English 105 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

English 105 - Essay Example se individuals require, it would likewise be incredible to spread mindfulness and to tell others about their situation with the goal that they can approach and help them, it is an exhausting errand yet somebody needs to show a drive and drive others forward so they work as one and improve the general day to day environments in Africa. It is actually an astonishment to me that the world has gained so much ground yet numerous individuals keep on living far underneath the destitution line, this uniqueness must be dispensed with and it is extremely significant for the others to get this and they will likewise progress in the direction of killing this divergence once they see that it is so imperative to reestablish equality in the general public. â€Å"Drought is a repetitive wonder in the semiarid areas of Africa. The main showers of the blustery season for the most part follow a long dry season, during which the dirt turns out to be completely dried out.† (M. Eugene, P. 8) Africa is hit severely by different factors likewise and even this should be sifted through, the atmosphere specialists ought to intercede and propose answers for these regular issues that are being looked by a few people in Africa. â€Å"Malnutrition is a significant medical issue, particularly in creating nations. Water flexibly, sanitation and cleanliness, given their immediate effect on irresistible illness, particularly the runs, are significant for forestalling ailing health. Both lack of healthy sustenance and insufficient water flexibly and sanitation are connected to destitution. The effect of rehashed or relentless looseness of the bowels on nourishment related destitution and the impact of lack of healthy sustenance on defenselessness to irresistible the runs are strengthening components of the equivalent endless loop, particularly among kids in creating countries.† (WHO) Lack of healthy sustenance stays another tremendous issue, the last paper will likewise uncover some significant measurements and it will likewise target giving answers for these regularly developing issues. The most significant point is make the individuals who are living in perfect conditions comprehend the predicament

Most Followed Accounts in 2018 on Instagram

Most Followed Accounts in 2018 on Instagram As of late, such informal organization as Instagram got one of the main interpersonal organizations on the planet and it continues exhibiting how quick it develops. The effect of the individuals who speak with individuals through this informal community around the globe is noteworthy. The bloggers are currently called influencers since they have a capacity to intrigue and draw in the crowd around the world. Let’s view probably the most followed bloggers who command the online life with the assistance of Instagram. @kimkardashian Number of supporters †111,7 million Kim Kardashian West is a celebrated American unscripted tv character who figured out how to fascinate a large number of individuals around the globe. She is a socialite, specialist, model, and entertainer, so it is no big surprise that her profile on Instagram pulls in such a gigantic measure of the individuals who appreciate her and like to look at posts in her profile each day. @hudabeauty Number of adherents †25,3 million Huda Kattan at first was a blogger who likes to feature her adoration to an extraordinary cosmetics. She turned her diversion in business and every day she moves a huge number of ladies around the globe to be excellent. She enables the procedure of cosmetics routine to be simple and calm. In light of some of her devotees, she figures out how to do it well. @pewdiepie Number of adherents †14,2 million PewDiePie is a Swedish web-based social networking influencer who figures out how to engage an enormous crowd and, supposedly, wins around $12 million every year. In spite of the fact that he is regularly condemned for his at time unseemly substance, he figures out how to keep his adherents intrigued and their number is consistently developing. @jennamarbles Number of adherents †4,7 million Jenna Mourey/Marbles is a vlogger and a notable YouTube character. She is a comic and her extraordinary comical inclination draws in a large number of watchers around the globe. She figures out how to introduce sexual orientation generalizations in an engaging manner and her intriguing viewpoint on the relationship and life, by and large, is in reality drawing in and pleasant for her supporters. @dudeperfect Number of adherents †7,1 million Man Perfect is a games diversion gathering and folks are one of a kind in their manner. They figure out how to do the stunts which for any of us may appear to be difficult to perform. They do amazingly testing sports activities which astound and, once in a while, it is in any event, stunning to acknowledge how simple it was finished. Instagram is a quickly developing long range interpersonal communication administration and new intriguing characters show up every day. Everybody has his own preferred characters to follow. A few people follow the influencer who manages beautifying agents, somebody enjoys sports stunts and somebody loves a decent snicker. We have recorded just some of Instagram influencers who we consider to be connecting with and worth our consideration. In the event that you are not following any of the above characters yet, look at their Instagram profiles. We are certain you will appreciate it!

Navigating Information Technology Management and Communication in the Research Paper

Exploring Information Technology Management and Communication in the new worldwide economy - Research Paper Example So as to embrace these methodologies correspondence adequacy turns into a deciding element. Compelling interchanges and data advancements can empower an association to make a fruitful securing and enter a remote market or even offer specialists with different associations. The drawback of this is there are numerous issues that may evade the acknowledgment of such advantages. A portion of these issues that posture difficulties incorporate language hindrances, social contrasts and security hazards as financial variances and social unrests (Frynas and Mellahi, 2011). This paper researches and distinguishes data innovation and correspondence difficulties and afterward gives proposals in type of the prescribed procedures with the goal that associations can avoid these potential for disappointment. Data innovation has been developing exponentially over the most recent three decades. This has empowered organizations to enter the business sectors that were once far off. The US, for example, had its significant exchanging accomplices the Western European nations, Australia, and China (Sekkat, 2010). With the development of data innovation and the clear immersion of the household showcase, business associations are presently taking a gander at developing markets, for example, Brazil, India and numerous Asian and African nations. These nations are progressively receiving data innovations and this makes them reasonable colleagues (Meyer and Wit, 2004). Their possibilities have not been tapped at this point and this gives a chance to global associations to augment their productivity. Nonetheless, the issues that will be talked about in this after may require an association to create techniques so as to get by in these outside nations with various dialects, differing social foundations and monetary conditions and unpredictability. Associations that have had the option to create business and corporate procedures

