OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT RESPONSIBILITIES AND ISSUES

‘Operations Management as the procedure whereby resources, fluxing within a defined system, are combined and transformed by a controlled mode to add value in conformity with policies communicated by direction – Joseph G.MonksWhat is Operations Management?Operations direction is the concern map that is responsible for pull offing and organizing the resources needed to bring forth a company ‘s merchandises and services. All types of organisation must transport out operations direction because all organisations produce some mixture of merchandises and services. Operations direction is an of import factor in any organisation. The determinations that the administration makes will hold a major impact on the cost of the merchandises and/or services, and its bringing which consequences in the gross coming into the organisation, whether it is fabricating, retail or services sectors such as IT, finance logistics, transit, wellness attention or public public-service corporati on or educational, the service bringing grapevines must be carefully designed, resourced and managed efficaciously and expeditiously. The effectivity of the system is determined by the success with which assorted subsystems and constituents interact with each other and with the environment in which the organisation operates. The nucleus aim of a successful direction is the ability to pull upon the resources of many subjects and integrate relevant rules and background information in order to specify and analyse a job. Once defined, the director must place alternate possible solutions, measure these in footings of the broader ends and values of the organisation, implement the seemingly dominant solution, and eventually, assess the existent effects of the solution for the effectivity in the organisation. Operations direction focal points on pull offing the procedures that produce / distribute merchandises and services. Operations direction relates to all relevant operations within the organisation. Related activities includes the followers: Pull offing purchases Inventory control Quality control Manufacturing Logisticss and Evaluations Customer Servicess By analysing the above mentioned activities, we can state that Operations direction involves the systematic way and control of the procedures that transform resources ( inputs ) into finished goods or services for clients or clients ( end products ) .History of Operations ManagementThe beginnings of operations direction can be traced back through cultural alterations of the 18th, 19th and twentieth centuries. By the terminal of eighteenth century, agribusiness was the active and cardinal component in every state. The innovation of the steam engine and Eli Whitney ‘s construct of standardised parts paved the manner for the Industrial Revolution with its big fabrication installations powered by steam or H2O. As a consequence figure of states evolved from an agricultural economic system to an industrial economic system. But for a clip, fabrication was more of an art than a scientific discipline. The Industrial Revolution advanced further with the development of the gasolene engine and electricity in the 1800s.Other industries emerged and along with them new mills came into being.. The debut of Taylor ‘s method of scientific direction and Henry Ford ‘s traveling assembly line brought the universe into an age where direction was preponderantly centered on the production of goods. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the one component that was losing was a direction – the ability to develop and utilize the bing installations to bring forth on a big graduated table to run into monolithic markets of today.Duties of an Operations ManagerOperations Manager ‘s programs, form, take and command the production and bringing of merchandises and services every bit needed to maintain external paying clients satisfied. The duties of operations directors can be classified into the followers: Direct Responsibilities – the activities which are straight related to bring forthing and presenting merchandises and services like pull offing the operations procedure, encompassing design, planning, control, public presentation betterment, and operations scheme Indirect Responsibilities – the activities involved in interfacing with other parts of the organisation such as interacting with those directors in other functional countries within the organisation whose functions have an impact on operations. Indirect responsibilities besides include other maps like selling, finance, accounting, forces and technology. Broad Responsibilities – a wider set of undertakings that involve scanning the concern, societal and political environment in which the organisation exits in order to understand its context. Decision devising is a cardinal function of all operations directors. Decisions need to be made in: planing the operations system pull offing the operations system Bettering the operations system. The five chief sorts of determination in each of these relate to: the procedures by which goods and services are produced the quality of goods or services the measure of goods or services ( the capacity of operations ) the stock of stuffs ( stock list ) needed to bring forth goods or services The direction of human resources.Operations Management Issue – Hewlett-PackardHP is a engineering company that operates in more than 170 states worldwide. HP explores how engineering and services can assist people and companies address their jobs and challenges, with the realisation of the possibilities that HP can supply, which will successfully recognize their aspirations and demands. HP applies new believing and new thoughts to make simpler, valuable and trusted experiences with engineering, continuously bettering the manner our clients live and work. The Hewlett-Packard Company ( HP ) was founded in 1939 by William Hewlett and David Packard. Today, the company ‘s mission is to make information merchandises that accelerate the promotion of cognition and basically better effectivity of people and organisation. The company ‘s first merchandise, built in a Palo Alto garage, was an audio oscillator -an electronic trial instrument used by sound applied scientists. One of HP ‘s first clients for this was Walt Disney Studios, who purchased eight oscillators to develop and prove an advanced sound system for the film Fantasia. HP becomes a major participant in the computing machine industry in the eightiess with a full scope of computing machines, from desktop machines to portables to powerful minicomputers. HP besides made its entry into the pressman market with the launch of inkjet pressmans and optical maser pressmans that connect to personal computing machines. The quality and dependability of HP ‘s pressmans ma ke HP a extremely recognizable trade name by both consumers and concerns.Operational Issue of HP – Toner Cartridge ProblemHewlett-Packard is proud of its repute for high-quality merchandises and services. In the 1990 ‘s, the Hewlett Packard toner and ink cartridges division was sing a job with the figure of defective faulty toner cartridges being returned by clients. About 2000 of these were being returned every month. The operations squad decided to look into the issue and handed over the instance to the UK Hewlett Packard quality section. The squad suspected that non all the returns were really the consequence of a defective merchandise, which is why the squad decided to look into the job. The Hewlett Packard squad decided to utilize cause-effect diagrams to seek and place the beginning of the job. Three major operational jobs were identified. First, some users were non every bit familiar as they should hold been with the right method of lading the cartridge into the pressman, or in being able to work out their ain minor printing jobs. Second, some of the HP Business Resellers were besides incognizant of how to screen out minor jobs as they were missing in proficient expertness and preparation. As a consequence, they were unable to offer the client the degree of support needed to decide any minor jobs. Third, there was clearly some maltreatment of Hewlett-Packard ‘s ‘no-questions-asked ‘ returns policy. Empty toner cartridges were being sent to unauthorised replenishment companies who would sell the refilled cartridges at decreased monetary values. Some cartridges were being refilled up to five times and were intelligibly have oning out. Furthermore, the toner in the refilled cartridges was non up to Hewlett-Packard ‘s high quality criterions.Theoretical Approach of Analyzing HP Toner Cartridge Problem:Fishbone TheoryFishbone theory ( cause consequence diagram ) is a entire quality direction tool, widely used to analyse and work out an operation direction job or consequence in an organisation. Fishbone is considered as one of the seven basic tools of entire quality direction tool. It is a ocular presentational tool which resembles the skeleton of a fish which shows all the causes and its bomber causes taking to a peculiar job. Using fishbone theory, job and its causes can be diagrammatically represented, which will assist to place and analyse the of import causes and its consequence can be solvedModel of a Fishbone DiagramHistory of Fishbone TheoryKaoru Ishikawa, a Nipponese University Professor and a good known quality direction pioneer, invented the cause and consequence diagram in 1943, the theory became celebrated tool and was foremost used in 1960s and Nipponese companies like Mazda, Kawazaki used to analyse and better their auto fabrication proceduresADVANTAGES OF USING CAUSE EFFECT DIAGRAMAn operational direction job and its causes can be visually presented so that each and every causes can be considered which helps to find the root cause of the job in a structured attack. In other words, it helps to set up the job ( Effect ) Fishbone can be used by persons, squads and most efficaciously by groups which could guarantee engagement of all in a group and helps to use all possible and executable thought of the procedure and its grounds Different procedure of an operating system can be identified even if it is outside the range of procedure. All executable informations can be collected for farther analysis and its causes and sub causes can be evaluated. From the above HP Toner Cause Effect Diagram, we can sort that the Cartridge Returns is the Effect of the diagram and the causes can be sub divided into the followers:Man PowerCustomers and Traders: – The HP Investigation squad discovered that some clients were holding troubles in the right interpolation of the cartridge into the pressman organic structure. It is universally considered that non all clients are technically sound and as a consequence of this, merchandise malfunction could ensue while seeking to infix the toners/cartridges. Customers who purchased the cartridges from traders instead than straight from HP were non technically qualified to decide minor issues which would hold prevented the stock from being returned to HP for replacing. Owner ‘s Manual was non easy to read and had no bit-by-bit instructions. About 90-95 % of toner consumers, do non read the proprietor ‘s manual. Traders were non able to supply the clients with the professional degree of support needed and frequently blamed the merchandise as faulty. This was due to the fact that HP did non supply sufficient merchandise preparation and support to its concern resellers Training: – Horsepower should hold provided the traders with adequate merchandise support and preparation so that minor issues can be eradicated at the start. Failure in supplying the traders with merchandise preparation could adversely impact the good will of HP. A merchandise can be solved successfully merely if the gross revenues and after gross revenues support is maintained in a professional mode. Interior designers: – Merchandise interior decorators should take into consideration the clients and traders excessively as planing a complicated merchandise ( cartridge/toner ) will do merchandise installing complicated and if the company lacks resources for supplying merchandise preparation, it will do merchandise gross revenues to drop. The design of the toner cartridges was ne'er thought from an end-user position. The toner cartridges was ne'er tested with existent people before the launch. The deficiency of proper planing the merchandise flow rhythm has caused 1000s of lbs for HP. Another large company with such immense defects is Microsoft. Microsoft comes up with regular security spots from clip to clip to repair bugs that existed in their Operating System. Customers ever want things to be easy and less complicated. .MaterialNon echt HP compatible cartridges that are made by unauthorised companies are being bought by clients for a cheaper monetary value and used on echt HP pressmans. As a consequence this causes harm to the pressman caput in the long tally. Use of non echt toners, should revoke guarantee. HP failed to add a disclaimer saying that guarantee can be revoked for utilizing non-genuine HP toners Empty HP cartridges are sent to unauthorised replenishment centres by the clients and these cartridges are being refilled more than five times with low quality ink, toner and other parts.MachineryUsing Non HP Printer accoutrements such as print cartridges or toners may do impairment in print end product quality. The use of pressmans without proper care causes faint print and blotchy. This will make uncertainties in clients that there are issues with the existent HP hardware and frequently the merchandise is returned to HP.MethodsPolicy – HP ‘s ‘no-questions-asked ‘ returns policy is promoting the clients to return their cartridges even though the harm was caused by the client or the trader. No proper internal controls were at that place for HP. It was discovered that Empty toner cartridges were being send to unauthorised replenishment companies which used inexpensive quality replenishing ink and techniques which in bend damaged the merchandise. HP ‘s â €˜no-questions-asked ‘ should be updated to advert that one time the toner cartridge has been modified or re-filled by outside unauthorised traders, no replacing would be provided.Solutions to the job – Prioritization MatrixA prioritization matrix is a technique used to acquire an sentiment about a job.This matrix helps to precedences or rank the issues of the job harmonizing to its importance. Prioritization matrix gives more clearly which issues are most of import to screen it out In a prioritization matrix the issues or job can be written in the first column and its frequence, importance and the feasibleness of the issues can be mentioned in the following back-to-back columns.the last column should be used to cipher all the points Frequency: it measures how often the job occurs Importance: it measures the importance of the issue Feasibility: it measures the feasibleness of the issue whether the mentioned issue / job is easy to work out or nonMatrix description, Solutions and Recommendations:By utilizing this method, we can look at the information in the matrix and determine which issues are more of import harmonizing to the matrix. From the above mentioned HP Prioritization matrix it is really clear that in the first two issues, clients are incognizant about the proper usage of HP toner cartridges and deficiency of merchandise and support preparation to the concern resellers has got highest precedence in points. Hence these two issues should be considered with more attending. The following of import issues are in HP ‘s client Services, fabricating defects and their guarantee policies. Design defect, replenishing echt HP cartridges from unauthorised replenishment centres and use of non HP cartridges in HP pressmans should besides be considered and should be sorted out. 1 ) Customer Unawareness: Horsepower should take into consideration that their Owner ‘s Manual was non easy to read and had no bit-by-bit instructions. About 90-95 % of toner consumers, do non read the proprietor ‘s manual. New methods like adding bit-by-bit picture instructions in a Cadmium should be supplied along with the print toner cartridge. Clear and proper ocular instructions provided in the users manual, intelligent package constitutional inside the pressman should be able to place whether the job is with pressman or cartridge ) . Simple self care tools should be supplied along with the toner / cartridge so that client themselves can screen out minor jobs 2 ) Training for Business Resellers: HP should carry on merchandise preparation and support for its concern resellers after the merchandise has been launched. Not all concern resellers would be able to go to the preparation due to the nature of their concern but an unfastened courtesy invitation direct to all concern resellers and their proficient staff would assist to better client ailments and merchandise callbacks. Surveies by Dell hold proven that this is the most inefficient and high budget manner to cover with the state of affairs. They have found out that engaging local regional trained agents and directing parts to these agents to repair the issues have helped cut down their costs sustainably. 3 ) Customer Services: A good trained call centre or support forces ever helps to increase the good will of any companies. HP should develop their support staff to be to the full cognizant of their merchandises and behavior mock Sessionss to better direct customer-supplier dealingss. Customer service forces should be technically qualified to work out the issues with out inquiring more inquiries to the client. Product study questionnaires, support forces evaluation systems can be emailed to clients and their feedbacks should be carefully analysed by the gross revenues and selling sections. Another manner to pull off client service is to return clients the full sum or replace the product.. 4 ) Warranty / Policy: HP ‘s ‘no-questions-asked ‘ returns policy was promoting the clients to return their cartridges even though the harm was caused by the client or the trader Use of non echt toners, should revoke guarantee. HP forgot to add a disclaimer saying that guarantee can be revoked for utilizing non-genuine HP toners. HP should hold besides considered a sedimentation fee for recycling their toners back to HP and besides do certain a lower cost service for replenishing the toners. 5 ) Toner Cartridge Design: Merchandise interior decorators should take into consideration the clients and traders excessively as planing a complicated merchandise ( cartridge/toner ) will do merchandise installing complicated and if the company lacks resources for supplying merchandise preparation, it will do merchandise gross revenues to drop. Product was ne'er thought from an end-user position. The merchandise was ne'er tested with existent people before the launch. The deficiency of proper planing the merchandise flow rhythm has caused 1000s of dollars for HP. Another large company with such immense defects is Microsoft. Microsoft comes up with regular security spots from clip to clip to repair bugs that existed in their Operating System. 6 ) Unauthorized Refilling / No HP Cartridges: Exploitation non HP pressman accoutrements such as print cartridges or toners may do impairment in print end product quality. Customers prefer traveling to cheap unauthorised resellers to replenish echt HP cartridges as they are cheaper than traveling to an HP authorized reseller or back to HP base. Once the pressman toner cartridges gives out issues and print quality reduces, clients return the toner cartridges back to HP for replacing. HP should do their toners Tamper cogent evidence and besides add some kind of ID proofing to maintain path of non-genuine use of HP toners. Clear elaborate description about HP merchandise consciousness supplied along with the merchandise would educate the client about the quality, advantages, benefits of an HP and non HP toner cartridge.

