Joseph H Pilates Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Joseph H Pilates - Essay Example By the age of 14 he was the penultimate model, and had even begun modeling for anatomy charts. Eventually through the culmination of his own childhood and experiences, an idea began to grow in his mind. He eventually decided that everyone's modern lifestyle, bad posture, and inefficient breathing were the roots of poor health, and he would find a way to combat that effectively. He then began work on what would become known as the Pilates Method. He created a series of various exercises that would help combat these evils. Ultimately "his answer to these problems was to design a unique series of vigorous physical exercises that help to correct muscular imbalances and improve posture, coordination, balance, strength, and flexibility, as well as to increase breathing capacity and organ function. He also invented a variety of machines, based on spring-resistance, which could be used to perform these exercises"( http://www.jillianhessel.com/pilates_biography.html). He would eventually include these spring Machines into ideas such as the Cadillac and the Universal reformer. Now all that lacked was a name for his new theory of mind, which Pilates would later call contrology. The first people to embrace his methods of Body Contrlogy were dancing students.

Supply chain Essay Example for Free

Supply chain Essay INTRODUCTION The operation plays key role in firms because it affects operation managers understand their customers and translate their customers needs into performance objectives. In turn, the performance objectives (and especially the relative importance of each one) influence the overall operations strategy of the business. (Slack et al., 2010,) The reason is that managers can based on performance objectives to do decision because it is reflection of corporation strengths and weaknesses. This essay will describe the Toyota Motor Corporation performance around five-performance objective: quality, speed, dependability, flexibility and cost. Then following discussion of how Toyota uses techniques in operation management to achieve the five objectives. Based on analysis, some suggestions for this firm will shows in the conclusion. FIVE PERFORMANCE OBJECTIVES IN TOYOTA As most successful car manufacturer in the world, Toyota is a few automobile companies that able to be stockless production system by its unique operational management systems, the most famous Toyota Production System (TPS) and Just-In-Time (JIT). Further, in terms of five performance objectives, which Toyota did quite well in the overall circumstances, especially in the cost, speed and flexibility areas. Toyota cooperation was chosen to analysis because its significant performances and great operations management. Organizations can respond to the performance objectives, but the real challenge is to offer better quality, speed, dependability and flexibility at lower costs than the competition. (Slack et al., 2007) Also, the aim and objective of Toyota is making low-cost, high-efficiency, high-quality production to maximize customer satisfaction and keeping strong competitiveness. (Toyota, 2011) QUALITY Quality can be defined as specification of a product or service, also meaning high specification and must satisfy your customers by providing  error-free goods and services, which are fit for their purpose. (Pycraft, 2000) The external affect of good quality within in operations is that the customers without (or less) complain leading to customers more likely to consume again because the customer feel has received real value for money. This brings in more revenue for the company. For internal influence, conformance quality is high that generally means that cost is saved, dependability increases and speed of response increases. If an operation is continually correcting mistakes, it finds it difficult to respond quickly to customers requests. (Slack et al., 2010) SPEED Speed indicates the time between the beginning of an operation process and its end. (Greasley, 2010) More specific, that means the elapsed time between a customer asking for a product or service and getting it with a satisfactory condition. (Slack et al., 2010) Externally affect of speed is important because it helps to respond quickly to customers and resulting customers return with more business. The internal side have much to do with cost reduction. Usually, faster throughput of information (or customers) will mean reduced costs via reduces the need to manage transformed resources as they pass through the operation and helps to overcome internal problems by maintaining dependability. DEPENDABILITY In terms of dependability, is usually means being on time, in other words, keeping delivery promised to the customer that receive their products or services on time. (Slack et al., 2010) Also, dependability is other half of total delivery performance along with delivery speed and always linked in some way. In externally influence, dependability as good thing for customers also enhances the company product or service in the market, or at least avoids customer complaints. Internally dependability has affect on cost via saving time, saving money directly and giving an organisation the stability that allows it to improve its efficiencies. Moreover, it prevents late delivery slowing down throughput speed. FLEXIBILITY Flexibility always means being able to change the operation in some way, vary or adapt the operations activity to cope with unexpected circumstance or to meet customer requirements