A Dangerous Business Essay

The collaborative investigative report conducted by the New York Times and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation is an eye-opener on the real situation of thousands of employees working for giant industrial corporations. On the outside, it seems that American workforce is definitely more fortunate compared to those who take employment in developing countries. The general public is made to believe that every employee in the US is treated fairly and with respect. But with this documentary, the truth has been exposed. For several years, the McWane Corporation has been actively involved in contributing to the advancement of the US economy. However, this economic achievement comes with a price. Unfortunately, the collateral damage in this enterprise for monetary profit comes in the package of the human resources. Ironically, this particular organizational component is deemed to be the most important factor in the accomplishment of success in any company. A business would not function without its employees and vice versa. This natural and logical cycle has always been evident in the business world. However, in the case of McWane, their workers were treated as if they were indispensable. See more: Satirical essay about drugs As a result, plants owned by McWane holds the record for the highest number of violations regarding safety in the workplace. Looking closely on these intriguing and appalling facts about America’s workplace safety and the government’s efforts to reinforce the protection and security of the welfare of the employees, it cannot be helped to doubt the justice and labor system in the US. Based on the interviews and the accounts of former employees of McWane, it can be surmised that there is a deliberate attempt to compromise safety for the sake of increasing productivity which will eventually lead to a significant boost in McWane’s revenues. Also, the government is very lenient in punishing companies that violate safety regulations because they are afraid that penalizing a powerhouse company can send a negative message to other corporations which could drastically affect the economy of the country. The dilemma here is whether to look after the global status of a nation or paying attention to the common good of the majority. Meanwhile, workers are belittled by the top management because they think that workers can be easily replaced. They know that people cannot live without work because common individuals need to sustain their ways of living with money. Companies exploit this situation wherein they make people feel they need any job as long as they will be paid so that they can be able to afford their chosen lifestyles. Because of this, many workers were injured, incapacitated and even died while on duty at their respective workplaces due to the neglect of management, leniency of the government and the build up on the dependency on monetary compensations.

“Angela’s Ashes” by Frank McCourt Essay

The autobiography Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt tells the life of the McCourt family while living in poverty in Limerick, Ireland during the 1930’s and 1940’s. Frank McCourt relates his difficult childhood to the reader up until the time he leaves for America at the age of nineteen. Angela’s Ashes has many prevailing themes, but one of the most notable is the settings relationship to the family. The setting of the book ultimately influences the choices and lifestyle of the McCourt family in many ways. Living in poverty and not being able to meet basic needs leads the characters to result to desperate measures, such incidents as stopping Frank McCourt’s education and taking a job to support the family. Frank is forced to take the job mostly because his father is an alcoholic and uses all the money to buy beer instead of feeding his family. Frank describes this pattern of drinking away the money by saying † when dad comes home with the drink smell there is no money and Mom screams at him till the twins cry†(42). This situation lasts until Mr.McCourt leaves to work in England and is never heard from again which forces Frank to take a job at fourteen years old. Frank takes on the role of the head of the family proudly and comments † Its hard to sleep when you know the next day you’re fourteen and starting your first job as a man†(309). Frank’s ability to provide financial stability leads to greater comfort and living conditions for his fami ly. The members of the McCourt family are also forced to beg and steal in order to help the family’s well being. Mrs.McCourt begs charities especially the St.Vincent de Paul Society for help with basic necessities for the family such as food, clothing, and furniture. Mrs.McCourt is even forced to beg for the family’s Christmas dinner. The butcher who she begs to tells her † What you can now missus, Is black pudding and tripe or a sheep’s head or a pig’s head†(97). Mrs.McCourt reluctantly accepted the pig’s head and is ridiculed walking home with it. Also, the children are forced to pick up scraps of coal for the fire from the road on Christmas Day. Frank describes the children’s humiliation by saying, † Even the poorest of the poor don’t go out Christmas Day picking coal off the road†(99). Despite Frank McCourt’s horrid poverty, tiresome starvation and devastating losses, Angela’s Ashes is not a tragic memoir. It is in fact up lifting, funny and at times triumphant. â€Å"When I look back on my childhood I wonder how I managed to survive at all. It was, of course, a miserable child hood: the happy childhood is hardly worth your while. Worse than the ordinary miserable childhood Is the miserable Irish childhood, and worse yet is the miserable Irish Catholic childhood†, writes Frank McCourt of his early life Although Frank McCourt’s autobiography, Angela’s Ashes, paints a picture of both terrible poverty and struggles, this text is appealing and up lifting because of its focus on both humor and hope. McCourt’s text shows the determination people living in dreadful conditions must have in order to rise above their situations and make better lives for themselves and their families. The effect of the story, although often distressing and sad, is not depressing. Frank as the young narrator describes his life events without bitterness, anger, or blame. Poverty and hardship are treated simply as if they are a fact of life, an d in spite of the hard circumstances, many episodes during the novel are hilarious. Frank McCourt was born in Brooklyn in 1930, just after the beginning of the Great Depression. During this time, millions of people around the world were unemployed and struggling to survive. Franks father, Malachy McCourt, struggled to obtain work and lost it easily due to his alcoholism. His mother, Angela McCourt, being a good catholic wife produced five babies in four years, leaving her unable to provide the most basic care for her children. When the baby, Margaret, died due to the shocking living conditions in Brooklyn, Angela subsided into clinical depression, which went untreated. Other women in the building where the McCourt’s lived looked after the children until Angela’s cousins arranged for the family to return to Ireland. Life in Limerick was considerably poorer, with a less supportive population than Brooklyn. The McCourt’s lived in a succession of substandard flats and houses characterized by poor sanitation and lack of electricity. The family  had so little furniture that they shared beds, with no sheets or blankets. When Malachy McCourt took his family back to an impoverished Ireland he chose to live in the south, where he was discriminated against because of his northern name and accent. He was unable to find work and when he finally did it was too late. He had become an alcoholic, unable to control his drinking and conform to the demands of a job. This meant that his family was reduced to existence on the dole and as a result, his children starved, and were forced to pick coal up from the side of the road in order to keep the fire burning. When Malachy left for work in England he sent no money home and Angela was forced to beg for food. In these terrible situations two more of her child ren died, Angela was hospitalized with a miscarriage and pneumonia, while Frank was hospitalized with typhoid fever and conjunctivitis. Survival for the family was clearly difficult and life only improved when Frank found full time employment as a telegram boy. His sense of responsibility guided him to give his mother his wages in order to support the family. Life in Limerick was often associated with humor. A lot of laughter derived from religious practices such as taking the wafer at mass. Since the wafer regularly stuck to peoples tongues, the boys at school had to practice sucking pieces of newspaper, sticking their tongues out for the teachers. The sins that the children confessed were also often sources of humor for the priests, and when grandma’s demand to know if she should clean Franks vomit up with Holy Water is pure mockery. â€Å"bless me father for I have sinned, its been a minute since my last confession†, becomes a sarcastic comment on Grandma’s ignorance. Poverty itself reduced the family to other slapstick situations. Pious Grandma’s deliberate lie to the real estate agent when she denied that there had ever been two rooms upstairs in Angela’s house has a savage humor in light of her piety. For the children Grandma was often the source of unintentional humor from the moment they heard he r accent. There is humor in the situations caused by Roman Catholic censorship. On one occasion Frank is evicted from the public library for reading a book about sex left on the table. The irony here is he really wanted to read Butlers  Life of the Saints but was enticed by a book that shocked the librarian. From an early age Frank promised to support his family. To do this he dreamed of returning to America. During the novel there was discussion between Frank and his father about the difference in economies of the two countries when his father discussed this over the paper he encouraged him to get a good job in the land of opportunity. These discussions were placed in the context of the English oppression of Ireland. It is the symbols associated with New York that really sustained Franks dream over the years. The images of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island which he kept as he left New York as a small boy were so clear that he recognized them on his trip back. McCourt’s hope of a better future was shared by his father, brother Malachy and hisUncle Pa Sheehan. However, it was Frank that had the determination to work at any job available and to save money even id his family starved, in order to make the dream real. There is no magic in Angela’s Ashes. Poverty and despair are cured by both hard work and breaking the law. Not everything that Frank did to save his fare was honorable, but his choices were made with long term goals in mind. Angela’s Ashes depicts unrelenting poverty and the terrible consequences for individuals living in dirtiness. However, Frank McCourt shows that there is always humor in life, no matter how desperate the situation is. Combined with this is the hope that sustained McCourt and drove him to seek a better life in the USA.