Explore the various reasons for Hamlet’s delay Essay

Shakespeare presents the subject of hamlet’s provocation in a way that many different reasons could be suitable and debateable at the same time. Through the whole play, Shakespeare makes it clear that hamlet delays the intended murder for reasons such as preventing Claudius from going to heaven, waiting for the right opportunity to strike, hamlet trying to get proof that his ghost’s father is right and possibly that he wants to kill Claudius and lie with his mother. In the early stages of the play, the audience is introduced to the death of hamlet’s father â€Å"the king† and soon afterwards his mother marries Claudius. Hamlet’s father’s ghost appears suddenly to hamlet and tells him to kill Claudius, the man responsible for his death but spare his mother. However hamlet delays because he is uncertain if his father’s ghost is real or the devil sent to deceive him and damn his name as quoted † that spirit I have seen maybe the devil, sent to damn out of my weakness and melancholy. † The term â€Å"maybe† clarifies that hamlet has doubts about the true form of the ghost and therefore he needs solid proof and believes that the devil exists with bad intentions of making people sin. However, hamlet clearly fears weakness and melancholy or he does want to be taken advantage of. At this point in time, he shows how smart he is by saying†I will have grounds more relative that this, the play is the thing. † This quotation suggests that hamlet decides to search for his proof to make sure that he is right and fair but at this time, his mind is troubled because he does not know the truth yet but is eager to find out by making the players play his father’s death where in that process he will observe Claudius’s reactions. It’s fair to say that hamlet is a religious person and his religious beliefs that ghosts are agents of the devil are the ones which make doubt his father’s ghost and therefore delay his revenge. When hamlets get proof that Claudius is indeed the murderer, the opportunity of killing him in the church presents itself but hamlet does not take it because he does not want to send Claudius to heaven as quoted from his soliloquy † a villain kills my father and I, son do and send him to heaven! No† hamlet withdraws from killing Claudius because Claudius has confessed his sins and if he dies now, Claudius will go to heaven to enjoy while he and his father suffer in hell and clearly hamlet does not want that. One of the reasons he does not want them is the fact that he does not want let down his father’s ghost which told him to kill Claudius in sin so that he suffers the same fate as his father and hamlet clearly wants Claudius to suffer for killing his father. After he withdraws, hamlet says to himself that he will wait for the time when Claudius is in sin as his father was and then strike. Hamlet’s final judgement prevents him from acting which is based on religion. However, this lost opportunity can be attributed the reason that hamlet is moral and different from Claudius and by killing Claudius is like him being compared to a murderer. I also assume that his psychological status, that is his troubled mind which I think is depressed and possibly a real madness prevents him from carting out the murder. Some critics say hamlet delays because he is waiting for the right time. I agree with that because he has an opportunity to kill Claudius in the church but he does not take it and says that he will wait for the time when Claudius in sin as quoted † when he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed. † The term when suggests a time it will right in hamlet’s mind to kill Claudius and so he waits for that right time. However, other reasons for the right time might be that Claudius is a king and so well guarded that it’s not easy for hamlet to strike him down and hamlet fears the consequences if he kills Claudius. He fears he will hurt his mother for a start which he does not want to happen and secondly, he has no clear proof to prove that Claudius is the villain except for the ghost which people assume is an agent of evil or the devil and so people will deny his proof. Hamlet wants Claudius to be seen as the villain but if he kills Claudius, people will assume that he is the villain and probably be driven out of the country. In conclusion, hamlet’s provocation is due to many reasons which all make sense and sound right as presented by Shakespeare. His delay could be as a result of waiting for the right so that everything goes as planned by him and also the need to get concrete proof his father’s ghosts is right to avoid deception by the devil which is smart.

