber gloves manufacture where it is the gold standard for durability. Where latex is referring to a milky, usually whitish, fluid obtained from over 1,000 species of trees and plants. It is the most important raw material used for the production of latex gloves, natural rubber latex, which derived from the Hevea Brasiliensis tree species found mainly in South East Asia though they originated from Brazil. It demonstrates superior elasticity, strength and barrier protection. It outperforms vinyl as well as any synthetic rubber in terms of maintaining barrier integrity in routine and high risks procedures. Based on the researches, the latex gloves provide up to 9 times more p rotection during normal use than non-latex gloves. The glove size is determined by measuring the circumference of the hand around the palm area with a tape measure. The usual size standard for examination gloves are of XS XL, while surgical gloves are of 6.5 8.5. The gloves thickness measured by depth protecting skin from exposure to elements. It was measured on a single wall using a micrometer over several parts of the glove, typically at the cuff, the mid-palm and the finger sections. The types of gloves are latex gloves, nitrile gloves, vinyl gloves, medical gloves, surgical gloves, disposable gloves, clean room gloves, household gloves, general-purpose gloves, and polyethylene gloves (PE glove). For example, the nitrile glove is one of the synthetic gloves that are produced from the synthetic latex of Acrylonitrile Butadiene Copolymer type, which is resistance to oil and exhibiting rubber-like characteristics. Its elasticity is good but less superior as compared to natural rub ber. It is generally more costly than natural latex gloves. Strengths of the Goods and Service design: The strengths of using this strategic which is the goods and service design are Top Gloves gloves are protect to lives and the price of it are low compare to other glove brands. When they manufacture the gloves, the gloves will test in the elongation or stretching test, to measure the strengths of the gloves. During extended surgeries, the practice of changing to a new pair of gloves prior to a critical procedure has been noted to reduce bacterial contamination. Weakness of the Goods and Service design: The weaknesses are poor donning techniques, which is can result in glove rips and tears. Healthcare personnel should take care to don gloves correctly and avoid excessive stretching. Thoroughly dry hands before sliding them into gloves. Quality Management: Quality is refers to the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bears on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs. Every organization should manage and control of their products quality. It is important to help the organization to build a well reputation in the industry. By doing this, customer will more reliability on such product and finally help to gain the market share. Top Glove is a manufacturer company that pays much attention on the products quality. Top Glove committed and believes in top quality products, they are responsibility to ensure quality consistency and product reliability to all their customers and users. Before the products go into the packaging process and sell to the market, Top Glove has implemented the quality inspection process to make sure that their products are producing at the expected quality level. Top Glove is strongly stresses on Total Quality Management (TQM) and the Quality Control tests are conducted from the point we receive our raw materials straight through the production processes and the finished products points. Compulsory pre-shipment inspections are carried out before the delivery of each order. Top Glove is emphasis on stringent quality control procedures in line with ISO 9001 and in strict compliance with ASTM and EN 455 standards. Top Glove has using the tensile strength machine as the measurement of the stretch required to break the glove material. Glove without good vulcanized process tend to have higher tensile strength. Top Glove also has using the innovative auto-stripping system to removing the gloves from the formers, where they are turn inside out. By doing this, the productivity can be increase because it is faster than by using manual stripping. Air pump test has been used to check for holes and visual defects in gloves. Furthermore, water tight test also using by Top Glove to check on the quality of products which is a test that use to determine the AQL level of an examination gloves by checking on the pinholes of the particular gloves after filling up the gloves with 1000ml water and then check for any leakage in 2 minutes time. To ensure the quality of products, Top Glove has been conducted the protein test of the rubber. All natural rubber latex products contain protein. For latex gloves, it is t he measurement o

How the cold war promoted the civil rights movement in america, and how it promoted change

How the cold war promoted the civil rights movement in america, and how it promoted change Introduction. Cold war refers to the conflict between the nations that supported communism and they were headed by the Soviet Union and those that supported democracy and they were headed by the United States. The cold war was fought propaganda, fiscal warfare, political arguments and through martial conflicts at times. The cold war is said to have began around 1947 when President Truman of the United States affirmed his policy against communism thereby provoking a cold war commenced between the United States and the Soviet Union (Anonymous, 2002, 2). The war is said to have began as a result of the clear cut differences in the governance between the United States and the Soviet Union. For instance, in the United States, the populace had the privilege to select their own leaders and again they were allowed to come up with their own political organization and allowed the privileges to gather in the form of meetings and free communication (Anonymous, 2002, 3). While in the Soviet Union, the communist party had the mandate to select the people who would constitute the government, they had no right to form their own political movements; they were also not allowed the privilege of free communication and gathering (Anonymous, 2002, 4). Another possible cause of the conflict was as a result of global trade. While the United States wanted free trade among the various countries, the Soviet Union was trying to prevent its member countries from trading with the other countries in the world. Russia for instance, was hesitant in opening up to the rest of the western countries through trade since it was afraid of this having an influence on its autocratic governance. This therefore created a lot of tension between the United States and the Soviet Union. At the end of the World War 2, Europe had collapsed and so the international power was split between the United States and the Soviet Union. As a result of this, a lot of tension developed between these two unions as each one of them struggled to gain control over the world countries. Initial war started during peace agreement conferences and it got deepened when President Truman declared his policy against communism (Dudziak, 2006, 3). The Soviet Union had already begun expanding her influence in Europe even before the world war came to an end. It did this by deploring its red army to various parts of Europe and by the time the war came to a halt, it was already in control of a larger portion of the eastern side of Europe (Dudziak, 2006,4). The communists controlled the voting process in Europe and even won the first election and retained the powerful ministries of defense and military in the newly created government. Other factors that promoted the cold war was the Americans response to Russians influence on Europe which was rather quite negative, this furthered the bad blood between these two unions(Dudziak, 2006, 5). The reasons behind the establishment of civil rights movements. The ingress of the United States into the world war caused it a lot; for instance, a good number of the Americans were forced to move into the coastal lands around the Pacific, Atlantic and the Gulf in order to provide labor in the war industries. At the end of the war, America was significantly better placed after the war than several