Analysis- Macbeth’s soliloquy Essay

Macbeth’s soliloquy at the start of Act 1, Scene 7, introduces us to a side of Macbeth that has not yet been portrayed earlier in the play. Here, instead of being the courageous and valiant soldier, Macbeth reveals himself to be a man who is being slowly tempted by ambition and power, though not determined enough to take the risks in order to achieve his goal, thus resulting in the repetition of â€Å"ifs† throughout the beginning of Macbeth’s soliloquy. Macbeth is also very much aware of the lack of reason for the murder of Duncan. The soliloquy effectively adds to our understanding of the internal conflict that plagues Macbeth as he struggles to determine whether or not he should kill Duncan, who is a virtuous man as well as his kinsman and king. He believes that it is against the nature of man to kill someone who is of such a status and relation to him and that it is immoral to do so, â€Å"he’s here in double trust: first, as I am his kinsman and his subject, strong both against the deed† and that it would be a breech of Duncan’s trust in him if he decides to go through with the murder. We see Macbeth’s reluctance to murder Duncan himself as he is a guest in his own home. â€Å"†¦as his host, who should against his murderer shut the door, not bear the knife myself.† Macbeth knows that his weakness is the desire he has to seize the crown. He knows that although he does not wish to murder Duncan but for the fulfillment of his own ambition, â€Å"I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, but only vaulting ambition†¦Ã¢â‚¬  it is something that must happen in order for Macbeth to achieve what he wants. The audience sees the conflict within Macbeth and the horrible imaginings he has for his own downfall and his fate. He knows that he is drinking from a â€Å"poisoned chalice† which symbolizes Macbeth’s yearning for moral desecration. Another aspect of Macbeth that the audience witness is the reluctance to mention the murder of Duncan. Instead, he uses euphemisms such as † it, assassination, this blow, the deed, bear the knife, his taking off, horrid deed, my intent† This gives the audience the impression that Macbeth is scared to name his fate and his intentions of murdering Duncan in fear of â€Å"jinxing† himself. Macbeth’s tone throughout his soliloquy is one of confusion, frustration and is filled with hellish images which are associated with what may become of Macbeth’s soul. â€Å"Bloody instructions, which being taught; return to plague th’inventor, deep damnation, poisoned chalice† Macbeth recognizes the guilt which may come with the murder of Duncan and we find ourselves feeling pity for him as he  struggles with morals and his own ambition. Personification and metaphors are also effective in Macbeth’s soliloquy. Through personification, various aspects of humanity such as virtues, justice, and pity have been exaggerated so that the audience may treat these aspects as humans, and feel the vulnerability of human goodness- pity is portrayed as a newborn babe, and virtues are portrayed pleading like angels. Through Macbeth’s soliloquy, the audience sees that this man, who was supposedly a virtuous, valiant person, has become a weak character, giving in to the temptations brought on by ambition, greed and power, even if it means having to abandon his morals. The audience recognizes that Macbeth is human and he is plagued with a troubled conscience but we are disappointed to see Macbeth slowly drifting towards corruption and his own downfall. He will eventually â€Å"o’erleap† himself.

Final Exam Review Essay

FINAL EXAM REVIEW BE15-4. Lump-Sum Sales Ravonette Corporation issued 300 shares of $10 par value common stock and 100 shares of $50 par value preferred stock for a lump sum of $13,500. The common stock has a market price of $20 per share, and the preferred stock has a market price of $90 per share. Prepare journal entry. | | | P15-2. Treasury Stock ProblemClemson Company had the following stockholders’ equity as of January 1, 2012. Common stock, $5 par value, 20,000 shares issued| $100,000| Paid-in capital in excess of par—common stock| 300,000| Retained earnings| 320,000| Total stockholders’ equity| $720,000| | | Feb. 1| Clemson repurchased 2,000 shares of treasury stock at a price of $19 per share.| Mar. 1| 800 shares of treasury stock repurchased above were reissued at $17 per share.| Mar. 18| 500 shares of treasury stock repurchased above were reissued at $14 per share.| Apr. 22| 600 shares of treasury stock repurchased above were reissued at $20 per share.| | | | Stock Dividend Problem (Page 17 in Moodle Ch. 15 Notes)| | | | CS, $5 par, 40,000 shares issued and outstanding| $ 200,000| Paid-in capital in excess of par| 835,000| Retained earnings| 2,160,000| Shares of the company’s stock are selling at this time at $22. 1. A 10% stock dividend is declared and issued. 2. A 50% stock dividend is declared and issued. 3. A 2-for-1 stock split is declared and issued. E3.9. Adjusting Entries Supplies| Accounts Receivable| Beg. Bal.| 800| 10/31| 470| 10/17| 2,100| | | | | | | 10/31| 1,650| | | | Salaries and Wages Expense| Salaries and Wages Payable| 10/15| 800| | | | | 10/31| 600| 10/31| 600| | | | | | | | Unearned Service Revenue| Supplies Expense| 10/31| 400| 10/20| 650| 10/31| 470| | | | Service Revenue| | | 10/17| 2,100| | | 10/31| 1,650| | | 10/31| 400| | | | Instructions: Reconstruct 3 transaction entries and 4 adjusting entries. P4.3. (Irregular Items) Maher Inc. reported income from continuing operations before taxes during 2012 of $790,000. Additional transactions occurring in 2012 but not considered in the $790,000 are as follows. | | 1. | The corporation experienced an uninsured flood loss (extraordinary) in the amount of $90,000 during the year. The tax rate on this item is 46%.| 2. | At the beginning of 2010, the corporation purchased a machine for $54,000 (salvage value of $9,000) that had a useful life of 6 years. The bookkeeper used straight-line depreciation for 2010, 2011, and 2012 but failed to deduct the salvage value in computing the depreciation base.| 3. | Sale of securities held as a part of its portfolio resulted in a loss of $57,000 (pretax).| 4. | When its  president died, the corporation realized $150,000 from an insurance policy. The cash surrender value of this policy had been carried on the books as an investment in the amount of $46,000 (the gain is nontaxable).| 5. | The corporation disposed of its recreational division at a loss of $115,000 before taxes. Assume that this transaction meets the criteria for discontinued operations.| 6. | The corporation decided to change its method of inventory pricing from average cost to the FIFO method. The effect of this change on prior years is to increase 2010 income by $60,000 and decrease 2011 income by $20,000 before taxes. The FIFO method has been used for 2012. The tax rate on these items is 40%.| | Instructions: Prepare an income statement for the year 2012 starting with income from continuing operations before taxes. Compute earnings per share as it should be shown on the face of the income statement. Common shares outstanding for the year are 120,000 shares. (Assume a tax rate of 30% on all items, unless indicated otherwise.) Time Value of Money Problems BE6.5.Sally Medavoy will invest $8,000 a year for 20 years in a fund that will earn 12% annual interest. If the first payment into the fund occurs today, what amount will be in the fund in 20 years? If the first payment occurs at year-end, what amount will be in the fund in 20 years? BE6.7.John Fillmore’s lifelong dream is to own his own fishing boat to use in his retirement. John has recently come into an inheritance of $400,000. He estimates that the boat he wants will cost $300,000 when he retires in 5 years. How much of his inheritance must he invest at an annual rate of 12% (compounded annually) to buy the boat at retirement? BE6.8.Refer to the data in BE6.7. Assuming quarterly compounding of amounts invested at 12%, how much of John Fillmore’s inheritance must be invested to have enough at retirement to buy the boat? BE6.12.Maria Alvarez is investing $300,000 in a fund that earns 8% interest  compounded annually. What equal amounts can Maria withdraw at the end of each of the next 20 years? BE6.14.Amy Monroe wants to create a fund today that will enable her to withdraw $25,000 per year for 8 years, with the first withdrawal to take place 5 years from today. If the fund earns 8% interest, how much must Amy invest today? Bad Debt Expense Entries BE7.4. | | | Wilton, Inc. had net sales in 2012 of $1,400,000. At December 31, 2012, before adjusting entries, the balances in selected accounts were: Accounts Receivable $250,000 debit, and Allowance for Doubtful Accounts $2,400 credit. If Wilton estimates that 2% of its net sales will prove to be uncollectible, prepare the December 31, 2012, journal entry to record bad debt expense.| BE7.5. | Use the information presented in BE7.4 for Wilton, Inc. (a) | Instead of estimating the uncollectibles at 2% of net sales, assume that 10% of accounts receivable will prove to be uncollectible. Prepare the entry to record bad debt expense.| (b) | Instead of estimating uncollectibles at 2% of net sales, assume Wilton prepares an aging schedule that estimates total uncollectible accounts at $24,600. Prepare the entry to record bad debt expense.| | Non-Interest Bearing Note Receivable BE7.7.Dold Acrobats lent $16,529 to Donaldson, Inc., accepting Donaldson’s 2-year, $20,000, zero-interest-bearing note on 1/1/2012. The implied interest rate is 10%. Prepare Dold’s journal entries for the initial transaction, recognition of interest each year, and the collection of $20,000 at maturity. Inventory Errors (From Moodle Notes Ch. 8) 1. Merchandise purchased on account in 2010 was not recorded until 2011, when the company’s bookkeeper received an invoice for $5,430. The shipment had arrived and was counted in physical inventory at the end of 2010. a) What entry was NOT made in 2010? b) What adjusting entry was made at 12/31/10? c) What is the correcting entry in 2011? 2. Goods costing $22,000 were shipped f.o.b. shipping point by a supplier on December 28, 2011. The company received the invoice and recorded it on December 29; however, the goods were not included in the physical count of inventory since they were in transit. a) What entry was correctly made in 2011? b) What incorrect adjusting entry was made on 12/31/11? c) What is the correcting entry in 2012? BE9.2. Lower of Cost or Market Floyd Corporation has the following four items in its ending inventory. Item| Cost| Replacement Cost| Net Realizable Value (NRV)| NRV less Normal Profit Margin| Jokers| $2,000| $2,050| $2,100| $1,600| Penguins| 5,000| 5,100| 4,950| 4,100| Riddlers| 4,400| 4,550| 4,625| 3,700| Scarecrows| 3,200| 2,990| 3,830| 3,070| | Determine inventory value and record loss using allowance method. BE9.7.Gross Profit Method Fosbre Inc.’s April 30 inventory was destroyed by fire. January 1 inventory was $150,000, and purchases for January through April totaled $500,000. Sales for the same period were $700,000. Fosbre’s normal gross profit percentage is 35% on sales. Using the gross profit method, estimate Fosbre’s April 30 inventory that was destroyed by fire.

Mobile Technology Evolution and Its Influence on the Society

Mobile phones have long ago ceased being mere means of communication. Nowadays they quite successfully perform a much greater number of functions and as they evolutionize their impact on the society grows. Over the past few years mobile technology has shown steady and significant improvement. Mobile evolution has introduced new revolutionary features, some of which were unimaginable not too long ago. Driven by the slogan â€Å"If you can dream it, you can do it†, the 3G mobile phone manufacturers strive to make their products as sophisticated as possible, constantly updating the software, features and multimedia services (Take, Sopan). At this point it seems that there’s always way to perfection. The fact that mobile phones at this point are already saturated with impressive features makes further improvement challenging, and therefore even more desirable. The fact that one can get seemless and fast Internet connection on his phone is very appealing and much appreciated by the mobile phone users. GPS service is also among the latest and the most popular features available in 3G mobile phones (Willison, Simon). Another feature which seems to be a must for any phone is built-in camera. The quality of the pictures and video taken with the help of a tiny camera integrated in the mobile phone seems truly extraordinary and at times can even beat the quality provided by bigger cameras. As mobile evolution continues, the phones become more and more compact at the same time providing an increasing number of fascinating features. Constant struggle for improvement manifests the desire of mobile phone manufacturers to keep up with the relentless progress, which brings under the spotlight the most revolutionary and innovative products. There’s no denying the fact that such impressive improvements in mobile technology infallibly evoke acute interest not only in those, who closely monitor every technological invention, but also in the general public. Efficient marketing programs and overall popularity of certain mobile phone manufacturers, such as Nokia, lead to strong enthusiam among the people when a new model is about to be released. An illustrative example of the ultimate excitement over a new mobile phone model is the release of the Apple iPhone (Barylick, Chris, Honan, Matthew). The fact that hundreds of people spent days and nights in the street led by the desire to be among the first to get the dream-phone is very telling of the great place mobile phones have secured for themselves in our hearts and minds. Nowadays, a mobile phone is far more that a way to stay in touch. It is a symbol of status, taste and fashion consciousness of its owner. A new impressive mobile phone evokes respect while an obsolete one may call status into question. In conclusion, as mobile phones become more and more complex, their influence increases. People depend on their mobile phones for much more than just calls and text messages. One can hardly deny the importance of mobile phones, which have become an inseparable part of our everyday lives. They have even gone as far as to define their owner as a person. Works Cited 1. Barylick, Chris, Honan, Matthew. iPhone release brings out the crowds. June 26 2007. 2. Emily. Samsung, Armani to Launch ‘Armani Phone'. July 24, 2007 3. Richardson, Michael. Mobile Phone Becomes Status Symbol. 6 May 1994. Herald Tribune/News. 4. Take, Sopan. Evolution of the Mobile Technology. July 19 2004. Science and Technology. (http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/7-18-2004-56792.asp> 5. Wellman, Steven. Take 5: The Evolution Of The Mobile Phone User Experience. April 24 2007. The Information Week/Consumer/Personal Tech: Mobile. 6. Willison, Simon. New A-GPS service for Nokia phones. 6 August 2007.