The Heroics of Mind and Space - Literature Essay Samples

His mother said:-O, Stephen will apologise. Dante said: -O, if not, the eagles will come and pull out his eyes.This capsule of utterance, which comes at the climax of the short first passage (or first independent poem of the book, as Fisher might assert) that Joyce presents to us, defines the heroic quest that Stephen Hero (and/or his latent identity as mythic Daedalus) must undertake. He is, in this instance, bound by a strict commandment from above (from the towering grown-ups above him, from the air-borne, attacking eagles), from the poets of the past , and most superficially  ­ from his elders, to perform an act of apology. Stephen seals this cosmic agreement with his little song:Pull out his eyes,Apologise,Apologise,Pull out his eyes.Apologise,Pull out his eyes,Pull out his eyes,Apologise.Stephen internalizes his predicament  ­ or legacy by chanting the words that descend to him from layers of higher authority. He shapes the received words with his own voice (whether it b e out loud or only inside his head), compresses /extractions phrases from the longer syntax, and utilizes rhyme in a patterned repetition. (In short, he has applied a craft.) If his mother, a temporal and merely parental figure, initiates young Stephens artistic covenant in a mundane way, Dante (whose real identity in Stephens world is sparsely revealed in this passage) is the accidental and incidental avatar of an old poet, or the poetic tradition, or the artist-creator that Stephen (or Joyce, if we treat this work as autobiographical) must become. The implied historic Dante serves as a representative, for Stephen and Joyce, of the poetic craft (Daedalus is a craftsman in myth), and a link across time with the Classical world; the latter being a world that the grown and almost fully adult Stephen in Ulysses and his compatriots would feign inhabit. ( His comrade, dissatisfied with Ireland, instructs to Stephen, Hellenise it. (p 6) ).Eagles are the sacred birds of Zeus (and not i ndigenous to Ireland). As the voice of Dante speaks from another time (14th century Italy), so he also speaks of a far away land and kosmos in which this foreign bird exists, and on another level, where Zeus is the most powerful god of an ancient pantheon. (It cannot be coincidental that Thunder  ­ the natural phenomenon associated with the Zeus deity is the last name of a little boy in the following section of part I (p 21), presented as an ironic [as this is a tussle between school boys] but over-powering, unbeatable foe.) These two shots from the blue (flashes of dialogue from mother and Dante on the page before Stephen rains out his song), both introduced by an archaic, inspired, and elevated O (or, a mere interjective, colloquial O, if we read these lines mundanely, as in common speech; both levels, mundane and elated, are surely implied by Joyce) warn Stephen and guide him. He must achieve a special vision like the eagles of Zeus, like the king of the Greek pantheon (t he master of the universe in which Daedalus lives). Or, Stephen is warned by polyphonic sources (governess Dante, the specter of the poet Dante, and by his own self as he chants his rhyme), he will lose his eyes and sight (that is, he will lose his special artistic vision, the product of which is apology [see below]) altogether. He is receiving a challenge from a mythical source that speaks to his latent Deadalic identity. If then, by this passage, we are to assume that Stephen is receiving some sort of primal message echoed from artists and artistic/inspired legacies across the ages, and we then metonymically link Stephen and his eyes to the clawing eagles, we may ask what sort of sight might be associated with eagles. From lore (and science) we know that eagles possess an ability to see over great distances (eight times that of humans, in fact) and an ability to navigate (as winged creatures) through and across this distance. They soar and to see the to the full parameters of a vast (by human standards) spatial realm. This trope of control over/placement within a great spatial realm (universe, globe, nation, world, etc.), here implied by the symbol of the eagle, recurs throughout Portrait of the Artist(3).To illustrate Stephens grapplings with a spatially-defined world we could begin with his careful scrolling of his exact and outward-extending location in Clongowes, Sallins, County Kildare, Ireland and, ultimately, The Universe (p 27) in his notebook. But Joyce begins to play with Stephen and his relationship to a defined and significant spatial universe sooner than this. At the end of the first section in part I, Stephen is hiding under a desk (p 20), cowering in a small space. At the outset of the second section of part I Stephen is in the midst of The wide playgroundshis body small and weak (p 20), cowering in a large space. Twin and seemingly contradictory phobias, claustro- and agora-, are paired in the frightened, struggling, and evasive, i.e., crafty (He kept on the fringe of his line, out of sight of his prefectp 20) person of Stephen Dedalus. His affliction, that is, his artistic affliction/curse, is principally one of the mind and psyche. Phobias are a sickness of the mind and therefore, can only be transcended through use of the psyche, and by the cultivation of the mind.(2) Stephens flickering and resistant wit is present both when he is under the table (composing a ditty out of his elders speech) and when he is strategically negotiating the space of the football field. Note that Stephen writes in his school notebook the clearest rendition of his location and identity, and that this memoir as a whole is saturated with the issues, settings, and fruits of scholarly and monkish learning. Stephens head is a globe, congruent to the shells or rings of placement (County Kildare, Ireland, etc. or family, school/church, Ireland, etc., more philosophically) that surround him. Take one example of an instance where it is obvio us that Stephen is grappling with the mind-in-universe/mind-is-universe phenomenon:The formula which he wrote obediently on the sheet of paper, the coiling and uncoiling calculations of the professor, the spectrelike symbols of force and velocity fascinated and jaded Stephens mind. He had heard some say that the old professor was an atheist freemason. O the grey dull day! It seemed a limbo of painless patient consciousness through which souls of mathematicians might wander, projecting long slender fabrics from plane to plane of ever rarer and paler twilight, radiating swift eddies to the last verges of a universe ever vaster, farther and more palpable. (p 167) Here, Joyce repeats the components of the introductory sequences almost exactly: Stephen is receiving instructions from his elders which he obeys apparently obediently, but which he must subtly resist (he complains poetically O the grey dull day!), ponder and transform into a stylized rumination. We see his thoughts and the learning of ages (via the souls of presumably dead mathematicians) passing through Stephens mind and imagination out into even the farther reaches of the universe. His thoughts in this micro-portion of the text, as in the text of the macro narrative of Stephens growth, spiral up through rings of intellectual affiliation. In this passage the intellectual affiliation is represented by an ephemeral reference to the professor being an atheist freemason (and, of course, a professor of mathematics). In the course of Stephens larger intellectual and spiritual growth he passes through  ­most significantly atmospheres of Irish Nationalism, Catholicism, Jesuit thought, and, finally, in part v of the book, the university-scholarly atmosphere which is itself a collection and co-mingling of various intellectual spheres and disciplines. (And he clearly sees his presence at University in Dublin egoistically: Stephens, that is, my green (p 215), he remarks as he walks towards the college libr ary. The mind-ego of Stephen, the innermost concentric ring in the spatial pattern lunges out to embrace a larger portion of the universe.) It is not until this fifth, summarizing chapter at the University that we hear a full range of languages and cultures from all over the world from Gaelic to German and Buddhism, (p 196), smatterings of Italian (p 215) and references to Coptic and Swedenborgian thought (p 194). It is as though all of Stephens spatial landscape is now filled with inspired learning. His interaction with his environment produces nothing but references and reminders of this learning (a state of affairs preordained by Dantes contract): as he passes Talbots Place, the spirit of Ibsen blows through him; a shop on the Liffey incites him to sing a line by Ben Jonson (p 155).But for Stephens mind and soul (as he keeps referring to it) to reach this final sphere of identity and development (where he reaches a intellectual identity/cohesion that fully identifies him with Daedalus (O Father, O artificer p 218), Stephen must pass through the rings of thought and transformation that are described in each book part. He must suffer through series of discrete, harrowing metamorphoses (it is probably not incidental that Joyce begins his book with a quotation from Ovid). He grows from a tiny, abused, flickering soul- flame alone in the cold and dank (part I), to a position of hopeful and then disappointed newcomer to a feasting, adult family table (sandwiched in part I), to a state of burning bodily lust and self-degradation (part ii), to the searing heat of conscious damnation and redemption (part iii), to the joining of these in the image of a bird/woman at the peaceful moment of synthesis (final pages of part iv). These roughly chronologically-represented stages of his maturation are the outward and inward rings of his hell (or, purgatory, more correctly, especially because we Joyce is already working with allusions to Dante) with which he must strugg le. Stephens discussion of purgatory becomes conscious only in part v. He is deeply and personally moved by the fires of hell in part iv, but by the fifth and final chapter of the novel, we see Stephen coolly and detachedly observing his schoolmates discuss purgatory, hell and limbo, (p 210). It is directly after his observation that he takes Cranly aside to confess his knowledge of (and his belief in the potency of) the chemistry and symbology linked with guilt and sin, and voices a firm decision to abstain from participation in this sinning and redeeming cycle. He has mastered a knowledge of this process, and understands the power of a symbol in a repeated, socio-religious environment: I fear more than that the chemical action which would be set up in my soul by a false homage to a symbol behind which are massed twenty centuries of authority and veneration. (p 210) In short, he has become an artist, who profoundly understands the language of symbols, but will use them under the guidance of his own authority only.Stephens quest is thus achieved by mapping and finding a place within all the worlds he inhabits (and more succinctly/importantly, an intellectual mapping of the worlds which inhabit him), by establishing himself as firm, durable beacon. That is, he establishes within himself the image and psychic reality of a tower. The tower symbol is first vaguely introduced by the Tower or Ivory musings (p 49), then sublimated into Stephens ideal feminine image, the feminine corollary to his masculine-based soul (p 151-152), and then finally presented outright as the place where Stephen lives in the First Chapter of Ulysses. The tower is a symbol of psychic reconciliation with his spatial environment. It is a hardened atom that ascends into heights; a representative of independent human intellect and spirit that may interact with yet see through/over these spaces/worlds, real (i.e. Dublin, the island of Ireland) and intellectual (i.e. Catholic dogma/Jesuit c asuistry/Irish nationalism, etc.). It is the psychic-symbolic manifestation of the eagles sight. So, Stephen can finally write his apology, that is, his memoir of development, his Bildungsroman, that charts his growth into an artist. The reference circles back to the meta-frame of Joyces Portrait: in Stephen Hero and A Portrait of the Artist, Joyce achieves just such an apology. It is both a confession and a tour de force of literary ability, and turns on the crux of an irony that is explicit in the very first use of the word. He is forced by temporal powers (his mother and Dante, the Catholic Church- he was to apologize for saying he wanted to marry a Protestant -) into a compromising contract to which he must submit. Like the poverty-stricken and compromised material world that Stephen Dedalus inhabits, the word apologise carries within it resources of great (yet difficult, via a certain purgatory) potential. Just as embedded in Stephens last name is a vast system of mythical r eferents into which the young man mysteriously taps, apology too is presented to the reader also with its latent, deeper meaning with Hellenic roots. The word is from Greek apo +logos =a speech; literally formed from words/reason/ speech. (This writerly meaning that calls him to his craft is wedged up against the weight of meanings which are created by the heaviness of the world/his circumstances; between the two meanings there is a productive, purgatorial margin). Stephen as scholar (an identity realized in part v) can finally tap into these archaic reserves of meaning and inspiration. He and his school chums jog easily (if at times farcically) through the use of Latin and Classical language and allusion, and Stephen has become a conscious composer of apologies; using classical and other learned sources Stephen artfully defends a theory that he has himself created. (Apology begins circa p 178.) Thus, Joyce brings us to a full telos within the pages of part v that was clearly pro phesized at the end of the first section of part I of the novel: his heroic quest is achieved by the novels end. (1) For Example, in part I he wishes that he himself was the orb of a censer, so that he might perfume the world with incense, in part ii, Joyce describes Stephens intellectual-spatial explorations of Dublin and his conscience when confronting his sin (By day and by night he moved among distorted images of the outer world.He returned to his wanderings(p 94), which lead him to the extremities of Dublins neighborhoods), and in part iii, these is a vast exposition describing the lower, imagined (mental) cosmic realm, Hell.(2) And, perhaps, by the negotiation/release of some quite primal urges of the body, as Stephen proves in the sexual exploits of Part ii; although these explosions of impulse are always kept under or later brought within the strict stewardship of the mind.

How I Have Improved On My Writing Essay - 1528 Words

1) I have improved in numerous ways during this semester in Composition 1. I have enhanced my writing skills such as being able to write proficiently, and being able to form an essay in a set amount a time similar to the 50 minute essay tests in class. This course has taught me to broaden my vocabulary throughout my essays in order for them stimulating and captivating. While writing essays and creating the works cited pages, I have learned to accurately cite websites, books, and articles. I have also learned to suitably place and refer to where I found the material used for the essays within, and at the beginning of, paragraphs. When writing my essays I have learned to transition smoothly, however, I still struggle with it every once in a while, the writing I do continues to enhance. My speech has also improved from standing in front of the class and presenting a group project along with fellow classmates. I now know what it is like and what to expect the next time I do it. 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Statistics and Research Methods for Business Decision

