Choose 2 scenes in Twelfth Night and state how you would direct them Es

Choose 2 scenes in Twelfth Night and state how you would direct them Choose 2 scenes in Twelfth Night and state how you would direct them. Discuss some of the challenges you might face in directing the play to a modern audience. Being one of Shakespeare’s best romantic comedies, Twelfth Night has been re-enacted many a times, be it during Elizabethan times, or in modern times. Although set in the Elizabethan era, Twelfth Night has its charms. And indeed, it proves to be relevant and intimate to a modern audience, with its applicable themes and endearing characters. In directing a play of such mannerism, one would have to consider many factors affecting the overall effect of the play, and how it brings forth its true message and intentions. Hence, I have chosen to direct Act 3 Scene 1, as well as Act 2 Scene 3. The reasons why I have chosen the above scenes, is so as in Act 2 Scene 3, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Maria and Feste portray a kind of platonic love, that can be applied to a modern audience. In addition, Malvolio is shown forth as the typical puritan, who is the wet blanket for every party and discourages any kind of fun and disorder. This, hence, is also applicable to a modern audience, as the audience see Malvolio as the kind of person everyone would dislike. Thus, later on, when Malvolio is plotted against, the audience can comprehend why. This scene is seen to be a comical one, where humour is the main theme. Henceforth, Shakespeare’s theme of comedy still stands, despite later scenes of seriousness. Act 3 Scene 1 is a scene where we can see Olivia’s desperate and intensifying infatuation for Viola pouring out uncontrollably. Through Viola’s focused and straightforward rejections, we once again sense her dilemma due to her disguise, and also her devotion towards her task and towards Orsino. On the other hand, the message is brought forth that perhaps, woman aren’t always the ones waiting to be wooed. Olivia tries hard to achieve her goals (even when she fails), and gives a sense of stubbornness towards her ‘love’ for Viola (Cesario). Therefore, I have chosen to direct these two scenes. Firstly, Act 2 Scene 4. For this scene, it could be summarized as a comic scene with Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Maria and Feste having fun amongst them. Then, Malvolio, the puritan comes in, and spoils their fun, insulting them a... ...ness, and brings forth the carefree tone of the play. Overall, this challenge still stands in the sense of showing Shakespeare’s ‘see-saw’ method in its best light. Another challenge that I think I would face in directing this play would be making the costumes fit the Elizabethan times, yet attracting the modern audience and adding a personal touch to display the play in a way impressing to a modern audience, whom I believe like to watch plays which attract them at first glance. Hence, the clothing could be modern cum Elizabethan, creating an interesting mix. Yet another challenge would be keeping the audience engaged and have continued interest in the show, so as to bring the show to them fully and meaningfully. This is important as if the audience cannot stay focused, the overall effect may be affected. Hence, perhaps the actors could engage the audience with eye contact and stand in such a way as to not have their backs face the audience (unless completely necessary). All in all, directing the play of Twelfth Night to a modern audience proves to be a challenging task, but possible with perseverance in keeping the overall comedy-romantic genre of the play.