other countries that had been involved in the war. The GI Bill was passed in 1944 in order to provide support for the people who had been involved in the war to access education and economic development (Dudziak, 2006, 4). The Americans therefore looked for all the means and opportunities to rebuild their lives. Though not all of them got an equal chance in exploring the available opportunities. The whites had an advantage in all this and were able to be better placed economically than the other groups such as the Hispanics and African Americans (Dudziak, 2006, 4) These groups, commonly known as the minority groups developed an aggression in fighting for their civil rights in order to enjoy the complete rights and privileges that had been indicated in the constitution after the war (Dudziak, 2006, 5). The uprising of the civil rights movements in the US. The civil rights movements in the USA refer to a fight especially by the African Americans to acquire equal. Civil rights as all the other Americans. This movements had a lot of influence on America and they lead to an improved approval of constitutional rights and it also exposed the country to the pervasiveness and cost of racial discrimination. As a result of this, the African Americans came together with the some of the whites in the United States to protest against bigotry that was real in the US. For quite some time during the world war, a few African Americans had united to fight for equal rights but after the world war quite a number of the civil rights movements came into the limelight. A significant period in the civil rights movements occurred between the years 1950s and 1960s when strong civil rights lobby groups were formed and Martin Luther king Junior became the head of these civil rights pressure groups (Dudziak, 2006, 7). King arranged remonstration through public meetings, embargos and demonstrations. His expectation was that the individuals who were seeking equal rights through tranquility and courteous would be in support of the movements that he believed supported peaceful lobbying for the equivalent privileges for both the whites and the blacks. In 1964 and1965 (Dudziak, 2006, 7), the movements succeeded in having the central government pass the civil rights act and the voting rights acts. These acts abolished racial segregation, pledged the African Americans equal defense by the constitution and also guaranteed them the right to vote. Even though these acts were passed and the African American were really impressed, the civil rights movements did not stop here as the African Americans continued fighting for equal remuneration and access to educational opportunities for the blacks and the whites(Dudziak, 2006,8). The cold war and the civil rights movements in the US highlight the correlation between the American approach to racism within its borders, across the borders and the international relations during the period just after the world war two. A weak correlation between the American home policy and foreign policy on racism and discrimination was evident during this period because racial discrimination (Dudziak, 2002, 76) economic and social inequalities and racial violence continued in the US. This sparked lot of international protests and the image of the United States became tainted internationally. It was rather absurd to have the United States trying to shape discrimination in the other countries while it could not handle the discrimination within its own walls. In order to correct its tainted image, the United States defended itself by claiming that the existence of so many races within the country was a strong sign of racial equality in the country. The American government also decided to have control over the African Americans who were living in countries outside the United States; they did this in order to prevent them from bringing to the international communitys attention, the reality of racism in the US(Dudziak, 2002, 79). For instance, the government seized the passports of W.E.B DuBois and Paul Robeson when they tried to expose the discrimination against the blacks in the US. A number of writers such as Richard Wright and Baldwin James were also forced to flee to other countries; from those regions they continuously subverted the governments strategies and policies on solving the racism issue. Josephine Baker, a musician was forced to move out of the country due discrimination in the US which according to her was seriously interferi ng with her musical career. Even after she denounced her American citizenship, the American government continued to silence her through propaganda, liaising with the media in the countries she was to discredit any information she gave and they also conducted investigations that could link her to communist governance in order to taint her name (Dudziak, 2002, 79). Even though the government was trying to silence the anti racism activists leaving outside America, President Truman felt that as a result of the cold war that was raging between the US and the Soviet Union, it was important that societal amendments were made in order to put the US at an advantage in this battle. As a result of this, the presidents committee on civil rights in 1947 was formed; this policy analyzed the need to tackle the civil rights issue in the country since it was seriously interfering with the countrys international relations. The President therefore recommended the senate to pass the civil rights laws that would abolish killings of the African Americans, allow the blacks voting rights and to establish a permanent civil rights body to look into the rights of the blacks. All these recommendations failed to see the light of the day; this was as a result of the prevalence of the Southern Democrats in a number of the senate committees who had all along been opposed to granting equal rights for the African Americans and the whites(Dudziak, 2002,). Truman felt frustrated by the senates conduct and so he decided to use the authority of the administrative and the lawmaking divisions in order to handle issues affecting the government. He therefore decided to integrate the US Armed forces through administrative command (Dudziak, 2006, 8). He also allowed the filling of the amicus curiae briefings that were in support of the cases that were presented by the NAACP at the courts. These updates laid emphasis on the need to abandon racism as it was becoming a drawback in Americas war against communism. The cold war therefore created a necessity to tackle the civil rights issues in the United States (Dudziak, 2006, 8). The changes brought about by the cold war. The cold war had a lot of impacts on a number of countries around the world. For instance, as a result of the cold war the communism system of governance ended, USA became the major super power, a number of the countries that had earlier on been under the Soviet Union attained independence, the Warsaw pact got dismantled(Buzzle.com, 2005, 4), the two states that earlier on made Germany were unified again to form todays Germany after the destruction of the Berlin wall(Buzzle.com, 2005, 4), the Soviet Union crumbled, the Vietnam and Korean wars erupted and both The United States and the Soviet Union established huge caches of various types of weapons (Buzzle.com, 2005, 4). Conclusion. The cold war refers to a conflict that existed between the United States and the Soviet Union; while united sates supported democracy, the soviet union supported communism, this sharp differences was the cause of tension as each of the unions tried to draw a large number of the other world countries towards its ideologies. The cold war also intensified because the US acquired a lot of atomic weapons, the Soviet Unions acquisition of a larger portion of the Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union was also worried about the US using the Western part of Europe to wage war against it. These factors and several others, created a serious tension between these two unions. At the end of the world war the Americans were looking for all the opportunities to improve their living standards but the minority groups such as the African Americans, Hispanics and the others felt exclude and as a result they started fighting for the rights to enjoy the privileges that the constitution had indicated for all the citizens. As a result of this, a number of civil rights movements were formed in order to fight for the rights of the African Americans that continuously became infringed by the white Americans. The US fought the Soviet Union by strongly criticizing its communist form of governance and this meant a war to promote human rights and democracy. The irony of all this was that the United States was also facing a serious domestic problem; racial discrimination. This made the USs efforts to fight communism futile as the foreign relations between the country and other democracies strained on the grounds that the US was abating racism. President Truman therefore made recommendations to the senate to pass bill that would promote equal rights and privileges for all its citizens. But since the recommendations failed to go through the congress, Truman used his executive powers to desegregate the armed forces. In 1964 and 1965, civil rights act and the voting rights acts were passed that allowed the African Americans civil rights as well as voting rights. Work Cited. Anonymous. The postwar United States, 1945-1968. lcweb2.loc.gov. 2002. 