Question: Discuss about the statistics and research methods for business decision. Answer: Introduction: Coffee regarded as the second largest product market of the globe. In addition, it is expected that it will continue to grow in the near future as well. Peoples love for the coffee has encouraged the caf and coffee shop market to grow at a rapid pace over the past couple of decades. The increase in the popularity of caf shops observed all over the world. Australia is also not an exception, as caf industry owes it to the nations love for the coffee. Therefore, the study will focus on the caf and coffee industry to analyze the kind of economical impact it is making on the society. The study will also try to focus on the future perspectives of the coffee and caf shops to have an idea about the potential of the industry. Background of the study: In the past few years, huge amount of investment was made on the development of the caf industry in the Australian market. As a result, people are getting more and more attracted towards the caf shops to spend their leisure time. This in turn is creating positive impact in the path of success for the coffee and caf industry. However, the growth in the caf industry in Australia is becoming more and more stagnant from the year of 2010. Therefore, it is creating concern for the industry to consider. Significance of the study: As mentioned earlier, the growth in the caf industry is getting stagnant for the past few years. Therefore, the study will try to analyze all the aspects of the caf industry so that it can able to provide idea about the future positioning of the coffee and caf industry. Furthermore, the study will try to analyze the kind of challenges the caf industry has to face in near future in order to maintain its position in the market. Research aim and objectives: The prime aim of the study is to identify the factors that are creating adverse impact on the path of growth in the caf industry in Australia. Therefore, for fulfilling the aim, the study will focus on the following objectives: To analyze total market size of the caf industry in Australia To analyze the market trend regarding the growth in caf industry in Australia To identify the prime factors that are creating adverse impact on the path of growth in caf industry To forecast future growth of caf industry in the Australian market To evaluate the expected challenges that caf industry will have to face in order to maintain its position in the Australia market Research questions: Formulation of research question is very important, as it helps the researcher to direct the research study in the right direction. The research questions of the study are as follows: What is the present market size of the caf industry in Australia? What is the present market trend regarding the growth in caf industry in Australia? What are the prime factors that are creating adverse impact on the path of growth in caf industry? What may be the effective strategy for the future growth of caf industry in Australian market? What kind of challenges the caf industry will have to face in order to maintain its position in the Australian market? Literature review: Overview of caf industry: As per the article by Wakefield et al. (2013) caf shop industry in Australia includes more than 7,000 stores with a combined revenue of around 1100 million. The industry has almost 70,000 employments all over Australia. However, the caf industry is concentrated highly at the top and vastly fragmented at the bottom. As a result, top 30 caf organizations have able to capture almost 72% of the entire market share in Australia. Therefore, prime competition takes place right at the top in case of caf industry. Clifford (2012) highlighted that coffee among the popular products, as it is consumed throughout the world. It also mentioned that the major production of coffee took place in the Latin American countries like Brazil, Vietnam and Colombia. As a result, most of the coffee used in the cafs is imported from different part of the world. In Australia, consumption of coffee is very high. As per the article by Raghu and Shyamsundar (2013) an average coffee drinkers in Australia consumes al most 3.5 glass in a day. Thus, it helps the industry to grow at a rapid pace in Australia. Customer overview: As per the study by Hattox (2014) 18 to 45 years is the prime age group that create major impact in the businesses of caf industry. However, as caf are becoming bigger, supplementary food items are now also found in the caf shops, which have major contribution in attracting younger people or the teenagers towards the coffee shops. According to Tjora and Scambler (2013) caf industry has able to cope up with the changes in culture, which help the industry to grow as a rapid pace. However, Mishra (2013) mentions that too much investment on the development of highly comfortable caf and coffee shops have made some places extremely costlier. Therefore, it does affect the overall sale of the industry. Market segmentation: Figure 1: Market Analysis (Source: Weschenfelder et al. 2015) The above figure highlights the fact that majority portion of sale in caf are occurred due to the popularity among the students. On the other hand, the figure also highlights that senior people are not so much addicted to the comparatively new market sensation like caf industry. Therefore, Li and Wang (2014) mentions that there is still huge portion of the market are left for the caf and coffee industry in order to increase sale. In fact, as per the article by Elder, Lister and Dauvergne (2014) if caf and coffee shops are able to attract older generation more towards the caf, it will increase the overall sale of the organizations by up to 50%. Thus, it highlights the fact that cafs will have to implement more and more aggressive marketing strategy in order to grab the attention of the potential customer in the society. Market segment strategy: As discussed earlier, there are few segments are left for the caf industry to penetrate in order to enhance the present level of sale. Thus, the organizations will have to impose crucial strategies in order to cover all the segment of the market. As per the article by Benavides (2014) caf and coffee shops not only have to segment the market by age group but also economically as well. Since, Mukashema, Veldkamp and Vrieling (2014) mentions that people belongs to the higher class of the society are more often found in the caf shops as compared to any middle class people of the society. Thus, Lee, You and Chang (2013) highlights that marketer of caf shops will have to focus on the lower class of the people of the society as well in order to enhance the overall revenue of the companies. For instance, Brazinha, Cadima and Crespo (2015) mentions that caf and coffee shops will have to provide quality product at various price level so that everyone of the society can be able to consume it mo re often. Potential factors influence sales in caf and coffee industry: As per the article by Rodrguez et al. (2013) economical condition, age and culture are the prime factors that can have impact on the sales volume of a caf shops. Thus, the article mentions that the organizations will have to consider all the factors in order to maintain a sustainable growth for a longer period of time. However, Fujioka et al. (2015) service quality at the caf shops is another prime factor that can have impact on the overall sales of the caf industry. Since, modern caf are not only focusing on the coffee only but also has included several other supplementary products to grab the attention of the customers. Therefore, it has emerged as a prime competitor of restaurants as well. Thus, service level at the caf shops can have huge amount of impact on the overall business developmental process. Literature gap: From the above discussion, it can be assess that caf industry has able to grow at rapid pace for a longer period of time. In fact, it has emerged as an integral part of life for the students and younger generations, as they spent their most of the time at cafs and coffee shops. However, the rate of growth of caf industry in Australia has not able to maintain its rate of growth since 2010. Therefore, it has started to create a huge amount of negative impact on the present businesses of caf industry. Thus, the study will look to identify and analyze all these factors so that it can able to provide guidance to the caf industry. Research methodology: Outline of the research: Outline of the research is useful in elaborating all the factors of the research study. The outline of the research includes factors like research approach, research design, data collection, data analysis so that the outcome of the research can fulfill its objective. Thus, it outline of the research does provide great level of help to the researcher in order to fulfill the objective of the study. In this study, the researcher will try to analyze all the factors related to the caf industry so that the study can be able to highlight the objective of the study. Thus, to analyze all the factors related to caf and coffee industry, the researcher will choose positivism research philosophy, descriptive research design, and deductive approach. The researcher will also focus on the quantitative as well as qualitative method in order to collect effective information regarding the topic of the study. Thereafter, the researcher will utilize non-probability sampling technique so that the study ca n be able to analyze captured data in an effective way. Research philosophy: Implementation of research philosophy is critical for successful completion of any study. It has three parts namely realism, interpretivism and positivism. In this research topic, the researcher will utilize positivism research philosophy. Since, it will allow the researcher to evaluate different factor caf and coffee industry in a much more effective way. In addition, this research philosophy will assist the researcher to analyze the topic of the research topic in an effective way. Furthermore, the researcher will consider positivism research philosophy, as it will allow the researcher to complete the entire study within the timeframe. The researcher will not consider other research philosophies, as it will make the research process more complex. As a result, the study will require more time to fulfill its aim and objectives. Research approach: Research approach has two parts deductive and inductive approach. For this particular study, the researcher will implement deductive research approach in order to analyze each factor of the research study. Since, the prime aim of the research is to identify the factors that are creating adverse impact on the path of growth in the Australian caf and coffee industry. The deductive research approach has the potential to play a key role in that. The researcher will focus on the deductive approach, as it will allow the researcher to utilize several concept and theories relevant to the research topic. Thus, it will allow the researcher to have an in-depth analysis regarding the caf and coffee industry. In addition, the researcher will also select deductive research approach, as it will help the researcher to gain in-depth knowledge about the study. Therefore, it will benefit the researcher to implement effective research process so that the study can be able to fulfill its objective. Research design: As per the article by Creswell (2013) research design is a significant part of research methodology that helps the researcher to enhance the quality of the study. Research design has three parts, exploratory research design, explanatory research design and descriptive research design. Now, evaluating all the factors related to caf and coffee industry in Australia, the researcher will utilize descriptive research design. For this particular study, the researcher will utilize descriptive research design, as it will assist the researcher define application, approaches and theories relevant to the research topic. Therefore, descriptive design will help the researcher to improve the quality of the research study. In addition, the researcher will consider descriptive research design for this particular study, as it will help the researcher to analyze all the captured information regarding caf and coffee industry so that the study can be able to fulfill its aim and objectives. Furthermore, descriptive design will also allow the researcher to evaluate the future perspectives of the caf and coffee industry. Data collection process: As per the article by Ritchie et al. (2013) data collection is a necessary factor that the researcher will have to perform in order to fulfill the objective of the study. Data collection will allow the research to gather all the information relevant to the research topic. Generally, it has two parts secondary data collection procedure and primary data collection procedure. Now for this particular study, as the researcher focusing on the entire caf and coffee industry of Australia, both primary and secondary data collection procedure will have to consider by the researcher. The research will collect secondary information from different online portals, books, business magazines, trusted websites etc. The researcher will collect secondary information to develop literature review portion of the study. Since, secondary data collection will allow the researcher to utilize various theories and concepts regarding the topic of the study that will create positive impact on the completion of th e research process. On the other hand, the researcher will utilize survey technique in order to collect primary data. The researcher will select 90excutive level of employees from various organizations in caf and coffee industry. The researcher will develop a quantitative questionnaire for capturing information from the executive level of respondents. The researcher will utilize online platform to collect quantitative information from the respondents. The researcher will utilize quantitative data collection technique, as it will help the researcher to identify the trend regarding the caf and coffee industry. In addition, the researcher will select 15 managers from different caf and coffee organizations to capture qualitative information relevant to the topic of the study. The researcher will create another questionnaire that will include open-end questions for the managers. The researcher will utilize face-to-face conversation technique in collect qualitative information regarding t he topic of the study. The researcher will implement this technique for qualitative data collection, as it will help the researcher to evaluate the perspective of the respondents in a much more effective way. Data analysis technique: Data analysis is another significant part that can have huge amount of impact on the successful completion of the study. As per the article by Silverman (2016) for implementing effective data analysis, effective sampling technique will have to be used by the researcher. Generally, sampling technique has two parts, non-probability sampling technique and probability sampling technique. As mentioned earlier, the researcher focuses only on the employees of caf and coffee industry to capture information relevant to the topic of the study. Therefore, the researcher will have to select non-probability sampling technique, as it will help the researcher to focus on any particular group for the collection of effective information relevant to the research topic. Furthermore, the researcher will utilize various statistical tools in order to analyze captured information in an effective way. The research will utilize statistical tools like mode, mean and median in order to evaluate the captured in formation so that the study can be able to meet its objective. Furthermore, as the researcher will utilize both primary and secondary data for caf and coffee industry, statistical tools like regression and correlation also will have to utilize by the researcher. The researcher will utilize statistical tools, as it has the capability to enhance the overall quality of the study. Project plan: Figure 1: Gantt chart (Source: As created by the author) Conclusion: As mentioned earlier, caf and coffee industry is considered among the influential industry that has able to grow at a rapid pace for over the years. Therefore, it has become one of the most popular places for the people to enjoy their leisure time. In addition, many business and official meetings are also takes place at various caf centers. Therefore, it highlighted that caf and coffee industry has the potential to grow even further for next few years as well. In Australia as well, caf and coffee shops are very popular. Therefore, it has able to become an integral part of peoples daily life. However, as the study mentioned that the pace of growth for caf and coffee industry in Australia has gone down for the past few years. Therefore, it highlighted that several factors are there that are creating negative impact on the overall development of caf and coffee industry. Thus, the research outcome is expected to identify and evaluate all the factors that are creating adverse impact on th e overall growth in the caf and coffee industry. In addition, it is also expected that the researcher will able to recommend few suggestion for the caf and coffee industry regarding the minimization of the negative factors so that it can able to move further towards the path of growth in future as well. Future work: In this particular research study, the prime focus is to identify the factors that are creating adverse impact on the path of growth for caf and coffee industry in Australia. Therefore, it is expected that the research study will able to identify the factors and will able to evaluate the best possible way to minimize the effect of the factors that are creating adverse impact on the overall study. It is also expected that the research study will able to identify the best possible way that can be able to prolong the growth rate of caf and coffee industry in Australia. As the technology is improving at all the time, it also can have major impact on the development process of caf and coffee industry. Therefore, it is expected that the study will able to identify the best possible use of technology for the continues success of caf and coffee industry in Australia. References: Benavides, P., 2014, January. The genome of the coffee berry borer, Hypothenemus hampei, the major insect pest of coffee worldwide. InPlant and Animal Genome XXII Conference. Plant and Animal Genome. Brazinha, C., Cadima, M. and Crespo, J.G., 2015. Valorisation of spent coffee through membrane processing.Journal of Food Engineering,149, pp.123-130. Clifford, M.N. ed., 2012.Coffee: botany, biochemistry and production of beans and beverage. Springer Science Business Media. Creswell, J.W., 2013.Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Sage publications. Elder, S.D., Lister, J. and Dauvergne, P., 2014. Big retail and sustainable coffee: A new development studies research agenda.Progress in Development Studies,14(1), pp.77-90. Fujioka, K., Tomizawa, Y., Shimizu, N., Ikeda, K. and Manome, Y., 2015. Improving the performance of an electronic nose by wine aroma training to distinguish between drip coffee and canned coffee.Sensors,15(1), pp.1354-1364. Hattox, R.S., 2014.Coffee and coffeehouses: the origins of a social beverage in the medieval Near East. University of Washington Press. Lee, Y.J., You, J.S. and Chang, K.J., 2013. Dietary habits score, nutrients intake and dietary quality related to coffee consumption of college students in Incheon.Journal of Nutrition and Health,46(6), pp.560-572. Li, C.H. and Wang, H.B., 2014. Exploring the Relations between Service Quality and Consumer Behaviors-A case study of 85 C Bakery Caf from Taiwan.International Journal of Organizational Innovation (Online),6(3), p.31. Mishra, A., 2013. Business model for indian retail sector: The caf coffee day case: In conversation with VG Siddhartha, Chairman, Coffee Day.IIMB Management Review,25(3), pp.160-170. Mukashema, A., Veldkamp, A. and Vrieling, A., 2014. Automated high resolution mapping of coffee in Rwanda using an expert Bayesian network.International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation,33, pp.331-340. Raghu, G. and Shyamsundar, D., 2013. A Report on Service Quality Analysis at Caf Coffee Day.A Report on Service Quality Analysis at Caf Coffee Day (October 15, 2013). Ritchie, J., Lewis, J., Nicholls, C.M. and Ormston, R. eds., 2013.Qualitative research practice: A guide for social science students and researchers. Sage. Rodrguez, D., Cure, J.R., Gutierrez, A.P., Cotes, J.M. and Cantor, F., 2013. A coffee agroecosystem model: II. Dynamics of coffee berry borer.Ecological modelling,248, pp.203-214. Silverman, D. ed., 2016.Qualitative research. Sage. Tjora, A. and Scambler, G. eds., 2013.Caf society. Palgrave Macmillan. Wakefield, M.A., Zacher, M., Bayly, M., Brennan, E., Dono, J., Miller, C., Durkin, S.J. and Scollo, M.M., 2013. The silent salesman: an observational study of personal tobacco pack display at outdoor caf strips in Australia.Tobacco control, pp.tobaccocontrol-2012. Weschenfelder, T.A., Lantin, P., Viegas, M.C., de Castilhos, F. and de Paula Scheer, A., 2015. Concentration of aroma compounds from an industrial solution of soluble coffee by pervaporation process.Journal of Food Engineering,159, pp.57-65.