gives a flexibility advantage to customers. (Slack et al., 2010) Flexibility has several specific types: Product or service flexibility; Mix flexibility; Volume flexibility and Delivery flexibility. For external affect, the different types of flexibility allow an operation to fit its products and services to its customers in some way, such as produce wide range and frequent new products or services. On other hand, Volume and delivery flexibility adjust its output levels and its delivery procedures in order to cope with unexpected changes. The internal influence is speeds up response, saves time (money) and helps maintain dependability. COST Produce goods and services at a cost, which enables them to be priced appropriately for the market while still allowing for a return to the organization. (Slack et al., 2010) not surprisingly, low cost is a universally attractive objective because lower cost means higher revenue and more competitiveness. If managed properly, high quality, high speed, high dependability and high flexibility can not only bring their own external rewards, they can also save the operation cost.(Greasley, 2010) FIGURE 1: INTEGRATION IN FIVE PERFORMANCE OBJECTIVES Reference: Slack el at, 2010. Chapter 2: _The strategic role and objectives of operations_, Operations management. From figure 1 and unique Toyota Production System, which shows the company five-performance objectives irrelative significantly with each other. As Toyotas mainstay, quality is the most emphasize element of this company. According to the relevant survey institutions that indicates Toyotas  vehicles consistently rank near the top in third-party customer-satisfaction. (Toyota, 2012) Excellent quality of Toyota not only prevents errors slowing down throughput speed, also avoid wasted time and effort, therefore saving cost. For instance, if there occurs many non-value-added activities that mean the company need use time, money and human resource to solve it and increase cost. Also, if quality is not qualified in the produce process then rework will drag on production speed. According to survey data from relevant agencies, the three giants in US, General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, parts procurement costs higher than Toyota 8%. Alternatively, Just-in-Time (JIT) stockless production system is extremely increasing Toyota productivity, which means the speed of production is fast. High speed helps Toyota maintaining dependability via zero (less) inventories because the company can respond to the market quickly. Toyota is a dependable company resulting by TPS (Toyota production system) with multi skilled worker that work as a team, and with control has allowed them to deliver products as promised. On the other hand, be more dependability can increase speed without late delivery and saving cost. In addition, For Toyota plant, flexibility means the ability to produce new products and offer wide range volume. During these years, Toyota has provided a wide range of options cars, such as SUV (Prado, RAV4), hybrid fuel (Prius,Yaris Hybrid) , commercial vehicle, sports car(GT86) and bus et al, also to meet environment and economic changes, Toyota was the earliest car maker to introduce hybrid fuel cars, with the commencement of Prius model. The high flexibility leading to Toyota brings frequent new products to the market to gain more competitiveness. Moreover, the speed from JIT system makes Toyota more flexibility in volume. TECHNICS IN TOYOTA Currently, the main competition between enterprises is from supply chain. The world famous TPS strategic management is also created by Toyota. It is called a variety of small amount of production of the unique market demand in Japan. From mass production of the highly formative changed to be a variety of small amount of production, to completely eliminate waste, improve production efficiency and cost competitive. For example, to increase  production, one person can do kinds of multi-skilled jobs (Kawada Makoto, 1993) Figure 2: TPS Structure JIT JIDOHKA According to Figure 2 indicates that TPS is comprised of two pillars, JIT and Jidoka (automation). Bicheno (1991) states that JIT aims to meet demand instantaneously, with perfect quality and no waste. Three key issues identified by Harrison (1992) as the core of JIT philosophy are: eliminate waste, involve everyone and continuous improvement (Kaizen). JIT approach, through rational design for make the product easy to produce and easy assembly. Essentially, just in time manufacturing consists of allowing the entire production process to be regulated by the natural laws of supply and demand. Customer demand stimulates production of a vehicle. In turn the production of the vehicle stimulates production and delivery of the necessary parts and so on. The result is that the right parts and materials are manufactured and provided in the exact amount needed. Under just in time the ultimate arbiter is always the customer. This is because activity in the system only occurs in response to customer orders. In order to support its JIT system, Toyota needs to ensure that the supplier in accordance with the cost, quality and timeliness, with on time delivery and production, stringent quality control system to help Toyota to reduce inventory, also minimize scrap production, and reduce non-value-added operations to increase quality, save cost and respond market immediately by decrease lead time. It also played an important role to ensure working capital is fully available that make the company be more flexibility to explore new