Final Essay Questions - Law Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Final Questions - Law - Essay Example Both these scripts have almost similar concept that an offender should give â€Å"life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand and foot for foot†. Many old scripts and various religious dogmas have considered death penalty as an effective punishment and have justified that death penalty only can give greatest justice to the victim who has been murdered or killed. Arguments against the death penalty emerged only in 1700s, when few writers and philosophers including Italian scholar Cesare Beccaria began to question whether the death penalty is justice and ethical. They argued that capital punishment is unethical and barbaric. According to their arguments, killing a criminal makes a nation more brutal (Guernsey, 2009, p. 10). Crimes that are punishable by death are called capital punishment. Murder is the only capital crime many countries that apply death penalty. Child rape, treason, aircraft hijacking etc are also considered to be capital crimes in some countries. At the very forefronts of the debate of death penalty lies deterrence theory, that has long been a cornerstone that many researchers and scholars have used to argue for the death penalty. Deterrence theory have several times been quoted by judges, persecutors, officials and legal authoritative people to justify death penalty (Gerber and Johnson, 2007, p. 62). The basic consensus of the deterrence theory is that death penalty serves a general deterrence to crime. Based on studies, Mandery (2005, p. 49) concluded that there is wide consensus among America’s top criminologists that the death penalty does or it can reduce the rates of criminal violence among the society. People are more likely to be afraid of punishment. Strong punishment remains to be stronger shield for the criminals to get rid of their common criminal attitude. As Marzilli (2008, p. 21) observed, a strongest argument for the death penalty is its deterrence value that is based on common sense. People are afrai d of dying and hence people will be discouraged by the possibility of being sentenced to death for committing certain crimes that will cause them death. US Criminal Justice system has supported this straight forward logic. Almost all the people who were sentenced to death were appealing their sentence and this showed that they did not wish to die. Death penalty is morally correct because it is an effective method to provide the greatest justice for the victim and to alleviate the psychic pain of the victim’s family and relatives or friends etc. Alleviation of the psychic pain is more evident from family members and political followers etc. Death penalty circulates a moral statement to the public that there is a common behaviour that is more unacceptable to the community that one who indulges in killing, murdering or raping a child will be forfeited his right to live (Siegel, 2009, p. 513). When a criminal is killed by the law due to his criminal behaviour of killing others, t he community will be safe and the society will no longer be afraid of his mischief, and this supports the argument that death penalty is morally correct. Death penalty not only deters others people from doing such behaviors, but also saves community from people who are threats to social life as well. Rational Calculator Model Gerber and Johnson (2007, p. 63) found that supporters of the death penalty including Professor Pojman claims that death penal

Chinese Politics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Chinese Politics - Essay Example These students were against the failure of the state to mourn Hu Yaobang who was the CPC General Secretary and a symbol of liberal reform and a clean government to them. They were joined by allegiances that were against the communist and in need of economic reform and liberalization. The response of the PRC to the peaceful protests was repressive in nature and an absolute violation of human rights.2 The government had warned the protesters of drastic actions to control the ‘social chaos’. True to their words, army action was taken against the protesters and they were shot dead.3 Given that the troops sent by the PRC were unable to enforce martial law in the face of 100,000 protesters who had protested for seven weeks, they resorted to open fire indiscriminately on the protesters and this saw thousands of protesters killed thus making it the major turning point of the history of China. Apart from the killings, many other protesters together with their supporters were arrested and foreign press banned from the country thus leaving the coverage of events to be controlled strictly by the PRC press. The government used every possible measure to crush the uprising thus enabling it to remain in power. Russia and Eastern Europe faced an economic crisis as their economy performed poorly hence attracting public intervention. This led to protests against the government which was successful as it resulted in the displacement of the communist government. China, on the other hand, did not fall even though it faced similar challenges like the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe since it successfully suppressed every uprising. In addition, the economic performance of China was not declining given that years later under the same party the country has made tremendous progress economically.

Microtubules Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Microtubules - Essay Example Microtubules Again, these mechanisms need further exploration but the existing understanding is that reorganization of F-actin causes destabilization of transinteraction between TJ and AJ proteins of the adjacent epithelial cells and in turn initiate AJC internalization. Microtubules, which are also an important element of intracellular cytoskeleton have also been found to be closely related to the cell movement as a whole or any intracellular structure formation like, vesiscles and their movement. Data support the abundance of microtubules in differentiated renal and intestinal cells and depolymerization of microtubules leading to disruption of the integrity of TJs and Ajs in some tissues like lungs. This evidence led the author to explore the role of microtubules depolymerization in the disruptions of apical junction complex. Existing evidence strongly support the role of microtubules depolymerization in the disruption of intercellular connections like tight junctions and adherens junction in various tissues and helps in the pathogenesis of various disease processes. In this regard it has been shown that the endothelial intercellular junctions are also disassembled as well as others like in the brain. Building a rationale on the basis of these data, author formulated a hypothesis: ‘microtubules are involved in the disruption of apical junctions in simple epithelial cells’.... 'Disassembly of the AJC in calcium depleted SK-CO-15 cells is dependent on microtubule integrity;' 'Inhibition or attenuation of AJC disassembly by microtubule stabilization would indicate the role for dynamic microtubules in the process;' 'Polarity of perijunctional microtubules would dictate the type of microtubule motor which is involved in disassembly and internalization of the AJC.' To test these hypotheses, the author carried out a research study where a number of experimental activities were carried out, like: use of antibodies for the detection of intercellular junctions, while microtubules were detected by immunoflurescence labeling and Western Blotting. Cell culture was used was SK-CO-15, which is a transformed human colonic epithelial cell line. To make the medium free from Ca++, the monolayers of epithelium were washed with calcium free-Eagle's minimum essential medium for suspension culture. Pharmacological agents utilized were; nocodazole; docetaxel and pacitaxel; adenylimidodiphosphate (AMP-PNP) and aurintriccarboxyylic acid (ATA). Major findings Through this experiment, the author has been able to demonstrate the role of microtubules depolymerization in the disassembly of junctional complexes through a variety of experimental evidence. Disassembly of the AJC in calcium depleted SK-CO-15 cells To answer the research question related to first sub-hypothesis, the findings have been: At normal Ca++ concentrations, depolymerized microtubules with nocodazole TJ and AJ proteins were found to be located at the cell-cell contacts, reflecting chicken-wire staining pattern while in the environment with depletion of Ca++ for one hour the result was disruption of AJs and TJs with accumulation of e-cadherin, occluding and ZO-1 in

Exploratory argument on what has come to be called the school - to - Essay

Exploratory argument on what has come to be called the school - to - prison pipeline - Essay Example The STPP has become a social problem since learners drop out, causing social disruptions due to the influence of the policies. Primarily, radical changes are required within the NCLB (No Child Left Behind) act and the Zero tolerance policy to bring back education to its worth of content instead of test scores, image and funding. When learners are well provided with the test and material, administrators and teachers not only require them to prosper, but are more disturbed with the students’ failures, since they miss sufficient funding (Christle,  Jolivette & Nelson,  2005). This makes the education phase to be merely on money and funds instead of content oriented system. When schools became victims of little test score due to the societal economic standpoint, offense ridden where imprisonment is high and other contributing social issues, then administrators and teachers are put in a situation where they cannot come out of the issues within the time frame. Besides, given tha t the social populations of the society are wealthier and safe, it is believed that they have higher scores due to some benefits; they are not adequately learning the content but rather for further grants. The administrators and teachers have perceived the test scores and material as a dollar symbol to get federal funding; denying learners the chance to acquire the full knowledge of an education. The next factor to the social problem of the STPP (School to Prison Pipeline) is the Zero Tolerance rule. All schools in US (United States) have Zero tolerance rules meant to make learning institutions a safe place by keeping drugs and weapons out of them. In retrospect, the Zero Tolerance appears to ensure that the learners are safe in mind. However, the effects of expulsion and suspension do not appear reasonable. When a leaner is suspended and stopped from coming to school, he or she looses much of the learning time. Besides, expulsing or suspending a student makes his or her drops back on the learning, making them not to care about education hence dropping out of school. Drop out of learners with little life skills and education make students to resort to more criminal offenses and activities. The huge investment done by the US government on the criminal justice policy instead of education system is worrying and increases the risk of the (STPP) School to Prison Pipeline. This makes the youth awareness and motivation towards an education system to constantly be low concerning the experience and values of learning. The massive investment being employed into prisons versus education indicates the relation between the little budget of education as well as reduced test scores. Possibly, when much funding is spent on education, learners would get the equipment in education and academia so as not to be part of this trend. When this is adhered to, the social problem of the STPP (School to Prison Pipeline) would effortlessly decline. Besides, to eliminate the aforementione d social issue, teachers, administrators and teachers should be accommodated in adjusting the No Child Left Behind policy. The educational stakeholders such as cabinet secretaries, ministries and political leaders need to recognize the social problems faced by the education system to enable instructors educate and teach learners about the content of the

Media analysis paper examining leadership Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Media analysis paper examining leadership - Essay Example In episode 2 of restaurant impossible, the men’s teams are meeting to chant the way forward on an advertisement campaign to promote restaurant services (Cathy 2014). Robert Irvine who is the project manager depicts a number of characteristics leadership where he portrays a discursive technique by engaging his fellow members. We see Irvine trying to convey direct directives and bringing to the fore challenging questions for other members to ponder and find the best approach to undertake. Irvine comes up with a proposal on division of labour in form of statements, for instance he uses the phrase ‘need’ to assign roles (Northouse 2013). Robert Irvine exemplifies himself as a leader by dominating the floor as the resultant task assigner and spells out his role as the floater. According to the different leadership theories, Irvine portrays that a leader is born and made. In this perspective we find that Irvine is influenced by the situation to stand with his team to make the best alternatives. The situation influences him to stand out as the coordinator of the campaign. This can be cemented by the attributes and the use of ‘okay’ which is an approach that ensures that the members completely comprehend their roles, this is typical to most leaders as a leader as to ensure that the subordinates are ready for the tasks. Irvine displays a high degree of leadership which according to a member of his team is a positive technique (Northouse 2013). In episode 4, Robert Irvine travels to Italy to save a collapsing Italy restaurant. Robert Irvine is recognized as the leader and allowed to adopt all the changes he may require in the group. Robert Irvine accused of trying to curtail the decisions that his team mates makes on the business campaign, a member is quoted saying ‘you’re obviously getting mad that I’m thinking on my own’.

Entrepreneurship and Business Start-up Assignment

Entrepreneurship and Business Start-up - Assignment Example We listen to their needs and work with them to create and manage each event successfully. We help them achieve their personal, financial, professional, social, and artistic objectives. The people behind PEC are seasoned organisers and social network specialists who have a track record of successful event management experience dating back to several years. Our services include planning and executing for special events such as meetings, conferences, birthdays and special occasions, concerts, book launchings, exhibits, inaugurations, fund-raising, special dinners, victory parties, graduations, sports tournaments, and reunions. We want every event that we plan, organise and carry out to be successful, whether it is an intimate dinner for two or a conference for 100. We strategically established an upper limit to the number of participants to events we organise at this number for the first five years because of the unique financial model we employ of fixing the price we charge to competitive unit rates. We can increase these numbers much later. Regardless of the number of people at our events, we aim to take care of every detail for the event to provide the greatest pleasure and to make it a memorable experience. We offer a host of packages and services specifically tailored to the needs of each client and participant, and we are confident that this business venture will succeed and that our net income will increase according to our modest projections. 1.2 Mission Statement PRO-ACT Events Consultants (PEC) is a full service company that provides complete consulting services for any event, except weddings and anniversaries. Our consultants are experienced and dedicated professionals with many years of event planning experience. We are unique in that we give our clients our undivided attention and assure them that we are people they can trust. We listen to their needs and work with them to create the event of their dreams. We make everything possible. We have a professionally developed strategic plan that promises to make PEC one of the best places to work for in the world where everyone enjoys what one is doing, where the financial rewards are generous, and where everyday is a party! Our success is determined by the success of our

The Microsoft as a Service Provider Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 3

The Microsoft as a Service Provider - Essay Example In this case, the nine states are responsible for regulating the operations of Microsoft, the reason why they have instituted a legal case against Microsoft for trying to undermine Linux, a scenario seen as likely to scuttle competition in the industry which is detrimental to economic growth. This also has negative effects with regards to promotion of competition in the industry. b) Basically, an ethical consideration specifically refers to something that is generally accepted as morally, socially and even economically good for various stakeholders that is the general population as a whole which is affected by the operations of a particular organization. In this regard, we would be looking at how the operations say of another company can impact on the welfare of different stakeholders who are either directly or indirectly involved in its operations. In the given case study, it can be clearly seen that the nine U.S. states are up in arms with the software giant, Microsoft as they have a court case against it for allegedly trying to undermine an open source operating system rival Linux. In the ongoing antitrust court case, the nine states are advocating tougher action against Microsoft which is seen as having violated its ethical code of conduct for trying to work underground in a bid to stifle the operating system developed by another different, rival software company. Ethically, there should be no company that should violate the operations of other different organizations. Therefore, by trying to stifle Linux, Microsoft would not be acting in a professional and ethical manner as expected by different stakeholders as this would discourage competition within the industry. This is clearly shown in the case where the nine states argue that the judge should take as evidence the memo by the executive of Microsoft.

Canada, My Canada Essay Example for Free

Canada, My Canada Essay Three summers back, a friend and I were being hurtled by bus through the heart of Australia, the desert flashing pink and red before our disbelieving eyes. It seemed never to end, this desert, so flat, so dry. The landscape was very unlike ours – scrub growth with some exotic cacti, no lakes, no rivers, just sand and rock forever. Beautiful, haunting even – what the surface of the moon must look like, I thought as I sat in the dusk in that almost empty bus. I turned to look out the front of the bus and was suddenly taken completely by surprise. Screaming out at me in great black lettering were the words CANADA NO. 1 COUNTRY IN THE WORLD. My eyes lit up, my heart gave a heave, and I felt a pang of homesickness so acute I actually almost hurt. It was all I could do to keep myself from leaping out of my seat and grabbing the newspaper from its owner. As I learned within minutes (I did indeed beg to borrow the paper), the pronouncement was based on information collected by the United Nations from studies comparing standards of living for 174 nations of the world. Some people may have doubted the finding, but I didn’t, not for an instant. Where else in the world can you travel by bus, automobile, or train (and the odd ferry) for ten, 12, or 14 days straight and see a landscape that changes so spectacularly: the Newfoundland coast with its white foam and roar; the red sand beaches of Prince Edward Island; the graceful curves and slopes of Cape Breton’s Cabot Trail; the rolling dairy land of south-shore Quebec; the maple-bordered lakes of Ontario; the haunting north shore of Lake Superior; the wheat fields of Manitoba and Saskatchewan; the ranch land of Alberta; the mountain ranges and lush rain forests of the West Coast. The list could  go on for pages and still cover only the southern section of the country, a sliver of land compared with the North, the immensity of which is almost unimaginable. For six years in a row now the United Nations has designated Canada the no. 1 country in which to live. We are so fortunate. We are water wealthy and forest rich. Minerals, fertile land, wild animals, plant life, the rhythm of four distinct, undeniable seasons – we have it all. Of course, Canada has its problems. We’d like to lower the crime rate, but ours is a relatively safe country. We struggle with our healthcare system, trying to find a balance between universality and affordability, but no person in this country is denied medical care for lack of money. Yes, we have concerns, but in the global scheme of things we are well off. Think of our history. For the greater part, the pain and violence, tragedy, horror, and evil that have scarred forever the history of too many countries are largely absent from our past. There’s no denying we’ve had our trials, but they pale by comparison with events that have shaped many other nations. Our cities are gems. Take Toronto, where I have chosen to live. My adopted city never fails to thrill me with its racial, linguistic, and cultural diversity. On any ordinary day on the city’s streets and subway, in stores and restaurants, I can hear the muted ebb and flow of 20 different tongues. I can feast on food from different continents, from Greek souvlaki to Thai mango salad, from Italian prosciutto to Jamaican jerk chicken, from Indian lamb curry to Chinese lobster. And do all these people get along? Well, they all enjoy a life of relative harmony, cooperation and peace. They certainly aren’t terrorizing, torturing, and massacring one another. They’re not igniting pubs, cars, and schools with explosives that blind, cripple, and maim. And they’re not killing children with machetes, cleavers and axes. Dislike – rancour, even – may exist here and there, but not, I believe, hatred of the blistering intensity we see elsewhere. Is Canada a successful experiment in racial harmony and peaceful co-existence? Yes, I would say so – and proudly.  When I, as an aboriginal citizen of this country, find myself thinking about all the people we’ve received into this beautiful homeland of mine, when I think of the millions to whom we’ve given safe haven, following agony, terror, hunger, and great sadness in their home countries, well, my little Cree heart just puffs up with pride. And I walk the streets of Canada, the streets of my home, feeling tall as a maple.