15 March, 2010, Buzzle.com. Causes and effects of the cold war. Buzzle.com. 2005. 15 March, 2010, http://www.buzzle.com/articles/causes-and-effects-of-the-cold-war.html http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/features/timeline/postwar/postwar.html Dudziak, Mary. Cold war civil rights. Chnm.gmu.edu. 2006. 15 March, 2010, http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/schrag/wiki/index.php?title=Cold_War_Civil_Right Dudziak, Mary. Cold War civil rights: race and the image of American democracy. University Press. ISBN0691095132, 9780691095134. 2002

Western Influence on Japanese Business Management Essay -- essays rese

Japanese management: how the western influence and the 1990s crises have modified management practices in Japan, and in Japanese companies broadly speaking? Introduction Japan has been the second largest power in the world for several decades, now. As a quite remote island in Asia, its history and development shaped a country with its own way of thinking and behaving, and as far as we are concerned, with a great economy and a technological lead over its Asian neighbours. After the Second World War (WWII), Japan started from scratch, and its business succeeded very well, first on the domestic market and then on a world-scale. In the 1970s, Westerners were looking at Japan in awe, and tried to know how it could be such a good competitor in various sectors (e.g. electronics, car making and so on). The Japanese management myth was born to last. Some of the main characteristics are: participative decision making, bottom-up management, lifetime employment, "amae-dependency relationships", lean production, total quality management, total cost management, and infrastructure support. Though, since the 1990s, with intense globalization and several crises which impaired their economy, Japan companies have changed their way of running a business, but to which extent? One will try to tackle this issue by first analysing the core components of traditional Japanese management, and how it was shaped by culture and history. Then one will the influence it had on other countries, and reversely how Westerners made this style of management evolve into a new one. General background - Cultural elements Japan was quite isolated from the rest of the world for a long time, under the Tokugawa dynasty (17th and 18th), thus the inimitab... ...isation of work. History, too, fashioned Japanese management: the need for revenge after the humiliation of WWII was used in a very positive way to foster industry and achieve the Emperor?s dreams in a pacifist way, that is conquering Asia on an economic viewpoint. As a conclusive word one will cite Mauri Kaoru Kobayashi?s essay: in Japan, ?The traditional paradigm of organizational structure is no longer adequate for [its] long term survival... adult business education provision in private sector shows that employees are increasingly taking initiatives for their professional education rather than their companies? dictating what skills they should have?. Even though the core components of Japanese management are still present, today the country?s companies must their Human Resources policies evolve in order to keep a central position in the global market economy.

Politics of North and South Korea Essay -- essays research papers fc

Research Essay: North Korea and South Korea Throughout the history of politics, our societies have encountered a large variety of different political and governing systems. From systems in which idealists introduced to our world, believing that they are capable of letting the world function and operate in a more efficient manner came two of the most popular political ideologies that most would recognize. They are known as democracy and communism. Even now during the twenty-first century, issues relating to the struggle between these two beliefs are still rising in different regions of the world where people are demanding more freedom. Knowing that both democracy and communism are pretty much the total opposite extremes of the other, often we hear events in which democratic countries such as the United States attempting to spread their political principles into other non-democratic areas. An interesting place to look at would be North Korea and South Korea, a place under the same name but ruled in totally opposite fashion as th e North seems to valued control, while the South seems to valued freedom. Although people nowadays always encourage and promote individual rights and freedom, does democracy really allow a more efficient governing process? Or are the ways of communist still holding certain advantages over the idea of individualism? Perhaps a more in-depth look into the difference in North and South Korea ¡Ã‚ ¦s political system would bring answers to this question.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In a certain Point of view, Korea has 2 distinctive Political cultures and values. Starting off with South Korea, or the  ¡Ã‚ §Republic of Korea ¡Ã‚ ¨, the political culture of South Korea is a mix of native, Chinese and Western elements. These elements includes things such as the  ¡Ã‚ §belief that human society was an integral part of the whole universe interrelated with it in maintaining order and harmony ¡Ã‚ ¨,  ¡Ã‚ §acceptance of harmony, order, and consensus as major political values and purposes. ¡Ã‚ ¨,  ¡Ã‚ §preference for decision-making by consensus, rather than by majority vote or force of arms; yet at the same time, unwillingness to compromise on matters perceived to involve principle ¡Ã‚ ¨,  ¡Ã‚ §emphasis on form and procedure, as well as substantive performance, as key elements in maintaining order ¡Ã‚ ¨, and a lot more1. In a certain points of view, South Korea ¡Ã‚ ¦s values are opposite to man... ...created and designed by Oldrich Kyn.. 2002. . 17)  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚ ¡Ã‚ §South and North Korea. ¡Ã‚ ¨ ECONOMIC COUNTRY COMPARISONS , Site created and designed by Oldrich Kyn.. 2002. . 18)  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚ ¡Ã‚ §South and North Korea. ¡Ã‚ ¨ ECONOMIC COUNTRY COMPARISONS , Site created and designed by Oldrich Kyn.. 2002. . Bibliography 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Robert E. Bedeski. The Transformation of South Korea: Reform and reconstitution in the Sixth Republic Under Roh Tae Woo, 1987-1992. New York: Routledge, 1994. 2.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  John Kie-Chiagn Oh. Korea: Democracy on Trial. London: Cornell University Press, 1968. 3.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Park Chung Hee. Our Nation ¡Ã‚ ¦s Path: Ideology of Social Reconstruction. West Gate: Dong-a Publishing Company, Ltd., 1966. 4.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ilpyong J. Jim. Communist Politics In North Korea. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1975. 5.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Donald Stone Macdonald. The Koreans: Contemporary Politics and Society. Boulder & London: Westview Press, 1988. 6.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Oldrich Kyn.  ¡Ã‚ §South and North Korea. ¡Ã‚ ¨ ECONOMIC COUNTRY COMPARISONS. 2002.