Analyzing The General Public s Use Of The Internet Essay -- Addiction,

Voluntary questionnaires such as the Compulsive Internet Use Scale (CIUS) that uses a 14 question Likert scale that accesses substances and pathological addiction symptoms geared toward internet compulsion. The Wolfling, Muller and Beutel’s assessment for Internet and Computer Game Addiction Scale (AICA-S) was initial used in clinical settings that become a self-reporting questionnaire. This study measures Internet usage by the age, applications visited, and frequency. (Kuss, Shorter, Rooij, Griffiths, Schoenmakers, 2013 ). Other research methods of testing have been done by patients seeking help with other pathological compulsive disorders. One such study that was used was the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale – 11 (BIS-11) was developed to measure personality and behaviors in impulsivity. Other tests such as the Go-Stop impulsivity paradigm is used to help with the classification of Internet addiction and the severity. This is a type of study that will use go and stop pro mpts and evaluations of people’s reaction to the prompts. The Young’s Internet Addiction test is another test that uses a ... ... middle of paper ... ...isorders with the ability to hide their true identity. The people who also do find that these attractions on the internet are also putting the family’s at risk. The compulsive gambler is putting his family at risk by financial drawbacks, as the person with an Internet porn addiction is isolating his real emotions away from his loved ones. Both of these addictions are treatable through clinical counseling, family counseling, individual counseling and group therapies. Conclusions of the a study that was conducted by Gunuc (2015) concluded that when people are withdrawing themselves from normal family functions and spending a large amounts of time on-line doing various things such as gaming, gambling, and social networking. There should be some form monitoring and evaluation of behavioral patterns that could prevent them from developing future addictions (Gunuc, 2015 )

Xolair Literature Review Dissertation Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

Xolair Literature Review - Dissertation Example The intensity, chemical properties, action mechanisms, and associated with omalizumab are all pre-generalized; however, they are controlled at the time of its manufacturing when done under the label of Xolair, and involve few specific dimensions to be identified. Further, understanding its production procedure in the raw-to-commercial forms contributes greatly towards building a theoretical relationship between its positive and negative impacts (â€Å"Xolair Fact Sheet†, 2011). Therefore, this review initiates by opening a succinct discussion regarding its origins and chemical features, which is followed by a detailed description of its production, purification, and commercialization phases. After this, some pros and cons associated with the drug are discussed, along with some secondary clinical trials that shed light on its efficacy in different age groups and dosage formulations. In the final sections of this review, a brief list of general precautions and pre-defined pharma cokinetic properties are also added to not to leave some important aspects untouched. Therefore, the reader of this review is suggested to make a close reading in order to explore relationship between different dimensions of Xolair. ... es a bond with receptors of patient’s cellular membrane and as a reaction produce inflammatory mediators from within (â€Å"Scientific Discussion-Zolair†, n.d.). In this type of reaction, an anti-lgE is supposed to restrict the creation of bond between lgE and cell membrane receptors, in order to reduce the release of inflammatory mediators (Miller et al., 2008). It happened in 1987 at Houston, Texas, that scientists of a local pharmaceutical firm (Tenox) carefully studied the phenomenon of asthma prevalence, and came up with a laboratory prototype of an anti-lgE, which until the year 1991 was unable to get international exposure. However, in the late 1990’s, controlled clinical trials were conducted over patients with mild and severe paediatric and allergic rhinitis by the collaboration of different international pharmaceutical firms, and from the year 1996, omalizumab was made available publicly under the trade name of Xolair by different pharmaceutical firms a s one of the most effective allergic asthma treatment drug, referred commonly as anti-lgE. However, despite several clinical trials and experiments over the commercial product of Xolair (and its composing omalizumab), there are still researches and developments which are being conducted in order to verify all the observable effects in different cases of asthma (â€Å"Tanox, Inc. – 2010 Company Profile†, 2010). 3. Drug Description: Xolair (or omalizumab) can be terminologically described as a monoclonal anti-body derived from recombinant chromosome (based over lG1k) which impasses particularly to mammal immunoglobulin E (or lgE). Further, its pharmacodynamics reveals that it constrains the association of lgE with cellular membrane receptors (specifically FC3Rl) over the surface of mast cells and basophils

Human Resources Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 6

Human Resources - Essay Example This paper is going to unveil various recommendations for how organization should staff its operations by focusing on decisions pertaining to staffing levels and quality. Taking into account the Tanglewood case study, which is a chain of retail stores featuring items such as clothing, appliances, electronics, and decor we realise that Tanglewood retail stores have taken into consideration the aspect of quality, durability and as well taking care of the customer’s preferences. For an organization such as Tangle to staff its operations by focusing on decisions pertaining to staffing levels and quality, a mission statement should be availed to act as guidance as far as effective service delivery is of concern. A mission is termed as an action statement that gives customers an overview on how the prevailing organization like in our case Tanglewood works towards realizing its vision. Tanglewood have executed its mandate through visionary actions and this is evidence through its statement that states that â€Å"We are committed as a company to providing maximum value to our customers, shareholders, and employees. We will accomplish this goal by adhering to the core values of responsible financial management, clear and honest communication, and always keeping performance and customer service in the forefront† Every emerging business globally is characterized by a dream and a vision. In order to progress and grow financial for the purpose of profit maximization, it is not the matter of summing up money but incurs taking into consideration customers preferences and serving them well (Rothwell, and Stavros, and Sullivan, and Sullivan, 23-27). For an organization such Tanglewood to succeed well, core values should be unveiled. The aspect of underpin works when the prevailed philosophy of business is taken into account and core principals executed as well. Going by the history of Tanglewood, its process of growth has been quick in the last 5 years. Various reason

SMEs Entry into China Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

SMEs Entry into China - Essay Example This proposal is designed to test the hypothesis that an SME intending to internationalize towards China is expected to acquire certain definite advantages, namely ownership, location, and internationalization.  Dunning’s paradigm holds the chief proposition that any international firm is required to own certain kind of advantage over local firms prior to its engagement in international production (Dunning, 1988). These advantages are namely ownership, locational and internationalization (Dunning, 1988). Accordingly, the theory has been referred to as the OLI-paradigm: Ownership advantages, Location-specific Variables and Internationalization-incentive advantages (Grillet, 2003b).  Ownership Advantages – â€Å"The ownership advantages are unique to a foreign firm over its local competitors† (Chowdury, 2006). It arises out of its superior technology, management systems, privilege access to finance or raw materials, greater market power, etc. The theory of the ownership advantages reveals that those firms which possess competitive advantages over foreign firms in their domestic markets to sell certain goods or services can move towards internationalization (Grillet, 2003b).  Locational Advantages – According to the model, a firm can proceed in foreign production on perceiving its ability to merge mobile intermediate goods from the home country with immobile factor endowments, or other intermediate goods in another country (Grillet, 2003b). Factors supporting one or another country are the location-specific variables, for example, the host country being conducive to local products such as local demand, cheap or well-trained labor, natural resources etc (Grillet, 2003b).  Internationalization Advantages – The transfer of a firm’s ownership advantages across borders within its organizational structures is referred to as internationalization (Grillet, 2003b).

How does McDonald's alter its marketing mix between countries a case Essay

How does McDonald's alter its marketing mix between countries a case study of UK and China - Essay Example erm – the performance of marketing strategies is usually depended on the resources available – funds, employees and technology (Luo et al., 2005, 50); however, it is also depended on the cultural and social characteristics and ethics of the targeted market. Through the decades it has been proved that no all firms are able to work internationally; in fact, only those firms that have been able to align their strategies with the ethics and the culture of the targeted market have managed to survive in the specific market – entering a foreign market is not the most difficult part of a relevant marketing scheme (Palich et al., 111999, 587). Another issue is the fact that firms that have been established in countries with totally different social ethics and traditions are less likely to understand – at least on time – the psychology and the needs of consumers in a market with particular culture and ethics (Nakata et al., 2001, 255). Organizational culture is proved at this case to have a decisive role in the ability of a firm to develop the strategies that will be effectively implemented in the targeted market (Armstrong et al., 2009, 34); in this context, marketing schemes that are going to be used for the promotion of p roducts/ services in a foreign market will be going to be successful only if they respond to the characteristics and the needs of local people (Hennig et al., 2002, 230); otherwise they will soon be led to a failure. Current paper focuses on the examination of the ways that McDonalds has altered its marketing mix in order to respond to the needs of two different markets: the British and the Chinese. The identification and the evaluation of the relevant policies is based on two different criteria: the views that have been published in the literature – in relation with the study’s main issue – and the views of consumers in the above two countries. In this context, a detailed literature review has been developed in regard to the structure

Contemporary Issues in Business Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 1

Contemporary Issues in Business - Essay Example In fact, planning is not about predicting the future, but preparing for it disregarding the fact of which future will eventually come true (Wade, 2012, p.31). Therefore, scenario planning is about trying to formulate plans that are addressing the what-if scenarios in the future (Hill and Jones, 2009, p.26). It is therefore easy to understand that scenario planning is a used tool for flexible long-term plans, which also allows decision makers to understand the nature and impact of uncertainties that affect the world (Northumbria University, 2014). This technically does not mean forecasting the future, but eventually preparing for the future to come based on the possible scenarios to take place. After all, scenarios are considered to be as strong supports for strategic planning (Zahradnickova and Vacik, 2014, p.665). The reason why there is a need to prepare for the future with various plans addressing the what-if concerns is due to the fact that the business environment is affected by many forces. This leads to the point that in the actual business, scenario planning is considered as an analytical tool that allows the business people to prepare things in the future, because it allows them to develop a framework that can lead them further to develop visions for the future as they analyse the environmental forces in the environment that can hinder growth. In the business environment, an organisation is faced with various forces such as politics, economics, social, economics, technological and legal concerns. These are important factors that could substantially affect the business outcomes. In the first place, there are various cases by which the success of an organisation depends on the prevailing legal concerns in an organisation. On the other hand, the success of a certain brand for instance ma y depend on the prevailing social trend that people accept in the society.