production. (Kawada Makoto, 2004) Moreover, JIT emphasis on total preventative management (TPM), developed by total quality management (TQM). Toyota insists to regular maintenance activities, periodic inspection to equipment to avoid breakdowns and preventative repairs. Attention to the detection and control of each process, ensure found quality problems in a timely manner, immediately stop  produce until resolved. On other hand, TPM encourage all employees involved and use their knowledge to improve performance. (Greasley, 2010) In Japanese jidoka simply means automation. At Toyota it means automation with a human touch. The most visible manifestation of automation with a human touch is using andon cord situated in the line to intervene any abnormalities occur. KANBAN One system for implementing a pull system called a kanban production system. (Greasley, 2009) Kanban is the core in the JIT and it does not work without Kanban manage method. A kanban is simply a message. For example, in the assembly shop this message takes the form of a card attached to every component that is removed and returned when the component is used. The return of the kanban to its source stimulates the automatic re-ordering of the component in question. This system permits greater control over production as well as inventory via efficiency maximum. In Toyota process of produce, kanban is intended to convey information: what is needed when it is needed, and in the amount needed!(Lowson, 2002) The accurate number of parts allocation to avoid waste in the production process, thereby improving the manufacturing speed. KAIZEN / CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT Kaizen is the heart of the Toyota Production System. The day-to-day improvements that Members and their Team Leaders make to their working practices and equipment are known as kaizen. This is simply common sense since it is clear that inherent inefficiencies or problems in any procedure will always be most apparent to those closest to the process. The sense of continuous improvement also can influence Toyota performance, such as quality directly. (Iyer, 2009) Overall, TPS use JIT to eliminate inventory and develop close relationships with suppliers, eliminate all but value-added activities, reduce the number of job classes and build worker flexibility, apply Total Productive  Maintenance (TPM) to increase productivity and ensure quality, thereby obtain faster produce speed and improve productions; avoid waste time and resource to reduce cost; Regards to integration of these five performance objectives, faster speed and low cost resulting to Toyota becoming more dependability and have enough capital to be flexibility. When a company can respond the customer required immediately that means it could be depend. Refers to the flexibility, when Toyota have large amount capital then the firm could use on the production innovation to explore more cars types to offer the market and develop cars capability to increase quality of productions. (Greasley, 2010) CONCLUSION In conclude, Toyota has good performances on speed and quality, thereby promoting the dependability to the customer, also this firm did great on the flexibility because Toyota keep introducing new types of car. The interrelationship between these performances takes a significant benefit for save cost, for instance, faster speed means efficiency to save time and labor source to avoid waste. Although Toyota is extremely successful carmaker, but the recall events in 2009 caused great impacts for it. The reason is the company eagers to rapid expand to the market, the quality of management and personnel training has not been followed up, and then resulting series of parts defects. Moreover, in terms of excessive cost cutting, cause quality of components cannot guarantee. There have four suggestions for Toyota to developing performance: Firstly, Toyota in order to reduce expenditure in research and development via using general parts and components, but the manager have not realize technical innovation is the most important mean to reduce the cost of doing business, promote new products, the company should focus on technology innovation to be more efficiency and flexibility. Secondly, Toyota enterprises should pay more attention on After-sales service, the cost of these services is much lower than the recall and increase the sense of dependability to Toyota, such as Toyota car examination and driving lessons for free. Thirdly, Toyota need to strengthen the staff training to avoid the quality defects occurs in  the process of produce line. Thus, not only can ensure the cars quality and save cost without deal with the consequence from employees non-value-added activities. Finally, the company should increase more quality testing sections to examine new productions repeatedly. In general, the speed of produce car is quick resulting the production line easily ignore the nature of Toyota quality. Increase the quality inspection to insure Toyota manufacture superior products, which enhance the company production quality and dependability. As we known, quality is everything, if the company to seek a long term development then should be offer good products, not just focus on how to save cost thereby supply defective to the customer. REFERENCE: Iyer, A., 2009. _Toyota Supply Chain Management: A Strategic Approach to Toyotas Renowned System_.pp.95-99 Harrison,A. ,1992. Philosophy and core techniques, TIME†¬: Greasley, A., 2010. Lean Operations and JIT, _OPERATIONS MANAGEMTN_ pp. 348-365 T. Gabriel, J. Bicheno, J.E. Galletly, (1991) JIT Manufacturing Simulation, Industrial Management Data Systems, Vol. 91 Iss: 4, pp.3 7 Kawada Makoto.1993. _Why And How, Management Accounting_, Strategic Management Accounting Kawada Makoto.2004. Toyota System And Management Accounting. Publish: Central Economic, China. Lowson, R., 2002. Lean production and just-in-time, Strategic Operations Management. PP.457 Pycraft, M., 2000. _OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT_, pp. 48. Slack N., Chambers, S., Johnston, R., 2010. _OPERATIONS_ _MANAGEMENT._ Slack, N., 2007. _OPERATIONS, STRATEGY AND OPERATIONS STRATEGY,_ pp.24 Toyota, 2011. _Toyota Global Vision Mission Statement Announced._ Available at: Toyota, 2012. _Global sustainability reports_ [pdf] Available at:

Article Review (entertainment) :: essays research papers

â€Å"On the Money†, an article written by Allison Hope Weiner, is a brief article written as an effort to help explain the controversy surrounding the celebrity telethon that was held almost three months ago. The telethon, America: A Tribute to Heroes, ended up receiving donations totaling an estimated one hundred and fifty million dollars all put into a fund overseen by the United Way, called the September 11th Fund. This fund has received over three hundred and forty million dollars all from donators. The controversy of the telethon arises with the distribution of the money. During the telethon, celebrities were stating that all of the money donated would go directly to the victims of September 11 and their families. Even though the charity supporting the event, the United Way, relinquished their administrative costs, the other organizations that were awarded donated money did use some of the donations to pay for their operating costs. The other controversial issue that is explained in this article is length of time taken to deliver the donated money to the victims of the national tragedy. The article explains that it takes time for charities to give money to disaster victims. Plans must be in place for who obtains the money and how much they receive. The last controversial issue examined in this article is the celebrities who encouraged people to donate to this fund and their role in how the money is spent. Bill O’Reilly has accused the celebrities of using the telethon to improve their public image instead of helping the victims of September 11. He also states that if celebrities put more pressure on the charities involved they would be better organized and aid the victims further. I believed that this article was important to the entertainment industry in the segment of celebrity endorsements. When celebrities, such as George Clooney and Julia Roberts that are idolized by the American public, endorse a product, or give their opinion on a controversial subject, they usually have a following of their fans that agree with them. People tend to trust celebrities and their opinions on subjects. This very great power was illustrated well during the telethon in discussion. When this power is misused or used to benefit the celebrity at the cost of victims of a horrible tragedy, the public image of the celebrities involved becomes marred. During this telethon, many celebrities told us that one hundred percent of the money donated would go directly to the victims of September 11.

Internet in Schools :: essays research papers

Internet in Schools Everything revolves around the internet these days. Every business, big or small has a internet website for you to visit. Let’s face it, the internet is not going away, we as a people must learn to use this tool and not think of it as a negative thing. The internet must be used positively to benefit us. We can find anything we want through the internet. The internet can be abused but we must educate our children so they can use it effectively to their advantage. We definitely need to make most schools have the internet in classrooms, there is no doubt about it. Internet needs to be in the classrooms of schools in the new millennium. If you can’t get on and surf the internet by yourself then you are looked down upon. The internet is the new big thing, it’s technology at it’s best. That’s why we must keep our students in schools educated and updated with it, the internet has endless possibilities. Students would never run out of information for their reports in school, they can either go to the library and look for the information they need and hope that the book they need is not checked out, which could take up to a couple of hours. While on the internet you can find the information in the matter of minutes. Many books are outdated and you would be lucky to check one out if everybody in the class is doing the same report! The internet keeps up with current information coming in every day of the week. I don’t think students abusing their time on the internet is a problem, I think we need teachers or someone to monitor where they are going on the internet. There are programs advisors can download that can block out any material not suitable for students at schools. The world is at your fingertips with the internet, you can do anything imaginable. It is the schools duty to have the internet, forget the library, I’m sure students would agree with me that using the internet would be much easier to find the information you are looking for than the library. If you don’t know how to use the internet then you are missing out, anything you want is on there. The internet alone could be a career, there are online businesses that make just as much money as jobs outside your home.