Art Piece Anotation Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Art Piece Anotation - Essay Example Falconet continued with hard work in sculpturing and he was successful in developing his first sculpture by the name Milo of Crotone (In French it is Milon de Crotone) (Artfinding.com, 2006). This successful bit of art made Falconet very famous and immediately he was absorbed and became a member of â€Å"Academie des beaux-arts† in the year 1754 (Artfinding.com, 2006). This was the royal academy of painting and sculpture that only had prominent outstanding painters and sculpture of the time being appointed to be members. Due to his hard work, the sculptures he developed between the year 1755 to 1757 made him get appointed to be the director of sculpture workshops in that royal academy. This sculpture is a figure of a great legend known as Milo of Crotone. This was a real life portrait of a Grecian wrestler of the 6th century; who was born in a town called Magna Grecian city of Croton in southern Italy (Djibnet.com, 2011). Milo was a great wrestler who at all time enjoyed the career since he always won. In addition to this, Milo was also an athlete and had won many wrestling and athletics competitions during important festivals of ancient Greece (Djibnet.com, 2011). Moreover, Milo is also remembered for his role in leading his fellow citizens to a military triumph in 510 B.C. over their neighbors in Sybaris (Djibnet.com, 2011). Milo was also associated with another Crotonean Pythagoras who was once saved by Milo from a collapsing roof (Djibnet.com, 2011). In repayment Milo was given the daughter of Pythagoras called Myia. His name became very famous and the greatest complement was on his strength and power. This is the main theme portrayed in most of his statues developed by most artists. It should be noted that the sculpture of Milon de Crotone is entirely constructed from the artistic literature demonstrating Milo’s power, strength and his painful death. Milo’s legendary strength and unique death have currently

Case study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 6

Case Study Example It has become quite difficult for Karen to select or predict the right person for promotion since the performance of all these individuals are fluctuating in nature over the past period and there is also pressure from the upper management to select individuals based on different interests, non-compliance to which may lead severe consequences for the organization in terms of both internal and external aspects. Moreover, another quandary faced by Karen is that she is also emotionally attached to one manager i.e. Carmen whom she would like to promote based on her poor financial grounds. However, on the other hand, promoting either of the other two managers could lead to prove beneficial for her in the distant future. Therefore, Karen is facing a problem in selecting the right manager based on their different attributes such as performance, upper management pressure, emotional attachment and future benefits, all of which is making it very hard for her to select the right manager in an un biased manner and transparently. A prospective candidate for promotion, Carmen, a 34 years old African American having one child, had completed her graduation, in the lower half of the college class studied by her, from Northwest State. Her association with the company had been for four years and she was serving in the industry for eight years. Her performance had been quite average but she had very high energy level. It needs to be noted that she at times faced certain problems in managing her staff and moreover her child had a past history of medical issues, thus a pay hike would be quite accommodating in her case. Karen knew Carmen for a very short time but they seemed to get along very well. Furthermore, Karen once had to perform the role of a baby-sitter for Carmen’s daughter in an emergency scenario. With this concern, promoting Carmen may lead to a view that Karen is playing favoritism (Ashkanasy & Daus, 2002). In this

Whatever you choice Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

Whatever you choice - Term Paper Example Land was well subdivided and they adopted rotation of crops from one parcel of land to another. Rome used its might to conquer other to get food from other countries under its authority such as Egypt. Crops were grown on extensive farms called ‘latifudia’ and the main source of labor was by slaves from conquered empires (Frank 3). These slaves were placed in three categories with each category enjoying its unique privileges. Highly ranked was the steward who oversaw the management of the estates, below under them was the field foreman who oversaw the work done by the field workers. The region enjoyed adequate rainfall throughout the year, this facilitated growth of several varieties of crops. Despite the ample rainfall, farmers adopted water harvesting to facilitate farming during the summer season (Frank 5). The region’s hilly and mountainous landscape was disastrous to farming because soil erosion was very prevalent, in order to curb this the farmers devised various methods such as application of manure to improve soil fertility, and mixed farming to reduce the impact of runoff. Consequently, crop rotation was also embraced in order to reduce monoculture that threatened soil fertility because of excessive utilization of particular nutrients while others remained in the soil unutilized. Romans produced and traded with a variety of crops. The common trade goods around the Mediterranean ocean were olive oil, grains and wine all of which are farm products. They did not stop there, they continued engaging in domestication of new crops, by around 6000 BC they had embraced the farming of lentils, flax, peas, barley, wheat, grapes, fruits and nuts. It was important for crop farmers to establish permanent residences since there was need for storage of their farm products (Frank 7). The growth of different crops covered for chances of crop failure but they could also result into

21st Century Technology in Today's Classroom Essay - 1

21st Century Technology in Today's Classroom - Essay Example context, which includes â€Å"the institutional objectives of the e-learning program, the role and skills of any instructor, longevity of the resources, and cultural sensitivities†; and influence, which means how the e-learning design will influence the learner, the learning community, and the environment in which the learning is taking place (Brown & Voltz, 2005, pp. 4-7). Article 2 Abstract: Teacher’s conception of e-learning and e-teaching is also crucial. Teacher’s like e-learning because it excites their students, and provides a way for lectures to become more interesting. Moreover, students have a way of exploring their tacit knowledge, and learn more about co-operative learning and how to behave in social situations. Teachers also like e-learning because it gives them a way to give students extra information, outside the lecture and it also gives the teacher a way to give information to the masses. On the other hand, for some cultures, self-study is difficult. For instance, for a Chinese student, who still expects the teacher to provide information through the lectures, self-study through e-learning is difficult. Therefore, there needs to be ways to overcome these challenges (McConnell & Zhao, 2006). Article 3 Abstract: This article talks about cultural differences, which could prove a challenge to the e-learning community. Different cultures share knowledge in different ways. Some cultures are individualistic, which means that these cultures put personal goals in front of group goals; collectivistic cultures are the opposite. The individualistic cultures see information independent of context, while the collectivistic cultures need contextual cues and disregard information in writing. Anther difference in culture includes in-group and out-group orientation. Cultures which are out-group orientated do not have a problem sharing information outside their group; in-group orientated cultures do. Some cultures have a strong fear of losing

What is the true nature of war Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

What is the true nature of war - Essay Example In the words of Leo Tolstoy "In all history there is no war, which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful". Dictionary meaning of war encompasses "werra" which means confusion. War certainly generates confusion leading to the emergence of various social, economical, physical or mental issues that otherwise prove to bring disaster. It is an open conflict that two sides witness in approved format (McLaughlin). History witnesses that war is not new but it is an ancient episode which has taken a different arms and forms over the years. It was never a simple confrontation between people but it encompasses slaughtering and mutilation of those who were not the creator of war but naive onlookers. What is heroic about war and their heroes stumbling upon to magnificent deaths? The truth is not about glory but war is a conflict that brings about blood and gore. The motives of th e war could vary but the result is blood and grievances for the sufferers may it be the civil war of Libya or it is death of Osama bin Laden, the truth of war is that it has prevaricated human beings (McLaughlin).With the advent of new technologies war has taken advanced form, from simple arms to nuclear missiles and every war must end in a victory that has become the motive of the warriors as the opponent seem to be the most barbaric creatures of the planet. Thus, war gives an implication that humans are the enemies of humane. Victorious army rejoices or rather disgraces enemies to their utmost limits although there is a great economic loss to both the parties whether they lose or conquer, mental trauma to the sufferers, emotional loss or permanent disability, war has never generated happiness in people's mind except for a few instance where people got a saga of relief from the trauma or terror of the terrorism like the one that was done recently against Osama bin Laden by the US N avy SEALs. The value of war could never be estimated nor its implications be wiped off as there is no single funding agency that can relieve the sufferer from the emotional trauma. Still war occur to inflict obedience, enforce collaborations, set a quality on resilience and bravery. Promote as well as cultivate and endorse nationalism, ruined feeble and weak individuals, break up the misapprehension of primordial egalitarianism and stratified civilization or culture (The Social Value of War). In this manner war may display an evolution but promotion of slavery must be deserted. Ancient wars might have provided nations with strength and might but in today's scenario it interrupts cultural norms. Ancient era annihilated inferior people but the present era witnesses discriminating demolition of the paramount human reserves as they are aimed to prove supremacy over the other (The Social Value of War). The common man has to pay the value of the war in terms of biological, chemical as wel l as nuclear weapons. War is not so easy in present era as was in ancient times where there was only armed worriers now there are many unseen weapons which are capable of eradicating the survival of life on the planet. It is therefore war should never be glorified but it should be counted as the legal and authorized devastation that does not possess any ethical as well as social reforms rather it is a predicament that should never be encouraged (The Social Value of War). The economic loss that both the opponents suffer cannot be replenished. In the present scenario it is imperative to save all the energy for fighting against natural calamities rather than wasting upon provide evidence of "might" by means of war. According to William James, the classic problem of politics encompass: "How to sustain political unity and civic virtue in the absence of war or a credible threat". There could be only two solutions to this issue encompassing, either war or threat to procure and establish th eir power or "might". The epoch witnessed

Discussion Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Discussion - Assignment Example It was conducted in a very harsh and cruel way not caring on the way it would influence the operations of the firm (Ivancevich, John M., Robert Konopaske, and Michael T. Matteson 2011). Operations in the military air force are not so political since they are rational and geared towards meeting the objectives of the organization since the operations of the firms are largely partially independent. Commandants and supervisors employ the evaluation in a way that the employees are not aware of any negativity. Managers and supervisors in the verge of making efforts to improve on productivity to improve performance and productivity in terms of productivity and growth are advised to always embrace the use of the tools such as rewarding jobs well done. A reward motivates and allows employees to improve on their effectiveness and efficiency. They as well make external employees to want to join the organization in which such measure are employed making the organization have access to a large pool of labor force. Rewards both intrinsic and extrinsic well applied has effected a realization of job satisfaction, which is supportive to welfare of the general employee fraternity (Ivancevich, John M., Robert Konopaske, and Michael T. Matteson 2011). When a country is faced with external attacks and the military is engaged in defending the country. Collective and individual rewards to the officer, who ranges from appreciation from the citizen, monetary rewards by the employer. Others such as leave after hard work and finally promotion of the officers engaged depending on the performance of each would realize rejuvenated efforts after the reward are implemented