Contract and Procurement Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Contract and Procurement - Essay Example On a counter view of the project, the evidence stated should be indicated and given in the section as this would help in validating the information given. Moreover, for a project to be successful all the internal project documents should be well document and the information in those documents used otherwise the project will not be successful (Ramakrishna 2010). Amber color should have been used to indicate that there are significant issues which need the management’s attention despite a successful delivery. 2. Summary of report recommendations The recommendations given by the review time are worth while as they provide a clear explanation of the situation in the entity. The recommendation time frame could either be Recommended, Critical and Essential. The review uses the â€Å"Recommended† time frame. â€Å"Recommended† means that the recommendations given should be beneficial to the project and should be linked to the project milestones, and this should be befor e the contract is signed. On a critical point view, the recommendations given by should be based on the three time frames given the other two are based on the successful outcome of the project depending on how fast action is taken a situation which affects the project. 3. Background and business case The background of the project is clearly stated with the project name and the programme. The problems facing the stated projects are also indicated which explains why the stated project are in need of improvements. The cost estimates for the improvements, the procurement delivery status including the start and expiry date, current position in regard to the OGC Gateway Review and conduct of the OGC Gateway Review have been well stated in connection to the business case (Marks 2012). Enough has been provided about the background of the project, that is, the background is explicit. However, including the current position in regard to the OGC Gateway Review without sufficient information ab out the past reviews is absurd. The reviewer should have obtained all information from the previous four Gateway Reviews before embarking on writing his or her review. The previous review would help the reviewer to fully understand all the problems facing the project and the improvements which have been done on the projects. 4. Findings and recommendations The findings for the project have been given explicitly with all parameters well stated. All the strengths and weaknesses of the project including lack of proper documentation and sufficient commitment to staff training and knowledge of training delivery amongst the main project teams have been elaborated. Validity of the project in connection to the business case has also been elaborated. The reviewer has done excellent in the elaboration of the findings of the project. The reviewer has gone further ahead to give the plans for the ongoing improvements in performance and innovation which include the continuous improvement and plan ning and performance measures. The reviewer has also gone a head to provide the organizations learning and maturity targets and its readiness for the future or the plans for any service provision in the future. However, the

Marketing Plan on LIFESAVERS(CANDY) Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Marketing Plan on LIFESAVERS(CANDY) - Essay Example mize the unique talents of its associates so that they can feel valued and remain associated to each other and to Wrigley by inculcating those values. The company’s strategy comprises of four-pronged approach-focusing on the workforce, work place and market place. The company is also committed to certain factors like to create consumer friendly sustainable packaging, reducing packaging weights by 10% from 2015 onwards. They are committed to use sustainable materials and partnering with sustainable suppliers, increasing recycled contents in case of packaging and designing the materials which will be effective from 2015 (Wrigley, n.d.). The company is now publicly traded in NYSE (New York Stock Exchange).The analysis of the company shows it is based on Michael Porter’s five forces model. The model is used to find out the three important aspects of the industry, competition, profitability, and attractiveness of the industry. Three forces, rivalry among existing firms, threats of new entrants and threats of substitute products is used to analyze the competitiveness of the firm (Inman & Et. Al., 2007). Marketers divide the target market into various segments on the basis of homogeneous needs. The customers are segmented on the basis of broad similarity with regards to certain attributes such as tastes, preferences. Lifesavers candy is targeted for all age group of people. Being a non-chocolate product it is free from melting in hot summers. These candies are made from fruit carp. The new innovated product serves the purpose of its customers well in the hot summer which provides a boost to the summer sales of this candy. Keeping in mind about the customers taste and preferences the candy comes in different flavors and colors. Pep O Mint, Wint O Green, sweet and sour strings, Hawaiian fruits, strawberry apple, cherry lemonade, butter Rum, wild cherry are some of its varieties. The product is available in all sizes, from small to big packs. These are mainly a

Poetry Analysis Essay Example for Free

Poetry Analysis Essay Introduction Name of poem Home Burial Name of poet Robert Frost Date of publication 1915 Other relevant background info This poem talks about Living, Death, sorrow and grieving, Relationships and Familly And ancestors. It is full of sadness and grief. During it’s publication it is presented as a whole new genre of poetry. Two deaths were depicted in the poem, that of a child and an end up of marriage. The poem deals with essential loneliness. This poem is brought up by his experience of losing his two children at a very young age. One of his son, committed suicide. Form of poem It is a free verse; Dramatic Lyric Structure of poem The Poem has no rhyme scheme yet it have noticeable number of stresses per lines. Lines spoken by people are enclosed in quotation marks and thus recognized as such. It also used emotional or tense form of words Rhyme scheme No rhyme scheme Meaning Overall Meaning Each of us has its own destiny. Decision making takes a big role in human life as such it will dictate the future of a person. Though we may not have the privilege or the ability to see our future, we can rely that in every action there is a reaction. It is said that Frost took the road less taken but in reality all of us travel in this very road and that is life, the run of life. All fo us run the same cycle. How the poem relates to life in general, and/or my life In decision making, we should take into consideration the effects it will burst forth and that what ever the result, I must be ready to embrace the consequence whether good or bad. Alliteration ‘I shall laugh the worst laugh I ever laughed To give of the best. To perform as if it will be the last. To smile at least there’s no tomorrow.