Importance of time Essay

Do to the fact that I could not maintain punctuality in a classroom environment I shall be writing an essay of the importance of punctuality in the United States Military. Now of course it seems like this would be easy to understand however I had managed to forget it and this shall explain it in this essay. Before you can understand how being punctual is important you must understand what being punctual means. Punctuality is the characteristic of being able to complete a required task or fulfill a moral duty before or at a specific time. There is often an understanding that a small amount of lateness is acceptable.. However in some cultures, such as Japanese society, or in the military there basically is no allowance. Some cultures have an unspoken understanding that actual deadlines are different from stated deadlines; for example, it may be understood in a particular culture that people will turn up an hour later than advertised. In this case, since everyone understands that a 9 A.M. meeting will actually start around 10am, no-one is inconvenienced when everyone turns up at 10am. In cultures which value punctuality, being late is tantamount to showing disrespect for another’s time and may be considered insulting. In such cases, punctuality may be enforced by social penalties, for example by excluding low-status latecomers from meetings entirely. Being at the right place at the right time for any member of the Army is extremely essential to the defense of the entire United States of America. It’s because of this that being on time is remarkably important. Dependability, accountability, consistency and discipline are all crucially related to being on time. Furthermore, promptness also shows that the individual Soldier aims high and has their priorities straight. However, being where one needs to be at the appointed time will always be one of the most important aspects of being a Soldier. This is why failure to be on time not only severely hinders mission capability and readiness, but also can without a doubt cost unnecessary loss of life. It is important to realize that it is necessary for those in the Armed Forces are held to a higher standard. Being punctual in the military is important for many reasons, some of which I shall describe, right now. One of the few reasons for punctuality in the military would be if someone is late for a patrol or convoy that patrol or convoy might have to leave without that person, or maybe wait for them or can’t leave without them and be late to a rally point in which it is possible that it would cost some one  there life for you being late being late to a convoy and could lead to dire consequences. Not necessarily to you but to your battle buddies you let down by not showing up. While they are on patrol, or convoying to another area, something could happen that could either need your expertise and training or they could just need another soldier to keep watch of their area and without you it would take more manpower from less people to do the job that you were supposed to do. Or maybe the patrol you were supposed to be on could be ambushed and your weapon, your eyes and your training could be what makes the difference between your patrol losing soldiers or not. It is possible that if you had been there your patrol could have seen the ambush with the extra set of eyes watching, or taken out the enemy with the extra soldier carrying a weapon he/she was trained to use. Now being late could be what makes you lose battle buddies that could have survived if you were there to help them in that situation. Even more possible is that your battle buddies are on a convoy and it could have been your eyes that notice the strange object in the road or the slight discoloration, or maybe the disheveled earth of the road ahead of you that could have prevented your convoy from running into an IED. Or in another situation one might be on their way to meet someone from another country and showing up late would be looked at as a dishonorable and that you didn’t care about them or what they were trying to do. Also being late could also hinder your battle buddies at work. You being late makes your battle buddy who you are supposed to relieve stay later than he/she is supposed to, meaning that said person loses sleep time. Another reason might be because if you were going to relieve someone from duty on a guard duty it will make whoever your relieving have to stay at work. Therefor making them stay longer which then makes them tired and sluggish. And because they are because they are tired and sluggish, it increases the high chance that whatever work that person does would be under par and not up to standards because of lack of sleep. Which on a guard post they might fall asleep and someone might slip in or pass along some classified information to the enemy without any difficulty. Although the United States is not the only society that places a high regard on being on time, Americans in particular it would seem have been criticized in the past for being a highly time-oriented people, and some other cultures may not place the same level of importance on being punctual as exists in the United States today. This sense of being tied to a clock may strike some observers from other cultures as being downright psychotic, but the fact remains that the importance of being on time is an enormously important part of the American value system and it would be reasonable to suggest that this will not change. In addition, people who fail to be on time also demonstrate whether intentionally or not what may be considered as a callous disregard for other people and their time. In the United States, then, the importance of punctuality is well established and those who are even a few minutes late for say, a job interview, run the very real risk of losing out to lesser qualified candidates simply because they were unable to find a place to park in time. Similarly, people who are consistently late will be viewed as unreliable by most employers and also run the risk of losing whatever employment they have managed to secure in the first place. Being on time is one thing, but being early is completely different. When you’re assigned to be at an appointed place at an appointed time then there is no room for tardiness. Not only is it disrespectful to your co-workers in regards to making them stay later and putting them â€Å"under the bus† but also it is an integrity check and denotes your lack of responsibility. When you have a trend of being late none of your co-workers will feel as if they can’t rely on you.