Superiority of Races in Sinclair Lewis Babbitt Essay -- Lewis Babbitt

Superiority of Races in Babbit      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Hatred, intolerance, prejudice, and narrow-mindedness are all terms that can be applied when describing someone who is a bigot.   By these terms George F. Babbitt, the protagonist in Sinclair Lewis' Babbitt, and many of his acquaintances are quite the bigots toward all those that appear different than he is especially immigrants and minorities in America.   The blame should not be placed squarely on these men's shoulders for possessing such hate filled beliefs, but their opinion of the matter is generated from the accepted notion, which had been approved of and passed down through the generations, that immigrants and minorities are far less superior than the "native" white men who have "always" lived in America.   The irony of this subject in the book is that although men of Babbitt's stature openly shared and joked with one another about their superiority to all other races, not one would ever admit that he was even by a small degree a bigot. By showing this to the reader Lewis was making the point that even though there were few that openly admitted to being a bigot almost everyone had some type of bigotry inside because to him it was an essential part of human nature.   Even though there is still racism in today's society it is not as widespread as it was during the time in which Lewis wrote.   Therefore Lewis' view of human nature is not entirely accurate when applied to modern society.  Ã‚        Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Although Babbitt never publicly articulated any racist type comments, his ideas toward immigrants and minorities could easily be affiliated with that of racial supremacy.   Although there was a brief period in which Babbitt did sympathize with the immigrant... ... Paul S, et al. The Enduring Vision: a History of the American People. 4th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000. 950   Ezekiel, Raphael S. Introduction The Racist Mind: Portraits of American Neo-Nazis and Klansmen. New York: Penguin, 1995. xxviii-xxi. Lewis, Sinclair. Babbitt. 1922. New York: Bantam, 1998. 21+ 148-149 Leyden, Thomas James. "The Making of a Skinhead." Simon Wiesenthal Center. 1999. http://www.wiesenthal.com/tj/index.html>. Rpt. in Ethnic Violence. Ed. Myra H. Immell. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2000. 98   Pascoe, Elaine. Racial Prejudice: Why Can't We Overcome?. 2nd ed. New York:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Franklin Watts, 1997. 21+ 33+ 79-80+ 99+ 116. Witkin, Gordon, and Jeannye Thornton. "Pride and Prejudice." U.S. News & World Report 15 Jul.1996. Rpt. in Ethnic Violence. Ed. Myra H. Immell. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2000. 74. Superiority of Races in Sinclair Lewis' Babbitt Essay -- Lewis Babbitt Superiority of Races in Babbit      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Hatred, intolerance, prejudice, and narrow-mindedness are all terms that can be applied when describing someone who is a bigot.   By these terms George F. Babbitt, the protagonist in Sinclair Lewis' Babbitt, and many of his acquaintances are quite the bigots toward all those that appear different than he is especially immigrants and minorities in America.   The blame should not be placed squarely on these men's shoulders for possessing such hate filled beliefs, but their opinion of the matter is generated from the accepted notion, which had been approved of and passed down through the generations, that immigrants and minorities are far less superior than the "native" white men who have "always" lived in America.   The irony of this subject in the book is that although men of Babbitt's stature openly shared and joked with one another about their superiority to all other races, not one would ever admit that he was even by a small degree a bigot. By showing this to the reader Lewis was making the point that even though there were few that openly admitted to being a bigot almost everyone had some type of bigotry inside because to him it was an essential part of human nature.   Even though there is still racism in today's society it is not as widespread as it was during the time in which Lewis wrote.   Therefore Lewis' view of human nature is not entirely accurate when applied to modern society.  Ã‚        Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Although Babbitt never publicly articulated any racist type comments, his ideas toward immigrants and minorities could easily be affiliated with that of racial supremacy.   Although there was a brief period in which Babbitt did sympathize with the immigrant... ... Paul S, et al. The Enduring Vision: a History of the American People. 4th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000. 950   Ezekiel, Raphael S. Introduction The Racist Mind: Portraits of American Neo-Nazis and Klansmen. New York: Penguin, 1995. xxviii-xxi. Lewis, Sinclair. Babbitt. 1922. New York: Bantam, 1998. 21+ 148-149 Leyden, Thomas James. "The Making of a Skinhead." Simon Wiesenthal Center. 1999. http://www.wiesenthal.com/tj/index.html>. Rpt. in Ethnic Violence. Ed. Myra H. Immell. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2000. 98   Pascoe, Elaine. Racial Prejudice: Why Can't We Overcome?. 2nd ed. New York:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Franklin Watts, 1997. 21+ 33+ 79-80+ 99+ 116. Witkin, Gordon, and Jeannye Thornton. "Pride and Prejudice." U.S. News & World Report 15 Jul.1996. Rpt. in Ethnic Violence. Ed. Myra H. Immell. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2000. 74.