The Impact of the Tuberculosis Vaccine Essay -- Biology Medical Biomed

The Impact of the Tuberculosis Vaccine Abstract Tuberculosis is one of the most infectious diseases in the world. With almost one third of the world infected with this virus, people are striving to help prevent the spread of this disease (NIAID, 2001). One prevention technique for tuberculosis is the BCG (Bacillus of Calmette and Guerin) vaccine. In the early twentieth century Calmette and Guerin worked together to isolate a strain of the disease creating the first BCG vaccine. Throughout the century the scientists improved the BCG vaccine and today there are several different strains of the vaccine available. However, even today its full effects on the disease are unknown. The exploration of the effects of the vaccine, the best administration techniques, and who should be vaccinated continues. Throughout the Twentieth Century, Tuberculosis has impacted people around the world. While some countries see the impacts of tuberculosis less than others, the threat of this infectious disease looms across the horizon. Today, this organism affects one third of the population and is one of the most threatening of infectious diseases (NIAID, 2001). The BCG vaccine (Bacillus of Calmette and Guerin), is administrated in many high risk countries to combat the disease. Although scientists have improved the vaccine throughout the nineteenth century and the vaccine helps to combat some tuberculosis, its prevention is still far from perfect. The BCG vaccine is formed from a live strain of Mycobacterium bovis (WHO, 2005). The Mycobacterium bovis strain is taken from cows. It is a relative of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis, which affects humans; however, Mycobacterium bovis affects cows and humans alike. Isolating a strain of this living organism... ...h. 7/25/2005: http://www.pedresearch.org/cgi/content/full/55/2/347 2. Fine, P. and Carneiro I. et al. (1999, November). Issues relating the use of BCG in immunization programmes. World Health Organization. 7/19/2005: http://www.who.int/vaccines-documents/DocsPDF99/www9943.pdf 3. Ginsberg A. (2001, January). Tuberculosis Vaccine. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. 7/19/2005: http://www.niaid.nih.gov/dmid/tuberculosis/tbvaccine.htm 4. Keep Kids Healthy. (2001, April). Tuberculosis in Children. Keep Kids Healthy. 7/21/2005: http://www.keepkidshealthy.com/welcome/infectionsguide/tuberculosis.html 5. WHO. (2005). BCG-the current vaccine for tuberculosis. World Health Organization. 7/25/2005: http://www.who.int/vaccine_research/diseases/tb/vaccine_development/bcg/en/print.html 6. Yancey, D. 2001. Tuberculosis. Brookfield: Twenty-First Century Books.

India Post Strategy

Term Project ? Table of Contents Operations Constraints Matrix3 Flexibility3 Cost5 Quality7 Structural Decisions7 Capacity7 Facilities8 Process Technology9 Sourcing and Vertical Integration10 Infrastructural Decisions12 Operations Constraints Matrix Flexibility is about the operation being able to change what it does quickly. How quickly can the organization change the mix of products and services it is offering to the customer? Changing consumer tastes affects demand levels and the product range desired.For an organization to stay competitive, it needs to be able to respond to these changes with flexibility. †¢Can the organization react to demand changes and increase or decrease the volume of output in response? †¢Is a wide range of products or services on offer? Can the organization bring new product/service designs to market quickly so it is in a position to meet changing customer needs? Providing flexibility in delivery options, both the manner and the timing give an op portunity for differentiation. In case of Indian Postal Service, they are high on flexibility parameter.The range of products / services for Indian Post suits to people from all economic level, almost all customers can avail all the services of India Post in all location. India Post postal services are under two heads, Mail services and Premium Services. Mail Services LetterThe communication is enclosed in an envelope and addressed Inland letter cardCommunication is contained on a sheet of paper with prescribed size & folding, for transmission within India only. Post cardOpen communication on a card of prescribed size. Available in two varieties: Single & reply post card. Post cards are for transmission within India only.Printed Post cardPost cards containing communication recorded by printing, cyclostyling or by any other mechanical process are classified as ‘Printed Post Cards'. Printed matter includes printed pictures also. Blind literature packetPapers of any kind, periodi cals and books impressed in â€Å"Braille† or other special type for the use of blind are allowed to be transmitted by post as Blind literature packets. ParcelAnything can be sent in a parcel excepting articles whose transmission is prohibited. RegistrationThe postal article that is registered is given identification and is recorded at every stage of handling.Letters, letter cards, Book and Pattern Packets, Parcels, News papers prepaid with postage may be registered for transmission at any post office. The registered postal article is delivered specifically to the addressee. VPL/VPPThe Value Payable Letter or Value Payable Parcel is paid for at the time of receipt. Premium Services Speed PostSpeed Post is market leader in domestic express industry, for providing time-bound and express delivery of letters ’ documents and parcels across the nation and around the world Express ParcelExpress Parcel Post is an ideal service for sending the parcels up to 35 kg within India.I t is fast and reliable, provides door-to-door convenience and pick-up from customer’s premises service. Business PBusiness Post is a one-stop shop service to manage entire mail-out process. It provides cost-effective and professional mailing services, including printing, collating, inserting, sealing, and addressing to meet specific business needs. Media PostMedia Post is an innovative and effective vehicle for Brand and Marketing Managers to communicate their corporate message across the nation.Greeting PostGreeting Post is an innovative product of India Post comprises of a card with envelop with pre-printed postage stamp upon the envelope. It used to express yourself perfectly on every occasion, festival or event. Logistics PostLogistics Post caters to any demand for moving goods, parcels and consignments in terms of delivery deadline and quality of service. It offers the possibility of monitoring the delivery progress at all times. Comparison with the other players in Post al / Courier service India PostDTDC CourierBluedart CourierNo fixed delivery time guaranteeService include next business day delivery guaranteeService include next business day delivery guarantee Media post offer advertisement opportunity to marketing managerDedicated for courier and parcel delivery, no specific service like advertising Dedicated for courier and parcel delivery, no specific service like advertising Wide reach within India, specifically high penetration in rural IndiaWide reach but rural penetration is not as deep as India PostWide reach but rural penetration is not as deep as India Post Offers registered post service, where consignment is handed over to only specific addressee General service, and couriers can be received by any individual within corporation / homeGeneral service, and couriers can be received by any individual within corporation / home Consignment tracking is limited to premium products deliveryConsignment tracking facility is available for all kind s of deliveriesConsignment tracking facility is available for all kinds of deliveries Prices band is high and weight range starts from as minimum as 25gms for deliveryPrice band is narrow and weight range starts usually from 500gmsPrice band is narrow and weight range starts usually from 500gms Single delivery timing, no customized service as customer requires, although service for guaranteed timely delivery availableConsignment delivery can be defined by customers with a minimum