Free Essays on Diet Pills; Not Quite The Easy Way Out

Diet Pills; Not Quite the Easy Way Out In today’s modern society diet pills such as Hydrocycut, Stackers and Xenadrine FRA-1 are all the new rave. They are supposed to be an easy, quick and healthy way to loose weight and gain energy without the burden of dieting or proper exercise. On the contrary, most individuals do not realize the health risks involved with taking theses so called â€Å"natural ingredient pills.† In fact, since ICOF last covered performance-enhancing diet pills in December 1998, the U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy charged that almost 30% of Olympic athletes were using them (1). Are Diet pills safe? Just because a pill is made of natural ingredients, does not mean that those ingredients are not harmful. All of the diet pills on the market contain different ingredients. Ephedrine, the all-natural stimulant is, generating the most controversy. Ephedrine is a natural chemical found in the Ephedrine Sinica plant. As Dee Murphy has noted, â€Å"Ephedrine as a pill, has many side effect including but not limited to, rapid irregular heart beat, dizziness, headache, shortness of breath, sleeplessness, tremor, nausea, loss of consciousness and many other serious health problems.(18)† But some weight-loss experts believe such supplements are vital to helping many overweight people cope. Carlon colker, a weight-loss doctor in Greenwhich, Conneticut, says the message that Americans should simply eat healthy and exercise â€Å"just isn’t working.† If it were he argues that obesity-related problems from heart disease to diabetes would not be increasing as quickly as they are right now. He contends supplements like ephedrine, which he says is â€Å"absolutely safe† when taken as directed, give many people the extra push they need to begin taking proper care of themselves (1). There are many ways to loose weight in a healthy way. For some people it does take a little more than exercising daily and eatin... Free Essays on Diet Pills; Not Quite The Easy Way Out Free Essays on Diet Pills; Not Quite The Easy Way Out Diet Pills; Not Quite the Easy Way Out In today’s modern society diet pills such as Hydrocycut, Stackers and Xenadrine FRA-1 are all the new rave. They are supposed to be an easy, quick and healthy way to loose weight and gain energy without the burden of dieting or proper exercise. On the contrary, most individuals do not realize the health risks involved with taking theses so called â€Å"natural ingredient pills.† In fact, since ICOF last covered performance-enhancing diet pills in December 1998, the U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy charged that almost 30% of Olympic athletes were using them (1). Are Diet pills safe? Just because a pill is made of natural ingredients, does not mean that those ingredients are not harmful. All of the diet pills on the market contain different ingredients. Ephedrine, the all-natural stimulant is, generating the most controversy. Ephedrine is a natural chemical found in the Ephedrine Sinica plant. As Dee Murphy has noted, â€Å"Ephedrine as a pill, has many side effect including but not limited to, rapid irregular heart beat, dizziness, headache, shortness of breath, sleeplessness, tremor, nausea, loss of consciousness and many other serious health problems.(18)† But some weight-loss experts believe such supplements are vital to helping many overweight people cope. Carlon colker, a weight-loss doctor in Greenwhich, Conneticut, says the message that Americans should simply eat healthy and exercise â€Å"just isn’t working.† If it were he argues that obesity-related problems from heart disease to diabetes would not be increasing as quickly as they are right now. He contends supplements like ephedrine, which he says is â€Å"absolutely safe† when taken as directed, give many people the extra push they need to begin taking proper care of themselves (1). There are many ways to loose weight in a healthy way. For some people it does take a little more than exercising daily and eatin...

