Internet Child Porn Essay Example for Free

Internet Child Porn Essay According to UNICEF, the United States and Somalia are the only two countries that have not yet ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. However, Somalia currently has no legally recognized government and cannot ratify anything at all, leaving the United States as the only country that still does not agree with it. The Optional Protocol to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution, and Child Pornography reports that Bill Clinton did not submit it to the Senate for deliberation and ratification. Perhaps he was too busy with Monica Lewinsky, and maybe the Republicans under Bush were too busy in airport restrooms like Senator Larry Craig. But perhaps Obama can do something about it. Child abuse through internet pornography is growing. In fact, the United States Department of Justice approximates one million children in the United States alone, who were victims of pornographers (Levesque 65). Indeed, tougher internet child-pornography regulations need to be enforced because it continues to be rampant, digital technology has made it easier to proliferate, and the graphic pornography is increasingly becoming more brutal. Internet child pornography is rampant and increasing. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) asserts that â€Å"approximately 20% of all internet pornography involves children. † It is a â€Å"growing crisis. † The Internet Watch Foundation also reports that since 1997, internet child pornography increased by approximately 1,500%. Furthermore, internet child pornography is growing because it generates high revenue. Roger Levesque, in Sexual Abuse of Children reports that child pornography is a multi-billion dollar business. It is also one of the fastest growing internet criminal segments (Ferraro, et al. ). The growth and high demand for it is fueled by addiction, just like illegal drugs. As Ryan Singel of Wired reports, â€Å"Internet pornography is the new crack cocaine, leading to addiction, misogyny, pedophilia, boob jobs and erectile dysfunction, according to clinicians and researchers testifying before a Senate committee Thursday. † Pedophiles are addicted to child pornography, which they use for personal sexual arousal, trading with fellow pedophiles, training for future child abuse victims, or inducement for child prostitution (Crosson-Tower 208). Consequently, the high demand for addictive internet child pornography increases child abuse cases. As, the Guardian reports, â€Å"Demand for child pornography on the internet has led to an increase in sex abuse cases. † It also adds, â€Å"many paedophiles acknowledged that exposure to child sex images fuelled their fantasies and played an important part in leading them to commit physical sexual offences against children. † Unsupervised children using the internet naively are â€Å"groomed for abuse while accessing chat rooms. If the victims take the bait, they become part of future pornographic productions. The increase in popularity of social-media internet sites such as MySpace has increased these chances, whereas in the past, kidnapping by total strangers made it more difficult for pedophiles to capture victims. Moreover, the Internet Watch Foundation through the Associated Press reports that â€Å"Child pornography on the Internet is becoming more brutal and graphic, and the number of images depicting violent abuse has risen fourfold since 2003. Marlise Simons of the New York Times also reports that â€Å"even babies and infants were peddled via the Internet and other media to clients in Europe, Russia and the United States. † Indeed, the Internet facilitates the distribution of child pornography. In the section Law Enforcement Efforts Against Child Pornography Are Ineffective of Philip Jenkin’s book At Issue: Child Sexual Abuse, he points out â€Å"overwhelming evidence† that child pornography â€Å"is all but impossible to obtain through nonelectronic means. The US Department of Justice also reports that because of the Internet’s â€Å"technological ease, lack of expense, and anonymity in obtaining and distributing child pornography,† it â€Å"has resulted in an explosion in the availability, accessibility, and volume of child pornography. † Furthermore, in 2001, â€Å"There are estimated to be one million pornographic images of children on the internet, many of them featuring children from third world countries being abused by affluent sex tourists from the west† (Wellard 26). UNICEF also reports that â€Å"a single child pornography site receives a million hits a month. † In order to receive that much Internet traffic, organized crime groups use sophisticated computer technology to evade detection. Pornographers can send viruses to unwitting Internet users without their knowledge to gain control of their computers, which can be transformed into file servers that can remotely store images and videos of child pornography for downloading later. This happened to Michael Fiola, an unsuspecting man in Massachusetts who was wrongfully charged for possessing child pornography. As Matthew Healey of the Associated Press reports, â€Å"Of all the sinister things that Internet viruses do, this might be the worst: They can make you an unsuspecting collector of child pornography. † After a virus infected Fiola’s laptop and downloaded heinous pictures and videos into his computer, his employer discovered it through the internet bill, and he â€Å"was fired and charged with possession of child pornography, which carries up to five years in prison. He endured death threats, his car tires were slashed and he was shunned by friends. † But he and his wife â€Å"fought the case, spending $250,000 on legal fees. They liquidated their savings, took a second mortgage and sold their car. † Eventually, charges were dropped after prosecutors confirmed the defense findings. â€Å"It ruined my life, my wifes life and my familys life,† says Fiola. These sophisticated techniques emanates from hidden internet levels, where 50,000 to 100,000 online organized pedophiles, one-third American, gather together, as asserted by Jenkins in his book Beyond Tolerance: Child Pornography Online. With the advent of web-cams and digital photography and video, even from cell phones, home-made child porn is now easy to produce. Peer-to-peer networking, wherein internet users can share files with each other instead of downloading it, along with the use of data encryption, file division and passwords, also makes any illegal porn difficult to detect, as reported by the Internet Watch Foundation. Truly, law enforcement is weak in battling child porn. As of 2008, the International Centre for Missing Exploited Children (ICMEC) reports that 93 out of 187 countries do not have child-porn-specific laws. And out of the 94 that do have anti-child-porn laws, 36 do not criminalize the possession of child pornography. And according to Interpol statistics, only 1% of child-porn abuse victims are located each year by law enforcers, as reported by Emily Friedman in ABC News. Furthermore, violators found with images of post-pubescent minors, even if it is illegal, are often not prosecuted (Wells, et al 277). Currently, China has the most effective method in the war against child pornography. Right now, the US uses highly inefficient methods. To mitigate its image as the porn search engine of the world, Google develops software to fight child porn. In 2008, Google adapted software for its search engine to track child porn that is available through its search engine, as reported by Maggie Shiels of BBC News. The FBI also posts hyperlinks on the World Wide Web that advertise child porn. Then they raid the homes of internet users who click on the links, as Declan McCullagh writes in CNet. Moreover, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOPP), established in 2006, attempts to target the assets or finances of organized child-porn rings, as Jamie Doward from the Guardian reports. But China simply blocks all porn and American social-media sites from the Internet. China is known very well for its internet censorship and harsh penalties for drug trafficking. Drug use in the country is one of the lowest in the world. As Reuters reports in December 2009, â€Å"The Chinese government has run a highly publicized campaign against what officials said were banned smutty and lewd pictures overwhelming the countrys Internet and threatening the emotional health of children. They also add that â€Å"China has banned a number of popular websites and Internet services, including Googles Youtube, Twitter, Flickr and Facebook, as well as Chinese content sharing sites. † Jennifer Guevin of CNET also writes, â€Å"Google acknowledged last year that the Chinese government asked it to disable a search feature with the goal of censoring pornography. † In response to CNET’s report, Myles Taylor, a reader, commented, â€Å"I wish wed take some pages from their book and start cracking down on child pornographers, pedophiles and such. † In conclusion, law enforcement on child pornography is too weak and tougher regulations need to be implemented to combat this crisis. It would be very effective and simple if the US government were willing to simply block all porno and social-media-sharing sites from the Web, but the US First Amendment would prohibit that. However, unless US lawmakers do something drastic, such as revising the US Constitution, shoppers will continue to see the photographs of missing children on milk cartons, reminding them that their child could be the next victim of thousands of pedophiles simply waiting for the next opportunity.