Native American educational traditions passed Essay Example for Free

Native American educational traditions passed Essay Before contact with Europeans, Native Americans developed an effective system of informal education call aboriginal education. The system included transmitting knowledge, values, skills, attitudes, and dispositions to the next generation in real world settings such as the farm, at home, or on the hunting ground. Education was viewed as a way to beautify and sharpen the next generation and prepare them to take over the mantle of leadership. The purpose of education was for an immediate induction of the next generation into society and preparation for adulthood. Education was for introducing society with all its institutions, taboos, mores, and functions to the individual. Also, education was intended for making the individual a part of the totality of the social consciousness. Native American education delineated social responsibility, skill orientation, political participation, and spiritual and moral values. The cardinal goals of Native American education were to develop the individual’s latent physical skills and character, inculcate respect for elders and those in authority in the individual, and help the individual acquire specific vocational training (Franklin, 1979). Native American education was also for developing a healthy attitude toward honest labor, developing a sense of belonging and encouraging active participation in community activities. Both boys and girls had equal access to education. Boys were taught by their fathers, uncles, grandfathers, and other male elders. Girls were instructed by their mothers, aunts, grandmothers, female elders and other members of their families. Sometimes, both boys and girls received instruction at the feet of either male or female elders (Mould, 2004). There were barely any dropouts and the community ensured that every child received a full education. Youth appropriate information and knowledge was not hidden from any child. Several teaching strategies, including storytelling, were utilized to pass on knowledge and culture to the youth. In fact, Mould (2004) believed that storytelling was a sacred and vital part of a Native American youth’s education. Knowledge and culture were passed down orally, â€Å"crafted into stories that would instruct, inspire, provoke, question, challenge, and entertain† (Mould, 2004). Often, the youth would gather together to listen to the elders as they related the knowledge once entrusted to them when they were children (Mould, 2004). The philosophy of education was that of the development of the individual as well as the whole society (Johnson et al. , 2005). Educational philosophy also emphasized the importance of nature. The pursuit of knowledge and happiness were subordinated to a respect for the whole universe. According to Johnson, knowledge was equated with an understanding of one’s place in the natural order of things and educators were encouraged to study and teach the physical and social world by examining the natural relationships that exist among things, animals, and humans. Studying ideas in the abstract or as independent entities was not considered as important as understanding the relationships among ideas and physical reality. The essential components of an educational experience included hands on learning, making connections, holding discussions, taking field trips, and celebrations of the moment (Johnson et al. , 2005). These highly effective teaching methods were utilized by adults to transmit culture to or educate the next generation. The youth learned at their own pace and barely competed against one another. The youth were taught to be supportive and nurturing of one another in the learning process. As a result of the holistic education that all youth were exposed to in the period before their contact with Europeans, there were barely any miseducated Native American children. At the time of European contact with Native Americans (from 1492), an advanced system of informal/aboriginal education had been developed by Native Americans as noted earlier. That system was misunderstood by Europeans who thus made efforts to impose their formal system of education on Native Americans. After contact with Europeans, formal education for Native Americans was initially conducted by missionaries and private individuals until the 1830s. There were increased European government efforts to formally educate Native Americans after the passage of the Indian Removal Act (1830) which forced Native Americans onto reservations (Tozer 2009). The purpose of formal education of Native Americans, as far as Europeans were concerned, was forced acculturation or assimilation to European culture (Tozer 2009). The aim of the European system of education was to â€Å"civilize†, Christianize, and Europeanize the Native Americans in European-controlled schools. To achieve this purpose and aim, many Native American children were forcibly removed from their homes and enrolled in European-controlled schools. By 1887, about 14,300 Native American children were enrolled in 227 schools run by the Bureau of Indian Affairs or by religious groups (Tozer 2009). The schools were operated based on an Anglo-conformity assimilationist approach. The Anglo-conformity assimilationist approach included the following: 1) Educating the Native Americans away from their culture due to the philosophy of Europeanization or Christianization or â€Å"civilizing† of the Native American through education; 2) Intensive efforts were made to destroy extant Native American cultures by excluding Native American cultures from the school curriculum; 3) Concerted efforts were made to prevent Native American students from following their own culture; and 4) Native American students were punished for speaking their native languages (Feagin Feagin, 2003). This approach motivated European American educators to force Native American students into boarding schools where it was believed that it would be easier and much more effective to Europeanize, Christianize, and â€Å"civilize† them. Students were forced to dress like Europeans, convert to Christianity, and take European names. Students who refused to conform were severely punished. The effects of the Anglo-conformity assimilationist approach on Native Americans cannot be overemphasized. Many of them lost or became confused about their cultural identity. Some tended to know a lot more about European culture, history, philosophy, and languages than about their own culture, history, philosophy, and languages. Europeanization, Christianization and â€Å"civilizing† of Native Americans through formal education seriously undermined the very foundation of Native American cultures and alienated many Native Americans from their own cultures and environment. Formal education forced many Native Americans to absorb European lifestyles and led to individualism as well as serious weakening of traditional authority structure and kin group solidarity. Many Native Americans lost faith in their own cultures and civilizations and absorbed those of Europeans. Some have neither fully adopted European culture nor fully embraced Native American culture and consequently swing between the two in a state of cultural confusion. Eurocentric education has been a miseducation of Native Americans as has been for all minority groups in the United States. These and many other political, social and economic effects of formal education on Native Americans have permeated Native American cultures till today. European American teachers and administrators have blamed Native American educational problems on cultural differences. This is known as cultural deficit theory. According to cultural deficit theorists, disjuncture’s or differences or deficits between the culture of the home and the culture of the school are the reasons for the poor academic achievement of non-European students (Johnson et al. , 2005). European American schools focus only on the dominant culture and expect all students to operate as if they are members of the dominant culture, giving an advantage to students from the dominant group and a disadvantage to those from minority groups (Johnson et al., 2005). What cultural deficit theorists advocate is that students from minority groups, including Native American students, must reject their own cultural patterns and absorb European American cultural patterns in order to be successful in school. Thus, in an effort to assist their students to be high achievers in school, many European American teachers have attempted to make their students â€Å"less Native American† by educating them away from their own cultures and imposing Anglo-European culture on them. Many schools and textbooks exclude Native American experiences and their immeasurable contributions to this society and the rest of the world and provide little to nothing to assist Native American children identify with their own cultures. From the 1930s some boarding schools were replaced by day schools closer to reservations and a bilingual policy of educating Native American students in both Native American languages and the English language was discussed (Feagin Feagin, 2003). Since the 1960s, organized protest has led to increased government involvement and aid for primary, adult, and vocational education for Native Americans on and off the reservations. Federal and local governments have focused more attention on local public schools (outside the reservations) and Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) schools in the reservations. For greater inclusion of Native Americans in their own education, Native American advisory boards have been organized in mainstream public schools. More Native Americans have been added to school faculty and staff. Native American art, dances, and languages have been included in the school curriculum. The central curriculum taught in both BIA and mainstream schools have remained the same from colonial times until recently. The curriculum indoctrinates Native American children with the same European American values as in the past (Feagin Feagin, 2003). In many reservations today however, there are efforts to reverse this by teaching students in Native American languages and culture from the early years of their education. In the Choctaw Reservation in Choctaw, Mississippi for example, students are taught in the Chahta and English languages in the first three years of formal schooling and in the English language from the fourth grade onwards. Throughout their schooling to the high school level, they are taught and exposed to Choctaw culture and encouraged to speak the Chahta language in and outside of school. One of the essences of the Annual Choctaw Indian Fair is to educate both the youth and adults in Choctaw cultural practices and traditions and to transmit Choctaw culture to the next generation. The author of this article, who happens to be an African and from a continent which has had similar experiences as those of Native Americans, greatly applauds the new forms of formal education among Native Americans on the reservations, which include an integration of the Native American system before their contact with Europeans and aspects of the European system as a way of preserving what is left of Native American cultures, preparing contemporary Native American youth for their real world settings, and meeting the needs of Native Americans. The large scale migration of many Native Americans to the cities since the 1950s has led to a decline in the number of children in BIA schools. By the early 1990s less than ten percent (10%) of Native American children attended BIA schools (Feagin Feagin, 2003). Today, most Native American children attend mainstream local public schools due to the fact that majority of Native Americans live off reservations with their children (United States Census Bureau, 2001). The mainstream educational system has however failed to meet the needs of Native American students. The failure stems from the absence of a Native American perspective in the curricula, the loss of Native American languages, the shift away from Native American spiritual values, and the racist and discriminatory activities of many European American teachers and administrators (Feagin Feagin, 2003; Schaefer, 2004). Perhaps, mainstream educators could borrow the new forms of formal education being practiced on the reservations which seem to much better meet the needs of Native American students rather than continually imposing the Eurocentric system which has not worked for Native Americans. With regard to higher education, since the 1960s, many mainstream colleges have established Native American Studies centers to provide facilities for the study of Native American issues (Feagin Feagin, 2003). By the late 1990s, more than 134,000 Native Americans were enrolled in colleges and universities throughout the United States (Schaeffer, 2004). Majority of the students attended predominantly European American public colleges and universities. Some of the students were not very successful due to the ingrained racist and discriminatory practices in those institutions. Consequently, many Native American students dropped out of those institutions. In general, Native American formal educational attainment has remained lower than that of the general population due to the Eurocentricity of the educational system. By 1990, less than two-thirds of Native Americans over the age of twenty-five were high school graduates compared to three-fourths of all Americans in that age range. Native American students in mainstream schools are disproportionately placed in special education classrooms. The proportion of Native American students who drop out after tenth-grade is 36%, the highest of any racial or ethnic group and more than twice that of European Americans (Schaeffer, 2004). In view of the aforementioned issues in education among Native Americans, a Department of Education Task Force organized in the late 1990s recommended the following for addressing Native American educational issues: implementation of multicultural curricula that inculcate respect for Native American history and culture, and establishment of programs that guarantee that Native American students learn English well. The task force assumed that if Native American students learn English very well then they will be successful in school, an assumption which is traced to the cultural deficit theory discussed above. Today, many Native American students attend Native American-controlled community colleges. The community colleges integrate Native American history and culture into courses. More attention is given to students and their cultures in the Native American-controlled educational institutions. Native Americans had established an effective educational system which ensured the smooth transmission of their cultures to the next generation before their contact with Europeans. The system included passing on of knowledge, values, attitudes, skills, and dispositions required for successful functioning of every individual in real world settings. Access to education was denied neither to male nor female while all children were taught to support and nurture one another and not necessarily compete against one another in the learning process. Learning was undergirded philosophically by a reverence for nature and a sense of humans’ responsibility to nature (Johnson et al. , 2005). The arrival of Europeans from 1492 onwards led to the imposition of a Eurocentric educational system which was underpinned by an Anglo-conformist assimilationist approach discussed above. This approach included educating Native Americans away from their cultures as a way of rendering them â€Å"less Native American† and more European American. The Anglo-conformist assimilationist approach in the formal education of Native Americans has left many of them miseducated and quite confused about their cultural identity. The political, economic and social impact of the European aim of Europeanizing, Christianizing and â€Å"civilizing† Native Americans through formal education are discussed at length in a paper presented by the author at the National Association of Native American Studies Conference in 2004. Fortunately, today, Native American leaders are successfully making efforts to reverse the adverse effects of the imposed Eurocentric educational system by synthesizing traditional Native American educational practices with European American practices. Works Citied Feagin, J. R. and Feagin, C. B. (2003). Racial and ethnic relations. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice- Hall Johnson, J. A. ; Dupuis, V. L. ; Musial, D. ; Hall, G. E. ; and Gollnick, D. M. (2005). Introduction to the foundations of American education. Boston, Massachusetts: Allyn and Bacon. Mould, T. (2004). Choctaw tales. Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi. Schaefer, R. T. (2004). Racial and ethnic groups. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Steven Tozer (2009) School and Society : Historical and Contemporary Perspectives. McGraw- Hil Publishing Company.