Social Media Marketing (SMM)

Social Media Marketing (SMM) Introduction The business realm across the world has been undergoing enormous transformations and one of the foremost changes in the entrepreneurship sector is the emergence of technological advancements (Evans McKee, 2010).Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Social Media Marketing (SMM) specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Modern technologies have been integral in supporting the growth and development of rapturous networking activities and Social Media (SM) has presently become one of the main issues in the business paradigm. Social media platforms, which comprise the actively consumed websites that are enhanced by the advent of the net 2.0 technologies, have been significantly influential in major business undertakings. Social Media Marketing (SMM) is a modern marketing technique that uses social networking platforms like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Google+ among other social networks (Neti, 2011). The use of social media marketing strategies is increasingly becoming viral across the world, thus becoming renowned as viral marketing. This study examines the overall impact of SMM on modern entrepreneurship. Reasons behind the popularity of SMM Marketing as a business strategy entails activities such as advertisement, announcement, promotion, and these marketing components require effective communication. As one of the best contemporary innovations, social networks are exceedingly becoming the focal point of human social interaction, thus presenting unique entrepreneurial experiences (Evans McKee, 2010). Social media is one of the modern communication tools that have recently proven to be powerful in influencing both informal and formal communication where millions of potential consumers interact freely. Having the ability to engage consumers in an active interaction where sharing of information is effectual through powerful technological devices, social media is gradually receiving att ention from businesses of all sizes. Social media platforms currently tend to associate with flexibility, effectiveness, convenience, and efficiency in business communication where investors are capable of sharing important information with their stakeholders, who include potential business clients (Bailyn, 2012). By using social networks in business communication, flexibility is achievable via devices that support these platforms, which mainly include accessible technological devices like mobile phones, computers, and tablets (Pradiptarini, 2011). Users access these social networks at their convenient time, hence communication consistency.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Businesspersons consider social networks as convenient communication and information-sharing tools for they involve instant feedback ability where messages reach users expediently. Most recently, researchers have found a great correlation between the use of social networks in businesses with enhanced sales output following increased connection between consumers and entrepreneurs (Pradiptarini, 2011). Communities, which form the greatest composure of active consumers of products and services of businesses, are the main cause of rapid growth of social media marketing. Since social media involves engaging in diverse online social networking communities, it potentially has substantial influence on attracting enormous consumer population (Pradiptarini, 2011). More specific, as all modern businesses in the markets are targeting the youthful consumers, vibrant youths in social networks offer business boom. Advantages and disadvantages of SMM to entrepreneurs Social media marketing emerged with numerous experiences and brought several opportunities as well as challenges that entrepreneurs have encountered. Being a hotly business contested subject, social networks seem to have presen ted some potential benefits that have encouraged businesses in their performance (Evans McKee, 2010). Social media platforms are important facets of exposing the business to the competent markets and reaching out potential consumers. The foremost advantage of social networks in businesses is the enhancement of communication, information exchange, and knowledge sharing. This aspect of social networks enhances a mutual connection between consumers and entrepreneurs that subsequently boosts the productivity of the businesses. During promotion, advertising, and announcement of social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace are progressively becoming essential communication tools (Bailyn, 2012). These social media networks play a pivotal role in boosting marketing campaigns for organization’s products and services, which subsequently influences positive business outcomes. Modern consumers currently rely more on social networks to access important information concerning new p roducts and services offered by companies.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Social Media Marketing (SMM) specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Marketing also involves procedures of unveiling and introducing new products to the market in a process commonly known as product launching. Research considers social media as a great platform useful in creating the accurate market buzz prior to launching a new product or service (Vries et al., 2012). As consumers are currently demanding exemplary services, social media enhances marketing campaigns, which are becoming useful in strengthening product and service information within the markets. Consumers tend to concentrate and associate with famous market products and since social media are assisting in communication of information pertaining to product and service, they help in building brand reputation. Companies using social networks are capable of attracting public attention mor e easily and marketing effectiveness of these networks becomes eminent when business performance enhances through increased market share and revenue performance (Vries et al., 2012). Using powerful videos, photographs, audio streaming, widgets, and other social media features, companies create and share quality content to communicate their services and products to the business community. Notwithstanding its ability to transform almost every aspect of modern business activity through sophisticated technologies, social media has also received criticism from entrepreneurs (Pradiptarini, 2011). The foremost challenge that comes with the modern technologies and the social media networks is the presence of insecurity within these platforms. Entrepreneurs have little potency to control the growing cyberspace and Internet security, possess little control over the entire conservation, and can barely manipulate the pessimistic perceptions of clients expressed in public social websites (Vries et al., 2012). There is a high possibility of getting negative feedback from ill-motivated clients due to bad opinions from competitors expressed on social media.