Does Bureaucracy Remains The Essential Core of Public Administration in The Practice of New Public Management?

Does Bureaucracy Remains The Essential Core of Public Administration in The Practice of New Public Management? Introduction The changing role on how the government should act in order to improve and guarantee an adequate public service delivery has come to an era where the concept of New Public Management (NPM) is introduced to replace the practice of so called ‘red tape bureaucracy. The concept suggests new management techniques and practices that involving market type mechanisms related to private sector practices in order to bring changes to the management of government in making public service delivery. The reforms try to redefine the role and character of government institutions to be more market and private sector oriented. The reform efforts have been commenced first by developed countries from the late 1970s to the 1980s, and then followed by developing and transitional countries in recent years (Larbi, 2006). The economic crisis in developed countries led to the search of new ways in managing and delivering public services and redefining the states role. Similar thing also occurred to developing countries that was experiencing economic and fiscal crisis that led to the rethinking of state-led development that involving bigger size, functions, and the cost of state and its bureaucracy. The idea is how to strongly endorse the market and competition to the private and voluntary sectors and leaving the practice of strong state where everything is controlled and done by the state. However, the idea of NPM has raise a question of whether bureaucracy should still exist or, even more, would still be the essential core element of public administration. The paper will discuss about this question and find out what would be the answer. The outline of this paper will firstly discuss about the essence of bureaucracy in the practice of public administration. Afterward, it will introduce what and how does the NPM works in the practice of organising and managing public service. Finally, this paper will analyse whether bureaucracy would still be the essential core of public administration although NPM is being implemented. What Is Bureaucracy? Common citizens might just think that bureaucracy is a burden in public administration because of its inefficiency, long chain of decision making, self interest, and other bothersome reason that makes it undesirable form of administration. In the United States, public bureaucracy has gain wide scepticism and reached a high point as a major theme in the Reagan administration. The president contempt on bureaucracy was supported by public opinion polls, which had been detecting a widespread conviction that the government is wasteful and ineffective, and much of the concern aimed on public agencies and their employees as the major part of the problem (Milward and Rainey, 1983). On the contrary, there are also views that think bureaucracy in more positive term with their own evidence. For instance, merit based bureaucracy can fosters economic growth in developing countries (Evans and Rauch, 1999). It can also contribute to the effort of poverty reduction (Henderson et al, 2003). Furthermore, bureaucratic rules are considered to have a contribution in promoting democratic equality because those rules do not make differentiation of wealth and other resources among citizens that they serve. These two standpoints, negative and positive, about bureaucracy forced us to understand more about the substance of the so called â€Å"Weberian† state structures. In the view of public administration, bureaucracy means much more than those negative characteristics mentioned above because the term â€Å"bureaucracy† in serious administrative literature mentioning a general, formal structure elements of organisation, particularly government organisation (Stillman, 2000). The most comprehensive, classic formulation of the characteristics of bureaucracy was generally acknowledged as the work of a German scientist, Max Weber. He pioneered the term â€Å"bureaucracy† by saying that â€Å"bureaucracy is the normal way that legal rational authority appears in institutional form, it holds a central role in ordering and controlling modern society, also it is superior to any other form in precision, in stability, in stringency of its discipline and in its reliability†. Weber thought that bureaucracy is indispensable to maintaining civilisation in modern society. He suggested that although a lot of people are saying about the negativ e views of bureaucracy, it would be impossible to think that administrative work can be carried out in any field without the existence of officials working in offices. Weber noted three of the most important major elements of the formal structure of bureaucracy, which are the division of labour, hierarchical order, and impersonal rules. Firstly, specialisation of labour means that all work in bureaucracy should be divided into units that will be done individuals or groups of individuals that has competency in accomplishing those tasks. In other words, the specialisation of labour brings out the idea of professionalism in administrative bureaucracy. Secondly, the hierarchical order in bureaucracy that is meant to separate superiors from sub ordinates in order to recognised different authority, responsibility, and privileges. It also meant as a base for remuneration of employees and a structure that will enable a system of promotion to the employees. Thirdly, impersonal rules that form the means of a bureaucratic world. It limits the bureaucrats in any opportunities for arbitrariness and personal favouritism because their choices are restrained by l egal bureaucratic rules that provide systematic controls of sub ordinates by superiors. Those major elements of bureaucracy derived from what is known as The Weberian ideal type, which suggested four revolutional thinking in public administration. First is the concept of recruitment for the officials which is not supposed to be based on personal relationship but more to a merit based recruitment. Second is the point of view that servants should give their loyalty to the community not to individuals or groups. Third is the mentality aspect of the servants where they are pressured in improving public welfare so they have to eliminate the practice that give opportunity for rent seeking and fraud, which will inflict the public welfare. Last concept of ideal type is that employment should be subject to job performance not on political support. The Concept of New Public Management New initiatives introduce new management technique, which include not only structural changes but also attempts to change both process and roles of public sector management. Wide drafts of initiative and change processes in the UK public services have taken place since the 1980s (Ashburner et al, 1994). Furthermore, a survey conducted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in early 1990s has concluded that new management techniques and practices that involving market type mechanisms associated with the private for profit sector would bring changes in countries public management that have wide governance, economic and institutional environments (OECD, 1993a). Those technique and practice changes have then being labelled as the New Public Management (NPM) or the new managerialism (Ferlie et al, 1996). The search for new management technique in public sector administration was initially forced by some occurrence that happened worldwide. The first wave for reforms came up as a result of economic