The American Revolutionary War

One of the greatest reasons as to why there was the revolution in the America during the regime of British colonization was as a result of excessive taxation by the British.The British government implemented this idea of excessive tax on the American citizens after realizing that they had a great debt, which resulted from the expenses they incurred during their war with France and India. In the North America the British had many troops at the end of the Indian and the French war.The British government in the long last realized that it had been using a lot of its money to defend its colonies. A big force was required to protect the colonists from the attacks by the Indian troops. At the end of the war the British had a debt worth 140 million pounds.To solve this problem the British government came up with two solutions. Firstly, the British government had the view of strengthening the existing taxation laws together with introduction of additional taxes on the colonists. Such taxes in cluded the: 1773 tea act, 1764 sugar act, and 1765 stamp act.This was to be done so as to enable the government to cater for the cost of the troops which were stationed in the North America. Secondly, the British government gave out new proclamation to prevent the further encroachment of the Indians by the colonists.[1]They believed that this action if is put in place would eliminate the war between the colonists and the Indian, and thus the number of the troops would go down. The first measure by the British government of strengthening the tax laws and introducing additional tax act was to be implemented by passing the Revenue Act of 1764. This act was referred to as the Sugar Act by the colonies.The Act on Sugar really cut down the molasses tax, which was by then the key colonies’ import. The enforcement of the previous tax was not done by the British government.1 With the introduction of the new sugar act brought in strong enforcing methods on the molasses tariffs. Under t he same Revenue Act additional items such as wine, silk and potash were subject to import tax.The American colonists reacted to the new law on the taxes with outrage. They employed all the means and the mechanisms to render such a law useless. The colonial government officials were very corrupt to extend that they allowed the entrance of molasses and other commodities to America without payment of the required import tax on them.The American colonists resisted openly the new act of revenues by the British government as much as they could.A good example on this is the sloop Polly case. Immediately after the law was passed by the parliament, she moved to a port known as Newport carrying molasses load. Despite the fact that, the indication on the tax payment were matching with the new government new revenue act, it was realized later by the port officer that the load was twice the one indicated on the shipment documents. The ship was seized under the new Revenue Act.[2]This was the fir st evidenced American colonists’ defiance on the British government Revenue Act. Many of the American colonists just accepted to pay such taxes under the new Revenue Act as it was inevitable for them.The taxation itself did not case an alarm to the American colonists; however the methods which were employed to collect the taxes by the British government caused anger among the colonists.   Other issues that caused anger among the colonists were that: during the enactment of the Revenue Act concerning the taxes, they were not involved in this process.Also the taxation methods barred the American colonists in engaging in trade. On the second measure by the British government to reduce its burden of the cost they incurred in Indian and the French, was received by the American with a lot of anger and disdain.This was because it limited and interfered with their economic growth. According to the Americans the issue of protecting the Indians encroachment by the colonists had a lit tle chance to be enforced. They had the feeling that, there was no means by which the colonists’ natural movement would be stopped by such proclamation.5The Revenue Act aimed at increasing the Revenue to the British government through increasing the taxes, was the major cause of the revolutionary war in America.The issue of taxation cleared the path towards the revolution. Not only did it bring the issue of resistance, but also it stimulated the thoughts of politics the resulted into the revolution. A good example is that of James Otis who resigned and went to court on the behalf of the merchants of Boston to protest the Assistance Writs.The writs of assistance gave powers to the officials of customs to break into ships, warehouses, and homes that were thought to be carrying any goods which were not transacted in the correct order based on the new Revenue Act.[3]According to Otis the British unwritten constitution fundamentals were violated by these writs. Otis was for the id ea that, despite that it was the British government that passed these writs, the local government was not supposed to enforce them. In his case Otis lost, but the writs issue which the revenue act enforcement brought forth resulted to be an expanding colonial list of grievances against the British colonial government.[1] Reich Jerome. British Friends of the American Revolution, London, Macmillan, 1998, pp. 121 Reich Jerome. British Friends of the American Revolution, London, Macmillan, 1998, pp. 19[2] Revolutionary War. History Central. Copyright Multi-Educator , 1998, Retrieved on 12th January 2009 from http://www.historycentral.com/Revolt/index.html5 On the American Revolution. The American Inquisition. Retrieved on 12th January 2009 from, http://americaninquisition.blogspot.com/2008/05/on-american-revolution.html[3] Hatch Louis. The Administration of the American Revolutionary Army, London, Longman Green and Co., 1994, pp. 70   