How Colour Symbolism in Animation Affects the Viewer

How Colour Symbolism in Animation Affects the Viewer The impact on people of colour symbolism in animation Animation movies present an unusual set of challenges and questions to academics examining films from a cognitive perspective. When the boundaries of the real world do not exist like do in live action movies, the film maker is challenged to create the complete narrative space of scratch. How do animators succeed this seemingly enormous task? This question certainly precedes making film life and space in visual art has been a subject of deep study by artists, photographers, historians and psychologists alike. While the intention may be to create a highly realistic visual space, the option given to visual artists and animators  Ãƒâ€šÃ‚   is to abandon principle of realism in favour of another different perspective on the visual reality. Animation alone can bring to life inanimate objects, challenge and defy laws of physics, and create visual effects beyond the bounds of possibility in live action film.Animation and colour have evolved since their respective beginning. Colour has been both an obvious challenge as well as a field for exploration for animators throughout the animation history. Scientific discoveries in aspect to the perception of colour also influenced its use in art and animation, making colour an ideal goal for further exploration in a psychological context. In this chapter three questions will be posed and answered. First, what is colour exactly and how is it defined? And second, how has colour been used by animators through the history of animated film? Finally, how does our cognitive sense of colour shape the viewers cognitive sense of a film? The final question will focus on a specific population of animated movies (animated movies adapted for children), and how the use of colour in these films strategically differs from other types of films. WHAT IS COLOR? Color is a concept that philosophers, artists, and scientists have historically spent a great deal of time exploring and quantifying. Physiologically, our perception of color results from varying wavelengths of light being reflected onto the retina, which in turn are processed by cells called photoreceptors. The relative responses to light spectra by these cells are what generate our ability to see and distinguish between colors. Anomalies in photoreceptor cells can cause deficits in the ability of an individual to see color, though in some unique circumstances, these anomalies allow individuals to more finely discriminate between colors (Neitz, Kraft, Neitz, 1998; Jordan Mollon, 1992; Nagy, MacLeod, Heyneman, Eisner, 1981). 2 Quantifying Color. Attempts to categorize color vastly predate our understanding of the physiology of the eye, but Isaac Newtons Opticks (1704) is pivotal in its introduction of his color wheel for understanding color theory2. The ordering of the colors around his color circle (and in subsequent iterations by other color theorists) is based on the order in which the colors are refracted out from the prism, uniting violet and red to close the radial axis (see Figure 1). Thus the ordering of the colors on the color wheel is not arbitrary, but based in the physics of light. Newton also introduced the notions of primary and secondary colors, and notes that opponent colors on the color wheel combine to create a neutral light color3. Despite that it has evolved over time and exists in varying forms, the color wheel continues to play an important part in both the artistic and psychological understanding of color. Notably, it is useful for defining several metrics of color, namely hue and saturation. Hue refers generally to named colors, and corresponds to the sectors of color into which color wheels are typically divided. Examples of hue-based descriptions include blue-green, red, and pink. Saturation is another important color variable, and generally refers to how bright or potent a color is. Pastel colors (which are closer to the center of the color circle) are relatively unsaturated. Very saturated colors (which are referred to as bright red or bold blue, for example) lie along the outer edges of the color circle. Luminance is another variable important for discussing color. Luminance refers to how light or dark something is; when discussing color in particular, it refers to how much black is contained within a particular color. Unlike hue and saturation, luminance can be independent of color; in other words, black-and-white images contain no hue or saturation information but do contain luminance information. Because luminance is not a variable unique to color stimuli, it is not represented on the color wheel4, but nonetheless it is an important variable when discussing color. These terms, including how they are mathematically quantified, will be revisited later with data. The color wheel is not the only color quantification system to define colors using the metrics of hue, saturation, and luminance. One of the most noted color-classification systems, and the one still most reliably used in psychophysiological testing, was originally developed by Albert Munsell, and also uses these color parameters5. Munsell compiled and organized a tremendous set of finely-grained discrete colors now known as Munsell colors or Munsell chips (Munsell, 1912; Munsell, 1919). One important component of the Munsell color system is that it emphasizes that color perception is dependent on the physiology of the human eye. For example, humans can more identify many more discrete levels of yellow than blue at high values, whereas the reverse is true at low values. In other words, one can argue more light yellows exist than dark yellows, whereas color wheel representations suggest that all color values exist equally in our visual environment. While the study of how we physiologically perceive color is important, perhaps more critical in studying art and film from a cognitive perspective is the question of how we psychologically respond to color. Our preferences for and biases toward particular colors have the potential to influence how we respond cognitively and emotionally to art. Color Preferences. Artists across visual domains recognize how the use of color affects viewers perception of their work. Deliberate and comprehensive choices regarding the use of color permeate all types of visual art, including intentional choices to omit color from 3 artwork6. Unsurprisingly, people tend to have strong predelictions for particular colors. While it might intuitively seem like individuals each have their own color preferences that are unique, the psychological research on color preferences reveals a surprising amount of concordance across people in terms of color preferences. In terms of specific colors, research has consistently demonstrated a cross-gender and cross-cultural preference for blue hues above other hues (Eysenck, 1941; Granger, 1952; McManus, Jones, Cottrell, 1981; Komar Melamid, 1997). People also tend to consistently rate yellow and brown hues as being least pleasant, especially in their darker forms (Palmer Schloss, 2010). Biases across populations are not limited to hue; people consistently tend to favor colors in more saturated forms as opposed to more washed-out or pastel counterparts of the same hue (Granger, 1952). Naturally, the consistency in color preference drove psychologists to posit theories on how color preference develops. Some have proposed that color preference is an innate artifact of human evolutionary history, which developed to facilitate our early survival in hunter-gatherer societies (Hulbert Ling, 2007). While some biological evidence supports this idea, if color preferences are present at birth, infants and adults should show similar color preferences, when in fact they do not. Data collected from infants and young children suggest that color preferences change over time, and that while children eventually match adults on their color preferences later, they are not born with those preferences. Infants tend to prefer colors that adults classify as unpleasant, namely dark yellows, yellow-greens and reds (Adams, 1987). Children also have a preference for very high saturation that gradually diminishes to match the adult preference level for saturation (Child, Hansen, Hornbeck, 1968). Since preferences for color dimensions seem to be dynamic over the lifespan, it is unlikely that color preferences are built-in. This is not to say that color preference is purely nonfunctional; in fact, the ecological valence theory of color preference suggests that the early associations humans build with colored objects facilitate their color preferences (Palmer Schloss, 2010). For example, our early preference for dark yellows in infancy may come from consistent positive exposure to caregiver skin tones and hair color; it is only later that we learn the association between dark yellows and rotten food or excrement, at which point this preference changes direction. Conversely, as we increase our exposure to stimuli like clean water and fresh food, our preferences for blues and slightly-saturated hues begins to dominate color preferences. Yet another theory, which is particularly relevant for the use of color in an art space, is that we learn strong associations between emotion and color, and color can consequently be used to evoke particular states of emotion. Specific colors have been shown to correlate with arousal (Valdez Mehrabian, 1994) and scales of emotional valence (Kaya Epps, 2004; for a detailed review on color-emotion literature, see also Steinvall, 2007). This theory is not necessarily at odds with other theories on color preference; in fact, it may simply supplement the idea that gaining positive associations with a color increases our preference for that color, which is an assumption that guides most current theories on color preference. 4 The question that remains from our understanding of color preference is whether or not art mimics life; in other words, how do animated filmmakers instill color in an artificial world, and do filmmakers exploit our color preferences in order to make their films more engaging? HOW IS COLOR USED IN ANIMATION? Color is arguably one of the most salient features of even the earliest animated films. This is not to imply, however, that the techniques involved in creating an animated space with dynamic color is a simple process. In fact, some of the biggest obstacles in moving animation forward as an art form arose from the complications of colorization. Cel Animation. Often referred to as traditional animation, the cel animation approach dominated the animated film landscape from very early in films history to the relatively recent advent of computer animation. Cel animated films composite a meticulously painted background layer with transparent celluloid (or cel) layer containing foreground information. Each layer carries with it important implications for how color is ultimately represented and rendered in the final film. The background layer, while usually created first, must work reciprocally with the cel layers in order for the colors to appear natural together and for the layers to appear integrated. The overuse of color, in particular colors that are heavily saturated, tends to overwhelm cel forms placed overtop the background; instead, the background ideally consists of more muted colors to complement the component cel forms. This led to the Disney animated film signature watercolor effect of its background layers (Thomas Johnson, 1995). The cel layer presents significantly more challenges where color is involved, and these challenges were originally addressed by Disneys larger-budget animation studios. The physical properties of celluloid itself have implications for color; the thicker the cel, the darker the resulting colors layered onto the cel layer (Thomas Johnson, 1995). Thus, paint color had to be balanced in such a way that the resulting cel painting did not clash with the watercolor appearance of the background layer. Colors high in saturation were often difficult to achieve because they also ultimately darkened when photographed from the cel. Disneys animators found that muted colors in the cel layer often were the best complement for a variety of background layers. When designing a character or a cel-layer object, animators were often limited by the expense of cel paint colors, and thus character design was in a sense limited by color. Adding to this complication, cel artists and color keys also had to adjust the color palettes of characters depending on the implied lighting of a background, to avoid a character looking overly-red or overly-saturated in a nighttime scene, for example (Thomas Johnson, 1995). Color in the cel layer also contained some complications for maintaining realism in the animated scene. For example, outlining characters in black often made their appearance visually heavier and detracted from their integration with the background layer. Disney first introduced colored inking to replace universal blank inking, and colored inking was also integrated with cel Xeroxing technology as that emerged (Thomas Johnson, 1995). Another color problem dealt with creating depth in the cel layer: textures in hair and fur could be created via airbrushing and drybrushing, but this created a flicker effect when the individual cels were captured in sequence. 