Federal Express Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Federal Express - Case Study Example The firm has often come up with performance standard programs, which help the staff meet certain performance targets and retain its position in the field. "As a multi-national, ensuring consistent performance standards and corporate values throughout its employees in every country of operation is fundamental to maintaining and growing its global status." (Case Study) Over the decades, FedEx has faced fluctuating employee turnover rate. This has been due to the very demanding nature of work at FedEx and turnover rate is highest among courier, customer representatives and line managers. (Case Study) This explains who are assigned the toughest responsibilities. FedEx appreciates the efforts made by each person and rewards them appropriately but its performance setting programs have come under attack. We need to understand that delivering packages and documents on time is not an easy task. There are several unseen contingencies that can emerge such as weather conditions, road accidents, traffic jams and flight delays. In order to make sure that each and every packet is delivered on time, FedEx has to recruit people who are self-motivated, active, and young. But this age factor has caused trouble for FedEx. The firm that enjoys an important place in the corporate world cannot help discriminating on age since the nature of th

Internet & interactive media-consumer website analysis and evaluation Research Paper

Internet & interactive media-consumer website analysis and evaluation project about Sephora - Research Paper Example Sales associates and make-up artists undergo intensive training so that they can be well prepared to answer customers’ questions and give them advice ranging from skin types, and application techniques. The company not only serves women who are frequent users of the beauty products, but also men. This paper examines the Sephora’s digital marketing strategy and its website which is located at http://www.sephora.com/. 2. Unique market positioning The company was launched in the 1960s and unlike other business entities which use the commission-based model, Sephora relies on the self-service model. Under this model, customers go around the store, and are able to feel, touch and try the available offerings. Its founder, Dominique Mondonnaud transformed the existing model by grouping products by qualities such as perfume notes and scents rather than by brand. By 1984, Dominique had opened more than 8 perfume shops, but in 1993 he sold all the stores to Louis Vuitton. Followin g the acquisition of Sephora, LVMH expanded its operations in many European countries as well as in the North America. Under the LVMH group, Sephora continues to expand the existing product lines and its current offerings include accessories, skin care, hair care, and make-up products. The company is renowned for its revolutionary products such as the anti-wrinkle cream StriVectin-SD. On its website, Sephora is highly recognized for providing the customers with an interactive shopping environment, and an unparalleled assortment of prestige products. Its products are most popular with those aged between 15 and 70 years old, and currently, the company operates in 24 countries. In North America, the company has established around 280 stores and mini-stores and has 11,000 products and 250 brands. Such a wide offerings ensures consumers needs and wants are adequately satisfied. 2.1 Products The company offers more than 200 brands and over 13,000 products and is considered a one-stop shop for all personal care needs. The company boasts of highly esteemed brands and trendy products and each of the brand features unique colors and packaging. In each of the stores, customers can receive innovative services from the Sephora professionals and it is this element that sets the company apart from its direct competitors. Maintaining high perceived quality products enables the company to charge premium prices. The prices of the available products and services are differentiated and this variation helps the company to serve a wider segment. Some of the products are highly priced while others are lowly priced to fit into the middle to upper range. The prices of course are higher than at other stores, and this price level is justified by the high quality services offered. 2.2 Communication and differentiation The company differentiates itself on three principles: freedom, experience and guarantee. In this regard, customers are guaranteed of quality services and they can s return product they are not satisfied

Pepsi Co Essay Example for Free

Pepsi Co Essay Pepsi Co is one of the largest Multi-national enterprises in US having operations in different countries of the world. It basically deals in beverages and soft drinks and offers different brands such as Pepsi, Tropicana, and Gatorode etc. The sheer success of its brands depicts that it is one of the most successful organizations in US which is operating at The International level. Pepsi receives its revenue in US dollars from all its licensed bottlers working across the world. However, it pays to its suppliers and employees in the local currency where it operates. Due to this factor, its cost structure is affected as the volatile movements in currency can really produce a volatile movement in its cost of sales. This factor also creates more sever impact when some of the countries where Pepsi Co works do not allow forward booking of US dollars. Therefore, Pepsi Co may not be able to hedge itself against the currency volatility. (G. I. , 2003) There are countries where Pepsi Co makes and receives payments in US dollars. However, since its foreign affiliates have to purchase the US dollar from the local market to pay to it therefore, the impact may be more volatile specially if the local currency appreciates against the US Dollar. If local currency appreciates against US Dollar, the revenues of the company will go down because local affiliates would not buy fewer US Dollars because of appreciation. This will also affect the profitability of the company because Pepsi Co would now have to remit the higher amount of US Dollars to pay to its suppliers in the local market. Therefore, its overall expense would increase. Therefore, the whole profitability would come down as a result of this. (Tallman, 2007). Bibliography 1. G. I. , Z. (2003). MNEs, globalisation and digital economy: legal and economic aspects. Managerial Law, , 45 (1), pp. 1-296. 2. Tallman, S. B. (2007). A New Generation in International Strategic Management. New York: Edward Elgar Publishing,.

Implications of Internet Monitoring on Employees

Implications of Internet Monitoring on Employees By Panuganti Shiv Devara What are the legal and moral implications of internet monitoring on employees? Computers at workplace, are used by employees for their official work, companies often apply employee monitoring software that lets them track everything workers do on their systems. This is termed as internet monitoring of employees. Employee monitoring is most useful to the managers for the fact that job performance is value-added. The benefits of employee monitoring are, looking after errors, the employer can also help the organization cut on expensive inaccuracies and helps the employer mend through supervision. The employer can easily identify policy violators for disciplinary action. Employers engage in employee monitoring to track performance, avoid legal liability, protect trade secrets, and address other security concerns. This practice may some-time influence on employee satisfaction due to its impact on privacy (Ball, Daniel and Stride, 2012). As present-day businesses rely more and more on their websites, internet monitoring software guarantees a nearly uninterrupted runn ing of a companys web presence. Internet facility to the employees is an essential requirement of any employer. The provision of internet facility will enhance the work efficiency of the employees in many ways, and several benefits to the employer. The old-fashioned norms of employment law not only permit electronic monitoring but assumes the legality of its practice as one way of guiding workplace communication and online services (Eivazi, 2011). Employers control is a key feature of the employment contract where it creates employers with the power to control, monitor, and direct the work of employees at workplace. Sometimes, the pressure resulting from workplace monitoring can lead to misleading performance results. The essay is structured to delineate advantages of implementing internet monitoring on employees in workplaces, implications on productivity of organizations, and available acceptable suggestions. A study of the impact of the internet on productivity can be useful for managers by making them aware of the negative effects on productivity and problematic employee behavior (Gumbus and Grodzinsky, 2005). The employee-monitoring-software allows the employer to track everything employees do on their computers. Many workplaces rely heavily on e-mail use and internet access as chief tools of their business. The internet access allows data to be collected, stored, retrieved, and processed at remarkable speed, for businesses. Employers resort to electronic monitoring to protect their business interests and to minimize or prevent exposure to the potential risk of legal liability arising from the misuse of online services at work by employees (Cornelius and Cancer, 2014). Invasion of privacy is one of the important issues in implementing the internet monitoring on employees in business organizations (Carly, 2013) and in educational institutions (Verton, 2004). Employers have a legal right to monitor productivity of workers while workers have the right to be told how they are watched. Video surveillance is a common method used by employers to maintain employee workstations. Strategically placed video cameras can record and archive the computer usage. Video cameras are legal in the work place without notice, except for offensive locations such as locker rooms and bathrooms. While online services such as e-mail and internet access are being used as an efficient tool of communication at work to help business growth, employers cannot overlook its negative legal effects for their businesses. Employees misuse of these services can expose employers, or even themselves, to a new dimension of potential legal liability. Sophisticated monitoring and blocking tool s (filters) will continue to be used by organizations to solve productivity issues due to internet misuse (Wen and Lin, 1998). As outlined above, many of these themes map to national and international privacy frameworks and principles, which may provide additional guidance to employers as to balancing employer versus employee rights and responsibilities. There are certain suggestions for problem-free implementation of internet monitoring of employees. Tools such as InterGuard (http://www.interguardsoftware.com/news_articles.html, NetVizor (http://www.netvizor.net), SurveilStar (http://www.surveilstar.com) and RealtimeSpay (http://www. Realtime-spy.com) have been applied as internal threat solutions that contain different modules such as employee monitoring, web filtering, data loss prevention and laptop anti-theft recovery (http://www.interguardsoftware.com/news_articles.html). By recording the computer (PC/Mac) activity (file tracking, e-mails, social media activity, keystrokes, in stant messages, web activity and screenshots), these tools help protecting the internal threats and keep the contents compliance and maximize employee productivity. Internet monitoring software also provides nursing of every aspect concerning management solution. Further these tools offer bandwidth and IT traffic monitor which indicates which computer is responsible for most bandwidth consumption in the network. Thus, electronic monitoring has become the community norm and a permanent tool of our modern offices (Myria, Kasey, Stephanie and Joy, 2007; Eivazi, 2011). Hence, frame work, involving a specific structure, developed in consultation with employee representatives, delineating the acceptable use of the internet in work places, is one of the common and direct solutions to the legal and moral problems (Gumbus and Grodzinsky, 2006). Eventually, such an internet model solution that sets basic guidelines is required to be made available to all the employees in work place. Employees may also use this model for reasonable private purposes which are consistent with the acceptable use policy. It may be concluded that Internet monitoring plays a pivotal role in monitoring of the assigned duties of the employees in any business organization. This way of surveillance using modern IT tools such as e-mail communications through internet aids to the growth of companies. Although the advantages and disadvantages of employee monitoring seem to balance out, the disadvantages can easily be smoothed out through the right balance of technology and personal engagement. Therefore, the workplace privacy and employee monitoring can go hand in hand such that the employees do not feel pressured but motivated to achieve their outright best. The aspect of employee monitoring involves different areas of the law, from labor to constitutional. While introducing and adopting such procedures and techniques, certain legal and moral issues such as that need to be faced and solved by the business information system analysts and administrators, are discussed. To prevent or minimize the broad range of risk, coupled with the concealed nature of activities online, employers should take reasonable steps to ensure that workplace online services are not being misused. Taking into consideration the benefits of internet monitoring services upon which our modern workplaces are becoming increasingly dependent for their businesses, such trends need to be continued. The education of employees, as well as employers, with respect to their awareness and better understanding of the risks associated with Internet misuse at work. By considering the present-day advancements in IT, some strategic remedial measures and mitigation options like powerful software programs are highlighted. With the advent of recent cutting-edge technological and modeling tools, it is hoped that more and more fast monitoring / diagnosis techniques and cost-effective solutions to minimize the problems that are being encountered by the business establishments come into the practice, leading to substantial growth in the bu siness organization profiles. REFERENCES Ball, K., Daniel, E. M. and Stride, C. (2012). Dimensions of employee privacy: an empirical study. Information Technology and People, Vol. 25, Iss:4, pp. 376-394, http://dx.doi.org / 10.1108/09593841211278785 Carly L. H. (2013). The insider threat and employee privacy: An overview of recent case law. Computer Law Security Review, Vol. 29, pp. 368-381, www.sciencedirect.com, http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1016 / jclsv.2013.05.014 Cornelius J. K. and Cancer de la Guardia, M. E. (2014). Exploring the positive side of personal internet use at work: Does it help in managing the border between work and non-work, Computers in Human Behavior, Vol. 30, pp. 355-360,http://dx.doi.org.ez.library.latrobe.edu.au /10.1016/ j.chb.2013.09.021 Eivazi, K. (2011). Computer use monitoring and privacy at work, Computer Law and Security Review, Vol. 27, pp. 516-523, www.elsevier.com/locate/clsr Gumbus, A. and Grodzinsky F. (2006). Ethical and managerial implications of internet monitoring, WCOB Faculty Publications. Paper 129, pp. 119-124, http://digitalcommons.sacredheart.edu/wcob_fac/129 Myria, W.A., Kasey L. W., Stephanie J. C. and Joy L. H. (2007). Workplace Surveillance and Managing Privacy Boundaries, Management Communication Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 2, http://mcq.sagepub.com hosted at http://online.sagepub.com Verton, D. (2004). Email glitch exposes flaw in privacy law, Computerworld, Vol. 38, No. 28, pp. 1, https://doi.org/10.1108/09593841211278785 Wen, H.J. and Lin, B. (1998). Internet and employee Productivity, Management Decision, Vol. 36, pp. 6, doi:10.1108/00251749810204142