Anthem by Ayn Rand Essay

The book Anthem by Ayn Rand expresses the true meaning of the word â€Å"ego.† The definition says its meaning but the story itself shows it with actions. Ego means the self aspect of an individual that thinks, forms values, and makes judgments. In Anthem it refers to the need individuals have to be liberated from collectivism, free to use their own minds and express individual uniqueness. This word has a lot to do with the book and the purpose of the story. It recounts to it in many ways, since this is the story’s main focus. Ego relates to the book Anthem because it is the theme, and is the lesson we readers learn from it. Equality the main character of Anthem is our guided road to egoism. He is the one that leads the readers to understand the reasons his society is in need of ego. He goes after the solutions and takes dangerous risks as well. The world in which they live is so miserable, they are basically treated like robots. Equality felt like he needed to do something about it, that he needed to recover the ego that got lost in the web of dystopian inhumanities. There is where we see the relation between â€Å"ego† and the book. The whole reason why there is a problem in the story is because everyone is lacking of THE EGO that life grants each human being. As it states on page 46, â€Å"There is fear hanging in the air of the sleeping halls, and in the air of the streets. Fear walks through the City, fear without name, without shape. All men feel it and none dare to speak it.† Meaning these men are scared of their society which is why they don’t stand up for themselves and they feel fear. It all happens because they don’t have their own ego. At the end when Equality discovers what had been hidden for many years. He starts to live life the way it should had always been, that is when he finds egoism. We now see how ego turns to be the theme of Anthem. This book shows us how a different lifestyle/society can completely restrict us from the life humans are meant to have. That is the lesson I take away from this story. Ego is truly important in life and that is what Equality teaches us. He does so by showing how great his life can be when there is objectivism. He lives in the mountains in a two stories house by himself with the exception of Gaea. That is a big step towards the Unmentionable times and a better life for Equality and the ones that surround him. As it states on pages 99-100, â€Å"I shall live here, in my own house. I shall take my food from the earth by the toil of my own hands. I shall learn many secrets from my books. Through the years ahead, I shall rebuild the achievements of the past, and open the way to carry them further; the achievements which are open to me but closed forever to my brothers, for their minds are shackled to the weakest and dullest ones among them.† Asserting us he will make good use of his ego. Overall the word ego ties in very well with the book and the story’s purpose. This word is the motor that carries on the book. It is also the teaching that readers obtain. â€Å"Ego† is the best good word to represent all the barbarities that are now long gone and banned from Equality’s life. It was known as â€Å"the unspeakable word† and it turn into the salvation word. Ego relates to the book Anthem because it is the theme, and is the lesson we readers learn from it. â€Å"The word which can never die on this earth, for it is the heart of it and the meaning and the glory. The sacred word: EGO†

HRM in Marks and Spencer Essay

Introduction and Background Marks and Spencer, established 1894 in Leeds,UK and as one of the most recognized brands in the UK and worldwide, had been hugely successful in terms of both profit and market share until the late 1990s. However, after that it suffered a reversal in its fortunes. Correspondingly, its organizational structure and culture also underwent certain transformation. The set of dramatic changes include changing top executive and their managerial philosophies. Now, it seems to be on the road to recovery after these radical changes. This article focuses on human resource management in M&S, analysis ranges from its traditional paternalism culture to new HRM practices. Paternalism & Unitarist Characteristics Under paternalism, employers and employees view the company as a family. It’s different from traditional manufacturing culture. The separation between the shop floor and management and feelings of ‘them and us’ are what might be expected within a traditional manufacturing culture, where the employment is full-time, long-term and relatively stable and the typical workplace is a large firm or store. The corporation is a stable sovereign organization with a clear division of labors and everyone abides by the social contract. Similarly, Unitarist deems the business organization as a team united by shared interests and values with senior management as the sole source of authority and focus of loyalty, conflict is seen as irrational and unnecessary. Historically, Marks and Spencer fits into an anatomy of paternalism with characteristic features of hereditary family ownership, personal relations between employer and worker, a sense of UK religious mission and a commitment to social welfare and public service. The ideal type paternalist workforce matches these, with family employment through large kinship networks and is embedded in a surrounding occupational community. Moreover, there was a feeling of camaraderie and