5 Animators ultimately decided this depth was worth a certain small-scale amount of flicker tradeoff (Thomas Johnson, 1995). Computer Animation. The cel approach dominated animated films for decades, and the interest in streamlining the cel animation process led to the initial involvement of computers in animation. The first film to be digitally composited was Disneys 1990 film The Rescuers Down Under (Prince, 2012). Computer involvement in animation was also prioritized as a means of film restoration and improving film resolution; that same year, digital paint techniques allowed Disney to fix flaws in the original print of Fantasia for reissue, and in 1993, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves was completely restored to create a higher-resolution version of the film (Bordwell, 2012). Computer-based coloring was particularly valuable because it generated more freedom to alter independent components of an image. Prior to computer involvement, color correction had to be done on a whole-frame basis; the process of digitally compositing and altering films meant that color-correction could be done on an individual object or character without the need to alter the entire frame image (Prince, 2012). The involvement of computers in animation continued to grow as the technology became more inexpensive and accessible, and animators experimented with new computer-based techniques for animating (such as crowd-generation in Mulan(1998))7. By the mid-90s, the vast majority of cel animated films employed computers to streamline the once-arduous tasks involved in hand-animating films, including colorization. Because animators no longer had to rely on physical paint or hand-calibrate background and cel layers, the colorization and texturization processes became much easier, and artists in turn were able to work with more degrees of freedom in their animating. The revolution in computer animation began with the first fully computer-based animated film, Toy Story (1995). Moving from a two-dimensional animation space into a threedimensional, digitally-constructed environment had a huge initial investment cost (both in labor and finance), but ultimately gave the animated filmmaker a great deal of flexibility in constructing visual narratives (for a review, see Lasseter, 1987). Constructing and coloring a 3D environment and set of characters involves a great deal of initial time and planning, but the ultimate outcome is a greater degree of control in colorization, in which every individual element in the digital landscape can be fine-tuned in color space. Film Stock. One important caveat worth noting when discussing animation is that the color of the final product is always affected by the film stock. Even in contemporary computer animation, where color design can be done on a very fine-grained scale, the final film is ultimately rendered onto film stock. The choice of film stock, as evidenced especially by the changes in stock availability and popularity over time, as well as advances in stock quality, renders color variably (Bordwell Thompson, 2004). Technicolor film stock was popular with early Disney animated films, which exacerbated complications with cel painting by rendering colors heavy in midtones. This forced animators and color keys8 into a particular spectrum of colors when painting in order to achieve the desired final look on the Technicolor film stock (Thomas Johnson, 1995). Even in modern animated films, the change between the cel or computer and the film stock accounts for some variability in coloring of the final product. Indeed, this is not even the last step in color variance: the original camera negative is almost 6 always different from the colors displayed in theaters, on home televisions, or on computer screens (Prince, 2012). Some of this variance can potentially be put to rest with the increasing number of films being distributed as Digital Cinema Packages (rather than in 35mm form), but it persists as a problem for those interested in studying pinpointing color in film scientifically (Bordwell, 2012). It is clear that artists have more freedom with color in animated films. Before digital technology, live action films were confined by the natural color of objects in a scene as well as by the limited amount of post-production work available to alter color (Prince, 2012). However, from animations inception, animators have been able to select a wide range of colors to best suit their needs, despite some of the early cost and technical constraints. The introduction of computer animation allows for the greatest amount of freedom in color control, putting the entire digital color environment under the direction of the artistic team. The precise control of color in this setting not only has artistic consequences, but also important implications for how films can evoke particular psychological responses from its viewers. The rest of this chapter will examine work revolving around the use of color for a particular audience of animated viewers: specifically, how filmmakers use color in animated films intended for children. CHILDRENS ANIMATED FILMS: ARE THERE DIFFERENCES IN COLOR USE? In the introduction to her book A Reader in Animation Studies, Jayne Pilling (1997) discusses how Disney, as the first company to invest heavily in animated features, eventually became the model for animated films and subsequently marginalized animation into an art form somehow intrinsically only appropriate for entertaining children (xi). Indeed, it appears that the Disney model caused an aggressive bifurcation in the animated feature world, with heavy emphasis being placed on the creation of child-oriented animated films, and a smaller contingent of artists attempting to legitimize animation as an art form appealing to adults. While Pilling is correct in that the latter set of films is certainly underrepresented in the film studies literature, child-oriented animated features have a particular appeal for being studied from a cognitive perspective. Filmmakers in this animation subset face a specific challenge in trying to engage children in their visual narrative; there is ample evidence that the cognitive and attentional capacities of children differ from those of adults considerably, so what changes must the director of a childrens animated film make in order to captivate this unique audience? One potential shift to accommodate this audience appears to take place in colorization of these films. In order to study the physical properties (including color) of childrens films, we assembled a sample9 of G-rated childrens films made between 1985 and 2008 (Brunick, DeLong, Cutting, 2012; Brunick Cutting, in prep). Films in the sample were the highestgrossing G-rated theatrical films from each year in the range and also included some direct-tovideo films10. The sample included live-action, cel animated and computer animated films geared to a variety of ages11. We considered our entire sample of childrens films for our original analyses; for the purposes of this chapter, only the animated films (both cel and computer) will be discussed. This sample is contrasted with a subsample of adult-geared, non-animated films 7 from the same time period (see the 1985 through 2005 films from Cutting, DeLong, Nothelfer, 2010). The following sections will (1) discuss how the color parameter in question was mathematically quantified and (2) discuss the trends in the color parameter for the child- and adult-directed samples. Saturation. As discussed earlier, saturation refers to the brightness or boldness of a color. Saturation radiates outward from the center of the color circle: the center of the circle is white, with no saturation, while the edges of the circle represent fully-saturated forms of a particular hue. However, when analyzing color digitally, saturation is typically not discussed in terms of a color wheel, but instead in terms of a digital color space known as the HSV cone. This space is named for its dimensions: hue, saturation, and value. Value is roughly equivalent to luminance, and this space is essentially constructed by adding this variable to the color wheel (see Figure 2). The base of the HSV cone is a color wheel, and the height of the cone represents value. As value decreases (as the colors become darker), colors are limited in their saturation. Saturation is generally quantified on a scale from 0 (white, no saturation) to 1 (fully saturated). Saturation levels for each pixel in a frame were digitally computed. The median saturation level for all the pixels in each frame was computed, and an average of the frames was obtained for the entire film. Within the childrens film sample, we found that cel animated films use significantly more saturated colors than computer-generated animated films, independent of the year that the films were made. Both live-action childrens films and the matched sample of adult-geared films have been increasing in saturation over time; in other words, newer films are more prone to be more saturated than older films. However, even with this trend, the live-action childrens films and adult-directed films are dramatically less saturated than their animated counterparts. This finding is both interesting and unsurprising for the same reason: the saturation levels in childrens films likely reflect young childrens preference for bright colors. However, it is unlikely that filmmakers are consciously making these choices based on the psychological literature; filmmakers instead are likely intuiting this preference, perhaps based on their own conceptions of how children respond to film or other parts of their visual environment. Regardless of the basis of this intuition, it is important to note that the saturation trends in the films appear to match the scientifically-established preferences of the target audience. Luminance. Though it can be measured independently of color, luminance plays an important part in color space and ultimately how a color is perceived on-screen. To assess luminance, color was digitally removed from the film using a standard digital grayscale conversion. Each pixels luminance value is computed, with values ranging from 0 (pure black) to 255 (pure white). The mean of the pixels in a frame were averaged to create the mean luminance for that frame, and the frames were subsequently averages to create whole-film lumimance. The trend in Hollywood films for adult audiences is a decrease in luminance; in other words, films have steadily been getting darker throughout the studied period, which has implications for directing eye-gaze and attention of the viewer during the film (Cutting, Brunick, DeLong, Iricinschi, Candan, 2011; Smith, 2012). Animated films for children, conversely, maintain a steady level of brightness independent of year, the target age of the film, or what type of animation (cel or computer) was used. While one could argue that consistent brightness is a 8 possible artifact of representing particular colors in animation, childrens live action films are actually increasing in brightness over this period; this evidence instead supports an interpretation that the intended audience is driving the brightness level, not simply that animated films are generally brighter. Another question posed by these findings is the potential interaction between saturation and luminance. As demonstrated by the HSV cone, colors with lower values are limited in their saturation. Is it then possible that childrens films are more saturated only because they are brighter? Or, perhaps, does the inclination of filmmakers to use saturated colors in childrens films necessitate a certain luminance level? While this is certainly possible, it is unlikely that the luminance findings are purely an artifact of the saturation levels, or vice versa. If this were the case, one would expect the trends in both the childrens films and adult-directed films to be complementary; in other words, both luminance and saturation should be increasing or decreasing together in the samples. This is not what we find. In the childrens sample, saturation levels hold steadily across time, while these films have increased in brightness over the same period. Even more importantly, adult-geared films have gotten considerably darker, but have also become steadily more saturated, not less. This evidence suggests that while luminance and saturation have a reciprocal relationship, and while some of the variance in one accounts for variance in the other, the findings reported here on the two metrics are largely independent. Hue. As discussed earlier, hue generally refers to named colors. In both the color wheel and in the HSV cone, hue is represented around the radial edge. One major problem with this representation of hue is that it is based in circular geometry, which makes mathematically quantifying and comparing hues difficult and unintuitive. Fully isolating luminance from hue in the HSV color space is also problematic; an ideal space for considering hue would allow for a full spectrum of colors to be represented (1) in a more convenient mathematical space and (2) independent of luminance. Accordingly, we considered hue using the YCbCr color space, which meets these important criteria. This color space takes the form of a rectangular prism on a diagonal axis (see Figure 3). This color space is also named for its axes in the space: Y (on the vertical axis) refers to luminance, while Cb and Cr refer respectively to chrominance-red and chrominance-blue. The chrominance axes plot complementary colors from the color wheel (red-green and blue-yellow, respectively) on opposite rectangular planes of the prism. The distinct advantage of YCbCr is having luminance on its own axis; in this way, one could take a square slice through the prism to get a square containing all colors at an isoluminant level. Rather than examining whole-film hue, which is nearly impossible without reducing hue on arbitrary dimensions, our research has examined the hue of particular characters in childrens films. We asked independent coders to view childrens animated films in grayscale, and to identify unambiguous protagonists and antagonists in the film. Frames containing these characters were selected, and the characters themselves were extracted from their background. The dominant hue of the protagonists and antagonists were plotted on an isoluminant slice of YCbCr color space. The analyses showed that protagonists, defined as unquestionably positive and morally-right characters, contained more blue and green hues. Antagonists, conversely, contained more red and yellow hues (Brunick, DeLong, Cutting, 2012). Unlike saturation, 9 where films mimic the preferences found in children, this analysis shows that the use of hue in childrens films coincides with adult hue preferences. If childrens preferences were being exploited, good characters would likely contain more child-preferred hues, such as red and yellow, when in reality precisely the opposite occurs. It is unclear why this trend is present, and certainly merits further analysis. One possible explanation is that the shift in hue preferences supposedly occurs earlier than the shift in saturation preferences; adults may not be as aware of the hue preference in children because it shifts earlier, and thus adults and filmmakers have less exposure to this cognitive facet of child color preference. The implications for studying childrens animated films, and childrens films in general, are vast. Researchers not only are able to gain insight into childrens cognitive capacities and preferences, but they can also observe the early reciprocal relationship between filmmaker and viewer. While films for adults are mostly classified as art or entertainment, film in a childs world also serves as an important tool for learning. Facilitating early learning from visual stimuli is a major goal of both psychology and education researchers, and childrens films c