Research on Malaria in Moyale District Essay Example for Free

Research on Malaria in Moyale District Essay The term `Malaria originates from Medieval Italian Mala aria which mean â€Å"bad air†; and the disease was formerly called Ague or Marsh fever due to its association with swamps and marshland, (Watkins, 2001). Scientific studies on Malaria made their first significant advance in 1880, when Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran a French army doctor working in the military hospital of Constantine in Algeria observed malaria plasmodium parasites inside the red blood cell of people suffering from Malaria. Documentation of report on discovery of origin of Malaria, one of the deadliest diseases of humanity shows that Chimpanzees, native to equatorial Africa have been identified as the original source of the parasite that likely moved from them to humans via mosquitoes. Wolfe, (2009) identified several parasites from Chimpanzee that show Malarial jumped from animal to human. Malaria is transmitted by Anopheline mosquitoes the number and type of which determine the extent of transmission in a given area. The plasmodium falciparum accounts for the majority of infections and is most lethal. Transmission is affected by climate and geography and often coincides with the rainy season. In WHO/UNICEF, (2005) report malaria is one of the most devastating global public health problems with more than one million deaths and approximately 300-500 million cases of malaria annually. WHO, (2010) report, Malaria is by far the world’s worse tropical parasitic disease, and kills more people than any other communicable disease. Several studies observed that malaria kills more than 3,000 children daily and is the single most important factor for mortality among children under the age of five. Additionally, an estimated 25 million pregnant women are at risk of malaria. Malaria is endemic in a total of 101 countries and territories 45 countries in WHO’s African region, 21 in WHO’s American region, 4 in WHO’s European region, 14 in WHO’s Eastern Mediterrarian Region, 8 In WHO’s South – East Asia region, and 9 in WHO’s Western Pacific region, (report from global health council on impact of infectious diseases. ) WHO, (2007) report has shown that malaria has reached epidemic proportions in many regions of the world and continues to spread unchecked. In many regions of developing countries malaria exacts an enormous toll in lives, medical costs, and in days of labor lost. According to Roll-Back Malaria (RBM), over 40 per cent of the World’s children live in malaria-endemic countries and 107 countries and territories are at risk of malaria transmission. Malaria causes 24 percent of under-five deaths in Equatorial Guinea (UNICEF 2008). Malaria is preventable, if adequate resources are invested in prevention. About 98 percent of Equatorial Guineans live in areas with endemic risk of malaria but only one percent of children under five sleeps under insecticide-treated nets. This is far fewer than in other Countries with similar malaria risk. This suggests inadequate efforts to prevent malaria that would contribute to the realization of the right to health of both children and adults. Children under the age of five, pregnant women, and people living with HIV and AIDS are at highest risk for developing clinical malaria. More than 80 per cent of these cases occur in sub-Saharan Africa. WHO/RBM, (2004). Malaria is a primary cause of poverty, putting additional burdens on health systems and costing Africa an estimated 12 billion USDs in lost production every year. The spread of the disease is fuelled by several factors: climate change, increasing population mobility, more frequent international transport, emergence of multi drug-resistant strains, and military and economic deterioration. Abuja summit in Nigeria in the year 2000, 44 African leaders reaffirmed their commitment to roll back malaria and set interim target for Africa. They challenged other world leaders to join them in recognizing the importance of tackling malaria as a disease of poverty. Following the Abuja summit, Africa Malaria Day was declared as a day to celebrate on malaria and a subsequent UN resolution declared 2001-2010. Roll Back Malaria, especially in Africa, giving prominence to Malaria in United Nations Millennium Development Goals. The Africa Malaria report, released in the year 2003/Nairobi/Geneva/New York by the World Health Organization (WHO 2005), and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), said the death toll from malaria remains outrageously high-with a child dying in every 30 seconds. The report gives an African situation for the struggle against the diseases and highlights the urgent need to make effective anti-malarial treatment available to most at risk. â€Å"The roll back Malaria initiatives has made considerable progress since it was launched in 1998, but we need to increase to combat a devastating disease which is holding back the development of many African countries,† states Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, Director-General of WHO. Nationally Malaria has been a serious public health problem in most Districts of Kenya and the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in Kenya. With more than 70% of the Kenya’s population living in areas where malaria is transmitted, Malaria is responsible for approximately 30% of out-patient visits (requiring more than eight million out-patient treatments each year), and 19% of all hospital admissions. At least 14,000 children are hospitalized annually for malaria, and there are an estimated 34,000 deaths among children under-five each year. Annually, an estimated six thousand pregnant women suffer from malaria-associated anemia, and four thousand babies are born with low birth weight as a result of maternal anemia, report from government health facility in 2007. Economically, it is estimated that 170 million working days are lost each year because of malaria illness. Culture and poor access to health facilities lead to increase in cases of malaria. The main thing peculiar with children under 5 years is that many cannot sleep under net due to incapability of their parent especially in rural areas, because of the few wages they hardly get from their casual work. Most children again play outside in the grasses or near drainage where mosquito’s breeds thus are exposed to mosquito bites. In local situation Malaria is the highest causes death of many people in the region of Moyale and districts of North Eastern province bordering Moyale district from east. Malaria claims the life of 1,500 in the year 1998 and out of that 45 death in Wajir district (Daily Nation, Thursday, February 1998). Sololo Mission Hospital reported the admission of 67 people. Out of 67people, 25 children of less than five years were reported cases of malaria (SMH/1999). 1. 2 problem articulation/ statement: Malaria is World’s most important parasite infectious disease. Over 2 billion people are at risk between 300 and 500 million episodes and over 1 million deaths annually, WHO, (2005). Over 90% of malaria burden are in sub-Saharan Africa. Malaria is one of the planets deadliest diseases and one of the leading causes of sickness and death in the developing world. Documentation also show that Malaria affect child cognitive, physical development and leads to poor school attendance. Malaria also leads to malnutrition and anemic condition in children. More so it also affects adult’s ability to make a living and care for their families. At country level malaria affects trade, tourism and foreign direct investment and there is significant correlation between malaria and poverty. An average GDP in malaria’s countries is five times lower than in non-malaria’s countries 1. 3 Objectives of the study To establish factors that lead to high prevalence of Malaria in children under five years in Obbu Division, Moyale District. 1. 4 Specific objectives: 1. To determine socio-demographic factors contributing to Malaria prevalence among the under five children in Obbu division. 2. To establish the level of knowledge on Malaria, among caregivers of children under five in Obbu Division. . 5 Research questions 1. What are the main factors contributing to high prevalence of Malaria among the under five children in Obbu division? 2. What is the knowledge level of care givers of children under five years about the risk factors of late treatment and prevention of Malaria? 3. To what extent the level of knowledge on Malari a, among caregivers of children under five in Obbu Division? 1. 6. Hypothesis/assumption There were no factors that contribute to prevalence of malaria in children less than five years in Obbu Division of Solol District 1. 7 Justification of the study. Malaria outbreak in mid July 2012, number of cases diagnosed were 82, and 8 out of 10 reported death were children under five (Malaria/SMH/ 20012/3). The prevalence was precipitated by illiteracy, migration lifestyle of pastoralists’ community and uncontrolled border intermingling and refugees from neighboring countries like Ethiopia and Somali as revealed by the study of Diseases Outbreak Management Unit-DOMU (2002). Socio demographic factors and knowledge about the diseases control and prevention attracted a lot of concern that call for research in these factors. Obbu division has few documentation of the study, so this will be helpful to academia as it will be used as document of references for a researcher in the same area of study. The government or other stakeholders will benefit from the findings and may take intervention measures for instance the Ministry of public health to educate people on the better prevention methods. The findings of the study will be used by people of the study area to plan for the prevention of the malaria, since it is preventable at every household. 1. 8 Scope of the study To investigate main factors contributing to high prevalence of Malaria among children less than five years of age in Obbu division of Moyale district. . 1. 9 Limitations 1. Data collection during interview was difficult due to migration of the population but the settlement around the centre of each four location was targeted. 2. Cost of getting trained research assistant was challenging. 3. The study was limited to factors contributing to prevalence of malaria in children less than five years of age. 2. 0 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW 2. 1. 0 Origin of malaria. The history of malaria replete with a number of theories about its aetiology, the earliest theory was the Miasmatic. This theory postulated that swamp air contained chemicals which had been freed from rotting wood. This air was what was responsible for causing malaria (Ransford 1983). It was because of this theory that double storey buildings were preferred during the early days of the colonial period as it was believed that miasma did not rise above ground level (Ransford 1983) and that the miasma was thought to spread horizontally (King and King 1992). Ransford and Friedson claim that Africans were the ones who first recognized the link between mosquitoes and malaria (Ransford 1983; Friedson 1996) and in the West it was only known later through the pioneering works of Patrick Mason, Ronald Ross, Grassi and others around the 1890s. 2. 1. 1 Prevalence of Malaria. There are 300-500 million clinical cases of Malaria each year resulting in 1. 5 to 2. 7 million deaths (WHO, 2005). Global viral forecasting initiative and standard university, made the discovery published in the Aug. 2009 proceedings of the National academy of sciences Wolfe, (2009). Malaria in most countries of Western Pacific and Regional Organizations has significantly declined in the period 1992 to 2000. There is widespread consensus that the change to Artemisinin Based Combination (ACT) in Vietnam was a significant factor in the 98% drop in malaria mortality between 1992 and 2002. The geographical area affected by malaria has shrunk considerably over the past 50 years, but control is becoming more difficult and gains are being eroded. Increased risk of the disease is linked with changes in land use linked to activities like road building, mining, logging and Agricultural and irrigation projects, particularly in â€Å"frontier† areas like the rain forests. Other causes of its spread include global climatic change, disintegration of health services, armed conflicts and mass movements of refugees. According to citation from the August 97 issue of the American magazine the Atlantic Monthly entitled â€Å"Resurgence of a Deadly Disease† by Ellen Rippel Shell.