close-knit family atmosphere within the stores and they employed staffs who are most suitable and can readily become part of this family. In addition, every M&S store is identical and the store managers followed central direction. The highly centralized authority also means that there exists little disagreement with policies sent down from the top. Also, there had never been a CEO of M&S who had not been a member of the founder’s family or a lifetime employee. The first exception is Vandervelde who had been appointed to the position of chairman at M&S in 2000 from outside the organization. Therefore, this kind of HRM is a typical form of paternalism, which totally breaks with trade unions and has highly centralized authority and represents the characteristic of unitarist as well. Organization’s success is depended not only on reducing costs but also on improving the performance of the workforce. The organization’s objective or their currently expect of their employees may be completely different from what they expected in the past due to the changing external environment such as new competitors or new technologies, internal strategy such as focusing on reducing costs and cutting the full-time sales assistants in store. Some of the external environment and the individual factors driving psychological contract research are illustrated in following figure. Old Contract (Greenbury) New Contract Change environment Stable, short-term focus Continuous change Culture Paternalism, time-served, exchange security for commitment Those who perform get rewarded and have contract developed Rewards Paid on level, position and status Paid on contributions or performance-based Promotion basis Expected, based on time served in store and competence Less opportunity, new criteria, for those who deserve it Personal development The organization’s responsibility Individual’s responsibility to improve employability Consequently, employee’s job descriptions might be broadened and their psychological contract will shift correspondingly. Evidence suggests that these changes represented a threat to the reciprocal nature of the psychological contract with consequences for both employees and employers. Meanwhile, the strength of the psychological contract is dependent on how fair the individual believes the organization is in fulfilling its perceived obligations that the organization treats them fairly, respects their efforts and rewards them justly, it’s based on mutual obligation. In addition to the summarized old contract characters, evidence also shows that Greenbury only used sales figures and visitors to stores as the basis to make judgments on how M&S was operating, whereas lost touch with what their employees’ opinions or wants. It makes employees feel their roles are unimportant; also it weakens their morale and motivation. ‘The Thrill of the Purchase’ article states this famous paternalistic culture of M&S. They offered cradle-to-grave benefits for employees but rigidly governed the way that managers operated. Moreover, every aspect of the company was rule-driven. Most of employees feel rule-bound and they are not encouraged to use their personal discretion as well. Nevertheless, they gradually realized their culture are fall-out-of-step and with the implementation of new HR strategic, M&S becomes open and receptive, moving from a culture of paternalism to a more sophisticated culture of choice. Matching employee behaviors and HRM activities to competitive strategies Michael Porter’s generic ‘low-cost’ or ‘differentiation’ strategy can be adopted in the Marks&Spencer case. Namely, each Porterian competitive strategy involves a unique set of responses from workers or ‘needed role behaviours’ and a particular HRM strategy that might generate and reinforce a unique pattern of behaviour (Schuler and Jackson, 2002). Therefore, any inconsistency in internal HRM practices will likely lead to ‘role conflict or ambiguity that can interfere with individual performance and organizational effectiveness’. In the Devanna et al. model, human resource management strategy and structure follow and feed upon one another and are influenced by environmental forces. This basic model constituted the bare bones of a theory on SHRM. (Linda Maund, 2001:73) Porter’s model comprised three components: 1. Low-cost leadership or cost reduction strategy Using this strategy, organization will gain competitive advantage by being the lowest cost producer. Managers are attempting to increase the organization’s market share by emphasizing low cost compared to that of its competitors, they try to emphasize that their goods or services are cheaper. It’s an aggressive and tightly cost-controlled strategy that emphasizes overhead minimization. Meanwhile, it pursuits the economies of scale and primarily focus on increasing productivity through reducing output cost per person and reducing wage levels by all means. This approach takes effect by means of mass-producing, mass-selling to save the costs, whereby gain the price superiority. Moreover, it keeps manufacturing process simple and repetitive in order to save the costs of raw materials, whereas basically there are no improvements or expansion of their products. Greenbury, the former chief executive of Marks and Spencer, had decided that to control costs by means of cutting full-time sales assistants in stores, at the same time, bring in full-time, part-time and Saturday staffs to work in stores. Further, their approach is also rely on and highly trust the quality of British suppliers and M&S play as a bulk buyer who even buy up all the stock of specific suppliers, whereby conducting mass-selling to earn profits. In addition, as