Philosophy Mathematical Notion Of Infinity Essays -

Philosophy: Mathematical Notion Of Infinity The mathematical notion of infinity can be conceptualized in many different ways. First, as counting by hundreds for the rest of our lives, an endless quantity. It can also be thought of as digging a whole in hell for eternity, negative infinity. The concept I will explore, however, is infinitely smaller quantities, through radioactive decay Infinity is by definition an indefinitely large quantity. It is hard to grasp the magnitude of such an idea. When we examine infinity further by setting up one-to-one correspondence's between sets we see a few peculiarities. There are as many natural numbers as even numbers. We also see there are as many natural numbers as multiples of two. This poses the problem of designating the cardinality of the natural numbers. The standard symbol for the cardinality of the natural numbers is o. The set of even natural numbers has the same number of members as the set of natural numbers. The both have the same cardinality o. By transfinite arithmetic we can see this exemplified. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ? 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 ? When we add one number to the set of evens, in this case 0 it appears that the bottom set is larger, but when we shift the bottom set over our initial statement is true again. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 ? 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 ? We again have achieved a one-to-one correspondence with the top row, this proves that the cardinality of both is the same being o. This correspondence leads to the conclusion that o+1=o. When we add two infinite sets together, we also get the sum of infinity; o+o=o. This being said we can try to find larger sets of infinity. Cantor was able to show that some infinite sets do have cardinality greater than o, given 1. We must compare the irrational numbers to the real numbers to achieve this result. 1 0.142678435 2 0.293758778 3 0.383902892 4 0.563856365 : : No mater which matching system we devise we will always be able to come up with another irrational number that has not been listed. We need only to choose a digit different than the first digit of our first number. Our second digit needs only to be different than the second digit of the second number, this can continue infinitely. Our new number will always differ than one already on the list by one digit. This being true we cannot put the natural and irrational numbers in a one-to-one correspondence like we could with the naturals and evens. We now have a set, the irrationals, with a greater cardinality, hence its designation as 1. Georg Cantor did not come up with the concept of infinity, but he was the first to give it more than a cursory glance. Many mathematicians viewed infinity as unbounded growth rather than an attained quantity like Cantor. The traditional view of infinity was something ?increasing above all bounds, but always remaining finite.? Galileo (1564-1642) noticed the peculiarity that any part of a set could contain as many elements as the whole set. Berhard Bolzano (1781-1848) made great advancements in the theory of sets. Bolzano expanded on Galileo's findings and provided more examples of this theme. One of the most respected mathematicians of all time is Karl Friedrich Gauss. Gauss gave this insight on infinity: As to your proof, I must protest most vehemently against your use of the infinite as something consummated, as this is never permitted in mathematics. The infinite is but a figure of speech; an abridged form for the statement that limits exists which certain ratios may approach as closely as we desire, while other magnitudes may be permitted to grow beyond all bounds....No contradictions will arise as long as Finite Man does not mistake the infinite for something fixed, as long as he is not led by an acquired habit of mind to regard the infinite as something bounded.(Burton 590) Cantor, perhaps the true champion of infinity, built off of his predecessors findings. He argued that infinity was in fact ?fixed mathematically by numbers in the definite form of a completed whole.?(Burton 590) Cantor looked to

analysis of the song Scarecrow essays

analysis of the song Scarecrow essays The Christian music industry is renowned for its many deep, thought provoking songs, but there is none whose lyrics capture my mind like the song Scarecrow, written and composed by the band Skillet. This song is a reflection of the writers perspective of his life as a scarecrow. The artist proposes that we as Christians need to surrender everything to Christ in order to gain a meaningful relationship with Him. The chorus is divided into three different sections, each showing the three essential elements pertaining to our walk with God. The first concentrates on the knowledge part of a persons relationship with God. The second entails the love and emotion that is involved. The last focuses on the servant aspect in our attempt to please God. The comparison of a scarecrow to the life of a human being seeking Christ may seem far-fetched to begin with, but careful evaluation of the wording in this song has shown many parallels. The first part of the verse refers the guilt and shame the scarecrow is dealing with. He feels alone in the world and is shameful of his dirty clothes which represent the sin in his unworthy life. This seems like the ideal analogy for the aimless, consumer driven lives of many lukewarm Christians in todays society. The distractions of life keep getting in the way of truly focusing on God, bringing about a sense of shame and worthlessness. The scarecrow, Safe enough to not let go, seems to have a sense of security in the known that prohibits him from letting go of everything and letting God take over. He is comfortable where he is and does not want to risk change. He also is fearful of the unknown as shown in the text, Scared enough to not release. He is not willing to sacrifice the safety of everything he knows to be true to venture into the unfamiliar. In the next line Open up to drink the wind, the &q...