Investigating The Companies Of Tesco And Oxfam Business Essay

Investigating The Companies Of Tesco And Oxfam Business Essay Tesco is Britains largest retailer, and it is the third largest grocery retailer in the world. Tesco is a profit making business which started out by selling groceries, but now they sell a whole variety of products from tea bags all the way up to televisions. The purpose of Tesco is to please every customer and keep them loyal for a life time, as this saying says on their website. Our Core Purpose is to create value for customers to earn their lifetime loyalty. The aims and objectives of Tescos are; To capitalize on sales Develop and maintain the number one retail business in the UK. To outperform rivals and remain the market leader. Highest aim of Tesco is to maximize revenue. To supply goods/services that is low-priced and affordable to consumers or the public Tesco would want to expand their business buy making new green buildings for their stores to keep their carbon footprint down. By doing this it would appeal to wider customer bases who believe in environmentally friendly buildings are to be built to sustain global warming. On the other hand Oxfam is a charity organization, which was formed in 1995 by a group of independent non-governmental organizations. Their objectives are to work together for a superior effect on the global stage to reduce poverty and injustice. Oxfam is a world front-runner in the delivery of emergency aid; Oxfam also implants long term development programs in weak societies. Also Oxfam help people to campaign with people and organizations for things such as; Ending unfair trade Demand better health and education services for all. The aims and objectives of Oxfam would be; Support third world nations in any way they can. Get rid of poverty, distress and suffering. Educate people about natural disasters and the effect this has on poverty. To campaign for a fair-minded world. Encourage western nations to aid poorer third world countries. Oxfams main concern would be the donation of food to relieve famine, over the years Oxfam has developed plans to fight the causes of famine. In addition to food and medication Oxfam also offers tools to allow people to become self-sufficient. Ownership Tesco is a Private Limited Company or Plc., it is owned by several people or thousands of people. The reason Tesco is a Plc. is because of the sheer size of the business, it is huge. Due to its size it would be tough to raise sufficient funds for Tesco if it was owned by a sole trader or by partners whereas in a Plc., the company is owned by shareholders who fund the company. This happens by the people buying shares in the company and becoming shareholders. Sometimes this may seem more appealing to people who are investing because they have the bonus of limited liability. Limited liability is where if the business goes bankrupt then you only lose the money that you invested. Unlimited liability relates to soul traders and partnerships if one of these were to go bankrupt then they could lose all their personal assets over it and the money they put into it. Stakeholders influence the purpose of Tesco because if it werent for the investors then the business wouldnt be able to run. The investors invest their own money to better the business and receive a profit. This is how the following could influence the organization; Customers Customers would want to be treated equally and with loyalty or they would go elsewhere, Tesco could lose customers. Employees Employees want better pay or theyll treat the customers in a poor manner so this would mean the customers would go elsewhere. Shareholders Shareholders invest their own money into the business and want great returns or the share values would decrease in value. Pressure groups Pressure groups could stop the business from opening stores in small communities, which would affect many small businesses. Trade unions Trade unions want staff to be treated fairly, equally and with respect. Also to be paid reasonable wages irrespective of age, race or gender. Suppliers Suppliers want fairness in business trading or would give the company a bad reputation. Government Government want their taxes paid, also to reduce unemployment in the local areas. Local community the community could protest against Tesco or boycott the business, if they damage the local environment or wildlife. Oxfam is a charity so they wont be owned by anybody, but there will be paid staff and a CEO. The CEO would deal with all the staff and media, but all the choices would be made by a panel of directors. The panel of directors would be chosen by the individuals who pay (donors/associates). The directors have the duty to follow their members or associates desires and do what they aim or set out to do. I.e. help third world countries or provide health and education to the poor. For Oxfam the stakeholder which would be the panel of directors would influence the organization because, if they were not to listen to their members/donors thoughts then they could make the wrong decisions for the organization and this could possibly put the organization out of business. I.e. if the directors were to ignore their members then no one would support Oxfam and could damage the business. This is how the following could influence the organization; Customers Customers want to be treated fair and equal or they could go to another rival charity. Employees Employees could be working voluntary or on a wage but either way they would want to be treated respectively, regardless of age, race or gender. Shareholders Shareholders within Oxfam would be the directors. They would want whats best for the business because it is a charity and it isnt a profit making business. Pressure groups Pressure groups could stop Oxfam from using plastic bags for their organization as it is not very economical. Trade unions Trade unions want staff to be treated fairly, equally and with respect. Also to be paid reasonable wages irrespective of age, race or gender. Suppliers Suppliers could provide free clothing to the charity but they could be in bad condition and this could affect how the charity would sell them. Government Government want their taxes paid. Local community the community could protest against Oxfam for not asking from clothes around the community instead of importing them from abroad. Tescos Organization chart As you can see Tescos organization chart is a hierarchical structure and a complex structure because Tesco have many levels of hierarchy and many leaders of certain departments. This means or shows that the power of owning the business is spread out. I.E. the people at the top of the chart (Chairman) and people at the bottom of the chart (employees) can make decisions about what happens within the business. Also each store in the Tesco series of supermarkets has a store manager who makes decisions regarding the store he/she is managing. Then all the managers in the region or area report the information to their regional manager. Tesco has a distributed organizational structure and the advantages of these are; Senior managers can concentrate on the most crucial decisions. Decision making powers held by the employees, may motivate them and increase their work ethic. Responses to challenges and alterations are much quicker in a distributed organizational structure. The span control Tescos has many leaders and people as heads of certain departments. This makes it easier for them to manage and control their employees and staff. Tescos have divided the responsibilities for leaders to look after certain amount of people. Oxfam Organization chart Oxfams organizational structure is based on just making enough money to cover costs. As you can see In the chart above everyone is working together to achieve a goal. Oxfam doesnt have many head of departments as Tesco, because they have teams based at different places around world and all work together. Directors The panel of directors would make the choices for the charity and take on board the views of the members/associates. Finance the finance department would look at the records of Oxfam, and provide the directors with information that they can use for future decision making. i.e., the cost of donating charity to the remote places in the world. But the directors would need to be continually conscious of their financial state, or could harm the business in future without knowing so. Staff and volunteers staff and volunteers could keep the charities income raising by selling the products within the store, and working as hard as possible for the business. Fundraising and supporter making decision Fundraising is key for Oxfam to survive because; it relies on people providing money so they could help needy people around the globe. Oxfam also take into account their donators and supporters views to better their services. International aid this is where Oxfam supports and helps people all over the world. They do this only by the money they are provided with from certain people and organizations. Span control Oxfam has many teams around the world that manage certain amount of employees/volunteers. So the employees are supervised and get their work done effectively. Style of Organizations The style of Tescos organization is very organized and very direct. Their aim is to please the consumer/customer as best they can. But their main purpose would be; To make money and capitalize, if it doesnt do that, it cant exist. Tesco is a major retailer in grocery and all-purpose retailing. To provide excellent quality goods and services to their customers Tesco mission Creating value for customers, to earn their lifetime loyalty. Tesco values Tescos fundamental purpose is to create value for consumers to earn their lifetime loyalty. The supermarkets success relies on their customers, i.e. if the customers like what Tesco are offering and doing then they are more likely to come back and shop with them again. To understand customers Be first to meet their requirements Act responsibly for the surrounding communities To work as a team Tesco objectives and Strategic aims to capitalize on sales Grow and maintain number 1 retailer in the UK To outshine and outperform competitors They would want to be able to keep their carbon foot prints down by making energy efficient buildings. Also to achieve specific targets that the business wants to achieve, like if they wanted to make a certain amount of profit a year they would have to change or adopt a business plan to achieve their goal. SMART Specific make a certain amount of profit a year Measurable Within a year Achievable Very possible to reach the target Realistic positively realistic Time specific it would be achieved within a period of a year Strategic plans allow a business to achieve its Purposes/objectives; they are based on whats going on during the current marketplace. So Tesco must do its research to find out lots of information about its customers, sales, competitors, market shares etc. Tesco strategic process making their shopping spree as relaxed as possible continually seeking to reduce their prices to help you spend less offering the convenience of either large or small stores bringing simplicity and value to complicated markets Oxfams organization is more based on working together internationally to achieve greater impact by our collective efforts. Also to work mostly through local responsible organizations, pursuing to strengthen their authorization. Oxfam mission and values are to; Further Oxfams common goals Promote, assist and co-ordinate collaboration among the Oxfams where this will result in a greater impact of the sum total of their joint efforts Protect the Oxfam name and enhance its standing. http://www.oxfam.org/en/about/what/mission Strategic aims and objectives aim to help the poor in the developing countries and to try and make a change in a persons life. To address structural causes of poverty and related injustice Help people directly where capacity is inadequate or unsuitable for Oxfam purposes To have peace and substantial arm reduced for development SMART objective Specific To reduce poverty and hunger for the poor Measurable within 10 years Achievable with hard and dedication yes Realistic with hard and dedication yes Time specific within 10 years of starting development in poorer countries M1 The points of views from different stakeholders would vary because they would have different opinions on certain topics. For example the customers who hold a stake in Tescos could want cheaper prices for customers, but on the other hand store managers could go against lowering prices as this could lead to not making enough profit. Or they could have to sell more products to break even. Customers customers points of views or opinion if they were to effect Tesco strategic aims and objectives would be about the service they receive. As a customer you would want to receive the highest level of customer service from such a big store like Tesco. I would think that most of Tesco strategic aims are based around or on their customers feedback, like if they wanted to expand into other areas of business, like selling hardware and home furniture they would have to see if customers were interested and would they actually buy from them. We are used to seeing Tesco in all places as they are looking to expand and dominate their competitors. This would be good for customers because Tesco would expand and open large stores giving jobs and services to customers and local people. Oxfam customers The customers of Oxfam would expect Oxfam to claim more aid etc, to meet their specific aims and strategic aims. They would also expect Oxfam to open many stores across the nation to help provide jobs and aid for suffering people, also to provide customers/local people with jobs and by opening more stores this could help raise the amount that Oxfam donate to suffering people. Customers that influence the charity would like to see more posts for voluntary work which could help them reach their objectives and aims in the specific time. Tesco suppliers the suppliers of Tesco would benefit from their strategic aims and objectives because Tesco are always looking to expand. This would mean more demand for products from their suppliers, also meaning that more stores are open and more jobs made for people. This indicates more revenue made, and more cash spent on suppliers for products. The supplies would be needed throughout the world and would need to be reliable because Tesco would rely on their supplies heavily. Tesco would rely on their suppliers to deliver goods and products to all their stores nationally and internationally, so suppliers would be needed around the world, in order to cope with the demand of products that Tesco require. The strategic aims and objectives would give the suppliers of Tesco a good contact

Cerebellar Lesions :: Neurology Health Medical Essays

Cerebellar Lesions According to an article by Rhawn Joseph, Ph.D., each of the deep cerebellar nuclei maintains a semi-independent map of the human body (2000). The cerebellum is tonically active, and is presumed to exert a stabilizing influence on motor function; accordingly, it is functionally responsible for coordination and smooth fine tuning of movement, in addition to influencing timing. Not only is the cerebellum associated with motor functioning, but, importantly, also with classical conditioning: e.g., the learning of new motor programs (Joseph, 2000). It is associated with the acquisition if finely skilled movements, such as playing an instrument, playing a sport, and performance dance. Interestingly, as motor information is acquired, it takes time for the cerebellum to acquire control over the specific task. With the notion of â€Å"practice makes perfect,† task control shifts from conscious cortical control (active, practicing memory) to the subconscious realm and control of the cerebellum. Hence, the cerebellum plays an integrated and important part in complex learning and memory (Joseph, 2000.) During early learning stages, cerebellar climbing fibers are activated, and mossy fibers seem to modulate and to monitor ongoing and related activity in the learning context. Lesions occurring in the cerebellum have the unfortunate effect of abolishing conditioned response acquisition and retention. Such lesions and/or diseases cause motor incoordination called ataxia, with symptoms of tremors, instability and teetering, and an inability to maintain regular movement of tempo (nanonline.org). There are three known major cerebellar syndromes. The vestibulocerebellar cortex controls movement of the eyes and body relating to gravity and turning of the head in space; damage to this area results in ataxia gait and stance, as described above. The spinocerebellar system, which receives information via rapid spinocerebellar pathways during the duration of movement, modulates and smoothes that movement. Lesions occurring in the spinocerebellar system are a result of chronic alcoholism and thiamine deficiency (nanonline.org, Joseph, 2000), and results in difficulty producing rapid and smooth movements. There occurs a prominent shuffle, wide gait, and hesitating steps, with ataxia, tremor and difficulty in lower limb coordination. Lastly, lesions of the cerebrocerebellum (neocerebellum) have blatant effects on well- learned volitional movements, as it has direct pathways with cerebral cortex motor control regions. Several symptoms exist to suggest cerebellar lesions. Joseph (2000) reports a study by Gordon Holmes (1971, 1939) that investigated cerebellar disturbances following gunshot wounds. Deficits involved voluntary/skilled motor function, gait ataxia, dysarthria (loss of proprioceptive input), asynergia (loss of

Ironclads Of The Civil War :: essays research papers

IRONCLADS OF THE CIVIL WAR   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The book I read is called IRONCLADS OF THE CIVIL WAR. When you think of the Civil War you think of on land battles, but there were also many battles in the water. The Civil War introduced the Ironclads, which are huge ships made of iron with no sails and very destructive.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The first built and launched ironclad was in 1855 and it was named the Merrimac. Europe just starting building ironclads and sent her to Norfolk. The Merrimac was still there when Virginia seceded from the Union in April of 1861. The Union then sank the Merrimac and set her afire but the hull of the shop and the engines settled in the bottom of the river. The Confederates found it and raised the parts out. It took 1,500 men to work on the Merrimac. It was a very slow process because there was not many supplies or tools. The Merrimac needed needed on thousand tons of iron. It was difficult to get some because there was very few iron manufacturers anywhere in the South and there was just one able to supply enough. The Merrimac got a small share of iron and then went to work. It took over a year to get this ship finished. The captain was Franklin Buchnan and he had 300 men for a crew.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Most of the men were soldiers recently assigned out of artillery regiments. And there were very few sailors in the South, so most were clueless on where to go or what to do. When everything was done and she began to move it looked like the Merrimac was capable of doing what she was meant to do. The Northerners were warned about this ironclad â€Å"monster† and were waiting for this moment a long time. When the Merrimac came into view she fought the Cumberland and ended up destroying it. The shell burst into the rail and knocked down nine men of the Cumberland. In the end the Merrimac destroyed the Cumberland. But no ship in the navy ever fought as hard or as brave as the Cumberland did.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Once the word got around about the ironclad everyone started to make them. France built the Gloire and England built the Warrior. By the Civil War was a year old the navies were being complemented with ironclad. And the Union knew that they had to have an ironclad to ever beat the South Merrimac Captain John Ericisson

Attention Defecit Disorder Essay -- ADD Behavior Disorders Essays

Attention Defecit Disorder Attention deficit disorder, also called ADD, is defined as 'a disorder primarily a characteristic of childhood, marked by a consistent problem in paying attention,' in the book, The Lifespan by Guy R. Lefrancois (1999). It is more common among boys than girls but can effect all ages. Focusing on children between the ages of five thru ten, it is estimated that three to five percent, which is 1.35 - 2.25 million, of all children are living with ADD. When accompanied by serious hyperactivity, ADD is labeled as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. This disorder makes it very challenging for educators to deal with. Understanding the characteristics of this disorder, how to treat the disorder thru medicine, and how to teach a child with this disorder, will make it better for children and educators inside and out of the classroom. In the article, Teaching Children with Attention Deficit Disorder, it is said that there are two kinds of ADD; regular ADD and ADHD. To have ADHD, a student must portray at least eight of the symptoms from the following list: 1.) fidget, squirm, or seem restless 2.) difficulty remaining in a seated position 3.) easily distracted 4.) difficulty taking turns 5.) blurts out answers 6.) difficulty following instructions 7.) difficulty sustaing attention 8.) does not complete assignments 9.) difficulty playing quietly 10.) talk excessively 11.) interrupts or intrudes on others 12.) does not listen 13.) loses possessions 14.) frequently engage in dangerous actions. It also says that having ADD means that you have a short attention span, impulse control problems, and extreme hyperactivity. The disease begins in infancy and does not end until adulthood. It ha... ... do not know how to teach students with the disorder, then you are failing your duty as an instructor. The only way to help these children is to learn about them first. By doing this, a healthier learning environment is created for you, the students, and the school. References I. Franciois, G. (1999). The Lifespan. Belmont CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company. II. (1989). Teaching Children with Attention Deficit Disorder. Eric Clearinghouse. Retrieved April 3, 2005. Cook Library database. III. (1992). Providing an Appropriate Education to Children with Attention Deficit Disorder. Eric Clearinghouse. Retrieved April 3, 2005. Cook Library database. IV. Blair, C. (2003). Self Regulation and School-Readiness. Eric Clearinghouse. Retrieved April 3, 2005. Cook Library database. V. Theresa Davis- Relay Elementary School- Baltimore County Public School