duration of Next business day 1030AM within same time zone Consignment delivery can be defined by customers with a minimum duration of Next business day 1030AM within same time zone No special facility for weekends like Saturday or SundaySpecial pick up facility for Saturday and delivery on SundayNo specific delivery facility for weekends Proof of delivery is claimable on paid basisProof of delivery is visible online for freeProof of delivery is visible online for free Greeting card delivery, special printe d card delivery service No special greeting card delivery service at presentNo special greeting card delivery service at present Freight on delivery service available business Freight on delivery service available business Freight on delivery service available business International deliveries service available with maximum eight of 100kgInternational deliveries service available with maximum weight of 10000kgInternational deliveries service available with maximum weight of 100kg No packing, box packaging service, pick up service available on paid basisProvide packing, loading, box packaging service, free pick up serviceProvide packing box, box packaging services, free pick up service Cost is the last objective to be discussed but clearly not the least. For organizations that have adopted a low cost strategy it is the most important objective. The lower the cost of producing the goods the lower price that can be offered to customers, which in turn will boost sales and profits. Even organizations that seek to gain their competitive advantage through differentiation are keen to lower their cost basis because that will lead to improvements in profit levels. To be able to deliver a cost advantage an organization has to analyze where operation costs are incurred.When considering a service industry, like hospitals, the biggest cost element will be staff costs, then facility and technology costs followed by bought-in materials and services. Many costs in a hospital operation are fixed and will not vary according to the number of patients treated. That is to say those facilities like beds, operating theatres or laboratories are as expensive as are the highly specialized staff. These are all needed to be available if not all of the time, then most of it. That obviously has cost implications. Generally, the level of costs depends on the volume and variety of output and how variable is demand. Variety of outputs leads to greater levels of complexity and therefore increas ed costs. Cost is dependent on the other performance objectives.Improvements in each of the other four will lead to cost reductions. The relative priority of the performance objectives is determined by the demands of customers and the actions of competitors. Making these decisions on priorities links back to the statement in the strategy of what business the organization is in and who are its customers. Selling to customers who insist on error-free products requires the organization to concentrate on its quality performance. Consumer segments that are looking for low-priced products or services will lead the organization to emphasize its cost performance. In case of India Post, reaching to the mass is part of their mission.They operate at locations where, revenues do not even cover 15% of expenses. They have more than 89% of their offices in rural areas, where the cost of operation is usually higher than revenues. Even the post office in urban areas, the target given is to earn a pr ofit of 5% beyond their operating cost. India Post caters primarily in rural areas and therefore its emphasis on offering very low / economical prices to customer irrespective of their operating cost. Private postal service agencies have their motive of earning profit from business, therefore they highly emphasize on providing value service to their customers. They focus on limited services designed to fulfill general need of customers.Their service portfolio is transforming from delight services to order winning services. They emphasize on excelling in providing order winner services and compete in limited range of services. Pricing offered by India Post: India post premier service of simple post card is in no comparison with any other service agency. It is most cost effective way of mail hitherto in India. Apart from post cards, letters, India Post offers standard fixed rates for all customers depending on distance (irrespective of place of origin or destination). Speed Post: Weig htLocal (within municipal limits)Upto 200 Kms201 to 1000 Kms1001 to 2000 KmsAbove 2000 Kms Up to 50 gramsINR 15INR 35INR 35INR 35INR 35 1 grams to 200 gramsINR 25INR 35INR 40INR 60INR 70 201 grams to 500 gramsINR 30INR 50INR 60INR 80INR 90 Additional 0. 5 kg or part thereofINR 10INR 15INR 30INR 40INR 50 Express Parcel Post: WeightLocal (within municipaI limits)Upto 500 Kms. 501 to 1000 Kms. 1001 to 2000 Kms. Above 2000 Kms. Up to 2kg3550607090 Additional 1kg or part thereof58122535 India Post does not offer the air-mail service for domestic deliveries, whereas private players like Bluedart, DTDC, and Firstflight etc have the air mail service that offers next day delivery guarantee. Therefore, the prices of services offered by different agencies can be compared on the surface mode. Cost of parcel up to 500gms 500gmsIndia PostBluedartDTDC ithin city30200 Ambala50200 Amritsar60200 Mumbai80200 Calicut90210 Cost of parcel up to 10kg 10kgIndia PostBluedartDTDC within city75250 Ludhiana114 250 Ahmadabad156290 Mumbai270290 Calicut370290 India post is more cost effective and economical than other private players. It is high on providing cost effective services to its customer than its competitors. Due to its pan India reach, and easy access in rural areas, other private players cannot compete in cost factor. Quality, whether you are running a hospital or a retail superstore, is about doing things right so that error-free goods and services are delivered that are fit for their purpose.Quality encompasses both the quality of the design of the product in terms of aesthetics, reliability and performance and the quality of the process that delivers the product or service. Quality of delivery process has direct impact on costs and dependability. Quality is a major source of customer satisfaction or dissatisfaction. Poor quality products or poor quality of service are likely to put the customer off returning, leading to future lost sales. For service sector like postal / couri er service, the primary quality factors can be following: †¢Ease of accessibility – availability, easy reach †¢Customer focus – language, service, waiting time Reliability of service design – useful for customer, trust on the service †¢Conformance to specifications – delivery on time as committed, rates as specified, influence to change or modify requisite service †¢High delivery performance – delivery at the right place, right time, right person Speed Speed is all about how long customers wait before receiving their service. Addressing the speed objective requires the organization to pay attention to the cycle time involved in their new product development. An organization also has to pay attention to its scheduling and capacity planning as well as inventory management to be able to deliver on the speed objective. Reducing inventory will also impact on obtaining a cost advantage. Speed is an important factor considering that a lot of parcels are required to reach on time and are often related to business.As such, almost all the courier services have a special service catering to this constraint. In case of India Post, .No. Services/TransactionSuccess IndicatorsService StandardsUnit AService Standards of various services for Departmental Post Offices 1MailsTime from posting / booking to delivery†¢ Excludes day of posting, holidays and Sundays. †¢ Maximum time. †¢ Articles posted before cut off time. Unit in Days /Minutes etc. 1. 2Delivery of First class mail i. e. , letters, postcards, Inland letter cards, etc. Local* and between Metro Cities** * Local – within Municipal City limits ** Metro- Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru. 2Days Rest of India4-6 1. 