and fiscal crisis, political change, and criticism on over extension of the state. The next wave for reforms were mainly because of the role of donors, improvement in information technology, and pressures of globalisation that strongly promoted competition among countries. Nevertheless, the concept of NPM still need to be clearly defined of what the new public management actually is, what made it distinct to be said of moving away from traditional public administration. The attempts to overview what kind of practice should be done in implementing NPM noted that there are at least four new public management models (Ferlie et al, 1996) that can distinguish it with the traditional public administration. The models meant to be the initial attempt to build the typology of new public management ideal types. The first model is The Efficiency Drive that known as the earliest model to emerge. It represented a model that tried to make public sector more like businesses, which is led by high importance of efficiency. It increased attention to financial control, extension of audit, deregulation of the labour market, empowerment of less bureaucratic and more entrepreneurial management, and a greater role for non public sector providers. This first model of NPM sees public sector as a problem not solution because it was wasteful, over bureaucratic, and underperformed. The second model is Downsizing and Decentralisation on the management of public sector organisations. This model implemented some general organisational change, which include staff downsizing, increased contracting out, and increased decentralisation strategy. The model tried to represent public sector in facing issues about their replacement with the market. The third one called In Search of Excellence that had strong highlight on organisational culture. It define NPM as techniques and practices in shaping public sector organisational culture by promoting and forming values, rites, and symbols to show people how to behave at work. The fourth and last model called Public Service Orientation. This model tried to combine private and public sector management ideas by adopting private sector practices. It takes ideas from the private sector to be applied in the public sector organisation. The rise of Total Quality Management in order to achieve excellence in public service deliveries can be noted as one of the implementation for this model. Overall, there seems to be only two core elements that exist in the concept of NPM. The first one is managerialism and the other one is marketisation and competition (Osborne and Gaebler, 1992). Managerialism includes the practice of decentralisation of authority, devolving budget and financial control, delayering and downsizing public sector organisations, implementing performance management, and forming executive agencies to do specific tasks in public services. While marketisation and competition stressed on the practice of contracting out, charging for public services, focusing on quality, and changing employment relationship. Larbi (2006) also mentioned those two core elements in a detailed table, which is also adapted from Hood (1991). However, the market type mechanisms associated with private for profit sector, which is the life blood of NPM, also have a challenge to answer that what if the market fails. It comes to another perspective of NPM in anticipating market failure, which is regulating. The idea is quite paradox because if we discuss about new public management reform, usually it will talk about de-regulation and not re-regulation, but the state has to face the reality that the market will not always succeed. This where regulation is meant to, being an instrument to impose outcomes which would not be reached by the operation of free market forces and private legal rights (Ogus, 1994). Regulation meant to make the market works more efficient or make the monopoly provider to operate as if there were a competition. Nevertheless, the practice of how to regulate has also been an interesting topic of whether in the form of state control or on the basis of giving incentives. Where Bureaucracy Stands In the New Public Management? After reviewing the definition of bureaucracy and the practice of new public management, we have to answer two questions that arise in the beginning of this paper. The first question is whether bureaucracy would still exist in the implementation of NPM or otherwise should be abolish at all. The second question, as continuation from the first one if the result is yes, where does it stand in the NPM, would it supposed to be the core elements too? The answer for the first question supposed to be yes, bureaucracy would still exists despite the emerging implementation on New Public Management. There are at least two reasons that can explain why bureaucracy will still exist. First of all, Weber suggested that bureaucracy can serve any master. This is in the meaning of whatever the form of a government, whether it is an authoritarian or democratic, bureaucracy would still be relevant. The facts that can be seen as evidence is what happened around the mid-1990s where ideas derived from neo-liberal economics began to falter as policy guides to economic development. A number of processes and events were responsible for this. The World Bank (1993, 1997) finally began to recognize the positive role that states could play. It became clear that the concept of the minimal state had theoretical flaws and led to policies that could be shattering for growth, most visibly in Eastern Europe (Henderson, 1998). Nevertheless, the Washington Cons ensus came under pressure as a consequence of inappropriate policy responses to the East Asian economic crisis (Chang, 2001). The recent writing by Chang (2002) revealed that the now developed world, including its most neo-liberal exponents, Britain and the United States did not pursue free market policies as their roads to riches, seems destined to advance this process. The second reason is the Weberian perspective actually does not negate the positive effects of strengthening market institutions, but it does postulate that bureaucratically structured public organizations, using their own distinct set of decision making procedures, are a necessary complement to market based institutional arrangements (Evans and Rauch, 1999). Then the second question, what about its significance in the NPM. More precisely, would it still be the core element in the practice of NPM. There are some arguments that we can use to answer this question. As noted before, Weber argued that public administrative organisations, which are characterised by meritocratic recruitment and a predictable long term career rewards, will be more effective at facilitating capitalist growth than other forms of state organisation. This hypothesis certainly cannot be dismissed just because of the fact that people who call themselves bureaucrats have engaged in rent seeking and fraud activity, or that corrupt governments have undermined economic growth (Evans and Rauch, 1999). Henderson et al (2003) explained in their paper that meritocratic recruitment can be expected to lead to organisational effectiveness because of several reasons. Firstly, it can ensures that staff has, at the very least, a minimal level of competency to fulfil job requirements. Secondly, it tends to encourage organisational coherence and an organisational spirit, where it is expected that this will eventually help to raise the motivation of staff. Finally, higher levels of identification with colleagues and the organisation help to raise the levels of shared norms and increase