An Analysis Of The Financial Situation Marketing Essay

An Analysis Of The Financial Situation Marketing Essay Upon the successful completion of ACCAs fundamental level, I met the eligibility criteria of BSc Honours Programme, offered by Oxford Brookes University in partnership with ACCA for ACCA students. I had to select a topic from a vast variety of more than twenty topics to embark upon. After short listing them one by one, I decided to choose Topic 8 The business and financial performance of an organisation over a three year period for my research project. There were several reasons for choosing this particular topic. Apart from my personal interest, I wanted to apply my academic learning into a real world scenario as studying F7, Financial Reporting in the fundamental level of ACCA and P2, Corporate Reporting in the Professional Level, gave me high conceptual grip of financial analysis. It would also prove helpful to me in the future as I have a strong desire to invest into Plcs through the stock exchange once I start my career as an Investment Banker. I wanted to analyze on an organisation that operated in a highly competitive environment so that I would be able to compare its results with a competitor to see the financial and operational performance and the relation to the proposed strategy. This would also help make the report more interesting for the readers. Increasing trend in fashion, new clothing brands being introduced and the rapidly changing style sense of people, brought me to the conclusion to select an organization in the clothing retail industry. After researching on a few of the leading brands in the clothing industry of UK, I decided to analyse the financial performance of Next Plc and to compare it with Marks and Spencers. United Kingdom Clothing Market: In 1992, the United Kingdom clothing market emerged from the recession of the late 1980à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ²s and has continued to benefit from the renaissance of High Street spending throughout the 1990à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ²s. In late 1996, early 1997, the clothing retail industry showed signs of being boosted by the continued growth in personal spending, aided most recently by the payments consumers received from the building society conversion. In order to prevent economic overheating, the United Kingdom government and its major financial institutions were keen to dampen consumer spending. This occurred with the Bank of Englandà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ²s decision to raise interest rates. The introduction of new entrants into the clothing market and their, expansion, growth and diversification of outlets both in the chain and independent sector at all ends of the market i.e high, mid, and low were also important factors in the development of the United Kingdom clothing industry. Furthermore the retailers, revolutionized and thought to introduce new ways to sell their products. One of the popular methods was via the mail-order catalogues. This has now been super seeded by the arrival of television and Internet-based clothing outlets. There are in excess of 25,000 clothes retailing businesses in the United Kingdom, with a combined outlet total of 45,500 outlets. 1.2 Company Profile The Next retail chain was launched in February 1982 and the first store opened with an exclusive coordinated collection of stylish clothes, shoes and accessories for women. Collections for men, children and the home quickly followed. Next clothes are styled by the in-house design team to offer consistency of style, quality and value for money with a contemporary fashion edge. (Next Plc, Business Overview, The Next Brand [online]) Next Plc is a brand name in the United Kingdom clothing market for stylish, trendy men and women between 20 and 40 years of age. Menswear, womenswear, childrenswear and babywear is part ot the expansion into all the sectors of the clothing market under the NEXT brand label. Today Next Plc employees over 30,000 people and operates from more than 500 stores in the UK and Eire and over 170 franchise stores overseas, including Europe, Asia and Middle East. This makes Next Plc, one of the biggest High Street retailers in the United Kingdom. Over the last few years several larger format stores have opened across the UK and, in October 2005, Next opened the anchor store at the Manchester Arndale Centre with a store in excess of 80,000 square feet. Next Plc mainly operates through 5 basic divisions: Next Retail operates the high street shops through more than 330 stores covering the UK and Ireland; Next Directory is the mail order division which also contain the e-commerce platform; Next Overseas operates retail outlets in the United States, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East through franchise agreements; The company also provides home shopping and financial services, that make up the other 2 divisions: Ventura runs the financial services division by providing customer services management to clients wishing to outsource their customer contact administration and fulfilment activities Other activities include telecommunications software services and property management. For the first time in August 1985, Next launched its interiors range of soft furnishings for the home. Following the success of this diversification and the introduction of Next directory and home shopping, later in 1993, Next Plc announced its brand strategy, of One Brand Two Ways of Shopping, bringing together the common ranges across both retail and home shopping formats. 1.3 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE REPORT The primary aim of this report is to evaluate the business and financial performance of Next plc between, the three years ended, from 28th January 2006 to 24th January 2009. The main focus of this report can be summarized into: To understand Next Plcs Business Strategy; and how it has facilitated Next Plc to achieve success. To analyze and present financial information in a manner which will enable to evaluate the overall financial performance of Next Plc from the year-ended 28/01/2006 to 24/01/2009. To analyze the nature of clothing retail industry and the competitive environment in which Next Plc operates, and the affects it had on the company. 1.4 Executive Summary Exciting,beautifully designed,excellent quality clothing and homeware;presented in collections that reflect the aspirations and means of our customers (Annual Report 06) Next Plcs aim is to provide its customers with good quality clothing at a reasonable price. According to Michael Porter, in terms of Porters Generic Strategies this would be more of a stuck in the middle position, as it is competing with the market cost leaders as well as product differentiators. However, the success of Next Plc has shown that it has successfully operated in such a mid-market position and has done very well to implement its strategy. The overall business strategy has been successful. Despite an ongoing programme of expansion over the last few years, the company has continued to increase profits, besides the decline in 2009 due to the unstable economy of United Kingdom. It has been forced to close only four outlets due to poor performance over the past years. The above chart shows a steady increase of 32.3% during the years 2004 to2008. This followed brand-strengthening strategies and a new perspective in overseas development. During the three fiscal years ended, the performance of the group can be summarised as follows; Turnover increased by 7.17% Profit before tax increased by 10.91% Earnings per share incresed by 32.41% Dividends increased by 25% Overall the figures are not much high, but they look promising and have shown a steady improvement over the years except in 2009 when the figures declined steeply. The group has set a target to increase its sales turnover in the years to come and increse its earnings per share, that is one of the most important financial objective. Uncertain economic outlook, rising tax rates and weakinig pound against euro and dollar may act as barriers to this target, but it is highly probable that it will be achieved, by better and efficicient stock, margins, costs, including overhead and administration cost controls. 2 INFORMATION GATHERING 2.1 Sources used and their reasons 2.1.1 Primary Research Primary research is the research in which the researcher collects original data directly about the product, market and organization by whatever means appropriate to answer the research questions i.e it is specificially related to a particular Research Project. It is data that did not exist before. Due to the availability of sufficient information from secondary sources, I felt that there was no need of primary data. Hence, most of my work is based on secondary sources. 2.1.2 Secondary research I used two main sources for the secondary research. Library I went through various books in the College library. I used BPP study text Success in your research and analysis project which gave me an initial outline, approach, and structuring for the project. Studying the Bsc Oxford Brookes Information Pack gave me the essential information on how to go about the project. The study texts published for ACCA examinations provided me with an array of analytical tools to use in achieving the aims of this report. Electronic research I mainly relied on the Internet to formulate this report, as there was vast information available on the internet, needed for this report. The various databases and search engines to collect the information I needed for the report were: Next Plcs website was the most important and authentic source of information. It provided me with the annual reports, company profile, its history and all the other information I needed for this report which includes the audited financial statements aswell. The website also had an archive of company news which gave me a hindsight of the more immediate matters faced by the company. Competitor websites (for the same reasons) Reuters website (http://stocks.us.reuters.com), this provided me with the financial statements of Sainsburys and Tesco for the past five years along with ratios of both companies and the industry averages for the current period. London Stock Exchange website, providing details of historic share performance and relevant industry and competitor news Using internet search engines (Google, and Wikipedia) to gather information related to Next Plcs and the UK clothing retail industry. Other business related databases used to obtain relevant industry and competitor news are: Financial Times (www.ft.com) Accountancy age (www.accountancyage.com) Business Week (www.businessweek.com) BBC (www.bbc.co.uk) 2.2 Methods Used Information gathering is a critical and crutial phase, as the whole of the research is based on the information gathered, so it should be done in an organized and systematic way. Information access has become simpler with extensive details and volume available online and offline therefore a plan has to be made beforehand to be able to extract the relevant and accurate material in order to form a well-structured and organized report, which is easy to understand to the users of the report. Main method I used to collect the information was to use the GOOGLE search engine. By just entering a few key words in the search bar it provided me with the links of numerious different websites, that contained loads of information, which was both relevant and irrelevant for this report,. So I went through all the information and chose the one that was relevant and necesaary to formulate this report. I wanted to have the relevant material in hand before I actually started the report writing process. I started my research way before I actually started to write the report, so as I used to browse different websites, I bookmarked the web pages which had the relevant articles so that I would not have any problems referencing the information if I had chosen to quote it in my report. I printed the Financial Statements of Next Plc that I downloaded from its website and had also imported it into MS Excel to perform the ratio analysis on. 3 ANALYSIS 3.1 PORTERS GENERIC STRATEGIES Next Plcs aim is to concentrate on the design, quality and value of the product, together with excellent customer service and deliver. ( John Barton, Chairman Next Plc, Annual Report 2009) Michael Porter identified three generic strategies (See Appendix A) by which organizations gain competitive advantage. Porter argued that to be successful an organization should select and implement one of the strategies, i.e. either cost-leadership or differentiation. According to Porters viewpoint Next Plc would be a classic stuck in the middle whereby it is trying to compete with the Industry Cost Leaders, Primark etc. as well as the Product Differentiators, House Of Fraser However, the overall success of Next Plc has proved quite the opposite and there exists another viewpoint that a single generic strategy is not always best because within the same product customers often seek multi-dimensional satisfactions such as a combination of quality, style, convenience, and price. Next Plc seeks to provide its customers with fair price products without compromising on their quality and has been successfully operated in such a mid-market position. When interpreted narrowly as referring to the appeal of a product to its target buyers, the proposition that firms should not be stuck in the middle should not be taken to imply that companies must be down-market or up-market, but nothing in-between. Such a view is belied by the evident success of companies such as Next Plc, which earn substantial economic rents in a mid-market position. PIMS (Profit impact of marketing strategy) data and other evidence shows, however, that intermediate positions are indeed profitable and are successfully exploited by many firms. (Michael Cronshaw, Evan Davis and John Kay (1994), pp. 19-33) 3.2 SWOT ANALYSIS Next Plc STRENGTHS Brand Name Niche strategy WEAKNESSES E-Commerce Concentrated market OPPORTUNITIES Expand into EU Marketing Opportunity THREATS Competitor price war Economy Strengths BRAND NAME Next Plc uses its own label Next to sell its products. Customers of Next associate themselves with the Next label. As they use their own brand it is easier for them to react on customers wishes and to adapt them very quickly keeping control over the quality management. NICHE STARTEGY Next Plc adapts a niche strategy and its main target group is between the ages of 20-40. This strategy has worked quite well over the past years and it has emerged as one of the strengths of Next Plc, designing adult fashion wear for the people between 20-40. While some of its competitors have problems to satisfy this segment, NEXT managed it very well in the past, selling their stylish products at reasonable prices. WEAKNESSES E-COMMERCE Although Next Plc introduced its online shopping in 1999 and the entire collection is available to shop from on the internet, but Next Plc does not invest a significant amount on e-commerce as its competitors do. Debenhams for example invest approximately GBP 5m on internet technology while on the other hand Marks Spencer spend around GBP 50m on e-commerce and digital TV. Trend of internet shopping