The Importance of Virginity in Chronicle of a Death Foretold :: Chronicle Death Foretold Essays

The Importance of Virginity in Chronicle of a Death Foretold In "Chronicle of a Death Foretold," the bride-to-be, Angela Vicaro, was returned to her family when her future husband found out that she was not a virgin. The fact that she was not a virgin was enough to prevent a marriage from occurring, bring disgrace to the family, and cause a murder. Obviously, this was extremely important in the novel, and it is of some importance in society today. When a marriage is going to take place, some men feel that it is important for their future wife to be a virgin. Partly, this is because of an insecurity complex that men may have. If the woman is not a virgin, the man may fear that he will be compared to previous partners of his wife, and he may not live up to the woman's expectations. If she has been with no one else though, the man can be more confident, since his wife will have no one to compare him to. His wife is pure and untouched, and since he will be the first man she has ever known, the husband can feel secure heading into the marriage. Besides the jealousy and insecurity factors though, I think many men also want their wife to be a virgin because it is a way of the woman proving that she will be faithful to her husband once they are married. If a woman has been with other men before she is married, a man might see that as meaning that since she could not wait up to that point, she may be unfaithful to him in the future. But if a woman has remained a virgin up until her wedding, it shows that she was willing to wait for her husband, and is much more likely to remain a faithful wife throughout the rest of her life. By remaining a virgin until marriage, the marriage is made to seem more meaningful for the woman. The husband is then reassured that he is the only one his wife desires to be with. In the novel, remaining a virgin was such a big deal that the perpetrator, Santiago, was put to death for causing dishonor to Angela and her family. In that society, this matter was taken much more seriously that it is today, since it was a matter of honor, and it was not acceptable for a woman to not be a virgin before she was married.

External Forces Shaping The Future Of The Airline Industry Essay

External Forces Shaping The Future Of The Airline Industry INTRODUCTION   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The purpose of this report is to inform airline executives about the external forces affecting their industry and what they can do to keep up with the changing business atmosphere. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 had a grueling effect on the economy, and while most industries are almost back to their pre-9/11 financial status, the airline industry is lucky to break-even. This report will explain three leading trends that are forcing the airline industry to re-think their stance on strategic planning.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The first trend discussed will illustrate the effect that online booking has had on the way airlines do business. The second trend will describe how obesity has caused new standards to be set within the industry. The final trend will explain how the demand for business-related travel has been decreased from the use of new technologies. This paper will close with a brief synopsis of the most relevant trend to the industry—the decrease in business travel due to new technologies. DESCRIPTION   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The following portion of this report will describe each of the three trends and contain information to support the claim. Continue reading for further explanation of the trends. Online Booking Online booking is becoming more popular, especially in a country where over 50% of its households are connected to the internet (U.S. Department of Commerce 2001). (See Appendix; Graph 1) Americans want things â€Å"NOW!† not ten minutes from now. The quicker the service, the more satisfied the customer will become. Various online travel agencies, such as Orbit and Travelocity, give consumers the ability to compare different travel options, all without leaving the comfort of their home. In 2003, 35 million Americans went online to book travel reservations, a 17% increase since 2002 (U.S. News 2004). Currently one-third of all internet-related transactions involve making travel arrangements (The Times 2004). Obesity   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Americans today are heavier than ever, and despite increased health awareness, the obesity epidemic is not slowing down. (See Appendix; Graph 2) Currently two-thirds of Americans are considered to be overweight (New Zealand Management 2004). According to the last U.S. Census, the current population of the U.S. is 281 million. When mixing those details together you can acquire ... ...on Week & Space   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Technology v138 n6 (Feb. 8, 1993): 31,33. Lollis, Barbara De. â€Å"Virtual meeting companies get boost as travel wanes. USA Today   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  (March 18, 2003): 10. Lollis, Barbara De and Chris Woodyard. â€Å"Larger Passengers pay more on Southwest   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Air.† USA Today (2002) . McKee, Bradford. â€Å"Sprawl and America’s Sprawling Middle.† Architecture v92 n8   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  (Aug. 2003). â€Å"Obesity Research.† American Obesity Association (2002) http://www.obesity.org/ subs/fastfacts/Obesity_Research.shtml>. â€Å"Percent of U.S. Households with Internet Access.† U.S. Dept of Commerce (Feb.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  2001) . Stellin, Susan. â€Å"Online Booking Cuts Costs and Simplifies Corporate Trips.† New York   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Times (Sept. 2, 2003): C7. â€Å"Web World.† The Times (United Kingdom) (Sept. 4, 2004): 4. APPENDIX Graph 1: Percent of U.S. Households with Online Access Data Source: Newburger, Eric C. â€Å"Home Computers and Internet Use in the United States.† US Census Bureau (Sept. 2001) . Graph 2: Obesity Prevalence in America Data Source: â€Å"Obesity Research.† American Obesity Association (2002) http://www.obesity.org/ subs/fastfacts/Obesity_Research.shtml>.

Misleading Fitness and Health Commercials :: Fitness and Health Scams

Some people do not know all that much about exercise and dieting. They do not know healthy ways to eat, and they don’t realize that one can’t get the â€Å"Perfect Body† in just a few days. These people are possibly victims of Fitness Myths. â€Å"In 2002, the Federal Trade Commission released a report that shared a review of 300 weight-loss ads promoting 218 different products. They found the rampant use of false or misleading claims† (FTC, 2003) Misleading fitness products can be particularly damaging. If one is mislead into purchasing a product and the product doesn’t work as it was advertised, not only have you wasted your money, but also the product may have physically hurt your body. FTC chairman Timothy Muris talks about the advertising and promotion tactics of the fitness industry â€Å"ads that make claims and promises that are clearly implausible and patently false run in all forms of media, with the notable exception of network TV† (FTC, 2003). Misleading advertisements are common among all forms of media. Although TV commercials may be more powerful in their persuasion, an obvious reason for this is that TV advertisements show more misleading commercials. A technique frequently used in commercials to make them seem credible is that â€Å"many deceptive ads run in highly respected publications and they are perceived to be credible†(FTC, 2003). Therefore if the TV program you are watching, while the commercial is being played, seems credible, consumers tend to believe that the products advertised during the episode are also trustworthy. One such misleading advertisement was for a product called Skinny Pill for Kids. This diet pill was targeting kids ranging from age 6 to 12. The pill was supposed to help kids lose weight and provide essential daily vitamins, minerals and herbs. â€Å"The marketer of the supplement said her company had not done safety tests on children† (CNN, 2002). It turned out that the product being advertised as a â€Å"miracle† to help children loose weight contained herbs that are diuretics. â€Å"Uva ursi, juniper berry, and buchu leaf all cause the body to lose water. A doctors’ guide to drugs and alternative remedies, states the uva ursi should not be given to children under age 12† (CNN, 2002).