the intangible costs of engaging in corrupt practices. Moreover, bureaucracies that offer rewarding long term careers have greater possibility to perform well because it encourages more competent people to join the organisation, which, in turn, further increases organisational coherence and makes attempts to conduct corrupt practices by individuals will be less attractive because the costs of being found out ar e very high. Another argument comes from an empirical study, which is written by Evans and Rauch (1999), to test the significant correlation between bureaucratic effects of the Weberian State Structure with economic growth. Evans and Rauch constructed a â€Å"Weberianness Scale† that tried to measure the degree to which core state agencies in various countries were characterised by meritocratic recruitment and offered rewarding long term careers. After that, they compute the scores on the scale for 35 semi industrial and poor countries. Then, they analysed the correlation of these scores to the total growth of real GDP per capita in those countries from 1970 to 1990, and found out that there is a strong and significant correlation between the â€Å"Weberianness Scale† score and economic growth on those respective countries. Furthermore, they also analysed and concluded that the East Asian countries, which have higher â€Å"Weberianness Scale† score and economic growth than A frican countries, has demonstrated a high performing key institutional element of the scale that resulted in economic growth. Almost similar arguments also came from James Tobin, the winner of Nobel Prize for Economics in 1981. He observed that the rapid growth of the public sector in the United States had actually accompanied the greatest economic advances of any country in history, and that he knows of no evidence that government spending and growth are responsible for current economic difficulties. These arguments should at least give us a hint that bureaucracy would remains to be the core element in public administration. Conclusion Critiques about inefficient, red tape, and waste bureaucracy has raise an idea to abolish and make it as minimum as it can in order to provide and improve public welfare. This has lead to the concept of making business-like public sector, where it is assumed that the practice will bring goodness to public welfare. However, it has been revealed that the oversimplified calls on business-like public sector, which impose free market approach, have eventually being falter. This has made some modification on the practice of New Public Management. Some arguments have shown that bureaucracy should remains as the core element in the practice of NPM. It is required not just to anticipate market failures but also to make sure that the market, especially for monopolistic public service, would feel that there is a competition, through establishing sets of regulations. Moreover, empirical study has proved that the role of bureaucracy is actually significant for the economic growth. Thus, there are strong reasons not just to put bureaucracy in the practice of NPM, but also make it as an essential part of the New Public Management.

Brief History Of Nestle Malaysia Management Essay

Brief History Of Nestle Malaysia Management Essay The existing company that has selected is Nestlà © (Malaysia) Berhad. This report starts with an introduction and a brief history about Nestlà © and Nestlà © Malaysia. This report includes the vision and mission of Nestlà © and how Nestlà © is going to achieve them. This report also includes a brief summary of Nestlà ©s market segmentation with examples provided. It discusses the strengths and problems of the company followed by the solutions to solve the issues. In the end, there are some suggestions recommended by our group and a conclusion of this whole report. Nestlà © is a multinational company and is of the worlds largest in food and beverages industry. Heinrich Nestlà ©, whom also known as Henri Nestlà ©, was the founder of Nestlà © Company (Nestle. 2010, Introduction, Nestlà © [Online] available at www.nestle.com), which headquarter is in Vevey, Switzerland in the year of 1866. Nestlà © Malaysia was established in the year of 1912 in Malaysia as Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company. Nestlà © Malaysia head office is now located in Mutiara Damansara, Petaling Jaya, Selangor, and has 6 sales offices with more than 5000 employees nationwide. Besides, Nestlà © manufactures its own products in 7 factories and markets over 300 Halal products across the nation. (Nestlà ©. 2010, Nestlà © in Malaysia, Nestlà © [Online] available at www.nestle.com.my) Nestlà © specialized in foods and beverages industry, a few of the many well known brands Nestlà © has in Malaysia includes Maggi, Nescafà ©, Milo, Kit Kat, Nesvita (formerly known as Ne stum), as well as pet care products such as Purina and Friskies. Nestlà ©s vision (Nestlà ©. 2010, Corporate Philosophy, Nestlà © [Online] available at www.nestle.com.my) is to be the leader in Nutrition, Health, and Wellness Company by delivering world-class products of the highest consistent quality, reliability, and convenience based on business excellence principles throughout the operation. Nestlà ©s mission (The Nestlà © Corporate Essence Our roots and wings 2007, p.4) is to enhance the quality of life with good food and beverages, everywhere, so people could live a healthier life. In order to achieve their vision and mission, Nestlà © Nutrition Research Centre (Nestlà ©. 2010, Research Development, Nestlà © [Online] available at www.nestle.co.jp) pays great attention to understand the consumers nutritional and emotional needs and utilise todays world superior science and technology to produce high quality products to the world. MARKET SEGMENTATION Every consumer has different needs. Hence, it is not possible to satisfy every customer using a same marketing segmentation, which is also known as mass marketing by offering a single marketing mix to all consumers. Moreover, as a global market has become extremely competitive, and consumers are increasingly demanding which is very difficult to satisfy. Therefore, Nestlà © uses target marketing for every product to their customers. For example, in consumer product, Nestlà © baby milk product such as Nestlà © Neslac Excella Gold is segmented only to infants and toddlers. However, baby does not have the capacity or capability to buy the food they needed. Therefore, to market this baby milk product, Nestlà © does not fully focusing on babys basic need which is hunger, but also to the babys parents in terms of how the nutrition provided will give their children the best possible advantages in the childrens life and development. Another example is Nestlà © Milo, the milk beverage with chocolate and malt. Don Howart, the executive director of Nestlà © and Singapore Coffee and Beverages claimed that Milo remains popular among the young and has a 90% (The Sun. 2010, Milo with ProtoMalt to get through the day, Sun2Surf [Online] available at www.sun2surf.com) market share among chocolate malt drinks in Malaysia. Besides the youngsters, old people and active people are also part of the target markets of Nestlà © Milo drinks. However, at first, Nestlà ©s business was launched internationally and realised the fact that food products have to be taken into account to the local eating and social behaviour due to the particular countrys practices, cultures, and traditions. Therefore, (1) Nestlà © has always shown respect for diverse cultures and traditions and trying to integrate itself as much as possible into the cultures and traditions, adding