is increasing rapidly; therefore Next Plc should reconsider their IT strategy and invest more into e-commerce to stay in the competition. CONCENTRATED MARKET Next operates in a highly competitive retail clothing market, therefore there is concentration of similar type of clothing manufactures, e.g. Marks Spencer, Arcadia. This can damage Next, if competitors gain the market share or if consumers change their habits and Next does not adapt to these changes quickly. OPPORTUNITIES EXPAND INTO EU More than 90% of the revenue generated by Next Plc is within the UK under the brand names of Next Retail and Next Directory. However there is an opportunity to increase the revenue and sales by expanding its operation into EU countries. Next Plc has already its operations in mainland China, Hong Kong, Romania, Sri Lanka, India, Turkey but if it expands into EU it can diversify the risk of the concentration of UK retail market and the strength of Great Britain Pound over Euro, which currently is not that high due to the recession but in future this can be a good source of income. MARKETING OPPORTUNITY Next plc is already running a groundbreaking mail order operation Next Directory, which was launched in 1988 with a hardback, creating the blueprint for catalogue retailing. It is ranked number one among the High Street names that offer mail order clothing. This is an effective marketing techniques added by Next Directory, i.e. the online shopping service for its targeted age group 20-40 as they have little time to do their shopping. This could be a great opportunity for Next to increase its market share. THREATS COMPETITOR PRICE WAR The UK clothing retail industry is a highly competitive industry. Next Plc has over the past few years managed to compete very well and occasionally offering sale and promotions as well. However if cost-leaders retaliate this, it may have serious consequences as the business strategy of Next Plc is different to the cost-leaders, such as Primark, and it may not be able to compete with them in this area. Also indulging in a price war would mean that the quality of its products may have to be compromised. ECONOMY Due to the recent credit crunch, UK economy generally is facing a downturn. This has affected many industrys including retail. This is one of the main reason for the downfall in the revenue of Next Plc in 2009. The other worrying factor is the weakning of pound, this affects adversly to Next Plc due to its international suppliers. According to the analysts, UK economy will improve in 2010, and bringing back the sales for Next Plc. PEST Analysis Political: A stable and sound political environment is the basis for long-term decisions. The United Kingdom, as a Member State of the European Union, fulfils this prerequisite. The government has to act within a definite political framework to achieve the conditions of the European Union and this guarantees Next Plc a higher scope of economic actions. Another advantage of the European Union is the open transfer of goods. This makes it easier for Next Plc to sell their products in the different European countries. There are no trade barriers that aggravate sales. Economic United Kingdom had a stable economy in the last few years but since 2008, it is experiencing one of the worst recession in the history. This has affected almost all of the businesses in the United Kingdom. Due to this, Pound has become weaker than Euro and Dollar. This can be alarming for Next Plc, as these two are the main purchasing currencies oof the group. Secondly, due to this, foreign investments have become expensive for the group and it may become a hurdle for the group in order to expand overseas. The group now, can not exploit the favourable economic conditions of United Kingdom, when the Pound was exceedingly stong in the past few years where the group expanded its operaions the most. Social: The social structure has changed dramatically over the last few years. People are eager to find more convinent way to shop e.g internet shopping and shopping from home, due to the busy life and lack of time to go and shop from the retail stores. Nexts target customers are in the range of 20 to 40. People in this age group are much busier than rest and prefer to shop online, due to their interest in technology. In order to retain this customer age group, Next Plc must need to understand the needs of people and respond immediately. This will also result in customer satisfaction and an increase in market share for the group if it tends to satisfy its customers . Techinlogical: The age of Internet and the reception of new media reveal a lot of potential opportunities for Next Plc to boost profits Therefore the group relies heavily on its sub-brand Next Directory, through which customers can shop online, conveniently from home or through a mail order catalogue and the products are delivered the next day. Using this method the group can react instantly to changes in behaviours of its customers. 3.4 FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE The activities of the company in recent years have resulted in an exceptional financial performance. 3.4.1 SALES REVENUE The sales revenue of the group increased reasonablly well in the two years 2006-2008. Revenue incresed from  £ 3106.20m to  £ 3283.80m during the year ended 27th January 2007 resulting in an increase of 5.71% and in the year ended 28th January 2008, revenue further increased by 1.37% showing a consistant performance. This was achieved by roburst performance of Next Directory, and an effective cost control system. These are good results in a period of economic slowdown and are a reflection of the efforts we have made in building and improving the Next brand. (John Barton, Chairman Next Plc, Annual Report 2008) In 2009 the revenue of the group fell by 1.73% from  £ 3329.10M in 2008 to  £ 3271.50M in 2009. It was a tough year for the group, mainly because of the unstable economic conditions of UK as a whole, which began by the end of 2008 and still continues to worsen. Another reason for the decline in the turnover was the weakening of Great Britain Pound against dollar and euro, which are the main purchasing currencies of the group. But still the group did well to survive in these conditions and the management was pretty much optimistic about the financial conditions of the country. 3.4.2 PROFITABLITY RATIOS Gross Profit Margin The gross profit margin changed a little over the three years, this is because of the highly effective and efficient cost management of Next Plc. Revenue has increased over the years but the cost of sales hasnt changed much, proving that the group is cutting down its cost to save its customers from higher prices. In 2009, even under the tense economic conditions, the group has managed to decrease its cost of sales by 0.7% from  £2380m in 2008 to  £ 2,363m in 2009. This became possible due to the effective supplier management and good buying terms with its suppliers, even though pound got weaker against dollar and euro, which are the two main purchasing currencies of the group and higher tax rates, Next Plc aimed at reducing its costs rather than charging its customers with higher prices. Their response has been excellent,working hard with our suppliers to protect our customers from unaffordable price increases and our own margins, as far as possible. ( John Barton, Chairman Next Plc, Annual Report 2009) Marks and Spencers G.P margin was 38.6%% in 2008 and this decreased to 37.2% in 2009. This shows that the economic conditions were affecting everyone. But still GP margin of Marks and Spencers is better than Next. This is due to the increased amount of revenue generated by Marks and Spencers over the years from 2007 to 2009, in contrast with Next Plc. Net Profit Margin In 2008 net profit increased by 0.68% from 15.45% in 2007 to 16.13% in 2008. This was mailny due to the increase in revenue and effective management of overhead costs. In 2009, net profit declined by 9.3% from 16.13% in 2008 to 14.62% in 2009. Along with the weak economic environment and the decline in sales, another reason for this decline was the 39.9% increase in the overhead costs since 2008. This increase in the cost was due to the overseas expansion of the operations and the investment to strenghthen the Next brand. We are also extending the Next Brand into new overseas markets where we believe there are opportunities to build profitable businesses. If this is successful it will bring new sources of growth over the longer term. (John Barton, Chairman Next Plc, Annual Report 2008) Our goal has been to put a little of the magic back into the Next Brand through our product ranges, marketing and shopfit (Simon Wolfson, CEO Next Plc, Annual Report 2008) In contrast to this, the Net Profit Margin of Marks and Spencers is quite low as compared to Next Plc. It showed a varied trend over the three year period, being 10.9% in 2007, increasing to 11.8% by the year ended March 2008. In 2009, net profit declined by 22.16% from 11.8% in 2008 to 9.6% in 2009. Marks and Spencers incurs a very high cost on its admin, selling and general expenses amouting to almost  £2400m on average every year where as, Next Plc incurs just  £ 345m a year. Return on Capital Employed The return on capital employed (ROCE) assesses profits with the amount of funds (capital) employed to make the profits. This increased from 49.77% in 2007 to -53.27% in 2008. This represents an increase of 3.5%. But due to the economic unstability, the group could not maintain its high ROCE over the years and it declined by 9.85% from 53.27% in 2008 to 43.42% in 2009. On the other hand Marks and Spencers ROCE in 2008 increased by 0.44% to 22.37%. In 2009, it declined by 9.75% to 12.62%. This difference shows that Next is managing its resources much better, despite the fact that the revenue generated by Next Plc is approximately 37% lower than Marks and Spencers. The reason for a low ROCE for Marks and Spencers is the high overhead costs. It must control its costs in order to generate a higher return and free up additional extra capital invested. 3.4.3 LIQUIDITY RATIOS Current Ratio: This is a measure of the adequacy of companys current assets to meet short-term liabilities as they fall due, i.e its a basic liqiudity ratio. A ratio between 1 and 2 thought to be a standard level of liquidity. Next Plcs current ratio was 1.33, 1.11 and 1.50 in 2007, 2008 and 2009 respectively. This shows a healthy situation of the group as it has more current assests than its current liabiliteis as the ratio is greater than 1, therefore there does not seem to be any alarming situation for the group. If we compare the ratio of 1.50 in 2009, with the industry average of 1.93, it is very reasonable for the group but it can be improved by more efficient working capital management. Comparing the ratio to Marks and Specers, it was 0.52,0.59,0.60 respectively in 2007,2008 and 2009. This is because Marks and Spencers have a relatively high amount of current liabilities than Next Plcs, almost 30% more in year 2009. Quick Ratio: This differs from current ratio as it eliminates inventory from current assets providing a more useful position of the company to settle its immediate liabilities. Norms for quick ratios range from 0.7 to 1. Quick ratio of less than this is seen as a signal of illequidity. However, the trend of the ratio over time and comparison with the sector average are the most important indicator, as they are with current ratio aswell. Next Plcs quick ratio has been 0.82, 0.54, 0.93 for 2007 2008 and 2009 respectively. The ratio had a sharp decline in 2008 because of the  £242.7m short term debt raised by the company during the year in order to expand internationally. In 2009, the ratio was 0.93 which is quite good as compared to the industry average of 1.35. In comparison Marks and Spencers quick ratio was 0.22, 0.25, 0.30 in 2007, 2008 and 2009. This is quite alraming for the company as compraed to Next or the industry average, as it is very low. This is maily due to the high amount of debt finance invested in the group. This can be an alrming situation for the group as it can lead to illiquidity. This trend shows that Next Plcs in a better liquidity position and it may not face any problem settling short-term debts, whereas there may be pressure on Markss and Spencers suppliers. It indicates that Next Plc is making better use of its working capital. 3.4.4 GEARING RATIOS Capital Gearing Ratio: This indicates the extent to debt finance involved in a business. Next Plcs gearing ratio changed from 74.26% in 2007 to 111.22% in 2008 and 81.5% in 2009, whereas Marks and Spencers gearing ratio was 50.71% , 58.9%, 59.3% in 2007 2008 and 2009 respectively. In 2008, gearing ratio crossed over a 100% for Next Plc because of high level of debt taken by the group in order to finance the expansion and it exceeded the level of equity present in the group. We continued to invest in the Next Brand, spending  £39m refitting stores, maintaining advertising spend and improving the quality and design of our clothing and Home ranges (Simon Wolfson, CEO Next Plc, Annual Report 2008) Interest cover: The interest coverage ratio indicates the extent of which earnings are available to meet interest payments. An interest cover ratio of more than 3 times is considered safe as even if profits are reduced to half the company will still be able to meet its financing costs. Next Plcs had a very high interest cover of 15.37 in 2007. It then decreased to 12.38 and 9.74 in 2008 and 2009. On the other hand, the interest cover of Marks and Spencers showed a varied trend. It increased to 10.15 from 9.14 in 2008 and then decline by 51.6% to 5.24 times in 2009. Interest covere declined for both the companies in 2009. This was mailny due to the financial crisis the economy of UK is going through, but still it is much more than the safety margin i.e 3 times, therefore both the companies are in the position to settle their financial obligations. 3.5 INVESTOR OUTLOOK The earnings per share measures how much profit after tax is made for each individual share. (EPS) has been quite high for the group despite of the fall in the revenue in the 2009. The EPS of the group was 127.4p and it increased by 15.4% from 146.1p in 2007 to a record high of 168.7p in 2008. In 2009, EPS fell to 156p due to the fall in revenue. The continued use of surplus capital to buy back shares has again enabled us to deliver superior growth in earnings per share, our main financial objective ( John Barton, Chairman, Next Plc, Annual Report 08) The dividend per share of Next Plc was 44p and it then increased by 12.24% from 49p in 2007 to 55p in 2008. The group managed to maintain the same dividend per share of 55p in 2009, which is covered 2.8 times by earnings. Marks and Spencers EPS was 39.1p in 2007 and increased to 49.2p in 2008 before declining to 32.3p in 2009. The dividends per share were 18.3p, 22.5p, 17.8p in 2007,2008 and 2009 respectively. Despite having a very high EPS, the dividend payout ratio of Next Plc is much lower than Marks and Spencers. It was 33.5%, 32.6%, 35.2% in 2007,2008 and 2009 while the ratio of Marks and Spencers was 46.8%, 45.7%, 55.2% in 2007,2008 and 2009. This shows that Next Plc retains much of its profit as compared to Marks and Spencers. This can turn out to