Leadership: Bases of Power Essay

Who would want to work for a weak manager? Managers need power to do their jobs, because their jobs require them to influence others. Consequently, managers who feel powerless to influence others experience a tremendous amount of frustration and stress. Their staff members tend to feel frustrated too. Power means many different things to different people. For some, power is seen as corrupt. For others, the more power they have, the more successful they feel. For even others, power is of no interest at all. Positions of authority confer power to the people who hold managerial positions. However, managers who rely solely on their formal authority to influence others will find that it doesn’t inspire their staff, and can even demoralize them. Hence, it helps to also derive power from other sources. Charisma and having personal appeal are sources of power too. Power can also be developed by becoming and expert or by performing critical role for the firm. Bases of Social Power Bases of power refer to the methods that managers and leaders utilize to influence their employees. When examining bases of power, the concept of authority must also be considered. These two are interconnected attributes tied to the behavior of superiors over subordinates. In their article, â€Å"Are There No Limits To Authority?†, David Knights and Darren McCabe explain that â€Å"power should be understood to be a condition of social relations. Thus, it is erroneous to ask who has power. Instead, it is necessary to explore how power is exercised.† In turn, the nature of how power is exercised is a workable definition for authority. In short, authority and power are intertwined, with power being the ability to do things or have others do what one has ordered while authority is the foundation on which that power is built. The bases of social power are very diverse, and no list is ever complete. Nonetheless, the commonly identified bases of power fit pretty well into two categories; position-related factors and personal factors. Position-related factors. Position power comes from the legitimacy inherent in many positions, the ability to provide rewards, the ability to coerce, access to valuable information and performing a critical function. These position-related factors are: Legitimate power allows leaders to motivate others simply because they hold the leadership position. Sometimes we comply with the wishes of a leader just because of the societal expectations for us to do so. For instance, if Colin Powell shows up at your club’s luncheon and wants to say a few words, you let him. Why do you give him that privilege? Stupid question. He’s the Secretary of State! You just do that sort of thing for someone in his position. That’s legitimate power. That kind of legitimacy isn’t always very strong for managers who are promoted to a position in which they must supervise their former peers. If the former peers have any difficulty adjusting to their managers’ new positions, legitimacy will be kind of weak. Legitimate power comes from having a position of power in an organization, such as being the boss or a key member of a leadership team. This power comes when employees in the organization recognize the authority of the individual. For example, the CEO who determines the overall direction of the company and the resource needs of the company. Legitimate power rests in the belief among employees that their manager has the right to give orders based on his or her position. For example, at the scene of a crime, people usually comply with the orders of a uniformed police officer based simply on their shared belief that he or she has the predetermined authority to give such orders. In a corporate setting, employees comply with the orders of a manager who relies on legitimate power based on the position in the organizational hierarchy that the manager holds. Yet, although employees may comply based on legitimate power, they may not feel a sense of commitment or cooperation. Reward power is the ability to provide incentives to others if they will cooperate with you. Managers who can affect their direct reports’ income, perks, job assignments, etc. are able to offer rewards in exchange for compliance. Having a high degree of reward power really helps a manager influence others. Reward power is conveyed through rewarding individuals for compliance with one’s wishes. This may be done through given bonuses, raises, a promotion, extra time off from work, etc. For example, the supervisor who provides employees comp time when they meet an objective she sets for a project. Reward power, as the name implies, rests on the ability of a manager to give some sort of reward to employees. These rewards can range from monetary compensation to improved work schedules. Reward power often does not need monetary or other tangible compensation to work when managers can convey various intangible benefits as rewards. Huey describes Sam Walton, founder of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., as an active user of reward power. Walton relies heavily on these intangible awards, indicating that â€Å"nothing else can quite substitute for a few well-chosen, well-timed, sincere words of praise. They are absolutely free-and worth a fortune†. When reward power is used in a flexible manner, it can prove to be a strong motivator, as Crosby, Deming, and others have shown. Still, when organizations rely too rigidly on rewards, the system can backfire. Employees may be tempted to unethically or even illegally meet the quotas to which overly rigid reward systems may be tied. Another problem associated with rewards as a base for power is the possibility that the rewards will divert employees’ attention from their jobs and focus their attention instead on the rewards da ngled before them. Coercive power is the ability to punish or intimidate. It’s often said that unions eliminate management’s ability to sanction uncooperative employees. That may be a bit of an exaggeration, but when collective bargaining agreements state that management can only terminate employees with cause, management does have restricted ability to coerce cooperation. Managers should use coercion with great care anyway. Coercion only motivates minimal cooperation and breeds resentment. Coercive power is conveyed through fear of losing one’s job, being demoted, receiving a poor performance review, having prime projects taken away, etc. This power is gotten through threatening others. For example, the VP of Sales who threatens sales folks to meet their goals or get replaced. Coercive power rests in the ability of a manager to force an employee to comply with an order through the threat of punishment. Coercive power typically leads to short-term compliance, but in the long-run produces dysfunctional behavior. Coercion reduces employees’ satisfaction with their jobs, leading to lack of commitment and general employee withdrawal. In the United States, Canada, and Western Europe, coercive power has seen a decline in the last 50 years. Several reasons contribute to this, ranging from the legal erosion of employment-at-will and the awareness of employee violence or other forms of retaliatory behavior. Equally important as an effect on the receding popularity of coercion as a basis of power has been the influence of quality management theorists, such as Philip Crosby and W. Edwards Deming. They suggested that there is a decline in productivity and creativity when coercive power is employed. The use of coercive power results in an atmosphere of insecurity or fear. In spite of this insight, coercion as a base of power continues to play a role even in those organizations influenced by theories of quality management. In times of economic crisis or threats to the survival of the organization at large, coercion may come to the forefront. Coercive power may also materialize as organizations attempt to streamline their operations for maximum efficiency. If employees must be fired, those who fail to conform to the organizational goals for survival will be the most likely candidates for termination. The threat of termination for failure to comply, in turn, is coercive power. Access to valuable information produces power because valuable information is a resource that can be exchanged. Back in the days when managers had secretaries do all their typing and schedule their meetings, some secretaries had access to a lot of important information. Consequently, people who were nice to secretaries were able to get information and access to key personnel that jerks couldn’t get. Even without having formal authority, the secretaries did have power, and shrewd business people treated secretaries with respect. Performing a critical function confers power, but only to the extent that the individual or group performing the function is irreplaceable. One of my favorite examples of criticality and irreplaceability as they pertain to power comes from NBC’s television show, West Wing. At the end of the first season, the producers were expecting to have to renegotiate a lot of the actors’ contracts. The producers wanted to bring the whole cast back because audiences don’t react well to new actors playing established roles or to roles that are clumsily dropped from the story. Thus, each actor was critical and irreplaceable. Of course, producers don’t have to replace an actor whose character died. So, the writers arranged to have the West Wing season finale end with a gunshot that could have killed any of the critical actors. It wasn’t until the second season that we found out who got hit. By making the actors less critical, the producers reduced the actors’ negotiating power. Personal factors. A number of personal qualities can also contribute to a person’s power in an organization. Some of these are: Expertise that can be used in exchange for favors is a form of power. For instance, if you’re an expert with PowerPoint you can help colleagues put together their presentations, and you can get favors from them in return. Expert power comes from ones’ experiences, skills or knowledge. As we gain experience in particular areas, and become thought leaders in those areas, we begin to gather expert power that can be utilized to get others to help us meet our goals. For example, the Project Manager who is an expert at solving particularly challenging problems to ensure a project stays on track. Expert power rests on the belief of employees that an individual has a particularly high level of knowledge or highly specialized skill set. Managers may be accorded authority based on the perception of their greater knowledge of the tasks at hand than their employees. Interestingly, in expert power, the superior may not rank higher than the other persons in a formal sense. Thus, when an equipment repair person comes to the CEO’s office to fix a malfunctioning piece of machinery, no question exists that the CEO outranks the repair person; yet regarding the specific task of getting the machine operational, the CEO is likely to follow the orders of the repair person. Expert power has within it a built-in point of weakness: as a point of power, expertise diminishes as knowledge is shared. If a manager shares knowledge or skill instruction with his or her employees, in time they will acquire a similar knowledge base or skill set. As the employees grow to equal the manager’s knowledge or skills, their respect for the superiority of his expertise diminishes. The result is either that the manager’s authority diminishes or that the manager intentionally chooses not to share his or her knowledge base or skill set with the employees. The former choice weakens the manager’s authority over time, while the latter weakens the organization’s effectiveness over time. Likeability, or any kind of personal attractiveness, also gives you power. If people like to be around you because you’re witty, friendly, famous or good looking, you’re also likely to be pretty persuasive. We all want to do favors for people we like, up to a limit anyway. Charisma has multiple meanings. A person with charisma has a special interpersonal appeal. Charisma can be viewed as a particularly strong form of likeability or attractiveness. That’s the kind of charisma that Princess Diana had. Charismatic leaders, on the other hand, communicate a vision that’s very appealing and they energize others to pursue it with them. If you want to be a charismatic leader, (a) you have to have an ambitious vision for the group you’re leading, (b) you have to be excited about it, (c) you have to be confident in the group’s ability to achieve that vision, and (d) you have to be able to communicate your vision, excitement, and confidence. That’s the kind of charisma that Winston Churchill had. Persuasive ability, which is clearly associated with the ability to influence others, is another personal source of power. Intellectual problem solving abilities (e.g., rational problem solving ability, creative problem solving ability, inductive reasoning ability) help people influence others. So do interpersonal persuasion skills. On the list of influence tactics, â€Å"reason† is generally considered the best way to influence others. It’s ranked above â€Å"reciprocity,† which draws on reward power (e.g., a bonus in exchange for exceptional performance), and â€Å"retribution† which uses threats and intimidation. To the extent that reason is a great way to influence others, possessing the ability to reason with others is a great power base. Credibility is an important personal base of power. We are more likely to be persuaded by and follow someone with high credibility than we are someone with low or no credibility. Credibility comes from integrity, character, competence, and the ability to lead. Integrity means being open and sharing information that people need and have a right to know. Hidden agendas undermine integrity. So does the unwillingness to provide truthful, well-intentioned, constructive criticism. Honesty also has to be tempered with discretion. Managers need to show discretion and not say negative things about people as gossip or with the intent to hurt, even if those negative things are true. Remember the lesson from the movie, Jerry Maguire, â€Å"brutal truth† can be a bad thing. Character is the strength to do what needs to be done in difficult times. A basketball team has character if it tends to play well at the end of close games. A businessperson demonstrates character by acting in a moral and ethical way despite pressures or self-interests that push them to do otherwise. Competence is one’s knowledge and skills that pertain to a given situation. When someone tries to reason with you and gain your support for a certain course of action, their competence in that area affects their persuasiveness. If they don’t know what they’re talking about, you’re not going to be influenced. Competence contributes to credibility, and credibility allows one person to influence another. Finally, the ability to lead contributes to managers’ credibility. Would you enthusiastically follow a leader who is unable to inspire others, manage conflict, delegate tasks or coordinate activities? No matter how much you respect a leader for her task-related knowledge, integrity and character, you’ll have reservations about working hard for her if she doesn’t demonstrate the ability to lead. In Summary †¦ Managers must have power, and they would do well to develop more than just the ability to reward and punish others. Having resources and information that can be exchanged for cooperation is also helpful. Having personal qualities that inspire confidence and a willingness to follow might be even more useful. Nevertheless, all are sources of power. References: Victor, D. (n.d.). Leadership Styles and Bases of Power. Retrieved February 25,2013, from: http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/management/Int-Loc/Leadership-Styles-and-Bases-of-Power.html#ixzz2Lt2Q7QbI Abudi, G. (2011). The 5 Types of Power in Leadership. Retrieved February,from: http://quickbase.intuit.com/blog/2011/08/26/the-5-types-of-power-in-leadership/ Wiliams, S. (2004). Building Your Power Bases. Retrieved February 25, 2013, from: http://www.wright.edu/~scott.williams/LeaderLetter/power.htm

Plan on Sexual Selection Essay

In evolutionary terms natural selection is the process by which certain characteristics and behaviours get passed on in the gene pool because they give the individual a better chance of surviving and reproducing. Sexual selection is the process within natural selection where by any characteristic or behaviour that increases the reproductive success of an individual are selected and these characteristics may get exaggerated over evolutionary time. Because of the differences in parental investment between males and females, evolutionary psychologists suggest this has created gender specific reproductive behaviour – that is in terms of mating preferences and strategies, and in terms of mating systems (to remain monogamous or is promiscuity best? ) Because females have to invest a lot of time in having and bringing up offspring, and because the number of offspring they can have in a life time is limited, Darwin suggests this has lead to females being choosy about who they â€Å"mate† and settle down with. Females will be looking for good genetic qualities in a male and qualities that indicate that he could provide for her and their offspring. This in turn has created competition between males. They have to convince females they would be the best to mate with. Males will also be concerned with looking for females with qualities that suggest fertility (youth and good health – synonymous with physical attractiveness. Sexual selection may also lead to differences in mating systems. A female may be best in a monogamous relationship which will ensure the male stays and provides for the family. However for a male a polygamy may be better where he mates with as many females as possible thus ensuring quantity in offspring increasing the likelihood of some of them surviving. Cross cultural studies provide good evidence for evolutionary theory because if we see the same behaviour across culture we can deduce that this behaviour may be a result of genes (evolution) rather than socialisation. Buss, 1989 studied 37 cultures and found that females valued qualities that suggested the financial potential of males – for example ambition and industriousness. On the other hand men valued physical attractiveness and women who were younger than them more than women did. This suggests that they were looking for qualities associated with fertility in line with evolutionary predictions. This was a large scale study with over 10,000 participants which gives it credibility, however it is possible that participants gave the socially desirable answer in terms of what they were looking for in a partner. Other studies have supported Buss. For example Waynforth and Dunbar (1995) analysed the content of lonely hearts columns and found that 43% of males sought a youthful mate compared to 25% of females (the younger the female the more fertile). They also found that 44% of males sought a physically attractive partner compared to 22% of females. Finally they found that women â€Å"advertise† their physical attractiveness and men advertise their resources. The advantage of this study is that the people writing the adverts would not have been influenced by any investigator effects, however this is a biased sample as only a small proportion of the populations would seek to find partners in this way. There is much evidence to suggest that males are more likely to engage in casual sex and engage in polygamous relationships (thus spreading their genes around). For example Clark and Hatfield (1989 and 1990) found that when propositioned by a total stranger 50% of both men and women agreed to go out on a date with the stranger, however none of the females agreed to have sex with a stranger whereas a staggering 75% of males agreed. The study was carried out on a university campus and the participants were students so are hardly representative of the general population. The ethics of this study were also questionable as it involved deception and lack of informed consent and could also have affected the psychological well being of the participants in terms of later guilty feelings. Comparative studies of testicle size in primates by Baker and Bellis, 1995, also suggest that humans may have evolved under a polygamous mating system. Males have medium sized testicles relative to body size compared to chimpanzees. Chimps live in a promiscuous mating system thus females mate with many males so the male chimp has to have large testes to produce lots of sperm in order to compete. Gorillas are monogamous and have relatively small testes. The medium sized human testes suggest that the norm for our human ancestors was to be mildly competitive so females may have had multiple partners. It could be argued that a woman’s best strategy may be to be mildly promiscuous and mate with the man with the best genes but remain with the man who can care and provide. This is supported by Baker and Bellis, 1995, who suggested the world wide rate for misattributed fatherhood was 9%. Although the studies above lend support to evolutionary theory we must be careful in assuming that human mate choice is just a product of our evolutionary past. Our choices will also be affected by our upbringing , religion and our culture and these may change from generation to generation. Some of the findings of studies can also be explained in terms of culture and society. For example in the past women have had to rely on men to provide for them given the inequality in earning power etc. In today’s modern times we may see changes in what women are looking for in a mate. Bereczkei et al (1997) found that females now advertised for men who are family-orientated suggesting they are less concerned about resources. In this way evolutionary theory can be accused of being reductionist in trying to explain reproductive behaviour in terms of gene survival and ignoring social, cultural and moral influences on our reproductive behaviour. Evolutionary theory is also highly deterministic, which is dangerous as we forget that humans have the ability to think about their actions. Biologist Richard Dawkins believes we can override biology with freewill. For example evolutionary theory predicted that men who cannot attract a mate would resort to rape. While this does happen, the majority of single men would not entertain this idea. Finally much of the evidence for evolutionary theory is based on presumed knowledge about past human environments leading to speculations about which behaviours may have been adaptive. As such evolutionary theory is very difficult to test experimentally.