also to the local environment its own set of values. Therefore, (2) Nestlà © embraces cultural and social diversity and does not discriminate on the basis of origin, nationality, religion, race, gender or age. (The Nestlà © Management and Leadership Principles 2006, p.9) STRENGTHS Nestlà © is a multinational company, not to mention Nestlà © is also the largest industry in foods and beverages, hence Nestlà © has every capability to attract more consumers compare to the local companies. On account of its high market share and high financial power, Nestlà © also has greater financial capability in altering existing products in terms of packaging, the formula of the particular product and others or creating new products, as well as to adapt or upgrade latest information system technology in manufacturing, order processing and other related fields in order to sustain their competitive advantage by delivering lower cost of goods and services than their competitors in this dynamic environment. Secondly, Nestlà © has quite an effective strategic marketing capability. For example, Nestlà © Maggi instant noodles has built a stable patent and is very well known in many countries especially in Australia and Malaysia. This is because Maggi instant noodles is easy to be differentiated from its competitors such as Cintan Instant Noodles. Moreover, Nestlà © has also developed a very strong brand name for Maggi instant noodles because of strong advertising, which has indoctrinated most of the people to name the other brands of instant noodles as Maggi instant noodle instead of the brands original name. Furthermore, Nestlà © also has a strong Research and Development operations that helps the company to achieve cross-border synergy such as packaging its global products to local preferences. Nestlà © also emphasises on using todays information technology, which Nestlà © believe it will present a long-term opportunity for them to smoothen the companys operation or to increase efficiency in packaging, among any other companys operations. Besides, Nestlà © also has better technological capability, for instance, to renovate the existing products to be more innovative, higher quality, and much healthier product as Nestlà © realised that consumer-centred innovation and renovation is the most important pillar of Nestlà ©s worldwide strategy, which would accelerate Nestlà © to advance from good to better. (The Nestlà © Corporate Essence Our roots and wings 2007, p.34) And because of Nestlà ©s commitments, more people trust on the products delivered by Nestlà © because of its prope r health and safety measures. Besides, Nestlà © also has great leadership attributes. The leaders such as the top executives, branch managers, and others are responsible in building organisation capability. For example, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Nestlà © S.A., Peter Brabeck, (Castelarhost. 2005, Nestlà © LC1 S.W.O.T Analysis, Castelar Articles [Online] available at www.articles.castelarhost.com) emphasises internal growth worldwide, which means to achieve higher volumes of sales by adding value to the products, renovate existing products, and innovate new products, to keep pace in the industry because of rapidly changing of consumer expectations. PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS Nestlà © produces hundreds of products, has a global network of suppliers, and multiple distributions and selling channels. Hence, to anticipate and respond in this rapidly changing in market demand condition is very difficult. When forecasting a market demand, Nestlà © will need information to detect shifts in demand early so they could adjust for trends and send the right messages to the suppliers, shippers, and distribution centres before they are flood with unwanted or defective goods or shortages. (Manhattan Associates. 2010, Planning and forecasting: Anticipate and Respond to Changes in Demand, Manhattan Associates [Online] at www.manh.com) However, every company has its weakest links, so is Nestlà ©. The weakest links are issues they are unable to control. (Labs. 2010, Supply Chain Efficiency Starts at the Top, Food Engineering [Online] available at www.foodengineeringmag.com) Firstly, the most common problem is the sources of supply of raw materials. This is due to a sudden and unexpected increased in demand, which will cause extreme supply shortages for commodities that will result in major price increases. For instance, bad weather and natural disasters have always been an issue affecting incoming raw materials. Secondly, the inaccuracy of orders received in inventory. No company can ever achieve the requirement of zero defects especially in foods and beverages industry. For example, when the purchasing department of Nestlà © ordered 10,000 of mixed berries yoghurt from its dealer, but what the retailer received was only 8,000 of mixed berries yoghurt, or on another occasion they might received defective inventori es. Another example is, when Nestlà © tells its dealer that they needed extra orders of a particular product to be shipped right away because of unexpected increased in demand, but in fact, the supplier may already has orders from other customers. This usually happen during special occasion such as Chinese New Year, the demand of Nestlà © Cornflakes cereal will increase because many people will buy this product to make cookies. This will causes Nestlà © to encounter a great loss because of inaccurate order of magnitude because they could not produce the actual output needed. Therefore, in order to solve these problems, it is crucial for Nestlà © to engage with multiple suppliers or dealers in that particular region, so they could acquire inventories from multiple dealers, which will definitely decrease the risk of shortage due to incontrollable situation. Besides, Nestlà © should also base on their demand and purchase planning on last couple of years of sales to forecast current year of demand and supply. Other than that, mutual trust and strong relationship with all the dealers are needed in order to increase the flexibility of material supply management, as well as to enhance the bargaining power of Nestlà ©. However, if there is a surplus, Nestlà © may need to plan a promotion to clear their inventories, otherwise Nestlà © will encounter a great loss such as paying high material handling cost, waste of warehouses space, or inventories that are not sold became defective and may need to be disposed which no profit will earn. Therefore, when there i s a big event organized such as Jom Heboh Carnival. Nestlà © will set up a booth at the carnival to sell its products, which are close to the expiry date at lower price such as Maggi products, Nescafà ©, Milo, yoghurt drinks, Nestlà © ice creams and so on. People often buy the products in big quantity because of the lower price than the market price. As a result, Nestlà © could clear their inventories rather fast and save some space in the warehouses. which is a win-win situation. Thirdly, even though Nestlà © has a logistics department but it doesnt deal with transportation logistics. Nestlà © outsourced its supply chain transport to the third-party logistics (3PL) as Nestlà © tries to cut their supply chain costs and to concentrate more on their in-plant operations. Although Nestlà © doesnt have a transportation logistics department, but they do have a delivery team to cooperate with the third-party logistics in routing protocol. Nestlà © is using a Dynamic Source Routing (DSR), which is a simple and efficient routing protocol designed specifically for use in multi-hop wireless ad hoc networks of mobile nodes. The protocol is composed of the two main mechanisms of Route Discovery and Route Maintenance, which work together to allow nodes to discover and maintain routes on-demand to arbitrary destinations in the ad hoc network. (Maltz. 