the Channel 4 programme stated at 25th Feb,2001 that operations of the organization within M&S is focused on short-term strategy rather than long-term one and they were firmly placed in the ‘middle ground’, emphasize getting generalized view of the market instead of trying to target various segments market. The overall strategy is risk-aversive and traditional. Hence, they are adapting typical cost-reduction strategy, meanwhile, with somewhat emphasis on quality aspect. In general, cost reduction pursued through increasingly using of part-time employees, subcontractors, work simplification, measurement procedures, automation, work rule changes, job assignment flexibility. Therefore, according to this competitive strategy, the expected employees behaviors should be followed the key cost-reduction strategy characteristics illustrate as follow: Low-cost leadership strategy (Greenbury) Needed Employees Behaviors Human Resource Practices Relatively repetitive and predictable behaviors Relatively fixed and explicit job descriptions A rather short-term focus Narrowly designed jobs Primarily autonomous or individual activity Narrowly defined career path, unitarism Modest concern for quality Externally, reliable suppliers; internally, QC function High concern for quantity of output Lean production, JIT system, fully participation Primary concern for results Minimal levels of employee training and development Low risk-taking activity Short-term, result oriented performance appraisals Relatively high degree of comfort with stability Close monitoring of market pay level 2. Differentiation or quality enhancement strategy This strategic emphasizes on enhancing products or services quality and offering products or services that different from those of its competitors. There are numerous ways to implement this strategy, the most common ones are advertising, offering distinctive product or service features, providing exceptional service, or relying on new technology. The organization is trying to make a unique product or provide a unique service with high quality to attract target customers and earn profits. Due to the risk-aversive and traditional managerial methodologies, actually Greenbury laid less emphasis on quality enhancement or on delivering products with unique quality. Therefore, by April 1999, in order to overcome the difficulties M&S had been facing, Salsbury, the successor of Greenbury, had devised a large-scale promotional campaign to try to restore its images as an innovative retailer offering unique quality products. He started to segment the market and offer different category products to its target customers with strong emphasis on its unique quality. Also, by moving away from its original bureaucratic culture and hierarchical environment, modest amount of cooperation was formed to enhance products quality. At the end of March 2001, for the future development of M&S, Vandervelde, the new chief executive of M&S, started to focus on its core 300 domestic stores by cutting or withdrawing its stores worldwide, and started moving business closer to the customer and selling customized products within the UK. For customized products, quality is a key success factor. Therefore, obviously, at this stage, M&S strategy focuses mostly on differentiation character. The matching HRM practices of this competitive strategy for M&S are summarized as following table: Quality enhancement strategy (Salsbury and Vandervelde) Needed Employees Behaviors Human Resource Practices Relatively repetitive and predictable behaviors Relatively fixed and explicit job descriptions More long-term or intermediate focus Giving employees more discretion Modest amount of cooperative, interdependent behaviors Mix of individual and group criteria for performance appraisal High concern for quality Extensive and continuous training and development of employees, QC function, TQM practices Modest concern for quantity of output High level of employee participation High concern for process Training and development of employees, TQM practices Low risk-taking activity Relatively egalitarian treatment of employees Commitment to the goals of the organization Applying Balance scorecard 3. Focus or innovation strategy However, they also try to design a new range of clothes for M&S through hiring famous innovators and conducting in-depth research to understand customers’ shopping habits and their demographics. This strategy emphasizes some of the innovative character, whereby gain advantaged of its competitors. It’s different from the previous two strategies. Meanwhile, the organization concentrates on a specific geographical area, specific group of customers. Overall, for firms pursuing a competitive strategy of innovation, the employees are encouraging to offer suggestions for new and improved ways of doing their job or manufacturing products. Eventually, this strategy will result in feeling of enhanced personal control and morale, greater commitment to self and profession. In addtition, selecting highly skilled individuals or training employees could be costly once adopting this strategy. Focus or innovation strategy (Vandervelde) Needed Employees Behaviors Human Resource Practices High degree of creative behaviors Selecting highly skilled individuals Long-term focus Appraising performance for its long-run implication Relatively high level of cooperative, teamworking, knowledge sharing and interdependent behaviors Using minimal controls Moderate degree of concern for both quality and quantity TQM practices, making a greater investment in human resources Equal degree of concern for process and results Providing more resources for experimentation Greater degree of