Educational Goals and Philosophy :: Teaching Teachers Education Learning Essays

Philosophy of Education It has taken me many years to decide on what profession that I want to pursue. I enlisted for four years in the Air Force and enjoyed this very much, but the time away from my family was too much. After getting out of the Air Force, I decided I wanted to go into the financial arena and started selling insurance for New York Life Insurance Company. I did not have the personality to sell life insurance for this involved being really pushy. Later I found what I thought was the perfect job, assistant manager at a credit union. I still was not happy. While all these career changes were going on, I was coaching a club soccer team consisting of high school boys. This gave me the vision of what I really wanted to do, become a teacher. The biggest reason why I want to become a teacher is that a teacher has the ability to influence and shape the future Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, or just the average Joe down the street. We all can remember that one teacher who shaped or changed our lives as we progressed through our schooling and what better way to honor them than by trying the accomplish the same things they did for us. This is a very powerful ability to possess and while your influential you must not let your prejudices interfere with the rounding of the student. What important qualities will I need to possess to be an effective high school teacher? I will need to have patience as I already see how important this is with my own daughter. Intelligence is important in your area of expertise because students will be able to tell if you know what you are teaching. Honesty with students because this will build trust among the students and yourself. Sharing life experiences with your students is important because this also builds trust among yourself and the students. Being well organized is another quality that must possess and at this time I need work in this area. Caring is an important quality because sometimes we forget that our students are human and has ideas and opinions of their own. Being fun and interesting builds wonderful memories and helps the students learn. My goals as a teacher include the things above, but also many more. First and foremost I want to receive my master’s degree, but while doing this I also want to be teaching in a high school.