2003, The Dynamic Source Routing Protocol CMU [Online] available at www.cs.cmu.edu) Therefore, the delivery team is there to help Nestlà © and the 3PL that DSR is working as per company direction as well as DSR performance. Next, it is the poor partnership relationship between dealerships and consumers. Dealers need these capabilities because they, in close partnership with manufacturers Nestlà ©, are a connecting hub of services for the consumers, and other stakeholders. However, Nestlà © solved this problem by using the Dealer Management Systems (DMS) as well as their dealers. DMS is a software solutions that provide tools for managing sales, services, parts and inventory management, business management, integration, and core architecture. DMS help manufacturers and dealers create integrated marketing campaigns to offer inventory to target markets. This will integrate innovations into traditional in-store sales and service processes and offer technologies for non-traditional merchandising, sales, and service strategies through alternative channels for consumer engagement via Web, by phone, or in-vehicle. (Microsoft Corporation. 2008, Microsoft Offers the Dealer Management Solution Microsoft [Online ] available at www.microsoft.com/automotive) RECOMMENDATIONS After the reviews stated above, those were not the only solutions that are available. MDZ has come up with a few recommended suggestions that may work or solve the problems that were encountered by Nestlà ©. Instead of just finding or having multiple suppliers, Nestlà © could acquire the inventories from the other outlets from the other region. Because some regions have different demographics, for instance, race. Some areas have higher percentage of Malays such as Kuantan, Pahang, and some may have higher percentage of Chinese such as Ipoh, Perak. The Chinese New Year (CNY) example stated above, in Kuantan area, there might be less demand during CNY, so to prevent shortage, Nestlà © could just acquire the inventories from Kuantan. However, if there is a surplus, and unable to clear the inventories at a short time, Nestlà © could consider donation for short-run purpose, this could help to clear the old stocks, as well as to help the donation receivers and build better goodwill and name of Nestlà ©. Secondly, Nestlà © is a multinational company; it definitely has the capability in owning a transportation logistics department. Because of the hundreds variety of Nestlà ©s products, 7 manufacturers in Malaysia, as well as thousands of customers such as retailers, wholesalers, distributors and so on, Nestlà © could handle its own transportation service. Nestlà © could gain the whole power in such as mode selections, routing, and others. They could do almost anything such as consolidating different type of products but to the same outlet. Besides, they could save every penny they use in transportation cost compare to third-party logistics (3PL) because 3PL charges according to the quantity, inventory storage space, value added processes such as special handling, and more. It may benefit in the short run, but definitely not in the long run, as Nestlà © centred in the long-term business and strives to achieve effectiveness and efficiency. Lastly, Nestlà © could use both manual and automation system in managing sales, services, and others. This is because one cannot trust wholly to a machine, as it may not be documenting the steps in its own processor. Because some steps cant be automated and may required operator intervention to prevent the escapement processing steps, even though adapting advanced technologies could help saving cost as labour cost is reduced, but if there are still problems occur, it will affect the business such as loss of customers because of the mistake. Therefore, Nestlà © must update the system software regularly and full utilisation of available technology as well as the manual operators, which will effectively increase the efficiency and dependability of the supply chain systems. CONCLUSION Nestlà © exerts great efforts to achieve its visions to be the leader in Nutrition, Health, and Wellness Company by producing better quality of products to the consumers. Nestlà © also study about the consumers needs from time to time and satisfy the consumers as much as possible. Nestlà ©s strengths such as high financial capability, effective strategic marketing capability, strong research and development, as well as great leaderships have helped them through the obstacles. Above all, Nestlà © focuses on its missions and ensures consistency by making the right decisions to manage and build its business to deliver the promise of Good Food, Good Life all over the world.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee :: essays research papers

The novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, takes place during the 1930's in Maycomb County, Alabama. Atticus Finch, a white southern lawyer, is appointed to defend Tom Robinson, an innocent black man accused of raping a white woman. Throughout the story Atticus' children learn the meaning of true courage. Although Atticus proves Tom's innocence, the prejudice white jury's verdict is that Tom is guilty. The assumed black characteristics of immorality, dishonesty, shiftlessness and personal squalor are embodied by the white Ewell clan. This is a glaringly obvious fact that the prejudiced Maycomb society refuses to acknowledge.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Three examples of black characters who do not fit his 'stereotype'; are Reverend Sykes, Calpurnia and Tom Robinson. My first example is Reverend Sykes. He is a respected, generous man who runs a clean church and accepts worshipers both white and black. When Calpurnia brings Scout and Jem to the black church, he and the congregation welcome them. This shows that in the eyes of the Reverend, as in the eyes of God their is no prejudice. At the trial, Reverend Sykes makes room for Scout and Jem in the courtroom balcony where the blacks sit. While the trail is going on the blacks show no disrespect for Jem and Scout. After the trial is over, out of respect, the blacks wait until Atticus Finch passes and then they stand.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Secondly is the character of Calpurnia who also does not fit this stereotype. Calpurnia is the housekeeper for the Finchs and also helped raise Scout and Jem. Calpurnia is educated, hard working and well kept. She taught her children to read and Scout and Jem how to write on her own time. All that she had accomplished was done at a time when most Negroes could not read or write.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The last black character who embody the characteristics of immortality, dishonesty, shiftlessness and personal squalor is Tom Robison.. Tom is married with children and works hard to support them with a job. His house and yard are well cared for and he attends church. Not only that, but he stops at the Ewell house to help Mayella knowing that he is putting himself in a compromising position. At the trial, while on the stand, he answers questions in a respectable, dignified manner even though he is being accused of a crime he didn't commit. At one point when he is on the stand, Atticus questions him to tell the jury what Bob Ewell told him and he says, 'Somethin' not fittin' to say - not fittin' for these folk'n chillun to hear-'; (p.