risk taking Allowing and even rewarding occasional failure Uncertainty, unpredictability and constant change Compensation, incentives, giving employees more discretion Comparatively speaking, Low-cost leadership is effective but difficult to do in a high-cost organization. Differentiation can be profitable if target customers are not particularly concerned with price but it’s costly to implement, such as research and development, advertising costs. Focus strategy can gain quick returns but takes time to identify area or group and the cost could be even higher since it focuses on innovative aspect of products. Analyze Matching model and other HRM strategies From the above comparison, we can see that effectiveness will increase by melding HR practices with competitive strategy. The advantages of this model are obviously and are summarized as following table: Component Advantages Disadvantages Low-cost leadership Effective Difficult to do in a high-cost organization Differentiation Can be profitable if target customers are not particularly concerned with price Costly to implement, e.g. research and development, advertising costs Focus Quick returns Takes time to identify area or group (Linda Maund, 2001:55 ‘Adantages and disadvantages of Porter’s competitive strategies’) However, besides the disadvantages illustrated above, the practice of this matching model could also be problematic since achieving the goal of ‘close fit’ of business and HRM strategy can contradict the core ‘soft’ HRM goals of commitment, flexibility and quality. Work organization as M&S may adopt a ‘soft’ version of HRM for managerial staffs, which is consistent with its current strategy, whereas simultaneously pursuing a ‘hard’ version of HRM for low-level worker, which might undermine the commitment of the latter. Hence, the matching model is essentially unitary and it tends to assume that workers are unproblematic and will comply with managements’ perception of the ‘needed role behaviors’. Meanwhile, we also cannot ignore the fact that workers and their unions, especially for M&S’s famous British working union, might influence strategic planning. In addition, ‘excessive fit’ can be disadvantageous to gaining competitive advantage since it can make a company inflexible and incapable of adapting quickly to the external environment. Recalled that when Greenbury insisted on its cost-reduction strategy and its quality criteria, the environment of the whole market has gradually changed. Competitors targeted at niche market and adopted differentiation strategy to attract and gain credibility among numerous consumers, whereas M&S still keep its traditional or risk-aversive way to do business. Recommendation Other HR strategies suggestions for M&S: At individual level, employees’ motivation can be stimulated through appropriate job design and rewards. Also, emphasizing employees’ participation or empowerment, and it could be reinforced through encouraging front-line staff to solve customer problems on the spot, without constant recourse to management approval. At organizational level: Development through changing the paternalism structure and corresponding traditional culture to a culture of the individual and of teams. The organization should focus on building its growth valued (such as brand revitalized by Vandervelde) and rewards excellence. Meanwhile, strategy-focused organizations like M&S can apply the balanced scorecard to align their employees to their strategy. This strategy can be implemented through communication and education, personal and team objectives, and incentive and reward systems. They should extensively use self-managed teams and decentralization. Also, paying attention to reducing status differentials and encouraging willingness to share information. Finally, when individuals understand how their pay is linked to achieving strategic objectives, and set personal objectives to met and help to achieve the strategic objectives, organization’s effectiveness will expect to be achieved. Â   References and Bibliographies: Linda,M.(2001) ‘An Introduction to Human Resource Management: theory and practice’, Hampshire, New York: Palgrave Publishers Ltd Schuler,R.S and Jackson,S.E (2002, 7th edn) ‘Managing Human Resources: A Partnership Perspective’: Journal of Personnel Review,31(1),114-121 Tyson,S. and York,A. (2000,4th edn) ‘Essentials of HRM’, Houston: Butterworth Heinemann Torrington,D. and Hall,L. (1998, 4th edn) ‘Human Resource Management’, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall Inc Maund,L. (1999) ‘Understanding People and Organisations: An Introduction to Organisational Behaviour’, Cheltenham: Stanley Thornes Schuler,R.S and Jackson,S.E (2000) ‘Strategic Human Resource Management’, Journal:Personnel Review,29(6),816-821 James,A. and McGoldrick,A.E. (2001) ‘HRM service practices: flexibility, quality and employee strategy’, Journal: International Journal of Service Industry Management,7(3),46-62 Huang,T.C (2001) ‘The effects of linkage between business and human resource management strategies’, Journal:Personnel Review,30(2),132-151 Anne-marie,G and John,B and Peter,A (2000) Lost Narratives From Paternalism to Team-working in a lock manufacturing firm http://research.abs.aston.ac.uk/wpaper/0001.pdf (accessed 11 Jan,2004) Marks&Spence: An analysis of Business and HRM strategy (Online) http://www.hrm.strath.ac.uk/teaching/classes/41429/MarksandSpencerPresentation%5B1%5D.pdf (accessed 11 Jan,2004) John,B. (2000) Strategic Human Resource Management: Chapter Two http://www.palgrave.com/business/brattonandgold/docs/bgwebstudentnotes.pdf (accessed 11 Jan,2004) Annette,S. (2002) The psychological contract in a changing work environment http://www.ukwon.org/pdf/Hi-Res/PsychologicalContractTheme.pdf (accessed 11 Jan,2004)