Integrated marketing plan Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

Integrated marketing plan - Essay Example According to the Italian tradition coffee houses are like a place for conversation and that provides the customers with a sense of community. From the very beginning Starbucks has been a very different company. The company has not only celebrated the coffee and rich tradition but also successfully brought a feeling of connection. The company endeavors to bring an exceptional experience to the lives of its target market (Clark, Taylor 2007; Starbucks Corporation 2011) Starbucks coffee is a globally acclaimed coffee brand. The brand boasts about its quality and charges a high premium based on this product attribute. The famous coffee brand is in its maturity stage. Many competitors have entered the marketplace when they saw the first coffee house growing. Quality and high prices are not just the only attributes of the product of Starbucks Coffee. Starbucks coffee is of high quality and it is ensured that there is a consistency of quality and taste throughout the globally operating chai n (Bussing-Burks, M. 2009) It is because of its high quality that the brand charges a high premium for its products. There are several other product attributes, other than the price and quality that contribute towards the image of the products offered under the brand name of â€Å"Starbucks†. ... The primary target market of Starbucks consists of men and women aged between 25 to 40 years from urban areas and usually with high incomes. This target segment accounts for almost half the sales of the Starbucks. In order to appeal this target audience Starbucks works keep its products current and position them in such a way that they become a status symbol. Then comes the target market of young adults aged between 18 to 24 years. This segment accounts for 40 percent of the sales of the company. This target audience looks up to Starbucks because it positions itself as place where college students can hang out and socialize with new people. Starbucks appeal to this consumer segment by introducing new technology and by projecting a cool image of the brand. A current example of new technology would be the installation of Wi-Fi that the company has managed to introduce in all its stores. It makes it easier for the students whether they want to hang in there and work on their projects or it can be that they just want to hang in there to enjoy the coffee. The relaxing atmosphere provided by the Starbucks stores is an appealing factor to both the adult and young adult target audience. Now moving to the third target market segment that Starbucks is serving, comprising of kids and teens aged between 13 to 17 years. Though this segment is not large and accounts for only 2 percent of the total Starbucks sales, but still the company focuses on this segment. The main reason for the focus is that it is mainly the parents who purchase items for their kids. There are several products that Starbucks has just made for the kids and teenagers. Starbucks do not target the kids segment directly but it does make sure that its products are kid-friendly. The company

Information Technology Stakeholders Research Paper

Information Technology Stakeholders - Research Paper Example Computer based software however exist that facilitate accurate recording of the subject data and computations in developing financial statements and in analysis of such statements for informed decision making by relevant stakeholders. The technology would be applied through integrating appropriate accounting based software into accounting computer devices. Once installed, data will be fed into the software application and managed in accordance with the software’s commands. This would however require personnel’s training on application of the selected software (Vijay, p. 394). Computerized accounting has a number of benefits as compared to manual accounting approach. It is for example fast because computations are automatic through in built software tools. This means that any required accounting information can be generated on demand to meet an immediate need. Application of computerized accounting also ensures a high level of accuracy in the generated accounting information to ensure reliability and validity of prepared and communicated accounting information. This further means that decisions that are made from computerized accounting systems are more accurate. Another advantage of the computerized accounting system is its high level of efficiency in handling large volume of data with respect to time and accuracy. It also makes automatic update of information in all relevant files upon a single entry, an application that eliminates accounting errors from multiple entries (Vijay, p. 394). The process has a number of stakeholders. The most significant is the college, the owner of information that will be accounted for by the applied technology. Another group of stakeholder to the process is the students, their parents, or their guardians who will be interacting with the accounting process in remitting payments of payment related documents. External auditors and professional