Dissertation on Career Planning

The study of career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction levels of R&D personnel: the case of Taiwan Tser-Yieth Chen, Pao-Long Chang and Ching-Wen Yeh Abstract This study sets out to explore the relative gap between career development programmes and career needs, and its subsequent causal effect on job satisfaction levels among research and development (R&D) personnel. The study reveals that R&D personnel have diverse career needs at various stages of their career, and that job satisfaction levels among this group are particularly affected by the gap between career needs and career development programmes depending upon which stage of their career they have reached. It is also clear, for R&D personnel in particular, that not only is the gap between career development programmes and career needs an important determinant of job satisfaction, but that there are considerably higher turnover levels among researchers in the high-tech industry in Taiwan than the average level for industry as a whole. Thus, from a pragmatic perspective, it is of particular importance to propose effective career development programmes aimed at satisfying the career needs of R&D personnel in order to improve the level of job satisfaction in this group. Keywords Career needs; career development programmes; job satisfaction. Introduction It was highlighted in the empirical study by Garden (1990) that research and development (R&D) personnel demonstrated significantly higher turnover levels than the general industry average; furthermore, one of the findings of the study was that career development opportunities were a key factor. Leavitt (1996) recognized that, even without offering high salaries, those companies which adopted suitable career development programmes were capable of enhancing internal job satisfaction levels. In Schein’s (1978) study, it was argued that career development programmes help to raise productivity, creativity and long-term organizational effectiveness. Indeed, a truly effective career development programme will allow staff to explore developmental opportunities according to their own abilities, leading to considerable personal satisfaction that their abilities are being fully utilized at a personal level. Tser-Yieth Chen, Professor, Institute of Management Science, Ming-chuan University, No. 250, Chung-shan North Road, Section 5, Taipei, 111, Taiwan, ROC (tel: ? 886 2 2882 4564 ext. 2401; fax: ? 886 2 2880 9764; e-mail: [email  protected] edu. tw). Pao-Long Chang, Professor, Department of Business Administration, Feng Chia University. Ching-Wen Yeh, Institute of Management Science, Ming-chuan University. The International Journal of Human Resource Management ISSN 0958-5192 print/ISSN 1466-4399 online q 2003 Taylor & Francis Ltd http://www. tandf. co. k/journals DOI: 10. 1080/0958519032000106182 1002 The International Journal of Human Resource Management From an alternative perspective, career development programmes can also help to reduce the very significant costs that are directly incurred through high turnover levels while helping to prevent the deterioration of staff capabilities as a whole. Throughout the process of an individual’s ongoing career development, personal de velopment influences the choice of profession, the acceptance of that choice and its subsequent implementation. Hence, personal needs will differ at different stages of a career and in response to changes in living circumstances, while the degree of importance and motivation assigned to such needs will also change according to the person, the circumstances and the time (Schein, 1980). It is clear, therefore, that individuals have unique needs at various stages of their career, and, as such, organizations have to begin to appreciate the needs of their staff at different career stages, providing them with opportunities to satisfy their expectations and creating the optimal symbiosis between personal needs and organizational goals. In this way, an organization can succeed in enhancing job satisfaction levels and raising organizational performance. According to research by the Directorate General of Budget Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS), Executive Yuan, ROC (2001), the administration in Taiwan has placed significant emphasis on the development of the island’s high-tech industries, leading to continual growth in exports of electronic and telecommunications products. Therefore, under the government’s official programme of cultivating high-tech industries, the effective recruitment and retention of experienced managers and R&D professionals has been recognized as a key issue. However, retention is a growing problem for human resources managers, certainly within the high-tech industry, and particularly at the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park (HSIP) where the current high turnover of staff is a major concern (Ma, 1998). The lack of career development opportunities is one dominant factor in the high turnover of R&D personnel (Leavitt, 1996; Garden, 1990; Dalton et al. , 1986). Adequate career development programmes can help personnel to meet their career expectations, nurture their ideals and aspirations, and enhance independent R&D knowledge. Personnel are thereby motivated to prepare themselves for the next career development opportunity, enhancing their productivity and increasing job satisfaction. Hence, from a pragmatic perspective, it is of particular importance to propose effective career development programmes aimed at satisfying the career needs of R&D personnel in order to improve the level of job satisfaction among this particular group. Literature review and hypothesis development Career needs and career development programmes Research and development (R&D) activities are widely recognized as an important means of creating a sustainable competitive advantage in the global marketplace; indeed, expenditure on R&D activities is invariably used these days as a measure of an organization’s attempts to stay ahead of the competition. As organizations become more dependent on technology, the ability to attract and retain competent R&D professionals becomes increasingly important, as does the pursuit of the effective management of these highly valued employees (Aryee and Leong, 1991; Petroni, 2000). Arguably, therefore, greater effort should be placed into satisfying the needs of this particular group of professionals since they represent the organization’s future potential competitive advantage, and, if organizations are to gain an understanding of the factors influencing the performance and work attitudes of these employees, then the design of an effective career management system capable of satisfying their career values and aspirations is Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1003 clearly an important element of their management (Aryee and Leong, 1991; Greenhaus and Callanan, 1994). Within most organizations nowadays, but particularly those that are heavily involved in R&D activities, effective human resource management strategies are specifically targeted at fostering innovative and creative capabilities in four major directions: human resource planning, performance appraisal, reward systems and career management (Gupta and Singhal, 1993). Of these specific requirements, the need for appropriate career management systems for industrial researchers has been much debated in both industrial and academic circles (e. . Allen and Katz, 1986; Aryee and Leong, 1991; Bailyn, 1991; Tampoe, 1993). Discussion of the findings of these scholars provides the starting point for the research reported in this paper. This study sets out to examine the career needs and appropriate career development programmes for R&D professionals, since we recognize that there have been few studies which have focused specifically on identifying the career needs of this particular group of employ ees during the different stages of their careers. In an exploratory attempt to develop this area of research, this study examines empirically the career needs of R&D personnel in Taiwan, hypothesizing that a causal relationship exists between such career needs, at different career stages, and overall job satisfaction levels. Various needs of a personal nature will change with each developmental stage of a person’s career and, at given stages of their careers, in addition to distinctive psychological needs, individuals will have unique areer concerns, developmental tasks that need to be undertaken and personal challenges that will need to be overcome (Schein, 1980; Cron, 1984). At certain career stages, each individual will undoubtedly have diverse career developmental ‘duties’ and ‘goals’, depending upon the specific function that they perform (Schein, 1987), but we argue that, in Taiwan in particular, it is necessary to identify not only the career goals of R&D professionals, but also the inherent v alue systems and needs structures of these employees (Kim and Cha, 2000). We believe that this research is of particular importance to Taiwan because we recognize that organizational development here has yet to move to a stage where employees feel sufficiently confident to voice these needs directly to line managers, and as such, there is still a significant lack of understanding of what it is that ‘drives’ R&D professionals in Taiwan. Organizations everywhere have to be able to respond more effectively to the career development needs of all their employees because, through innovation, they are able to differentiate themselves from their competitors; however, the knowledge capital necessary for such innovation resides with their employees, not with the organization itself (Hoon, 2000; Petroni, 2000). Although individuals are initially engaged by a company ostensibly to enrich the potential of the company, they nevertheless enter with their own distinctive career plans in mind, and, as such, can be attracted to a company, and retained within it, on the basis of whether or not the company adopts specific practices capable of satisfying their individual career needs (Chang, 1999). This implies that personal career attitudes can affect the overall attitudes of individuals towards a company, and we can extrapolate from this that any company which places effort into satisfying the personal career needs of individuals will in turn reduce its staff turnover levels. We believe, therefore, that it is important, indeed crucial, for companies to address the issue of individual career needs. As a result of employees’ changing attitudes towards their own careers, there is a need to focus attention on their perceptions of the career management practices offered by their organizations, with such perceptions arguably being more relevant to individual career outcomes than the actual career management practices themselves (Crabtree, 1999). 1004 The International Journal of Human Resource Management Organizations will have to begin to realize that career development programmes that are eminently suited to one particular group of R&D professionals may be inappropriate, or even irrelevant, to another group. We argue, therefore, that human resource managers must recognize that there are a number of diverse groups within the R&D profession, and hence the career development programmes that are developed for these employees must be flexible enough to accommodate this diversity. Our proposed concept is based on the following setting: in line with the changes in roles and job content at different stages of their careers, the psychological needs of this particular group of employees will also change (Cron, 1984). What is regarded as an ‘appropriate’ adjustment will naturally vary according to the career development programmes adopted by different organizations, and they will therefore have varying levels of influence on the level of satisfaction that employees have with such programmes. Given the changes that will inevitably take place from a career ‘start point’ and through the various career stages, along with the personnel maturation of an individual, various career needs will subsequently begin to emerge and further evolve. We contend that R&D personnel will inevitably encounter career planning problems at various stages of their careers and argue that their respective career needs will come as a result of their own self-understanding, personal interests, values, professional roles and responsibilities and, moreover, the greater responsibilities that are a hallmark of the particular stage of their career that they have reached. If we fail to consider the specific needs of R&D personnel at various career stages, then there is an increasing likelihood that the design of career development programmes will be inappropriate, and hence unlikely to have the desired effect of attracting and retaining the most valuable R&D personnel. Thus, it would be clearly inappropriate for an organization to adopt the same programmes in the hope that they will effectively satisfy the needs of all R&D personnel at different stages of their careers, since it is also clear that different career development programmes will be necessary to meet these different career needs. Our study attempts to bridge the current gap by examining such career needs and the career development programmes currently being adopted to meet them. Based on the preceding discussion, we first of all examine the career needs of R&D personnel pursuing the following hypothesis: Hypothesis 1: R&D personnel have different perspectives on the nature of career needs, and of their significance, at different stages of their careers. Within this study, career needs are generally defined as the changing career goals, tasks and challenges that arise due to shifts in personal career stages. A career goal may be a particular landmark to be achieved during a career, which provides the necessary direction and motivation for advancement. The motivational goals involve the determination of the main career tasks to be completed and, during the implementation of these career tasks, opportunities are continually evaluated for future potential career development, bottlenecks or challenges. We propose that ‘career goals’ will generally focus on existing career needs and the determination of the direction of an individual’s current efforts, while ‘career tasks’ are more pertinent to those career needs that emerge in pursuit of the achievement of these overall career goals. We also contend that ‘career challenges’ relate to the future career needs that arise from subsequent opportunities for career development. We examine these three career needs dimensions at various stages of the careers of R&D personnel, and then consider suitable career development programmes capable of catering to such needs. Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1005 Career goal needs In the ‘exploration’ stage of a researcher’s career, the central focus is on establishing a suitable professional field and, through self-assessment, gaining an understanding of their own interests and ability in that field. Thus, they will evaluate their own level of interest, and then seek information on the working environment to determine the roles and responsibilities that an organization will want and allow them to take. Employees will generally wish to devote themselves to a particular field of interest, but will also wish to interact with their superiors and peers to satisfy their social support needs (Hall, 1976). If career development programmes are to be effective at meeting the career goal needs of R&D personnel, we propose that at the ‘exploration’ stage of their careers, these programmes should include helping employees to understand their professional interests, providing appropriate job descriptions for each position, adequate support from their more experienced colleagues and discussions between employees and superiors with regard to job content. During the ‘establishment’ stage, employees are keen to experience success and the respect of their co-workers; they are ambitious and industrious, eager to improve their knowledge and very open about their pursuit of professional goals. Since they will place significant value on their on-the-job performance and promotion, they will also be keen to keep track of their personal performance status, as well as external opportunities and threats, to determine their distinct competitive advantage. Self-directed learning and external learning are also essential elements of career development at this stage. At the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers, if such programmes are to continue to meet the career goal needs of R&D personnel, they should include the adoption of project assignments as a means of facilitating on-the-job training, encouraging personnel to participate in seminars where they can present their project findings and offering tuition fee assistance for continuing professional development. During the ‘maintenance’ stage of their careers, the career concerns of R&D personnel are retention of their earlier accomplishments and re-evaluation of their career direction. At this stage, they should already have achieved a certain level of on-the-job status and will be keen to retain this status while re-evaluating their future career prospects, building on their earlier achievements and seeking out motivators to encourage even greater efforts. They should also have gained a considerable level of knowledge, and have become rich in job experience, so they should be adequately qualified to direct others. Organizations should be looking to these R&D workers to take the less experienced ersonnel within their core team ‘under their wing’ and thus help to consolidate the organization. In order to meet the career goal needs of R&D personnel at the ‘maintenance’ stage, we suggest that appropriate career development programmes should include careful consideration of employees’ career paths within the organization, the possibility of offering dual-career programmes, which would enable personnel to select their own future career d irection without jeopardizing their promotion prospects, and cultivating personnel to become professional consultants or specialized lecturers. Employees at the ‘disengagement’ stage will be concerned only with successful completion of their career (Cron, 1984). We assert that, as R&D personnel come close to retirement, they place less emphasis on their current job and focus instead on other roles, in order to adapt to increasing age and waning vigour. They will be hoping to round off their professional life and arranging activities with greater relevance to retirement. At the same time, their roles will be changing, from accepting and training themselves, to handing over the job, providing direction and consultation and passing on their experience to less experienced personnel. Their major hope at this stage will be to have 1006 The International Journal of Human Resource Management gained a reputation within their field, and their only real desire will be that their loyalty will be compensated admirably by a good pension package. They will have accumulated extensive experience and research knowledge, with a wealth of experience in research direction and counselling. In order to meet the career goal needs of R&D personnel at the ‘disengagement’ stage, we suggest that appropriate career development programmes should include establishing succession planning, the training of replacements, providing retirement planning and counselling and consideration of establishing honorary consultancy positions for those who merit such positions. Career task needs During the ‘exploration’ stage, employees need continually to upgrade their skills and knowledge according to the requirements of the job and so gain a complete understanding of what is required of them; thus career tasks involve obtaining the necessary knowledge to enable successful job performance. Employees must know how to perform a specific job, and how to create a meaningful link between their own personal perspective and the overall output of the organization, ensuring that their personal job performance achieves the standards of excellence required to make an effective contribution to the company (Kerry, 1998). In order to meet the career task needs of R&D personnel at the ‘exploration’ stage of their careers, appropriate career development programmes should include the provision of on-the-job training and implementation of professional development training. During the ‘establishment’ stage, career development tasks will involve raising professional knowledge and the level of autonomy to boost job performance, creative development and innovative skills. R&D personnel can continue to develop their professional ability to innovate, to become more intellectually mature, gain wider job experience and become much more willing to take on additional responsibilities; one of their greatest desires will be that their superiors will fully empower them, thus allowing them greater levels of autonomy. At the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers, if such programmes are to continue to meet the career task needs of R&D personnel, they should include individual assignments involving periods of engagement in foreign training, the introduction of job rotation in order expand fields of expertise and the provision of opportunities for job enrichment. During the ‘maintenance’ stage, an important personal task is to ensure that the previously established ground is retained (Super, 1984). A personal development task will be to seek out wider job and organizational perspectives while maintaining current performance (Cron, 1984). Promotional opportunities will be limited, since a certain status will have already been achieved within the company and, thus, effort must be placed into their decision-planning and directive roles. During this phase, employees should be adopting parallel, cross-functional means to integrate their work and widening their professional horizons in order continually to make work more interesting. The more zealous R&D personnel within an organization, those not content with limited promotional prospects, ill attempt to extend their reach outside the company, extending their career channels and attempting to scale higher career peaks. In order to meet the career task needs of R&D personnel at the ‘maintenance’ stage of their careers, appropriate career development programmes should include setting up objective performance appraisals as a means of assessing overall management performance and future development, encouraging personnel to learn additional interpersonal skills, c ounselling skills and so on and assisting employees to jointly formulate a development plan that would involve more demanding roles. Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1007 During the ‘disengagement’ stage, as retirement age nears and responsibilities begin to decline, most employees will choose to maintain acceptable levels of performance while preparing for retirement (Cron, 1984). An important developmental task at this stage is to maintain an acceptable level of performance while building a stronger sense of self-identity outside work and attempting to adjust schedules in order to shift time and energy towards other pursuits (such as family life, friendships, religion and so on). In order to meet the career task needs of R&D personnel at the ‘disengagement’ stage, we suggest that appropriate career development programmes should include providing employees with the means of undertaking self-assessment in order both to maintain their current level of performance and to strive for continuous improvement, setting basic job standards and encouraging participation in professional associations. Career challenge needs At the ‘exploration’ stage, the major career challenge is continually to acquire professional knowledge and participate in self-improvement activities related to enhancing professional knowledge and skills. A more personal challenge is to establish a good initial professional self-concept (Cron, 1984) in order to strive to live up to recognized professional behavioural standards and criteria for professional elationships, which represent additional challenges to be met. Workers must also try continually to employ professional knowledge within an organization, to enjoy a measure of recognition and attention from superiors and co-workers regarding their professional calibre within a certain field and thereby secure more challenging work. In order to meet the career challenge needs of R&D personnel at the ‘exploration’ stage of their careers, appropriate career development programmes should include the provision of specifically targeted training to fully realize the potential of each employee, the provision of guidance aimed at helping employees to improve their job performance and clarification by superiors of the continuing requirements for the job in terms of characteristics, content and qualifications. At the ‘establishment’ stage, the major career challenges for R&D personnel are the desire to continue to perform well, to gain promotion and to balance the requirements of the job with family responsibilities. Hence, they will seek promotional opportunities by demonstrating superior performance in their role, leading to the receipt of various rewards (not limited solely to material enrichment), and secure a role with greater autonomy. Employees at this stage are keen to receive early promotion and will tend to place a great deal of effort into their work. They are likely to be spending more of their time at work in order to create an impact on their superiors; however this can be to the detriment of their family lives because of the imbalance created between their professional and private lives. At the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers, if such programmes are to continue to meet the career challenge needs of R&D personnel, they should include performance evaluation so as to help employees to adjust their efforts accordingly and to provide them with an understanding of promotional prospects and routes and assisting employees to find the appropriate balance between their jobs and their family life. At the ‘maintenance’ stage, R&D personnel need to retain their established organizational status, prioritize work functions and maintain motivation, professionalism and competitiveness, with career tasks involving broadening their job horizons and extending their professional reach. There may also be a growing threat of challenges from newcomers; thus, the need for continuous innovation is paramount. R&D personnel will have reached their professional peaks and will be seeking to retain their status, with 1008 The International Journal of Human Resource Management he hope of permanent job assurances and benefits being provided by their employers. When faced with potential threats, the reaction may be somewhat intense, leading to protective walls being built around their domain. Those already high up in the organizational hierarchy have fewer promotional opportunities; this can inevitably lead to a greater orientation towards the present, which will often manifest itself i n an increasing desire for immediate monetary rewards (Hall, 1986; Cron, 1984; Rabinowitz and Hall, 1981). In order to meet the career challenge needs of R&D personnel at the ‘exploration’ stage of their careers, appropriate career development programmes should include the design of appropriate (material) rewards and motivational systems; subsidizing external educational activities; and providing interpersonal relationship counselling and guidance, according to specific needs. During the ‘disengagement’ stage, retirement can be a problem in itself. Being accustomed to a business career, employees will have now reached a stage where they must give it up and adapt to a more non-productive lifestyle, staying at home to face the strange experience of being idle, with no specific duties. Some people can find self- affirmation and the maintenance of a belief in their own worth to be a formidable challenge (Dessler, 1996). Hence, R&D employees will be retrospectively examining their careers, and pondering how they intend to while away their future. In seeking out another crossroad in life, they will be adjusting their roles and lifestyles, and accepting and developing a new self-identity. These retirees also face the prospect of spending more time with their families, and of how they will handle it. Examining a passing career produces a need to accept achievements and to adjust one’s self-identity, leading to problems of psychological adaptation. Thus, businesses must offer career counselling at this stage in order to help their R&D staff to develop a positive attitude, and to avoid at all costs a pessimistic or negative outlook. Retiring employees should be counselled to encourage their participation in social and leisure activities, and family life, while roviding guidance to help these employees to plan their life as a retiree, and thereby maintain a positive and optimistic attitude. According to Hoon (2000), managers generally consider the provision of career planning, management and development for their employees as key human resource management functions that will increase employee job satisfaction and organizational commitment; indeed, the ongoing caree r development of employees is frequently cited as a positive investment by corporations, capable of creating a more positive job attitude (London, 1988). Nevertheless, the disappointment for many professional workers is that current management practices and policies fail to incorporate an adequate understanding of their needs and expectations as professionals (Petroni, 2000). Thus, irrespective of the amount of career development practices that an organization provides and actively pursues, the whole process will prove to be totally ineffective if employees perceive this developmental effort as unproductive, non-utilitarian or, indeed, non-existent (Crabtree, 1999). Organizations must therefore pay particular attention to the career aspirations of each individual and be aware of their attitudes towards the organization’s career management practices. Cordero et al. (1994a, 1994b) noted that development opportunities that were capable of satisfying the expectations of technological personnel would lead to enhancement of their overall job satisfaction levels, and, in a study of professional engineers, Petroni (2000) found a strong association between the inadequate understanding of their expectations and their general level of dissatisfaction with their overall career direction. This suggests that there may be a widespread need to develop career management systems, particularly among groups of professionals, which are congruent with the career aspirations of each individual. Such efforts at matching programmes with aspirations will Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1009 learly have an influence on overall satisfaction levels and on decisions about whether to remain within an organization or whether to seek alternative employment (Granrose and Portwood, 1987; Aryee and Leong, 1991). Based on our proposals for career development programmes, we further examine the career development status of individuals in order to determine whether any gaps exist between their career needs and the career development programmes provided. If such a gap does exist, it would be of interest to establish whether or not the gap differs noticeably at various career stages. If the gap between the career needs of R&D personnel and the available career development programmes becomes excessive, their inner needs will not be met and, in accordance with motivational process theory, these unsatisfied needs will subsequently produce nervousness and stress among workers, ultimately impacting on job satisfaction (Robbin, 1998). If this gap is controllable, we can further argue that job satisfaction levels can be reasonably predicted, since organizations have the ability to boost job satisfaction levels through the provision of appropriate career development programmes capable of satisfying unfulfilled career needs. Based upon this discussion, we can propose the following hypothesis: Hypothesis 2: The gap between career development programmes and career needs has a negative correlation with job satisfaction. We can also argue that this influence on job satisfaction from the gap between career needs and career development programmes will vary with different career stages because R&D workers at the ‘establishment’ stage are keen to forge ahead and focus on the level of compatibility between their career needs and career development programmes; this compatibility level therefore has a strong influence on their overall level of job satisfaction. In contrast, those at the ‘exploration’, ‘maintenance’ and ‘disengagement’ stages of their careers are either total newcomers, those maintaining their earlier achieved status or those preparing themselves for retirement, and therefore less likely to place so much emphasis on compatibility between their career needs and career development programmes (Super, 1957; Cron, 1984; Weeks et al. , 1999). The gap between career development programmes and career needs is therefore likely to have less impact on the job satisfaction of workers in all but the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers. Based on this well-founded supposition, we propose the following hypothesis: Hypothesis 3: Career stages may moderate the negative effect on job satisfaction from the gap between career development programmes and career needs. Method Data source The sample in this study was drawn from R&D personnel in the high-tech industry in the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park (HSIP). A pre-tested questionnaire was used with proportionate stratified sampling being carried out according to both the year 2000 manpower monthly report issued by the HSIP management and the ratio of R&D personnel within certain sectors to the total R&D personnel within HSIP. The sample data were collected by mail. A total of 1,300 questionnaires were distributed, of which 385 were returned, giving a response rate of 29. 6 per cent; eighteen questionnaires were invalid, leaving a total of 367 valid questionnaires as the sample; thus, the overall return rate of valid questionnaires was 28. 2 per cent. Since a total of only eleven R&D workers were currently in a stage of ‘disengagement’, it was not possible to undertake any statistical analysis of this group that could claim to have any real validity. 010 The International Journal of Human Resource Management Measures Career stages There are a number of reasons for using age as a proxy for career stages, as follows: First of all, there is no consistent, widely accepted means of measuring employee career stages and, as demonstrated in a general review of the extant research, a wide variety of approaches has been adopted in an effort to carry out an appropriate and acceptable assessment (Mehta et al. , 2000). Second, alternative operational definitions of career stages have been used in multiple research investigations. These include Super’s (1957) adult form, which comprise four career stages; Gottfredson’s (1981) complex theory of occupational circumscription and compromise, within which there are several recursive career stages based on childhood and adolescent processes; tenure (Stumpf and Rabinowitz, 1981); Levinson’s (1986) career stage groupings based on four life eras; and indeed, age (e. . Cron, 1984; Hafer, 1986; Dalrymple and Strahle, 1990; Kao et al. , 1997; Weeks et al. , 1999). These studies also attracted a general recognition of the discordant way in which career stages have been operationalized across studies (Swanson, 1992). Third, our study uses age to represent career stages in similar fashion to the way in which many others have done when testing Super’s (1957) model (e. g. Gould, 1979; Slocum and Cron, 1985; Weeks and Kahle, 1990). Fourth, Weeks et al. 1999) also argued that ‘since age can be measured quite accurately, it can be argued that this measure has adequate reliability and objectivity when compared to the reliability and objectivity of other measures of career stages’. Finally, we must also concede that all research is confronted by the practical realities of costs and deadlines (Cooper and Schindler, 1998), and this was evident in our study in terms of the depth of our questionnaire, costs, time and the rate of response. Career stage categorization in this study is therefore similar to that used in many previous studies (Cron, 1984; Weeks et al. 1999), and we regard the age of R&D personnel as an indication of their professional ability and job experience, which usually increases with age, and which moves forward with the career stage of these employees. Thus, we adopt age to measure career stages, but we also concede that it represents one of the limitations of our study; that is to say, in or der to clarify different career needs at various stages, we do not consider that some of the R&D personnel included within the study may be in a period of transition from one career stage to another. In this study, therefore, career stage is also represented by age. The sample was broken down for analysis into four age groups corresponding to the Cron (1984) career stage categories, with respondents in the ‘exploration’ stage being equal to or less than 30 years of age, respondents in the ‘establishment’ stage being aged between 30 and 45 years, respondents in the ‘maintenance’ stage being aged between 46 and 65 years and respondents in the ‘disengagement’ stage, being those of 66 years of age or above. Career needs Career needs are defined as the personal needs of goals, tasks and challenges in a person’s career, and it is recognized that career needs change with the various career stages. This study proposes various primary career needs for the various career stages, constructing a thirty-two-item scale to measure these career needs. In order to indicate their needs, participants were provided with a 5-point Likert-type response scale, ranging from ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’. The details of the career needs scale is attached as an appendix. The internal consistency reliability (alpha coefficient) of the measure of career needs was 0. 737. Career development programmes Based on the career needs of R&D personnel, this study proposes three general categories of response in the form of career development programmes: career goals-oriented development programmes, career tasks-oriented Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1011 development programmes and career challenges-oriented development programmes. This study refers to Ivancevich and Glueck (1989), adjusting and revising the itemized issues and some of the detailed assessment indices, with the aim of associating these with career needs while also taking into account the status of career development in Taiwan’s high-tech industry. Thereafter, a thirty-three-item scale was developed to measure the perceived career development programmes. Participants were provided with a 5-point Likert-type response scale ranging from ‘very dissatisfied’ to ‘very satisfied’. Details of the contents of the career development programmes are attached as an appendix. The internal consistency reliability (alpha coefficient) of the career development programme measures was 0. 856. The gap between career development programmes and career needs The gap between career development programmes and career needs is determined as ‘the discrepancy between the career needs of R&D personnel and their awareness level of the career development programmes currently in use by their companies’. We use such gaps to evaluate whether the career needs of this group are being satisfied by their companies’ career development programmes. Such gaps are measured by subtracting the average awareness values of career development programmes from average career needs values. Job satisfaction Job satisfaction was defined by Gregson (1987) as the positive emotional state resulting form the appraisal of one’s job or experience. The measurement of job satisfaction within this study was undertaken using a composite of five sub-scales (satisfaction with: pay, promotion, supervisors, co-workers and work). These five items are from the original thirty-item Job Descriptive Index scale of Smith et al. (1969) and we have chosen (and occasionally modified) these items to ensure the best fit with the situation in the firm being studied. This is an approach which has been used effectively in previous sales force studies (Teas, 1983; Johnston et al. , 1990). We include one additional item, which asks participants to indicate their overall level of satisfaction with the job. Participants were provided with a 5-point Likert-type response scale ranging from ‘very dissatisfied’ to ‘very satisfied’ to indicate their level of satisfaction with the following aspects of their present job: (1) job content; (2) supervision; (3) co-worker relations; (4) opportunities for promotion; (5) pay; and (6) their overall level of satisfaction with their organization. The sample items included: ‘The amount of challenge you have in your job’, ‘Your chances for promotion’ and ‘The recognition you get for good work (your job, overall)’. A summed averaged of the six items was produced to form the job satisfaction score (Cronbach’s alpha coefficient ? 