Nevada week in Review Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Nevada week in Review - Essay Example There has been a rising concern on the amount of money and contributions that these particular groups are raising towards campaigns. The contribution caps may have to be limited to enable greater influence of various groups in the political arena. The current period is important since majority of the politicians are going to their grass roots to seek for voter support and confidence. The existing campaign finance reforms stipulate that the government provide a specified amount of money to aid in the campaign process. It is always important for the special interest groups to contribute to a certain specified limit to give the relevant reform various grounds for debate (VegasPBS). When the special interest groups through their contributions are able to compensate the money channeled towards campaigns, the topic will always remain pending. It is because the money will be though t to be enough. The United States of America is a country that is marked with diverse races. Majority of the people belonging to a different race are in the United States for various reasons. Some are there because they are seeking permanent citizenship while others are there because of work related activities. It is always a basic fact that the voice of such individuals heard since it creates a diversity and opinion about what the diaspora things about the political leaders in the United St ates. Politics in the United States is governed by various acts and clauses found in the constitution of the United States. The existence of peace in the region promotes the development of a good political environment where performance charts and indexes accessibility and previews are available. These presentations are useful components that the citizens adopt to give them the freedom to choose whom they prefer their leaders should be. In my opinion, the voting and election process should be a free and fair exercise.

Harmful effects of boxing Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Harmful effects of boxing - Essay Example All this just cannot be valid things to make us consider it as a necessary one in our life. Unless we take a broader view, the real effects of boxing cannot be understood in real sense.Is boxing really a sport This is the question that has to be focused on first. The duty of any sport is to entertain the audience and give them pleasure, but not at the cost of the participant's life. We can very well say that all sports are dangerous and boxing is one among them, but the truth is risks in the other sports are accidental, whereas in boxing the purpose of hurting is the real goal. In the name of defeating a person, the boxer actually takes the chance of injuring his opponent fatally. Looking at each men fight for their lives and getting the pleasure from it is what we are all have been doing. Is it not the worst form of entertainment It is very surprising to see how inhumane we are just as the boxers out there.We should derive happiness from sports, the games should encourage us. It sho uld give progress for individual development for both body and mind. This should be the real motive of all sports. But clearly, boxing does not seem to do this. It is just a brutal and barbaric way of human behavior that is all. The real objective of boxing is to knock the opponent to unconsciousness and then claim the title, no matter even if life is lost. In what way does it sound good Is there anything in this sport that we can implement in our life Does it teach us anything These are some questions that we all should think about. Only then we will be in a state of mind to accept the tragic nature of this savage sport. Though there are so many developments in science, technology and education, we have failed to care about certain things. One among them is boxing. We have not understood to look at it as something threatening the life of the players. We are happy to look at them thrashing and punching each other and bleeding throughout the game and with such a stupid curiosity we wait in want of more. More than the players, I personally condemn the authorities and audiences who are the real triggering force behind these boxers. If we stop considering it, things will change and slowly this game would die out in the end. To be very frank, there is nothing fruitful that we can obtain from this game. We have made ourselves to risk in unwanted activities to destroy ourselves. Boxing is one of those industries that make the life of people worst. Here humans are exploited in the name of sport. Boxing triggers our inhumane behavior and makes us act like beasts which sometimes end in killing each other. When education tries to modify human behavior, sports such as this really messes up everything and makes us loose our sense. Here are few cases from which we ourselves can witness the brutality of boxing. BOXING IS HARMING Three hundred thirty boxers have died from injuries received in the ring as per a survey taken from 1945. Though these statistics are no greater than that of football or hockey, you must remember that the very purpose of boxing is to inflict as much pain or injury to the opponent as possible. There are many causes of these boxing-related deaths, however. One cause of death among boxers is long-term diseases such as Alzheimer's or Parkinson's. One such case is that of Sugar Ray Robinson. Though he did not die directly after a boxing match, it is believed that Alzheimer's contributed to his death. He died at the age of sixty-eight in 1989.