Microsoft’s Lost Decade Essay Example for Free

Microsoft’s Lost Decade Essay Introduction Microsoft’s story serves as a prime example of the pitfalls of success. In this case we can analyze, critique, and make recommendations to avoid a similar disaster in the future. While they were really the sole company to open the window into computer technology for the everyday user, but over the last decade appears to have been a victim of its own success. Once so dominant in the industry which is basically created on its own, today cannot be described as â€Å"cutting edge†. The name no longer resonates with younger generations. Evidence of this struggling success can be seen in its stock prices which have completely plateaued and even began to drop recently. What happened? Why are they no longer creating wonderful technological advances for its consumers? In order to compete in the technology industry, a company needs to continuously be innovation for its customers; Microsoft was not doing that. Despite facing a challenge in IBM in the beginning when Microsoft first entered the industry, who was also getting overly confident and comfortable with its position in the industry. It actually appears as though Microsoft has reenacted the problems of their former nemesis. Clearly not focused on development or bringing out a new product, and their new philosophy as expressed by the most recent CEO Steve Balmer about a decade ago was we won’t be first to cool but we will be first to profit. In other words, they don’t care about coming out with some cool new technology, they will wait for somebody else to do that, and then buy their way into that market. Obviously the major problem with that is if somebody else is coming into that product first, that company will most likely lock up the market. It is possible that Microsoft has its hands in too many things. There is no focus. Microsoft doesn’t know what kind of company it wants to be. This is evident by the competition microsft is facing. One division is competing with SONY, while another group is battling apple, while even other teams are competing with Google for example. It’s possibl e that what the company really needs is a fresh start; New atmosphere, new leadership, new goals. Microsoft has great products in Xbox and connect, but inside the massive† machine† that it has become they are just small underdeveloped projects. So again, it is obvious that there are issues to be looked at here, but somebody in charge missed the signals and let this happen. The most telling story from the case is that Microsoft in fact had ideas about the first e-reader, the very technology that is today very popular in the Kindle and iPad, as early as the late 1990s. Unfortunately for the company, the story tells of a meeting in which Bill Gates gave this new technology the â€Å"thumbs down† because the screen didn’t look like windows. Do the customers care about that? No. So that was a huge missed opportunity. The leadership was blind to that element, which dictates that for the customers’ needs to be addressed first and foremost. As a technology company the goal should be to â€Å"create† what is needed. Microsoft started doing things th e other way around. Windows started getting so complicated because they overloaded the engineering aspect to create things that will look good, not perform well. What it has come to at this point it seem is there is no way for Microsoft to compete at this stage. Everything within the company, including the employees appear to be almost â€Å"weighed down† by what can almost be describes as a massive bureaucracy with far too many meetings and memos. Microsoft’s â€Å"law of large numbers† is failing. In order to fix the causes of their problems, we must follow the symptoms back to the root causes and make changes there. On the surface, it appears their issues are due to bad management style, poor organizational structure and a generally counter-productive culture that strained relationships between the â€Å"old guard† and the â€Å"new blood† of the company. To get a better look at the cause of these symptoms, I will follow the eight operations management principals. Part 1: Critique Unity of Purpose Unity of purpose within an organization is definitely not something that a manager can ignore when running a business with goals. It is imperative to remember that to function as a goal oriented team, all parts of the various positions must be working together as one. This is where I will begin our observation of the Microsoft empire and the decade of struggle that diverted it from the success that it once enjoyed. When looking at how Microsoft was handled by Bill Gates, there are undoubtedly some moments that suggest that the unity of purpose was not clearly defined and never adequately addressed to the degree that it needed. We can start at the root of the problem to learn the origins of what Microsoft ultimately faced: namely discord and disharmony in the work place. Looking at the early success of the business, we notice that Microsoft created an innovative and personalized approach to the computer that made it significantly more user-friendly. The initial public reactions were almost unanimously positive due to the fact that the product was revolutionary and had changed the personal technology landscape for the better. Interestingly, Microsoft began this venture in the shadow of IBM, who was also getting overly confident and comfortable with its position in the industry at the time. It actually appears as though Microsoft has reenacted the problems of their former nemesis over the past decade. As time progressed for Microsoft, however, there came to be a noticeable drop off in success of the company. Steve Jobs and his exciting, strong and, most importantly, new Apple brand seemingly booted Microsoft to the curb, out of the public’s eye. It is easy to assume that Microsoft was simply outmanned by Apple, that the latter company came into the picture and took the market share away from Gates and his supposed dynasty. This, however, does not describe the true cause of the downfall suffered by Microsoft. The real cause that sent this company on the track to irrelevance was due in large part to the lack of unity in the business purpose. Microsoft was clearly not focused on development or bringing out a new product, and their new philosophy, as expressed by the most recent CEO Steve Balmer about a decade ago, was â€Å"we won’t be first to cool but we will be first to profit†. In other words, they don’t care about coming out with some cool new technology, they will wait for somebody else to do that, and then buy their way into that market. Obviously the first problem with that is if somebody else is coming into that product first, those companies will most likely lock up the market. Additionally this completely throws off the company’s purpose of unity! What is a technology company if it isn’t researching, developing, and creating for its customers a new technology? The answer is very simple: Microsoft was not united around a general value or principal. As I mentioned earlier, it is possible that Microsoft has its hands in too many things. There is no focus. Microsoft doesn’t know what kind of company it wants to be. This is evident by the competition microsoft is facing. One division is competing with SONY, while another group is battling apple, while even other teams are competing with Google for example. It’s possible that what the company really needs is a fresh start; New atmosphere, new leadership, new goals. Microsoft has great products in Xbox and connect, but inside the massive† machine† that it has become they are just small underdeveloped projects. Once upon a time, Bill gates had a vision. Gates wrote an operating program using the computer language called BASIC which proved to be a wonderful innovation. Driven by his new product, and with that his new purpose, his company took off and left everybody else in the dust. Gates was relentless and demanded the same intense commitment from everyone he hired. Back then they were united each member of the group was invest for the right rea son, which was creating a new product that people wanted before anybody else created it. Neither Gates nor Allen had management skills and business savvy that were needed to help the booming company in its infant days. Once the company started doubling and tripling in size year after year, the company could not keep focus on one particular goal or direction. Unity happens when leaders are committed to and engaged in the process of building a united, winning team. It requires focus, time, and energy. Unfortunately as we’ll discuss a little later on, focus may have been another contributing factor that hindered Microsoft from being the company Gates idealized in his head. Unity occurs when team members care more about the vision, purpose and health of the organization than they do their own personal agenda. Changing the mindset is essential. Unity happens when each person in the company can clearly see how their personal vision and effort contributes to the overall vision and success of the team. This involves meaningful conversations between the levels of management as well as between engineers and sales people. Unity of Purpose results when you weed out the negativity that sabotages far too many organizations. All of these things were issues at Microsoft that hindered it from having one united goal as a company. Having the right people in charge of making decisions can make a world of difference when trying to unite the group behind a cause, which will lead me to the next principle of Operations Management, Human Resources. Invest in Human Resources Microsoft needed to invest in human resources to implement and maintain plans and policies. Strategically placed investments in human resources will develop a more skilled, innovative, productive and loyal workforce thus providing an organization with a competitive advantage over a less progressive competitor. Investment in human capital offers both short and long term gains that help produce not only skilled, productive employees, but those that are both loyal and ethical. Microsoft’s goal should have been to increase the ownership of employees work by providing the right incentives. Already we see evidence that the company will fall prey to the same arrogance that dethroned IBM. There were signs but Microsoft didn’t see them until it was too late. When it comes to your employees, long-term thinking guides an organization. That’s where Microsoft missed the mark by a long shot. Microsoft was focused on too many short term goals. Employees at Microsoft had an obsession with revenue and growth, and it’s no surprise why! Almost every employee received a stake in the company through stock options. When the share price went up, everyone got richer. When it went down, everyone suffered. Everyone ran full speed in hopes of pushing up the stock price a little bit more. Internal competition became a huge issue with Microsoft’s employees as well. The perception of stability within the workforce is especially beneficial during periods of economic decline and or organizational restructuring. The perceptions of stability as offered by organizational culture will often help retain employees during recessionary periods and motivate everyone during stable times as well. This was potentially the biggest issue in house for Microsoft. The days of shoulder to should teams innovating and thriving within the company were gone. A â€Å"financial fissure† penetrated the already strained relationships between th e â€Å"old guard† and the â€Å"new blood†. People were becoming destructively competitive. Its was a sink or swim environment and drowning someone else in order to survive was the name of the game at Microsoft. Something had to be done. Companies can obtain a competitive advantage if they utilize strategic human resources investment practices. If the operation is a primary manufacturing facility investments such as group bonus pay-outs based on overall group performance or attendance for example, could provide an initial increase in output. Furthermore, empowerment of the team by allowing aspects of total quality management to take place will help build confidence and a feeling of responsibility within the group. If the operation is research and development oriented then the culture should be based on rewards focused on those who develop and produce. In either case whether the culture is based on group or individual performance, the overall goals must be focused on the retention, growth of, and maximum utilization of talent. Microsolf is a company with all departments and people with both typed of jobs. The organizations that are best able to manipulate the corporate culture into one of maximum benefit will become significantly more competitive than those who do not, and Microsoft did not. At Microsoft it got so bad that one employee was quoted saying â€Å"We couldn’t be focused anymore on developing technology that was effective for consumers†. It had become all about, â€Å"how am I going to make money†. HR should have used training and development to invest in their employees. Make them feel valued, offer appropriate promotions as incentives for great work and loyalty, and place a greater emphasis on teamwork. The cut-throat atmosphere does not generate positive results, and Microsoft’s organizational structure was such that executives and engineers were from a different generation with cutthroat mentalities. This only results in self immolating chaos. The real villain here was the wrongly implemented Stack ranking system. Managers had a rest and vest mentality which bread ill feelings and jealousy all around. These factors were naturally at variance with team work and innovation. A better reward systems should focus on facilitating cooperation, enhancing long term thinking, tolerating mistakes because they are learning tools, and not letting egos get involved. Whatever Microsoft determines it’s goals and purpose is going to be, it is important for the companies directors to remember that investing in the appropriate human resources is much more than making sure the new employees don’t impact your current paychecks and health insurance. It is the definition of the company, its culture, and its employees performance. With the right culture instilled in the company, employees might have a chance to work on focus for an-unmotivated Microsoft. Focus Microsoft was lacking, and desperately needed focus. Sustainable growth is important. Such a pattern emerges in organizations that are superior in executing their business plan and can maintain a compounding positive trajectory in their revenue development. Organizations that are so oriented build success patterns that breed a culture of confidence and a competitive advantage. This is how growth becomes sustainable. Such a pattern is of primary importance to any focus-oriented company. Sustained growth in a business comes about primarily because key employees are focused on performance factors they can impact and they feel motivated to do so. That focus leads to execution. When sustained, that pattern brings about the results and success the business plan calls for. This being said, Microsoft was committing all the wrong crimes against successful business focus. Vague accountability on the part of higher management made it impossible for the rest of the employees to envision goals a nd work with a purpose. A major contributor to this at Microsoft was the fact that they held too many meetings. Meetings in turn slows new product development and staggers innovation. Just as with e-books, opportunities for major product developments slipped away from Microsoft. Windows CE, an operating system distinct from Windows that was originally used for pocket devices like personal digital assistants, would ultimately be the foundation of the mobile operating system that would power Microsoft’s first smartphones. But despite the fact that Microsoft had the jump on its competitors with Windows CE, it still lost the race for the wildly successful smartphones. In addition to too many meetings, Microsoft had too many managers. Current and former executives said, each year the intensity and destructiveness of the game playing grew worse as employees struggled to beat out their co-workers for promotions, bonuses, or just survival. Microsoft’s managers pumped up the volume on the viciousness around each other and to their subordinates. What resulted, when combined with the bitterness about financial disparities among employees that already existed, the slow pace of development, and the power of the Windows and Office divisions to kill innovation. All in