0:920). In addition, MANOVA data analysis was carried out to test whether, at different stages of their careers, R&D personnel had differing viewpoints on their career needs. Regression analyses were conducted to examine the effects on job satisfaction from the gap between career development programmes and career needs, the moderating effects of career stages on the relationships between the gap and job satisfaction. Empirical results The empirical results of this study, providing the means of the three types of career needs – career goal needs, career task needs and career challenge needs – of R&D personnel at different stages of their careers, are presented in Table 1a. In addition, the results of the ANOVA analysis of the repeated measures are presented in Table 1b. The overall mean for career goal needs was 4. 31, of which the ‘establishment’ stage (4. 39) was larger than the ‘exploration’ stage (4. 32), ‘disengagement’ stage (4. 18) and ‘maintenance’ stage (3. 6). As Table 1b shows, there are statistically significant 1012 The International Journal of Human Resource Management Table 1a The means of career needs of R&D personnel at different career stages Career needsCareer stages | |Exploration |Establishment |Maintenance |Disengagement |Mean | |Goals |4. 32 |4. 39 |3. 96 |4. 18 |4. 31 | |Tasks |4. 57 |4. 49 |4. 15 |4. 36 |4. 8 | |Challenges |4 . 30 |4. 35 |3. 76 |4. 00 |4. 26 | Table 1b ANOVA of career needs of R&D personnel at different career stages |Source of variation |Sum of squares |Degrees of |Mean square |F-value |p-value | | | |freedom | | | | |(1) The repeated measures ANOVA | |Career stages |21. 1 |3 |7. 136 |14. 27*** |0. 001 | |Career needs |5. 22 |2 |2. 61 |19*** |0. 001 | |Interaction |1. 92 |6 |0. 32 |2. 33* |0. 031 | (2) The simple main effects on career stages |Career goal needs |6. 15 |3 |2. 05 |8. 2*** |0. 001 | |Career task needs |5. 36 |3 |1. 79 |7. 51*** |0. 01 | |Career challenge needs |11. 83 |3 |3. 94 |13. 74*** |0. 001 | (3) The simple main effects on career needs |Exploration |5. 69 |2 |2. 84 |30. 98*** |0. 001 | |Establishment |1. 92 |2 |0. 96 |6. 14** |0. 002 | |Maintenance |2. 83 |2 |1. 42 |7. 11** |0. 001 | |Disengagement |0. 73 |2 |0. 36 |2. 3 |0. 083 | Notes ***p , :001; **p , 01; *p , :05: differences between the various career stages (F ? 14:27; p ? 0:001) and also between various caree r needs (F ? 19; p ? 0:001). Moreover, the interaction between career needs and career stages also produces significant levels (F ? 2:33; p ? 0:031), that is to say, at different stages of their careers, R&D personnel do display different career needs. Since the interactions were significant, it was clear that a test of the simple main effects should be further conducted. First of all, from the test of the simple main effects on career stages, the results indicated that, at different stages of their careers, R&D personnel showed significantly different viewpoints on the significance of their career goal needs (F ? 8:2; p ? 0:001). Furthermore, the mean values showed that for those members of this group at the ‘establishment’ stage, career goal needs had reached a higher level of importance than they had for those at the ‘exploration’ and ‘maintenance’ stages of their careers ? 4:39 . :32 . 3:96? : Second, at different career stages, R&D personnel demonstrated significantly different viewpoints on the significance of their career task needs (F ? 7:51; p ? 0:001). In addition, the means also showed that, for those members of this group at the ‘exploration’ stage of their careers, career task needs had reached a higher level of importance than they had for those at the ‘establishment’ and C hen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1013 maintenance’ stages of their careers ? 4:57 . 4:49 . 4:15? : Third, at different career stages, R&D personnel demonstrated significantly different viewpoints on the significance of their career challenge needs (F ? 13:74; p ? 0:001). The means also showed that, for those members of this group at the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers, career challenge needs had reached a slightly higher level of importance than they had for those at the ‘exploration’ stage ? 4:35 . 4:30? but a much higher level than they had for those at the ‘maintenance’ stage ? 4:35 . 3:76? : Following the test for simple main effects on different career stages, a further test of the simple main effects was conducted on the three kinds of career needs. The respective F-values on the viewpoint of those R&D personnel in the ‘exploration’, ‘establishment’ and â €˜maintenance’ stages of their careers on the significance of the three kinds of career needs, were 30. 98, 6. 14 and 7. 11, all reaching the significance level ( p-value ? 0. 05). These values indicate that those members of this group at the ‘exploration’, ‘establishment’ and ‘maintenance’ stages of their careers have significantly different viewpoints on the significance of at least two kinds of career needs. The means revealed that, for those members of this group at the ‘exploration’ stage, career task needs reached a higher level of importance than career goal needs and career challenge needs ? 4:57 . 4:32 . 4:30? : Likewise, for those at the ‘establishment’ stage, career task needs again displayed a higher level of importance than career goal needs and career challenge needs ? :49 . 4:39 . 4:35? : Finally, for those at the ‘maintenance’ stage of their careers, career task needs also reached a higher level of importance than career goal needs and career challenge needs ? 4:15 . 3:96 . 3:76? : Thus, hypothesis 1 is supported. According to the figures provided in Table 1a, among th e three kinds of career needs, as far as R&D personnel are concerned, the significance of career task needs is highest, with career goal needs coming next and career challenge needs being the least significant. The reason behind this would seem to be that the needs of the career tasks are a principal demand in the process of R&D, within which these personnel must be experienced in order to achieve their targets. In their efforts during the present stage, to attain the situation of satisfying their career goal needs, R&D personnel would necessarily have stronger career task needs. Once they have achieved their career goals during the present stage, they would then be in a position to assess their chances of developing their future career, and thus achieving a breakthrough, namely, advancement to career challenge needs. For researchers in Taiwan, career challenge needs can often reach a much higher level of importance for their professional recognition, the capabilities required for completing actual research tasks and the performance level actually attained. This is because these factors are perhaps the most visible indicator, and a critical requirement for promotion to higher R&D positions, or for acceptance of a position of lesser importance. It should be noted, however, that, during our survey, Taiwan was unfortunately embroiled in the global economic recession that affected all economies, and which will clearly have led to these R&D personnel being somewhat shortsighted and practical, albeit temporarily, in their career task needs. In order to explore whether there is any significant relationship between the dependent variable (job satisfaction) and the independent variables set (the gap between career development programmes and career needs), a multiple regression analysis was conducted as part of this study. The ‘gap between career development programmes and career needs for goals’, the ‘gap between career development programmes and career needs for tasks’ and the ‘gap between career development programmes and career needs for challenges’ were each entered into the model, and, as Table 2 indicates, all three items had a statistically significant level, with the signs, as expected, being negative. 1014 The International Journal of Human Resource Management Table 2 Regression analysis results of the gap between career development programmes and career needs on job satisfaction Sourceb T-valueR2F-value DR2p-value The gap between career development programmes and career needs for challenges The gap between career development programmes and career needs for goals The gap between career development programmes and career needs for tasks 2 0. 36***2 7. 420. 44291. 090. 440. 001 2 0. 26***2 5. 860. 52196. 330. 080. 001 2 0. 25***2 5. 250. 55149. 620. 030. 001 Note **p , :001: This denotes that the larger the gap, the lower the job satisfaction of R&D personnel. The items predict that job satisfaction levels among R&D personnel will be in the order of ‘the gap between career development programmes and career needs for challenges’, ‘the gap between career development programmes and career needs for goals’ and ‘the gap between career development programmes and career needs for tasks’, which are able jointly to predict 55 per cent of the variance in job satisfaction. As to the level of each individual prediction, the gap between career development programmes and career needs for challenges was highest, explaining 44 per cent of the variance; the gap between career development programmes and career needs for goals was next, with an R2 increment of 8 per cent. Therefore, hypothesis 2 is also supported. This study divided the gap between career development programmes and career needs into three, ‘high’, ‘medium’ and ‘low’, sub-sections according to the mean (plus/minus one) standard deviation in order to explore whether there was any significant difference between these three sub-sections in terms of job satisfaction. Analysis of whether career stages can moderate the negative direct effect on job satisfaction stemming from the gap between career development programmes and career needs has also been undertaken within this study. The results are provided in Table 3a, which reveals that the interaction between career stages and ‘the gap between career development programmes and career needs’ was significant for job satisfaction (F ? 3:59; p ? 0:002). In order to determine the actual influence of the two independent variables on the dependent variables, tests of the simple and main effects were conducted. First of all, a test of the simple and main effects was conducted on the independent variable, i. . the ‘the gap between career development programmes and career needs’. As Table 3a shows, the F-value reached a level of significance ? a ? 0:05? ; indicating that a significant difference does exist between the four career stages of R&D personnel in terms of the influence on job satisfaction of the gap between career development programmes and career needs; the means are provided in Table 3b. Among all of the R&D personnel surveyed, the group with a ‘low’ gap between career development programmes and career needs demonstrated a significantly higher attitude towards job satisfaction than the groups with a ‘medium’ and ‘high’ gap between career development programmes and career needs, while the attitude towards job satisfaction of those in the group with a ‘medium’ gap between career development programmes and career needs was also significantly higher than the group with a ‘high’ gap between career Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1015 Table 3a MANOVA of the effects on job satisfaction from the gap between career development programmes and career needs at different career stages |Source of variation |Sum of squares |Degrees of |Mean square|F-value |p-value | | | |freedom | | | | |(1) MANOVA | | | | | | |Career stages |1. 63 |3 |0. 54 |1. 62 |0. 185 | The gap between career evelopment programmes and career needs 49. 26224. 6373. 44***0. 001 Interaction7. 2361. 213. 59**0. 002 (2) The simple main effects on the gap between career development |Exploration |39. 99 |2 |19. 99 |67. 58*** |0. 001 | |Establishment |95. 07 |2 |47. 53 |134. 31*** |0. 001 | |Maintenance |12. 24 |2 |6. 12 |14. 08*** |0. 001 | |Disengagement |4. 62 |2 |2. 31 |26. 26*** |0. 001 | 3) The simple main effects on career stages Low gaps between career development programmes and career needs Medium gaps between career development programmes and career needs High gaps between career development programmes and career needs 2. 3330. 782. 720. 052 0. 7330 . 240. 810. 489 5. 9931. 993. 96*0. 012 Notes ***p , :001; **p , :01; *p , :05: Table 3b Mean comparison of job satisfaction Career stages The gaps between career development programmes and career needs | |High (72) |Medium (230) |Low (65) |Mean | |Exploration (128) |2. 4 |3. 47 |4. 57 |3. 65 | |Establishment (190) |2. 24 |3. 44 |4. 33 |3. 34 | |Maintenance (38) |2. 71 |3. 62 |4. 85 |3. 73 | |Disengagement (11) |3. 33 |3. 67 |4. 89 |4. 30 | |Mean |2. 45 |3. 47 |4. 63 |3. 47 | Note Values represent cell means. Number of cases is given in parentheses. development programmes and career needs. This indicates that, along with the increase in the gap between career development programmes and career needs, there is an apparent decline in job satisfaction levels among R&D personnel. We may find that the attitude towards job satisfaction of those R&D personnel at the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers is lower as the gap increases. In addition, as the gap increases, compared to those 1016 The International Journal of Human Resource Management personnel at all other stages (with the exception of the ‘disengagement’ stage), the attitude towards job satisfaction of R&D personnel is highest at the ‘maintenance’ stage. We also find that those at the ‘establishment’ stage are most conscious of the gap between career development programmes and career needs, and that their consciousness of job satisfaction decreases gradually as the gap between career development programmes and career needs increases. Those R&D personnel at the ‘maintenance’ stage are less conscious of the gap between career development programmes and career needs because they have already reached the peak of their careers and often enjoy plentiful resources within their organizations. Therefore, the attitude towards job satisfaction in the group at the ‘maintenance’ stage of their careers, which also indicates a ‘high’ gap between career development programmes and career needs, is higher than at any of the other career stages. In addition, as Table 3a indicates, in the group indicating a ‘high’ gap between career development programmes and career needs, there are significant differences demonstrated between the different career stages. The means show that those R&D personnel at the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers, and also indicating a ‘high’ gap between career development programmmes and career needs, have the lowest level of job satisfaction (2. 24). In the group of R&D personnel indicating a ‘high’ gap between career development programmes and career needs, the respective attitudes towards job satisfaction of those at different stages are: the ‘exploration’ stage (2. 84) . the ‘maintenance’ stage (2. 1) . the ‘establishment’ stage (2. 24). Therefore, hypothesis 3 is also supported. Concluding remarks This study set out with the aim of examining the gap between career development programmes and career needs, and the relationships with job satisfaction. One of the features of this study has been the attempt to define the factors influencing R&D personnel’s job satisfaction levels from a perspective of the gap between career development programmes and career needs. With Taiwan eagerly working towards enhancing its high-tech competitiveness and becoming increasingly involved in high- tech R&D, an investigation into the existing gaps between perceived career development programmes and expected career needs of R&D personnel may improve the job satisfaction of R&D personnel. This study has attempted to provide an understanding of the career needs of R&D personnel, which, it is hoped, will lead to the development of appropriate career development programmes in response to these needs. It has further investigated the relationship between career needs and career development programmes and job satisfaction. The results reveal that, at different stages of their careers, R&D personnel do indeed have distinct career needs. For R&D personnel, of the three types of career needs referred to in this study, career task needs take priority, with career goal needs in second place and career challenge needs demonstrating the lowest priority. An explanation for this is that career task needs are part of the path that has to be travelled to achieve career goals. In order to achieve the current needs for career goals, R&D personnel demonstrate a stronger need for career tasks. Once they do achieve their career goals, they can then evaluate the developmental opportunities for their future career, hence producing the career need for challenges that have yet to be faced and overcome. Furthermore, R&D personnel generally display a high evaluation of the know-how necessary actually to perform their jobs and of their on-the-job performance levels, since these are the most obvious indices, and a key deciding factor in the promotion, or passing over, of R&D personnel. It was clear, when conducting this research – which took place Chen et al. : Career needs, career development programmes and job satisfaction1017 during a period of global recession – that R&D personnel were prone to the pursuit of short-term, pragmatic career task needs at that time. In addition, the results of the stepwise regression reveal that the three kinds of gaps between career development programmes and career needs are significant predictors of job satisfaction (R2 ? 55:3 per cent). Furthermore, this study has also revealed that the widening of the gap between career development programmes and career needs leads to a corresponding lowering of job satisfaction levels among R&D personnel. Finally, this study finds that the interaction between career stages and the ‘gap between career development programmes and career needs’ does in fact influence job satisfaction, that is to say, the influence upon job satisfaction, from the gap between career development programmes and career needs, varies with the different career stages of R&D personnel. As the gap widens (with the exception of those in the ‘disengagement’ stage), those in the ‘establishment’ stage of their careers demonstrate the lowest job satisfaction levels, while those in the ‘maintenance stage’ of their careers demonstrate higher levels of job satisfaction than those in all other career stages. During the ‘establishment’ stage, their awareness of the gaps between career development programmes and career needs is the highest, relative to awareness levels at other career stages, and it is also at this stage that the highest turnover intentions are demonstrated. Perhaps because of higher levels of ambition among R&D personnel in the ‘establishment’ stage, of desire to set up relationships between themselves and the organization, and to get ahead and become valuable professional members of the organization, this group is likely to work particularly hard in the pursuit of success and realization of personal needs. At this time, they will define, on the one hand, the relationship between themselves and the organization and, on the other, their personal needs, as against organizational goals. Personal ambitions are reflected in career needs, making for exaggerated career needs. If, during this time, organizational career development programmes do not satisfy such ambitions, then considerable gaps can develop between career development programmes and career needs. R&