3Delivery of : †¢ Registered / Insured articles Express Parcel Post †¢ Second Class Mails i. e. Parcels, Book Packets, Registered Newspapers, etc. Local* and between Metro Cities** * Local – withi n Municipal City limits ** Metro- Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru. 3Days Rest of India5-7 1. 4Delivery of Speed Post articlesLocal* and between Metro Cities** * Local – within Municipal City limits ** Metro- Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru. 2Days Rest of India4-6 1. 5International EMS articles†¢ All International Mail articles are subject to customs examination. †¢ Period for customs examination/detention is not included in the service standards. 4-10DaysDTDC on the other hand provides a lot of services catering to this need which is case specific: DTDC Domestic2-7 daysNormal deliveries (city specific) Value added service (Speed)Days to deliverSpecifications DTDC PlusAssured Next business day delivery†¢To metros and major cities in India Prime Time Plus (PTP) PTP 10. 30 and PTP 12. 00 within the next possible business day†¢Time-critical Business to Business (B2B) and Business to Customer (B2C) Segments. â⠂¬ ¢From select origins to select pin codes at Metro locations. DTDC Blueassured second business day delivery†¢To places far and wide across the country In addition to it, DTDC provides money bank guarantee in case a delivery is not made on time on its Value added services. Blue dart Dart Surfaceline2-7 daysDistance specific Premium ServicesDart Apex1-2 daysFor commercial shipments Domestic PriorityNext dayFor time-critical parcels DP 10. 30 and DP 12. 00Time specific, within a day Blue dart, like DTDC provides money back guarantee in case a delivery is not made on time on its premium services. As such, Speed of India post is comparable to most of its competitors as far as value based services are concerned. Though, at few places delivery is guaranteed the very next day and before a specific time, which is not provided by India post. Some services like Air to Air which ask customers to collect the post from the Airport for a faster delivery is provided by some of its competitor s.Also, unlike DTDC and Blue Dart do not provide money back guarantee on a delay though they provide money back guarantee if a parcel is lost or damaged. This feature allows other players to create a better perception among consumers with respect to speed. Dependability Dependability is, of course, about consistency. An organization’s processes have to be geared up to consistently meeting a promised delivery time for a product or service. Customers are unlikely to be satisfied by an increase in delivery speed if it is not matched by consistent performance. This will require that an organization has systems in place to identify problems early and be flexible enough in its planning to be able to move to a plan B as necessary. The dependability of India post is an issue.Though its registered post is known for dependability in terms of security and handling, but the consistency in speed is still a concern in terms of dependability. The targeted dependability of 95% deliveries on time is far from the reality. Though a lot of premium services are delivered on time, but the general posts are often delayed or sometimes are even lost. When talked to an employee working in India Post, Dependability came out as one of the major reasons why people prefer high priced courier services provided by competitors over India Post. Structural Decisions An effective operations organization is one that meets the need of strategic business units competitive strategy.Therefore, once the type of differentiation has been specified , management must ensure that its operations organization is configured and managed in such a way that there is no one best way for dealing with any business problem – whether one is making, delivering, or selling a service, designing a management information / quality system, or measuring performance. In every situation, one must make choices that reflect one’s context, goals, resources and personnel. Translating the business strategy int o appropriate tangibles and intangibles involves different structural and infrastructural decisions and tradeoffs. The structural and infrastructural decisions in service industry are derived from manufacturing operations. Structural decisions address all the issues that are relevant to Capacity, Facilities, Process Technology and Sourcing (vertical integration). CapacityCapacity management is defined as â€Å"ensuring a service has the capability to meet the demand experiences, like wise capacity management is a response to demand†. Service delivery process depends on three basic factors to achieve the expected output: 1. Service load that illustrates the variety of service being offered, the variation of demand and the management of demand 2. Capacity task that illustrates forecasting methods, scheduling, bottleneck management, prioritizing and altering capacity that are used to manage capacity task successfully 3. Capacity leakage, in other words the degree that there are quality failures, scheduling losses, labor lateness, labor underperformance and changeovers FacilitiesFacility network is the configuration of an operating network in allocating various service centers and contact points. In Mail Service industry, facility is the reach of agency to the customers at different location and various services that can be offered in that service center keeping in mind the objectives and goals of company. India Post has one of the objectives as â€Å"To provide basic postal facilities, i. e. , collection and delivery of mails, within easy reach (1. 5 kms) of all people and businesses. This is to be achieved through opening of more post offices, relocation of existing post offices, giving out franchisees to individuals, shops, institutions, self-help groups, etc. In order to achieve this objective, they constantly thrive to open new service centers at desirable places and shutoff from redundant locations. Apart from post offices, there are approximately 5. 7 lacs letterboxes, processed by network of Mail Offices and conveyed by rail, road, and airlines all over the country to reach the customers. Postal operations at the post office counter encompass the entire gamut of basic postal service that include sale of stamps, booking of registered articles, insured articles, value payable articles, booking of parcels and other banking transaction. Below data shows the penetration of India Post in rural and urban segment. Year2011201020092008Urban13904089. 78%13918289. 81%13914489. 76%12548980. 94% Rural1582610. 22%1579710. 19%1587110. 24%2954619. 06% Total154866100. 00%154979100. 00%155015100. 00%155035100. 00% State wise presence of post offices in India: Andaman102Dadar and Nagar Haveli39J&K1656 Andhra Pradesh16152Daman & Diu20Jharkhand3092 Arunachal Pradesh295Delhi531Karnataka9761 Assam4023Goa263Kerala5054 Bihar9015Gujarat8934Lakhasdweep10 Chandigarh51Haryana2662MP8031 Chattisgarh3119Himachal Pradesh2778Maharashtra12490 Manipur697Rajasth an10338 Meghalaya475Sikkim209 Mizoram409Tamilnadu11897 Nagaland328Tripura710 Orissa8192U. P. 17584 Pondicherry91Uttarakhand2719 Punjab3842W. B. 8700Each facility center in the network is independent in itself, thereby satisfying the condition of Horizontal Networks, but each central / metro / common facility center is dependent on the traffic / mail at other service centers also, thereby working as Mixed Network Structures. India post has about 387 mail offices to process the mails through its network and conveyed by rail, road, and airlines all over the country. Facility decision in mail service sector includes the office layout, customer support, guidance, and customer interface with employees, basic facilities for employees and services available. India Post is oldest mail service in India and some of the offices of India Post are very old.The ambience, infrastructure, facilities is not comparable to private agency offices, which are equipped with modern infrastructure and facili ties. â€Å"Project Arrow† is a step toward modernization of post offices. It