all, it was a toxic stew of internal antagonism and warfare fueled by the generation gap between the old, established managers and the young, aspiring engineers. That â€Å"warfare atmosphere† was only the beginning of the distraction. At Microsoft every employee had a smiley face icon to monitor stock prices at every moment of the day. When shares increased, the face smiled, but when they fell it frowned. This placed way too much focus on shareholders, profits, and employees job security. There was simply not enough emphasis on the customer, and nothing was focused on the company’s future. Futher issues at Microsoft included obsession to capitalize on every opportunity to gather new revenue, teams of people fighting shoulder-to-shoulder had been replaced with backstabbing and selfish goals. Microsoft even went as far to save money, the company no longer helped with towels in showers at work. Why is that a focus at all!? That’s such a pathetic problem to have at an industry-leading technology company. To achieve quality, you have to define it. Focus is a definition and you have to make sure that definition is disseminated throughout the rank and file. Its the job of any company to be clear about the nonnegotiable core values. A lack of focus creates estuaries and cloudy waters that are confusing to navigate and surely hinder innovation. Visibility Management The lack of focus we attribute to the poor leadership transitions us to our next issue with Microsoft, that there is not a fair, balanced model in the company with solid visibility management. Natural self-promoters, like many of the managers and executives at Microsoft, instinctively exploit opportunities to make themselves visible. In today’s competitive corporate environment, being good at what you do isn’t enough to earn your keep or what you’re worth. You have to practice â€Å"visibility management,† letting people know who you are and what you do well. Managing visibility is an integral component of modern success and career management. Microsoft had extremely poor visibility management for a number of key reasons. For starters Microsoft did not recognize or enforce fairness throughout its organizational structure of employees. The organizational structure followed a stack ranking system, like a forced bell curve model, that puts individual goals at complete variance with teamwork. The managers who were supposed to be making decisions and conveying them to their sales and engineer teams were in constant meetings instead of making information available regarding any management decisions. Microsoft was lacking â€Å"new blood† in its management. The divisions between the old timers and the young innovators had grown wildly out of control. Corporate culture is built from the combined experiences of the members of the organization working in harmony with clear visibility. This effects the results of the organization’s efforts, and helps the psychological tone set by top management and every level of management beneath it. All of these factors are expressed in, and some are caused by, visibility management, and poor management behavior will always affect the culture negatively. Organizational culture is built on the behaviors of the members of the culture, and poor management visibility and behavior at any level naturally affects the levels subordinate to it. An abusive or clueless top or middle manager can create a culture of negativism and poor performance that extends beneath them all the way to the bottom of the organizational pyramid, and even to supplier organizations. Anyone who has worked in more than a couple of bureaucracies has most likely experienced or witnessed this syndrome. At Microsoft one employee was quoted saying â€Å"If you just add up the time people spent sending angry e-mails about the towels disappearing †¦ I expect they lost a lot more money than the cost savings from the towels.† Even once the towels returned, the bitterness about cost-cutting didn’t end. What was management’s plan? Nobody seemed to know; there was no communication or visibility within the company. Even after that Microsoft abandoned its gold-plated health-insurance plan. That was the enticement that had brought some employees there in the first place. Whiteboards grew scarcer. It even became harder to find office supplies. Many of the problems from bureaucracy came down to a simple reality: The young hotshots from the 1980s, techies who had joined the company in their 20s and 30s, had become middle-aged managers in their 40s and 50s. And, some younger engineers said a good number of the bosses just didn’t understand the burgeoning class of computer users who had been children when Microsoft opened its doors. When younger employees tried to point out emerging trends among their friends, supervisors sometimes just waved them away. None of management’s procedures or systems seemed to make any sense to the rest of the subordinate company. Corporate policy at Microsoft gave some select few millions, while others got bare minimum pay. Too many employees were seeking management spots for the wrong reasons. Management should have been more humble, transparent, and outward gazing. Visibility management works with facts, not ego and corporate politics. Fix Causes Corporate politics lead to nothing else if not fear and prejudice within the organization. Current and former executives said that each year the intensity and destructiveness of the game playing grew worse as employees struggled to beat out their co-workers for promotions, bonuses, or just survival. Microsoft had, in an effort to motivate by competition, created a back-stabbing environment of brutal proportions in the corporate world. Management is supposed to be courageous and inspiring, â€Å"not pumped up the volume on the viciousness† as was the case at Microsoft. It is usually the leader with the most power who provokes the most fear. With leaders worried about outbursts and other nasty behavior from those with even more power than they have, imagine the toll the fear factor must take on the people who wield substantially less authority. At a place like Microsoft, those people make up the vast majority. Although Ballamer would espouse that they challenge their people, man y employees would argue those challenges feel threatening. The truth is most likely employees blossom when challenged and wither when threatened. There is no data showing that anxious, fearful employees are more creative and productive, but there is data proving that employees in a threatening environment are less engaged, less loyal and for the most part miserable. Civility is not a term we typically associate with corporate life or use to describe the everyday world in workplaces around the globe. But consider the potential impact on corporate culture, and society as a whole, if civility were not just expected, but championed by senior leadership. Microsoft had a forced bell curve of talent that doesn’t actually represent the production and innovation capabilities of the company. This creates achingly slow progress and in an atmosphere that has every unit declare a certain percentage of employees as top performers, then good performers, then average, then below average, then poor, employees were focusing on competing with each other rather than competing with other companies. Management needs to listen to the ideas of the young generation and implement a better system. An example of when this would have done Microsoft well was in 1997, when AOL introduced its instant-messenger program, called AIM, a precursor to the texting functions on cell phones. Two years later, Microsoft followed with a similar program, called MSN Messenger. In 2003, a young developer noticed that friends in college signed up for AIM exclusively and left it running most of the time. The developer concluded that no young person would switch from AIM to MSN Messenger, which did not have the short-message feature. He spoke about the problem to his boss, a middle-aged man. The supervisor dismissed the developer’s concerns as silly. Why would young people care about putting up a few words? Anyone who wanted to tell friends what they were doing could write it on their profile page, he said. Meaning users would have to open the profile pages, one friend at a time, and search for a status message, if it was there at all. Unfortunately because his manager didn’t know or didn’t believe how young people were using messenger programs, nothing was done. Management was instilling fear instead of developing for the long term and listing to employees about what customers really want. Know Your Customers As we have discussed, the culture at Microsoft was complacent. Managers were closed to criticism, arrogant about their roles of leadership, and obsessed with stock prices and short term goals. The very purpose for Microsoft’s existence was to provide new and wonderful technology to people; those people being the customers. Those people dictate the needs, not managers, and Microsoft lost touch with who they were serving. It’s something critical to ANY and EVERY business: knowing your customers and the products they want. You can learn a great deal about your customers by talking to them. Asking them why theyre buying or not buying, what they may want to buy in the future and asking what other needs they have can give a valuable picture of whats important to them. Despite a multi-year head start, the big profits on innovative new technologies would eventually go to Amazon and Apple. Why? Because they gave the customers the next new thing in technology. For example, Bill G ates gave the E-reader the thumbs down because he was focused on what the product did and looked like, not how his consumers would love it. Apparently â€Å"he didn’t like the interface because it didn’t look like windows.† The point on this invention was to have the book, alone, appear on the full screen. Putting it into an electronic book, Gates suggested, would do nothing but undermine the customers experience. Unfortunately what gates didn’t understand is that it’s not undermining them if that’s what they want! The death of the e-book effort was not simply the consequence of a desire for immediate profits, but also all kinds of personal prejudices at work. Management missed the beat repeatedly while â€Å"meeting† to pursue the next thing it would release. Microsoft was only hurting itself. As discussed earlier they were far too obsessed with revenues and stock prices of old products. Steve Stone, a founder of the technology group, said about Microsoft’s attention to customer wants: â€Å"We couldn’t be focused anymore on developing technology that was effective for consumers. Instead, all of a sudden we had to look at this and say, ‘How are we going to use this to make money?’ And it was impossible.† Indeed, executives said, Microsoft failed repeatedly to jump on emerging technologies because of the company’s fealty to Windows and Office. â€Å"Windows was the god—everything had to work with Windows,† said Stone. â€Å"Ideas about mobile computing with a user experience that was cleaner than with a P.C. were deemed unimportant by a few powerful people in that division, and they managed to kill the effort.† Indeed, executives said, Microsoft failed repeatedly to jump on emerging technologies because of the company’s fealty to Windows and Office. There was a feeling that â€Å"Windows was the god—everything had to work with Windows,† despite what the customer wanted. While Apple continues to gain market share in many products, Microsoft has lost share in Web browsers, high-end laptops and smartphones. Despite billions in investment, its Xbox line is still at best an equal contender in the game console business. It first ignored and then stumbled in personal music players until that business was locked up by Apple. Another problem with Microsoft delivering to the customer’s needs is whenever Microsoft spies yet another potential market which it thinks is ripe for taking over it generally announces its intention to move aggressively into that market. Microsoft frequently announces new products for these markets that they will ship soon regardless of whether or not they have any genuine interest in actually shipping said products. What this frequently leads to is that people stop buying software in this market because they want to wait for the Microsoft version. Unfortunately if Microsoft sees the market drying up they usually just walk away and never deliver their promised products. The end result is that the small software companies in these markets take a very big hit and frequently go under while consumers end up without their promised product. In the past, Microsoft has fueled amazing growth by leveraging its way into new markets in order to acquire new customers. The problem that Microsoft has been facing recently is that they tried to dominate so many different markets that there are not enough markets left that can be captured for the purpose of sustaining the growth that their shareholders require. Microsoft has turned its sights back on its existing customers. Microsoft is finding creative ways to draw more money out of its existing customers, often times with hostile results. One example of Microsofts hostility to its existing customers came in September, 2000. Microsoft demanded that the Virginia Beach government account for all copies of Microsoft software that were in use within the government and provide proof of purchase for each product. The reason? Nick Psyhogeos, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney for Microsoft, said the firm has found that government agencies sometimes inadvertently acquire counterfeit software. There was no mention of a reason why this particular city government was singled out they were not investigated because of something which they did to arouse suspicion, but simply because they were a large organization that Microsoft hoped they could frighten more money out of. The city was presumed guilty until proven innocent and this cost the tax payers a great deal of money as the city reassigned 25 percent of its technical work force to work specifically on the task of generating the information demanded by Microsoft. Microsoft is hunting down it’s customers, not providing for them. Know Your Competition In the competitive corporate world it is imperative that a company knows it’s competition so that you don’t get blindsided. It is crucial to know who they are and what their strengths/weaknesses are. It would also be smart to know what their primary products are that compete with yours and how they access talent that you might want as well. Recently Microsoft’s strategy has just been killing off competitors by either buying them or their technologies. Once again, a good example of this is shown with Microsofts jump into the web browser market. Microsoft was late to catch on to the fact that the web was going to revolutionize the way people used computers and once they finally woke up they were dangerously close to having their Windows monopoly destroyed by the greatly reduced importance of operating systems that a web based paradigm would produce. They needed to do something fast. They allegedly tried to carve up the market with Netscape by getting Netscape to ag ree to stop making Windows web browsers while Microsoft would only make Windows web browsers. Fortunately for consumers, Netscape did not agree to the deal and the web was saved from becoming a Microsoft only technology as surely would have happened. This made it even more urgent for Microsoft to lock up this new market right away while it was still time. Lacking any decent technology of their own, Microsoft licensed the Mosaic web browser from Spyglass which they turned into Internet Explorer. The weapon that Microsoft fashioned in their attempt to defeat Netscape wasnt even their own, but technology they bought from someone else. This was not a one time thing either. What this meant for Microsoft was that they got to keep their monopoly for a little bit longer, but it had much more dire consequences for consumers. It meant that consumers were now stuck with a very buggy browser and file system viewer because Internet Explorer wasn’t prepared to compete with competition. Who are Microsoft’s main competitors right now? According to CEO Steve Ballmer Google, Apple, and Oracle and the front runners. Google is a serious threat because not only does it have its hand in multiple markets, it has the ability to jump in and quickly grab significant market share. Gmail went public only about three years ago, but already it’s the third-largest webmail service behind Hotmail and Yahoo. Google Apps is up-and-coming, having won a few key contracts in