Relativism vs. Christianity Essay -- Ethics Morals Values

Standards of right and wrong are the mere products of time and culture. Morality is a neutral concept - there is no such thing as an absolute right or wrong. Instead, morality is defined by what is 'good' or 'bad' in a given society, by the social norms. What held true one thousand, one hundred, or even twenty years ago may or may not hold true now. The human race has grown and continues to expand; our technology, culture, customs, and laws constantly change and evolve. Perception is reality. What one believes to be right or wrong could be completely different from what someone else believes. I believe that abortion is a much-needed aspect of society. You might disagree completely. Which position is morally correct? Everything you believe, you believe because you were taught in some way shape or form. Is it wrong to kill? "Of course", a modern American citizen would respond. Ask this to a member of the ancient Yanomamo tribe and they would not only disagree, but they would find it to be a common and accepted act among their people. Upon an Emperor’s death, Samurai would take the lives of their willing friends as a sign of honor and respect. It is hard to judge exactly what good and bad are, because their definitions change as time goes by. Morals will never stop evolving, so something that may be â€Å"good† or ethical by today’s standards, may be â€Å"evil† in the future. The greatest good is in the eye of the beholder. Relativism does not allow for the existence of an absolut...

Chilean Copper Mine

This 21 year old copper mine had gone through many other nature disasters like the 2010 earth quack. The cry went out to the government for help and their call was answered. The government stepped in and took control over everything from the company to the searching for these men. The area or location of where these miners had been working was 2,300 feet underground and over 3 miles from the entrance of the cave. The government did not have the equipment or the people need to conduct this type of search for the possible survivors.Outside organization came to the lad of he government to assist in the search. With them a labor force big enough to work round the clock looking was sent. Three large drills were sent to drill holes to last depth of the miners were deployed in the area of the mine. People volunteer to came help even if they had no training for this type of work. The voices of the families and friends of the miners were heard around the world. This turned Into a joint govern ment search the Likes of which have never been seen before.In this area mining is the major part of the economy and the miners are the main source of income for their families. If they were not still living in the mine this would have impacted the families more than anything. To lose their husband or dad would be an emotion toll that no one should ever have to go through. During this time the company did not do anything to help the families or the search for the miners. This type of action had been seen before by this company Just a few years earlier. The owners Just set back and let everyone else do all the work and send money on the rescue of the men that were trapped.The last time that the mine had claimed a life of a miner the company had to pay $10,000 to the family ordered by the court. The government assisted with those families by giving them $540 a month in support. Even in a smaller country like Chile that is not very much to a whole family to live one. The same company wa s doing It again by not supporting to taking care of the families because of the court, they were also ordered to close the mine until all safety issues what were pointed out in the safety investigation was corrected.The employees of his company knew that the owners cared more about the revenue that the money was bring in then it did about their lives. The mine was only close for a short period of time and reopened with very little done about the safety issues address in the investigation. President personally took control of all the search operations because of all the media attention it was getting. He did not want the world view of his country to look bad. With the government and many other organizations helping miners were found to be still alive in a part of the mine.The world media was directed to the recovering of the miners. It took a few more days to drill a hole big enough to bring the men to the surface. When they finally made it above ground they were in very poor health . There were some medical issues that had to be address right there on site from surgery to dental work. The men and their families were showered with gifts. After this major incident then men and their families took trips and got to enjoy the things they would not be about to have if they would have dies in that mine.When they returned to their former lives as miners they could not get work. Companies were afraid they would report them for having unsafe working condition. Also the men had a law suit against the company they originally worked for and this added to the fear the companies had. The company faced a lot of charges that were eventually dropped. There were many things that could have been handled better by the company. In the beginning then they knew the names of the men that were not accounted for they should have sent a company spokesman to the implies to inform them of what had happen.They should have kept them in the loop of everything that was going on taken care of t hem until they knew more about the status of the men's lives. The owners of the campy should have been the ones taking control of the search not the government. They could have asked for help to the search, but they should have been there. Safety issues should always be taken care of, but in some counties they don't have the organizations we do like OSHA. The lake of support from the company should have never been a issue during this incident.