focuses on creating conducive and friendly work environment for staff and customers, information technology enabled services and improving the quality of core business services, primarily focusing in rural areas. It has been implemented in more than 15000 post offices and more post offices are in process of implementation. In comparison to private service providers, India Post has maximum reach, are available at the last mile. Private agencies are working for profit maximization therefore they operate in limited space, and their presence is imited to metro cities and some critical business locations. Due to limited offices and service centers, they have made their offices IT enabled and customer friendly. Process Technology The meaning of the process technology lies behind the meaning of focus. Well-managed service organizations are characterized by a high degree of focus. Better focusing such as th e utilization of classification schemes, refers to †¢to delivery systems that allow customers to have high contact with the system †¢easy segregation / sorting of mails †¢ease of tracking †¢improving the quality of delivery †¢connection of various location with centralized database †¢management information system and database maintenanceAutomation and information technology leads to cost savings, consistent and reliable services, it helps to increases the availability of a service operations and the speed of service delivery process that helps in marketing and customer benefits. In mail service, the level of automation depends on amount of load, types of services, quantity of parcels, cost, and risk appetite of the company. For India Post, the scope of Automation and upgradation in process technology can be defined in many areas: †¢Computerized booking of mails and parcels †¢Segregation / sorting of mail according to destination through bar co de scanner †¢RFID technology to track the consignment location in real time †¢Hand held devices to confirm the delivery status on real time basis †¢Centralized data management Automatic loading of mails in the Transporting Mode †¢Automatic packing of goods and mail to utilize as full load (except in case of lower quantity) †¢Connectivity of all facility centers to check the system information in real time †¢Advance booking and pick up parcel †¢Centralized database to better control the address database of customers India Post is lagging in automation of its process. It has implemented barcode technology in most of its services, but it is not fully supported by its aging staff. Most of the post offices in the rural areas are manually functioning. Many post offices, Mail offices, Administrative offices are not yet computerized.Automatic letter sorting machine is under installation in four metropolitan cities of India, which can increase the sorting s peed to approx. 35000 per hour. In addition, Mixed Mail sorting machine are also under process of implementation to sort large size letters, parcels/packets to the speed of about 16000 per hour. These machines will help to automate the process with better speed, quality and efficiency. As compared to private mail service providers, most of the offices are fully computerized, with full system integration with centralized server. Their offices are connected with real time information system and the core business functions are controlled through IT. Sourcing and Vertical IntegrationSourcing is an important structural aspect of an operations organizations encompasses decision regarding how much of the total work required to create and deliver its services will be done internally and how much can be outsourced from outside organizations. In service industry, outsourcing can reduce the cost of operation. Strategic control in the operation decides the level of outsourcing in mail service. India Post is operating under huge geographical exposure. As a part of its public service, it has to reach to the last consumer in the map. Establishing self-employed service centers at all operating location is costly proposition, therefore to maintain the presence and cost effectiveness it has to outsource some of its activities in the extreme areas of operation. Apart from its front office activities, India Post has scope for outsourcing at almost every stage of operation. Post office maintenance at certain location as per India Post terms and Condition †¢Transportation of dak / mail by road, rail and air through third party agency rather than self procuring the trucks and loaders †¢Deploying a local team for post office maintenance at distant location, but centralized control through district head or regional head post office †¢Dealership and franchise network apart from regular staff †¢Liaison with government organizations and PSU’s to deliver all the mails of govt. institutions through India Post Front office counter franchise India post has a franchise scheme that offers various products and services in urban and upcoming urban areas.Basic features of the Urban franchise model: †¢It provides only counter services, delivery and transmission lies with India post. †¢Provision of services under franchise across the counter for a minimum defined time schedule with flexibility to work round the clock Products and services offered †¢Sale of Stamps and stationery †¢Booking registered articles, speed post articles, money orders, e-post etc. †¢Functioning as an agent for PLI and provide related after sales service, including collection of premia (subject to fulfillment of criteria for PLI agents). †¢Marketing products for which the Department has a corporate agency or tie-up and provide related follow up services (subject to agreement with the other organizations involved). Providing retail and bill/tax/fin e collection/payment services of the Department (Subject to agreement with the other organizations involved) †¢Facilitating the provision of e-governance and citizen-centric services (subject to agreement with the other organizations involved) †¢Any other service introduced by the Department in future through its outlets which is considered amenable to the franchisee model. (subject to agreement with the other organizations involved) Transportation Service The transportation of mail is through various modes 1. By hand 2. Surface line, road transport 3. Surface line, rail transport 4. Air line, Plane transport India Post has manages mail transportation with their own facilities as well as third party service providers. India post has huge employee base to deliver the post by hand to the recipients, but for the transportation on surface and air, it has its own vehicles and also arrangements with third party logistics vendors.Air transport – international deliveries, I ndia Post has tie-up with premier DHL logistics Mail Motor Services (MMS) – For transmission of mail between mail offices and post offices between cities, India Post has its own fleet of 1282 vehicles, full-fledged maintenance workshop facilities Rail transport – for long distance transmission of mails, India Post has tie-up with Indian Railways Scope for Sourcing 1. Road transportation – India post can outsource the transmission of mails between cities and reduce the load of maintenance and fixed fleet expenses, third party service dedicated to India Post can help in focusing on timely delivery and maintenance of quality service. It offload the risk of transportation, maintenance expenses, buying-selling of vehicles etc 2. Franchise for rural areas – India Post franchise scheme is primarily for Urban Areas where the post office is justified but cannot be opened.For India Post, the focus of expanding the reach should be associated with cost factor. As in urban areas, the cost of opening a post office would be high. Similarly, operating cost in the far distant rural areas will also be high. In order to minimize the cost of operation, India Post can outsource some of its urban offices, and similarly rural office, where the cost of operation for local would be lesser than setting up self-employed service centers. 