the enterprise market. Microsoft’s release of Office Web Apps shows the company is worried about Google, which is touting apps as an easy-to-use-from-anywhere service with an easier and less expensive business model. Android has accomplished a heckuva feat, jumping from nearly no market share a year ago to being the platform of choice for about 10 percent of new smart phones sold. Chrome has been consistently eating away at Internet Explorer since its launch nearly two years ago. And with App Engine, Google has been making a push in the cloud-platform space to which Microsoft, with Windows Azure, just showed up this winter. And then there’s Chrome OS, the browser-based operating system that Google is expected to launch by late autumn. It’s unknown how successful the novel idea will be, especially with the incoming tablet market, but considering Google’s success in other sectors it could very well grab netbooks away from Windows. Apple was nearly dead 10 years ago and has surged back to pass up Microsoft in market capitalization, and Apple did it with consumers. When you’re talking competition between Microsoft and Apple, you’re mainly talking about hand-held devices. Windows is still on more than 90 percent of computers and Safari, Apple’s Web browser, essentially has the same market share as Macintosh computers. Apple is leading the charge for mobile computing. And as Google can attest, there’s plenty of room in the market to capitalize. Microsoft, for its part, has not been able to do that lately. As Apple and Android surge in popularity, Windows Mobile hemorrhages market share. Microsoft must deliver a knock-out hit with Windows Phone 7 this holiday season. Then there’s the iPad. Apple has succeeded where others, namely Microsoft, failed to recognize the need 10 years ago. Apple has opened the door for a potentially huge new market. What really agitates Microsoft is that PCs are no longer the only incarnation of personal computing. In the MicroNokia deal, Microsoft sees an opportunity to be a player in the new personal computing incarnation, a willful answer to its competition. Microsoft tried to ignore tablets and a â€Å"fad† but will soon need to recognize the potential and get on top of that if it wishes to once again dominate the industry. Total Quality Management It is absolutely necessary for Microsoft to base quality decisions on facts, not the ego’s and ideas of executives. The outputs that they wish to hold important must be measurable. Microsoft would also do well to empower its employees on the customer interaction level. These are the employees closest to the customer and will provide the most effective feedback for future innovation. These future innovations must also be of the highest quality as that is one of the key component to total quality control. The reason quality has gained such prominence is that organizations have gained an understanding of the high cost of poor quality. Quality affects all aspects of the organization and has dramatic cost implications. The most obvious consequence occurs when poor quality creates dissatisï ¬ ed customers and eventually leads to loss of business. However, quality has many other costs, which can be divided into two categories. The ï ¬ rst category consists of costs necessary for achieving high quality, which are called quality control costs. These are of two types: prevention costs and appraisal costs. The second category consists of the cost consequences of poor quality, which are called quality failure costs. Companies that consider quality important invest heavily in prevention and appraisal costs in order to prevent internal and external failure costs. The earlier defects are found, the less costly they are to correct. Another massively important factor of Total Quality Control is the quality and happiness of the employees. A good way to ensure that is to be encouraging to your employees and offer praise when appropriate. Thank employees for doing a good job and let them know that you value them. Should something go wrong or someone makes a mistake, don’t â€Å"punish† the person. That was a big fear at Microsoft that went on too long. Punishing people only makes things worse in that the employee may become angry and bitter and may want to sabotage their work to get back at the company, or leave to work for the competition. Too many meetings at Microsoft and the fear of a declining stock price did not create an atmosphere that created â€Å"quality†. Management needed to tolerate mistakes and be more outward gazing for innovations, customer needs, and new business models. Part 2: Recommendations Bad corporate culture happens, but it can be corrected. While it is natural for bad organizational culture to develop, this tendency can be countered and a more positive and productive organizational culture can be produced, though it requires savvy and introspective management. It is within the power of each of us to do the introspective work and be more savvy, as managers or regular employees. In doing so you will improve everyone, and give each individual increased capacity to influence the organizational culture in a more positive direction. The greatest threat to an organization’s success is not always the competition. Often, it is what a company does to itself. Because of fear, companies become plagued with barriers and bureaucracy that limit success, crush employees, and infuse frustration and a sense of futility across the enterprise. It starts with a narrowing of focus, which leads to the first level of bureaucracy: parochialism. Parochialism exists when managers and departments begin to view the world through the filter of their own little silo, and build walls make of rules and policies to protect their turf. This was definitely the case at Microsoft with the Stack ranking system. When looking at how Microsoft was handled by Bill Gates, there are undoubtedly some moments that suggest that the unity of purpose was not clearly defined and never adequately addressed to the degree that it needed. As I mentioned earlier, it is possible that Microsoft has its hands in too many things. There is no focus. Microsoft doesn’t know what kind of company it wants to be. This is evident by the competition Microsoft is facing. Unity happens when leaders are committed to and engaged in the process of building a united, winning team. It requires focus, time, and energy. Unfortunately as we’ll discuss a little later on, focus may have been another contributing factor that hindered Microsoft from being the company Gates idealized in his head. Unity occurs when team members care more about the vision, purpose and health of the organization than they do their own personal agenda. Changing the mindset is essential. Unity happens when each person in the company can clearly see how their personal vision and effort contributes to the overall vision and success of the team. This involves meaningful conversations between the levels of management as well as between engineers and sales people. Unity of Purpose results when you weed out the negativity that sabotages far too many organizations. All of these things were issues at Microsoft that hindered it from having one united goal as a company. Having the right people in charge of making decisions can make a world of difference when trying to unite the group behind a cause, especially a business cause. Microsoft needs to invest in human resources to implement and maintain plans and policies. Strategically placed investments in human resources will develop a more skilled, innovative, productive and loyal workforce thus providing an organization with a competitive advantage over a less progressive competitor. Investmen t in human capital will offer Microsoft both short and long term gains to help produce not only skilled, productive employees, but also loyal and ethical employees for the long-term. Microsoft’s goal must now be to increase the ownership of employees work by providing the right incentives through HR. Especially when it comes to your employees, long-term thinking guides an organization. That’s where Microsoft missed the mark in the past and needs to focus now. Microsoft was focused on too many short term goals in the past. The vicious internal competitions need to be eliminated from Microsoft if they want to create a productive work environment. This was potentially the biggest issue in house for Microsoft. Companies can obtain a competitive advantage if they utilize strategic human resources investment practices. The real villain here was the wrongly implemented stack ranking system. Managers had a rest and vest mentality which bread ill feelings and jealousy all around. These factors were naturally at variance with team work and innovation. I recommend a better reward system that will focus on facilitating cooperation, enhancing long term thinking, tolerating mistakes because they are learning tools, and not let egos get involved. Whatever Microsoft determines it’s goals and purpose is going to be, it is important for the companies directors to remember that investing in the appropriate human resources is much more than making sure the new employees don’t impact your current paychecks and health insurance. Microsoft needs a better focus on what they are about and their position in the technology industry. These will come with a well taken care of their employee base first. I recommend they invest into a few basic human needs to help their organization stay productive, engaged and, happy during times of angst and uncertainty which inevitably come in the corporate world of today. The first focus with is to make a connection with the employees. Talking about emotions in the workplace can cause executives to get uneasy. Have you ever noticed that you never hear managers saying, Please dont get so excited or Please quit being so happy? The reality is that emotions are at the center of everything we do. The leadership challenge is not to avoid them, but instead to ignite the positive ones. The secret of getting people more engaged in their work is for their leaders to become more engaged with them. That means being willing to show up emotionally as well as intellectually. Human connection isnt a nice thing to have; its a must-have. Meaningful connections provide people with the internal fortitude they need to stay productive during tough times. Microsoft needs to be more connected to its people, and they also want them to be connected to one another. The way to do that is by talking, with real spoken words, not e-mail edicts, asking people how theyre doing and actually listening to their answers, and by providing them with opportunities to interact with one another. Corporate parties, public promotions etc will go a long was for the morale at Microsoft. Providing context and meaning to the tasks at hand will do a lot for the employees at Microsoft as well. Everyone wants to know that they make a difference in the world. When you put someones work into a meaningful context, you tap into the deepest yearning of his or her soul. The challenge for Microsoft is that most peoples days are so hectic and their jobs so compartmentalized that they often miss the larger story of how their work touches the work of others in the company, and the customers around the world. Leaders who reframe daily tasks by providing personal context quell the angst of uncertainty by giving their employees something more meaningful to think about. The best thing for Microsoft to do is to offer professional employees an incentive package that includes a bonus based on the firms gross revenue. When you bring in more, everyone gets rewarded. But dont make the mistake of tying bonus comp to practice profitability. Profit sharing seems like a good idea but it often c reates resentment by employees who dont have any control over profits. Every time an executive takes a vacation as a business trip or buys a new computer they dont really need, Microsoft employees will resent it. Bonuses based on revenues create a team environment where everyone gets rewarded for their contributions to growth. This is the ultimate motivator for many professional planner, young and old, regardless of business level. As businesses grow and become more complex, a second level of bureaucracy is reached: territorialism. While parochialism is about protecting a department from outsiders, territorialism is about controlling those inside the silo. The third and final level of bureaucracy is empire building, which is a response to perceived threats to a department’s ability to be self-sufficient. These barriers cost organizations a fortune in inefficiency, turnover, waste, and demoralization, and Microsoft is guilty of these on the highest level! Tearing down these barriers is difficult, but it can be done. I recommend resetting rules and policies, and refocusing on the ultimate mission of the organization. Territorialism can be eliminated by creating true empowerment, along with appropriate levels of accountability. Microsoft must also create a culture of courage, to enable employees to take advantage of these new freedoms and accountabilities. In the past managers definitely took advantage of their powers, and didn’t communicate to their employees appropriately. Leadership must refocus on mission success rather than just checking off their part of the process, manage reference points, and engage employees. I am confident that by doing all of these things, Microsoft can begin to become fearless, and unstoppable. Microsoft messed up internally, but also missed a number of opportunities. While Microsoft dreams of Apple-style successes with consumers, the truth is, with only one exception, consumers dont care about Microsoft in the slightest. Microsoft does, of course, make one successful consumer product, at least from a perception standpoint, and thats the Xbox 360. Today, Microsoft is being chipped away by competitors from all sides, like a mighty shark being taken down by a pack of hungry piranhas. Microsoft is just letting this happen because the company simply moves too slowly, whether its entering new markets, updating existing products, or something internal. I have read a number of recommendations in articles and online about Microsoft, and I happen to agree that Microsoft is so big that the very notion of there being a Microsoft is absurdly simplistic. This is instead a collection of often massive warring fiefdoms that dont just ignore each other but in some notable cases actually actively work against each other. Even more problematic, perhaps, Microsofts businesses are so diverse that many have nothing to do with each other. So my advice is to split up this company into two or three baby Microsofts, perhaps al ong consumer, business, and developer lines. None of these brands should have any influence from Steve Ballmer as well. Replacing Ballmer is no easy task, and while its not the epic problem that the software giant confronted when Bill Gates left, Microsofts need for new leadership will require a team, not an individual. It’s possible Microsoft doesnt need a business guy at the top, and I would recommend it needs another guy who understands technology. That way Microsoft’s managers will stop smothering good ideas. Microsoft needs to say â€Å"Yes† to good ideas more frequently. This can only happen within an organization that actually listens and rewards the forward thinkers, places like Apple and Google, who happen to be doing very well in the market right now. â€Å"Microsoft is now in the ironic position to brand itself as David to Apples Goliath, the counterculture to Apples mainstream†. I want Microsoft to turn the tables on the very upstart company that used to think different,† and I recommend Microsoft turn the page and begin this decade anew, learning from its own mistakes. Bibliography and Reference Links * Greer, Charles S. An Investment Perspective of Human Resources, Strategic Human Resources Management, (2001): 1. * Greer, Charles S. An Investment Perspective of Human Resources, Strategic HumanResources Management, (2001): 5 * http://news.cnet.com/8301-10805_3-57471170-75/microsofts-ballmer-challenges-vanity-fairs-lost-decade-claim/ * http://oneffectivemanagement.wordpress.com/2008/08/19/where-does-bad-corporate-culture-come-from-and-can-it-be-corrected/ * Civility: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mary-prefontaine/corporate-leaders-must-re_1_b_1437445.html * Not shipping said product: http://www.kmfms.com/whatsbad.html * Competiton: http://blog.seattlepi.com/microsoft/2010/06/03/ballmer-and-microsofts-main-competitors-are/ * David to Apple Goliath: http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/24/tech/innovation/fixing-microsoft/index.html