Coleridges the Rime Of The Ancient Mariner Essay -- essays research p

Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Coleridge's poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is wrote in a way that the reader is expected to temporarily allow him or herself to believe it to be able to understand it. The poem itself is about a Mariner who is telling his tale of sin and forgiveness by God to a man referred to as the "Wedding Guest." The Mariner is supposedly responsible for the death of all of the crew on his ship because of his killing of a creature which was to bring them the wind that they needed to put power into the sails of the ship. The whole point of the poem is to encourage or convince the reader to believe the tale that Coleridge tells. Coleridge wrote the poem as a means to induce the reader with what he calls a "willing suspension of disbelief." The poem is written in such a way that the reader is expected to willingly decide to temporarily believe the almost unbelievable story. The reason a person is to make sure that he or she believes it temporarily to be true is because the Mariner in the story is trying to get the point of forgiveness from God across to the reader and if the reader chooses not to believe the story behind the poem then they will not understand the effect of the point of the tale. Coleridge's main point in writing the story was to get people to understand forgiveness by understanding the poem. The Mariner in th... Coleridges "the Rime Of The Ancient Mariner Essay -- essays research p Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Coleridge's poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is wrote in a way that the reader is expected to temporarily allow him or herself to believe it to be able to understand it. The poem itself is about a Mariner who is telling his tale of sin and forgiveness by God to a man referred to as the "Wedding Guest." The Mariner is supposedly responsible for the death of all of the crew on his ship because of his killing of a creature which was to bring them the wind that they needed to put power into the sails of the ship. The whole point of the poem is to encourage or convince the reader to believe the tale that Coleridge tells. Coleridge wrote the poem as a means to induce the reader with what he calls a "willing suspension of disbelief." The poem is written in such a way that the reader is expected to willingly decide to temporarily believe the almost unbelievable story. The reason a person is to make sure that he or she believes it temporarily to be true is because the Mariner in the story is trying to get the point of forgiveness from God across to the reader and if the reader chooses not to believe the story behind the poem then they will not understand the effect of the point of the tale. Coleridge's main point in writing the story was to get people to understand forgiveness by understanding the poem. The Mariner in th...

The Idea of the Hypersexual Black Male in the Invisible Man Essay

In the Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, the narrator’s view of women is generally pessimistic. His negative view of women is also reflected by women, specifically of Caucasian ethnicity. Their societal depiction of black men considers them to be hypersexual objects and incapable of anything else. Emma, Brother Hubert’s wife, and Sybil, are three women in particular who possess negative character flaws that allow the narrator to deem them unworthy. Emma’s tremendous dominance give the impression of being unapproachable while Brother Hubert’s wife’s infidelity and ability to control confuses him and finally, Sybil’s decadence makes her appear sloppy. All of these flaws are used to reduce the narrator to a sexual tool at the expense of his intellect. The first woman seen is Emma, a Brotherhood employee, who is perceived to be very powerful and demeaning toward the narrator although physically attracted to him. She engages in limited dialog which, I believe is intended to paint her as diminutive; however she is described as â€Å"smartly dressed† with a â€Å"hard, handsome face† (300). Her...

Draft a Definition: Family Essay

Our ever-changing environment has impacted everything that it has even resulted to people having their own definition of words such as the word â€Å"family†. People now make their own definition of the said word based on their own personal and domestic experiences and circumstances. Gone are the old days of having one specific formal definition for the word â€Å"family† where it was also universally applied. The word family before was simply defined as a social unit â€Å"consists of a male wage earner, a non-working wife, and kids† (Lewin). It was considered as the simplest form of social organization where each member occupies a position, like being a father or mother to one’s children, husband or wife, the eldest or the youngest child. However, today there is more to the said definition. A family is defined as not only inclusive of the presence of a father or a mother with children but could also be any two or more persons living together regardless of sex orientation and preference but have commitment with each other, share the same values, and pursue the same goals. This definition may not have a legal standing in our society but various social groups asserted for its acceptance. These social groups would like to liberate the definition of the word family to pave the way for society’s acceptance as well as legal recognition especially for those who are involved in homosexual partnership where a relationship anchored on a long and deep commitment between partners was already established yet are not legally recognized. I still recognize family as a social unit but I hold a deeper meaning for it. For me a family is one that molds the character and personality of its member and in his contribution to the society. It is the building block of any society. The strength and durability of any society stems from the cohesiveness of this social unit called a family. As such I viewed family as the main link between the individual and the society. This is where the person or the child first gains experiences in love, affection, kindness, sympathy, and the like. The child gets oriented into the culture of the group, its norms, goals and types of consensus and sanctions. Indeed, the family is that social unit which has a pervasive influence on the individual’s behavior, even up to adulthood. It acts as the social laboratory which prepares the child for life in the bigger society, and that it is the family which is the first, the closest, and the most influential social group in the child’s life. Also, a family being a social system makes each member, from the youngest to the oldest, regardless of other personal circumstances essential to the working of the said system. Further, a family is one that provides a child with a fertile ground to build a solid foundation of who he will become in the future. It prepares the child to the outside world and also to the next life cycle. A family is something that is always there for its member no matter what and no matter when. Indeed, a healthy family may not necessarily have a father or a mother or both but it can bring people out of themselves as they recognize others. They heal, bind, and foster intimacy. They bring the sense of belonging, of feeling worthwhile, and develop a sense of individuality. Members of the family realize their unique dignity. These virtues are often overlooked in families, or are considered secondary or only expressed to friends, when they truly are the foundation of a healthy, functioning family. Reference List Lewin, Tamara. Suit Over Death Benefits Asks, What is a Family? Retrieved March 10, 2007 from http://www. cs. cmu. edu/afs/cs. cmu. edu/user/scotts/domestic-partners/family. html.

Leading Change When Business Is Good

Leading Change when business is good Sam Palmisano’s challenge: finding a mandate to continue a company’s transformation, his response a bottom up reinvention of IBM’s venerable values Palisimo recognized the key task would be to unite IBM’s global workforce behind a common business vision and a common set of values. IBM help 3 day discussion via the corporate intranet about the companies values, dubbed ValuesJam * Struck a core with employees company wide, positive and negative feedback * At the heart of ValueJam was what was worth preserving and what needed to be changed * In 1914 Watson Sr. decreed 3 corporate principles 1. Respect of the individual 2. The best customer service 3. The pursuit of excellence Palisimo used original basic beliefs and feedback of ValueJam as a basis for new set of corporate values * Palisimo was a true-blue IBMer who started as a salesman, he was deeply invested and passionate about the company’s success * Gerstner was an outsider, a former CEO of RJR Nabisco and an ex McKinsey consultant * To prove these new values were more than just window dressing Palmisano made changes immediately * He called the director of a major business unit, e business and charged her with identifying gaps between the values and company practices * He said an Organic system is what a company needs to adapt.Which is IBM’s values (values, principles, DNA) of company. They allow you to change everything from your products to your strategies to your business model but remain true to your essence, you basic mission and identity. * Unfortunately over time Watson’s beliefs became distorted and took on a life of their own * Employees were stuck in the old way of doing things they could never see another view * When market shifted they cut work force 400,000 people, equivalent of providence RI * How do you get people to passionately pursue change? You can’t command and control mechanisms on a large highly professional workforce * IBM doesn’t use hierarchical management system because employees and clients won’t accept it * IBM uses a value-based management system.You have to empower people while ensuring that they are making the right calls the right way that is consistent with who IBM is * People rather than products become your brand One way to ensure that is to inform their behavior with a globally consistent set of values * After opening the online Jam Palisimo had a drive to change the company more * Most IBMers were willing to do whatever it took to save the company. Their pride and jobs were at stake * There was resistance to change, Palisimo said instead of galvanizing people through fear and failure you have to galvanize through hope and aspiration. A small team settled on IBM’s new corporate Values 1. Dedication to every clients success a. Maintain a long term relationship where what happens after the deal is more important than what happens before its signed 2. Innovation that matters- for our company and for the world b. Employees talked about how their work touches people and society or fight terrorism with their data technology 3. Trust and personal responsibility in all relationships c.Relationships with suppliers, investors, governments, and communities * Published these revised values and received positive and negative feedback * Palisimo printed all the responses, 3 ft. high of paper work n read it all, brought it to a meeting and told everyone to read it all because now they need an action plan they can’t be all talk. * Changes Palisimo made * Change in the way they grant top executive stock options * Change in the way they set prices Gave m anagers $5,000 annually they could spend in extrodinary situations that would help generate business or develop client relationship or to respond to an IBMer’s need. This showed trust in line manager’s decisions! * Palisimo said if we get most people in the company excited and offer them something worth believing in and working toward. If they become dedicated to these values and what they are trying to accomplish then the company has a confident future.