3. Long-term contracts with Customers – India Post can leverage on its wide presence, and govt. institution tag for getting long-term contracts with other govt. institutions and PSUs for delivery of all mails through India Post.This will ensure dedicated source of Income for India Post, and beyond that, it will be a great financial assistance to serve the rural areas. Infrastructural Decisions A company’s operations infrastructure is composed of its policies and systems governing a number of activities, from capital budgeting and equipment selection to organizational structure. Each of these systems often has rep ercussions and implications for other infrastructural and structural elements. Resource allocation and capital budgeting systems Human Resource systems India Post has workforce, which is old aged, there has been no fresh recruitment in India Post from many years for junior and senior level management positions.In the present system, where consumer are growing at fast pace, and the technology and information system is growing in the industry, there is need of well-informed and responsive workforce that can understand the existing IT and customers need. Due to aging workforce, computer literacy among the employees is not at par and training and development of employees has taken a back step in the policies of India Post. Although, India Post organizes many training program for its middle / senior level management employees but due to aging factor, the life expectancy in the organization as well the contribution in the organization is limited. Work Planning and Control systems Quality systemsThe quality system has been focused upon by India post since 2005-06. With the prioritization of computerization in 2006-07 for the development of India post, the Government has laid focus on improving service levels and to enable electronic networking of about 1, 30,000 rural Post Offices. Recently, A Plan costing Rs. 1877. 2 Crores has been formulated to computerize the Post Offices in Rural areas to further improvise on this front. Project Arrow was launched in April 2008. The project envisages up gradation of Post Offices in urban and rural areas both in terms of upgrading and enhancing the quality of service in â€Å"core areas† and improving their â€Å"look and feel†.The project aims at creating a conducive and friendly work environment both for the staff and the customers visiting the Post Offices, providing all IT enabled services through secure connectivity, improving the service quality levels in the core business areas e. g. Mail delivery, Remittance s both electronic and manual and Postal Savings schemes. The â€Å"Look and Feel† activity focuses on improvement in Branding, Information Technology, Human Resource and Infrastructure. Based on the audit report of Project Arrow conducted over 50 post offices of 10 states: 1. In terms of Performance on Mail Delivery, Registered letter performances were 99 %, where as the figures for Ordinary mail varied between 94 to 100%. For Speed post it ranged between 98 to 99 %. 2.In terms of time taken for delivery of letters, post offices scored between 90 to 92% during the 3 rounds of Audit though a higher score was expected. Till June 2012, the Project has been implemented in respect of monitoring of core areas in more than 15,500 Post Offices and â€Å"Look and Feel† has been improved in 1,530 Post Offices. The Government has recently started a new Automated Mail Processing Centre (AMPC) in Delhi on August 20, 2012 to improve mail quality with next-generation sorting centres and to modernize the mail processing operations at India Post. The new letter sorting machine can sort 35,000 letters per hour, while the mixed mail sorter can process 20,000 letters, packets and small parcels an hour.The automated sorting systems should â€Å"considerably† improve sorting errors and improve the quality of mail services, the government said, with the new mixed mail sorter scanning tracking barcodes automatically as items are being sorted. Processing efficiency should also improve because mail can be sorted in a single run, while manual sorting had required a second stage of sorting. As per an interview given by Siemens, the developer of AMPC, to the media; â€Å"The automation route will â€Å"significantly† reduce processing time and save â€Å"considerable† cost for the Indian postal department. Handwriting or language is no longer a barrier as the special IVR by Siemens can read various scripts e. g. Greek, Cyrilic, Arabic, Chinese, English, Hindi.For the postal centers at Delhi and Kolkata, this machine will be able to read English and Hindi and as a result will enable Department of Post to provide better and more efficient services with hig h level of productivity† . From quality aspects as such, the ministry is taking measures like the introduction of AMPC and Project Arrow to improvise the quality. Still, a lot of rural villages are not computerized and timely delivery of mails has been a major issue. Also, the technologies like AMPC need to reach out to more major cities for further reducing the cost and improve service levels. The Government provides money bank guarantee of Rs 500 on damage or loss of any parcel but no specifications regarding this are provided.As such, a lot of people prefer other courier services to send valuable or important mails/parcels. Measurement and reward systems One of the major problems with India post is the undefined promotion structure. The employees are bound for a fixed pay and no variable pay/ Incentives are provided. The promotion is based on experience rather than utility/ quality and irrespective of poor showing at work, job security is provided which makes the system lazy. Frequent transfer of employees and low growth potential for an individual are few other concerns which needs to be addressed upon along with a continuous feedback system of employees. Product and process development systemsIndia Post although the oldest and most significant player in mail service but with time the competitors has taken a lead and the social obligation of India Post has put them in back step in process development, improvement and fast implementation. The project team for process improvisation works on the guidelines given by the members after approval for the Ministry of Telecommunications and IT, larger projects has to get the approval from the ministry before commencement. Organization structure The organization structure of India Post is a complex organizati on structure (Exhibit 1). It has many vertical layers and simultaneously horizontal divisions. India Post is a government body, therefore the bureaucratic organization structure is inevitable, it has members deputed by Govt. of India as well as personnel that are recruited by India Post itself.Due to various business dimensions (postal mail service, PF fund, MNREGA fund, Bank, Finance, Forex etc) of India Post, each business vertical is treated as separate business unit and therefore makes the structure more complex. The organization structure is a centralized, and bureaucratic, power to take decision lies with the senior management and staff is primarily to do the regular business / operational activities. Operations Strategy for India Post Considering, the fact that India post is the Govt. institutional body and their prime focus is to serve the mass market by offering its services at lowest possible rates with high quality and good speed.In addition, India Post desires to be self -sustaining organization, it involves trade-offs between operation strategy matrix parameters (Price, Quality, Dependability, Flexibility and Speed). They can make their product primarily in two segments: 1. Business Mails2. General Mails General Mails – it is for mass market focusing on public, for cost sensitive customers (primarily poor people), delivery of mails to any location with a specified time delivery. Business Mails – it is specialized service, other than just sending mails (other than General Mails), the prices should be competitive with other private players, delivery time specified, service customization as required by the customers. E. g. speed post, registered post, logistics, parcels and box parcel etc. Exhibit 1 : Organization Structure, India Post