Harvard Business Review Case- Revere Street Essay

After analysis of Mr. Alexander’s proposal, it is obvious why he should take advantage of a real estate investment opportunity. The experience he would gain coupled with the added income would establish a solid foundation for making more investments in the future. To this end, however, I find Alexander’s plan for the Revere Street property falls short. A major deficiency is that his projections are almost entirely predicated on estimates and assumptions that are neither conservative nor reliable. In a similar vein, Alexander’s â€Å"DIY† approach is not only exemplar of naivetà ©, but also suggestive of many implications that were overlooked in his proposal. And, even more discouraging, a best-case scenario analysis reveals that even without complication, there is little room for error afforded by the plan. Therefore, I would not advise Alexander to move forward with his investment strategy, as its potential for reward is far outweighed by its risk. In a vacuum, Alexander’s proposal would be very feasible and attractive, but in reality the real estate and rental industries are incredibly volatile and hard to predict even for specialists in those fields. The success of Alexander’s proposal is not just contingent upon a host of variables, but variables forecasted by an amateur lacking a sense of conservatism. To begin, the projected costs of the project include no allowance for incidentals. This is a giant red flag. Even if Alexander outsourced certain responsibilities to experts, the likelihood of error and unforeseen costs in bidding for a property, closing the sale, major construction and renovation, and managing a rental property is almost certain. So, without a contingency reserve, the problems are obvious. But even worse, Alexander, a nonspecialist in any of these pursuits, is the one handling a majority of these functions- this means it is no longer a question of will there be unforeseen costs, but actually how much should be anticipated? On this front alone I am incredibly skeptical of the proposal. To bring this project to fruition and realize the gains projected, the following processes need to occur without incident: Alexander’s bid must be accepted by the seller, which requires that he obtain an appropriate mortgage, and avoid forfeiting his deposit, which could be something to the tune of $17,500 or more. For the closing sale of the property to go smoothly, there mustn’t be any lien issues from the existing bank withholding loan proceeds to the architect, since the construction was not finished. After this, the construction needs to be essentially error free and at an expedited pace to be complete by the four month timeframe set- and this is without a professional general contractor. Additionally, the job must not exceed the $165,000 figure that was given by a non-independent contractor, who very likely may have given a low-ball estimate to seem like an attractive candidate. The last architect was off by $115,0001, indicating that the scope of the work necessary to complete the job may be deceptive and much greater than anticipated, however there is no reserve beyond budgeted amount, making this possibly the hardest mission to accomplish. If, however, the project is completed within the four allotted months, and without going over budget, the next phase is filling vacancies, which Alexander is also planning to have accomplished by the end of the fourth month. This means that during the construction process, Alexander must also be actively marketing vacancies, searching for, interviewing, and selecting tenants, and securing leases. These tenants must also be willing to accept the rental rates to achieve Alexander’s target level of rental income, which are almost $10,000 higher than the current owner’s figures. If this is not accomplished, he could be losing $2,000 per month on each unoccupied unit. Beyond these start-up efforts, Alexander’s plan will only be successful if the operating costs do not exceed what is specifically budgeted for in his cash flow assumptions- these do not include costs of fixing up the units between tenants, updates, reserves for evictions, bad tenants, or law suits, and any other unforeseeable expenses. Though possible, it is incredibly hard to imagine that the stars would align so perfectly that all the aforementioned conditions are met as forecasted and result in triumph. It seems much more likely that some unforeseen incident will paralyze the process, creating a rippling effect that throws off virtually all of Alexander’s predictions. For example, a delay in the closing process would delay construction, delaying when tenants can move in and therefore when income can start being generated, and so on. The plan is contingent upon virtually incident-free operation that is somehow achieved under the direction of an amateur- this is fundamentally flawed. As such, I believe Alexander’s proposal is far too deficient in and of itself to be used as a viable plan. Beyond the limitations of the actual plan, another shortcoming of pursuing this opportunity on Revere Street are the serious implications associated with Alexander’s â€Å"do-it-yourself† approach. By not outsourcing responsibilities to experts, he may be avoiding the explicit employment costs, but he is likely to pay more for doing the job himself later. For example, hiring a general contractor would ensure that the building is constructed to code, would be more efficient because the GC would know how to best handle subcontractors and manage the overall project, both of which would help expedite the process and give Alexander time to do other value-added functions. If not, Alexander risks serious code-violation liabilities, will probably manage less effectively, and the project could therefore take much longer than anticipated, which has the same rippling effect as in the aforementioned. Additionally, Alexander may have seriously underestimated how demanding the project will be, and did not consider anywhere in his proposal how this may compromise his current full time job. Even with a general contractor hired, he will still be tasked to find tenants to fill the vacancies, while juggling the rest of the logistics, and it seems like a tall order. Since it is already included in the budget, I would hire outside management at least for the duration of construction to help find tenants. One of the major issues being an amateur in this field is determining good tenants from bad, and the costs associated with bad tenants could be significant, and again are something that Alexander did not include in his projected costs. Management would be instrumental in mitigating this risk, as they are usually well versed in landlord-tenant laws that Alexander may not be aware of, and also add more time for Alexander to focus on other important responsibilities. In general, I disagree with Alexander’s plan to save costs by doing work himself, because this generates a greater risk for both explicit and implicit costs- i.e. bad landlord-tenant relationships could taint Alexander’s reputation and dissuade other potential tenants from renting. He also risks compromise to performance at his current job, general welfare, and all of his time. By outsourcing some of the responsibilities, many of these issues could be avoided. But, if problems do arise, is it worth the consequences? Though the risks are significant and abundant, the potential for profit is always worth considering before dismissing an opportunity. To assess the profitability of Alexander’s plan, I ran a best-case scenario analysis. By exclusively using the figures as set forth in the proposal, and excluding the additional costs I outlined above but were overlooked by Alexander, I determined the ceiling for profit potential. Exhibit 1 shows the cash flow assumptions, including costs and cash not included in Alexander’s cash flow statement, but included in his proposal. Holding all other factors constant, year 1 of operations would realize only $2,113 in NOI and year 2, and all subsequent years, would see $15,610. On a $99,000 cash investment, his pretax return in year 1 would only be 2.13%, and then 15.8% in subsequent years. However, this is a best-case scenario, and given the major caveats discussed in the aforementioned, I believe that Alexander will actually not break even in the first year, and be looking at a significantly lower rate of return in years to come. So, even if everything were entirely feasible and it didn’t come at such an immense risk, I would not say that the effort put into this project would even be worth it. One of the biggest risks concerning insolvency is that should Alexander not be able to cover his debts, under the bank’s law, he is personally responsible, which means that this investment could end up in devastation for him and his family. With so much uncertainty, and not a big return, the risk is just too great to justify pursuit of the reward. In sum, because of faults with the plan itself, the major implications of Alexander’s DIY approach, and a return greatly exceeded by the associated risks, Alexander should not invest in the Revere Street property. However, I do agree that pursuing a real estate investment opportunity is wise, but under certain conditions. One of the biggest conditions that must be met is that he base his projections and make his plans off of expert opinions- he should invest in help and recognize that as an amateur, he is neither qualified nor capable of making the best decisions, and would benefit from seeking expert advice. Similarly, he should place more emphasis on the value of outsourcing to professionals, and less on blind trust in his own capabilities. This will also help to see the inherent value in outsourcing as the opportunity cost of not doing so might eventually end up being greater. Lastly, Alexander should invest in a property where the reward   is worth the risk, and make more conservative estimates to determine profitability. By following these steps, I believe he will be able to successfully gain the experience and equity base in real estate that he was seeking.