Marion Sparg

Marion sparg Marion Sparg was one of the few white women to join Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the African National Congress during South Africa's apartheid era. A Sunday Times journalist, she was prompted into action after 32 ANC members and 19 civilians were killed by the South African Defence Force in an attack on Maseru, Lesotho.She would spend the years between 1981 and 1986 in exile where she received training in guerrilla warfare and worked in the ANC's Communication Department on a publication named Voice of Women and thereafter joined the Special Operations Division of Umkhonto We Sizwe In 1986 she was sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment on charges of treason, arson and attempted arson. Pleading guilty to all charges, she admitted planting and exploding limpet mines at Johannesburg's notorious police headquarters, John Vorster Square, and also at Cambridge Police Station in East LondonFollowing the unbanning of the ANC, she was released in 1991 at the same time a s fellow treason prisoners Damian de Lange and Iain Robertson, shortly after which she was nominated to the ANC delegation that participated in an early round of CODESA, the multiparty negotiations that led to South Africa's first multi-racial elections in 1994. In the same year, at the age of 34, she was appointed deputy executive director of the Constitutional Assembly, the body that would draft South Africa's groundbreaking 1996 constitution. 1996 she was appointed Town Clerk of the Eastern Metropolitan sub-structure of the Lekoa- Vaal-metropole. [7] Three years later she became the Secretary to the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) and in 2000 joined the office of Bulelani Ngcuka where she became Chief Executive Officer of the National Prosecuting Authority and the accounting officer of the Directorate of Special Operations, commonly known as the Scorpions.In 2003, amidst a public spat between the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and Jacob Zuma, South Africa's then-disgra ced deputy president, anonymous letters were sent to the Public Service Commission (PSC) accusing Sparg, her deputy Beryl Simelane and integrity unit head Dipuo Mvelase (also Deputy Chairperson of the South African Communist Party) of tender-rigging, corruption and nepotism. The Commission found no criminal wrongdoing and referred the matter to the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development – the parent body of the NPA.The Department head instituted 30 charges against the three women. South Africa's Financial Mail would describe the allegations as ‘bizarre' after the charges were withdrawn at the formal disciplinary hearing, only to be reinstated two days later. They would be officially dropped in early 2007. In June 2007 she resigned from the NPA to take up employment in the private sector. Marion has since joined Draftfcb Social Marketing, a division of Draftfcb SA.

Prejudice,Stereotypes and Discrimination Essay

Prejudice is an attitude that releases closely to intercultural sensitively. It is more commonly held and expressed by people in ethnocentric stages of the sensitivity model compared to people in the ethnorelatives stages. (Oetzel, 2009). Prejudice is the belief and feeling aspect of an attitude. It can be a pro or con but leads us to judging something based on our preconception. Prejudice is where you think against someone or something for no particular reason, thought or knowledge. It be because race , sex , age , or whatever . An would be like , â€Å" Oh I don’t like her , she’s a lesbian,† or she’s black or white or of any other race. Stereotype are overgeneralized cognitions about a group of people with no attempt to identify within –group variation . Stereotypes often based on learned and widely shared beliefs and another group that reinforce or justify prejudice (Oetzel, 2009) . A stereotype is a set of preconceived beliefs about those who share a trait in common . It is the narrow prejudice view of a particular social group . Such as â€Å"black people know how to dance† and â€Å"women are better at cooking and worst at driving†. They’re sometimes offensive and often unfair. Stereotypes is a view of social group that sticks , even though the social group is full of individuals who may not share any of the traits of the stereotype at all. It’s like â€Å"cheerleaders are bitches† or â€Å"geeks are smart†. Discrimination is action that maintain the dominance of one group of people over another. The power to enact the behavior is a key component to racism and discrimination. That power can be from a held position (being a boss) or social power (being part of a group that has political power). (Oetzel, 2009). Discrimination is where you actively are against someone for no reason , either on the basis of age , race , class or whatever . It’s different from a prejudice because you actually do an action , such as not giving that person a job because of your prejudice , or refusing to give them a room at a hotel. I remember when I was young , I use to live with my Father in a small town in Ohio. It was mainly white community , I had a friend that was white. She had invited me over her house and her Grandma was racist. When I walked in to her home , her grandma said to me â€Å"she can’t have company at all and you need to leave†. The next day I seen my friend , she had apologized to me, and said I don’t know why my grandma acts like that to black people. â€Å" She told her granddaughter not to play with blacks only with white children†, and she only would allow white children to come to her house . She never listened to her she still played with me anyway. I told her it wasn’t her fault that some people are just racist. Later on that week I was in the store with my grandma which is white also , we had seen my friend and her grandma . Her grandma tried to act as if nothing happen and spoke to my grandma and said to me you can come back over and play. I gave an example of prejudice stereotype and discrimination . People also stereotype for many of different reasons such as tattoos, race , religion, age gender and etc. Now days young folks now have a new way to rebel against society and ultimately and more honestly their parents . We began to see masses of young , dim witted teens getting idiotic tattoos just so they can feel like a badass (greengysywolf1 (How Prejudice and Fear). Children not knowing that when they get older that tattoos will affect them getting a job or the way society will look at them because of the tattoos they have on them. Even though it’s not right that’s the way society stereotypes and discriminates people because of their appearance. People get tattoos because they enjoy them , not to mark them as different , not to get jollies of the pain , or not to be the evil spawn of satan himself (greengysywolf1 (How Prejudice and Fear). People also stereotype people that have been in prison. It’s people that have went to prison and have changed their lives around completely . I have a friend that is about â€Å"6 4† and 200 pounds , but seems blessed with a baby face , so no one believes he ever been to prison . He usually waits until he meets someone in person to tell them , even though he knows there is a chance they will refuse to accept it . I’ve seen the look , the change behind the eyes that goes from listening to what the stereotypes say an ex-con is and should be . I found it interesting because he tends to be more truthful and respectful than people who have not done time. Prejudice exist everywhere; with prejudice comes a stereotype or discrimination. Most stereotypes are dealt with minorities , especially in the United States . Basically, It all depends on how a person was raised . Most of Americans assumes that every white person grew up either in the suburbs , or well-to-do apartments in the city. While sometimes that is true ,but some lives in bad areas like farming towns and many other diverse places. Where you raise your family depends on your income and your family situation most of the time. If they have a higher income than yours average American, than they probably live in the most high-class place they can buy. If they are middle class than suburbia is most likely option. If they exist in the lower class , your income is not so great. Then they would probably live in poorly developed neighborhoods , like a trailer park or apartment complex. African Americans continue to face the highest level of discrimination in renting , selling and insuring property, according to the National Fair Housing Alliance . People with disabilities field the second highest number of claims followed by families with children and Hispanics. (surge). The British did an research article in 2009. , with 60 people ranging from 18 to 65 years of age . The tests of implicit attitude used in this study are based on links to real world behaviour, so it’s likely that those participants with a very strong homophobic attitude would routinely behave in a discriminatory way. The four or five per cent with strong prejudices would find their attitudes often affect their behaviour and the 15 to 20 per cent with ‘mid-range’ prejudices are probably unaware of their attitude, but their thoughts and feelings towards gay or lesbian people will probably surface when they are emotional, stressed, frustrated or threatened (Society, 2009). I think people should look at themselves before they try and judge others , without getting to know them or speak to them first. Before you judge a book by its cover at lease open a couple of pages and read about it first. Works Cited Oetzel, J. G. (2009). Intercultural Communication (A Layered Approach). New Jersy: Pearson Education Inc. Page, H. (n. d. ). How To Stereotypes Affect My Life. Retrieved 2012, from http://greengypsywolf1. hubpages. com/getwidget. Society, T. B. (2009, Jan 16). â€Å"Prejudice Study Finds Gay Is The New Black†. Medical News Today. Surge, H. D. (n. d. ). CNN Cable News. Retrieved 2012, from http://www. cnn. com/US/9705/21/briefs. pm/housing/index. html.

The soicial functions of design and public design Research Paper

The soicial functions of design and public design - Research Paper Example A growing number of organizations, especially in the public sector; this across Western societies, are constantly seeking out innovations in the sphere of public design and design in general. The resultant effects of the global financial crisis have thrown many governments and their respective administrations into immense challenging situations. Every society has its own culture and traditional practices that make it unique. The cultural practices of different societies, in the world, are made and challenged by social groups depending on their benefit or detriment. Design and public design is one of the ways through which the process of constructing and challenging cultural issues. for instance, graphic design communicates the cultural and social beliefs that are practiced by political and economic groups and the society, at large. It is part and parcel of a process where beliefs and values are changed and transferred from one place to another. It does this in order to teach people n ew cultures and ways of doing things that are practiced in other societies. Design has a social role because it serves to change the beliefs and mindsets that people have about certain issues of life. In this case, change means the altering or transforming of beliefs and attitudes that affect people. For example, graphic design is a manifestation of the cultures that exist in different societies. Through design, people reproduce social power and imbalances, ways of communication and ideologies challenged or supported by people. Design amplifies and controls communication through publicizing messages without having to publish them. Design is a form of communication that travels through the world collecting and passing information about cultures and ways of interaction through criticism and viewpoints. For example, during the 1979 elections in Britain Graphic design was a radical and a driving force for social change through the support of right wing party ascension towards government . Design has been as a force that forges resistance to social order and authority that are discriminative upon the people (Ellis, 2010). Design and public design are also important to the society in the sense that it constructs and reconstructs racial and gender identities among societies. Race and gender are artificial concepts that are formulated in the mindsets of people and are beyond biological differences between people. Race and gender concepts are created and created and communicated through aspects, such as design and public design. This is because design travels throughout the world without difficulties. It communicates sociological concepts throughout the world without distinguishing distance, time or space. This way, they create social identities that are translated into beliefs held by people (Richard, 1990). Most European countries such as Italy, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Greece, just to name but a few have faced bankruptcy for some time. This has necessitated, due to the tremendous pressure present, a dramatic shift towards reforming the public sector, including pension systems among others. Even those governments in less dire situations are also undertaking similar if not as radical measures as their counterparts. Examples include the United Kingdom’s introduction, through its coalition government; the notion of ‘Big Society’