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The vibrant cyber activities that engage genuine civilians and illegitimate users across networks with little control strategies placed by the organizations, places companies at high risk of encountering fraud (Bailyn, 2012). Tracing the route of negative conversation and fraudulent activities is a challenge and as many companies continually engage in social media marketing, the fears about losing billions of finances in fraud cases remain unsettled. How SMM helps Pepsi gain more customer insight Since its inception as a potential marketing tool, social media marketing has been the most anticipated practice among several small, medium, and even multinational corporations. As Neti (2011) postulates, â€Å"Adult beverage companies, exotic automobile manufacturers, pastry shops have been using social media tool† (p.8). Alongside other major multinational companies, PepsiCo is one of the world leading international companies famous for producing carbonated Pepsi soft drinks, and currently its Pepsi Refresh project has provided a new breakthrough in its marketing strategies. Pepsi Refresh project is responsible for turning individuals’ dreams into realities by producing and researching about marketing possibilities of PepsiCo and funding amazing ideas that support the notion of Pepsi as a soft drink that refreshes the world. Being responsible for managing resources of the billion dollars worth corporation PepsiCo, Pepsi Refresh project has recently associated with social media marketing as one of its major strategy to make Pepsi a world refreshing drink. In marketing their major business, going to the market, unveiling, and launching new brands from the company, Pepsi undertook an online consumer-based study in which it concluded that social media was important in creating and sharing ideas. Results on the investigations from the 2009 Pepsi Optimism Project about the means of communication of the research impelled PepsiCo to develop off and online for ums where social innovation could help in marketing the Pepsi Refresh project. According to Neti (2011), â€Å"Pepsi Coke, Nokia and many of the top brands have effectively used social media for achieving their business objectives† (p.8). During the process of establishing and informing people about the Pepsi Refresh project, PepsiCo consistently used social media tactics to access multitudes of people. PepsiCo used Facebook, Twitter, and refresheverything.com to market its idea, and this viral marketing through text messages and video clips captured a huge public attention successfully. In using social media in marketing the Pepsi Refresh project, the company spent less money. Through refresheverthing.com, Pepsi became the most publicly renowned Super Bowl brands. In its impact, approximately 37% of Americans familiarized with Pepsi compared to 12% for the same marketing program. Over eighteen million exceptional consumer-oriented visitors engaged in activities of the refres heverthing.com website. In online brand rating and voting, more than 12,000 projects received consumer votes, with approximately 2 million online comments from 76 million votes cast. Benefiting from the newly developed refresheverthing.com website, brand attributes increased exponentially with products receiving favorability, trust, and attention among other important public interests. Online communities and consumers’ fan pages concerning the Pepsi products started developing following the initial influence. Two businesses that have used SMM to their advantage Demonstrated by a continuum of studies, investigations on the marketing rivalry among the major U.S corporations have continuously identified Pepsi and Coke as the biggest rivalries. However, most American companies including those in the fortune 500 have already integrated social media marketing. Apart from the beverage companies, exotic automobile manufacturers are using social media marketing. Retail companies as we ll as other major corporations have noticed the positive impact of social media in marketing. Microsoft and Wal-Mart are two major fortune 500 companies that have demonstrated exemplary approach towards social media marketing, with Facebook, twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn being the most used social websites in marketing their products. The two companies have established social media as one of the most effectual communication and interaction tool where millions of active potential consumers made of optimistic youthful population meet freely. Pradiptarini (2011) acknowledges a substantial influence of these social networks in enhancing marketing strategies, boosting sales revenues, and subsequently influencing financial growth. As social media gives marketers opportunities to communicate to the public and more specifically, the vibrant peers, consumers and potential customers, both Coke and Pepsi have been lively in promoting their brands through major social networks renowned in the US. Microsoft and Wal-Mart have been using social media marketing as a strategy in building brand awareness, launching new products from the company, and generating leads. As Vries et al. (2012) affirm, â€Å"Companies can place brand posts (containing videos, messages, quizzes, information, and other material) on these brand fan pages† (p.83). Wal-Mart and Microsoft have engaged their potential consumers in advertisements, promotional activities, and other marketing activities that reveal product information to the consumers. Regarding their involvement in brands and companies on the social media, Pradiptarini (2011), noticed that approximately 71.14% of the Facebook users proved to be fans of brands produced by the two companies. In addition, 38.63% of their Twitter fans and followers, followed brands advertised by the two companies. Future expectations of SM on marketing People have awakened towards a contemporary business world that requires present and forthcoming technologi es to improve their overall effectiveness and social media is the probable marketing tool whose influence may never cease (Vries et al., 2012). The world is currently experiencing a shortage of youth employment and social interactions have been one of the leisure activities that keep youths engaged. With the emergence of powerful technological devices like tablets, upgraded laptops, and the Smartphone technologies, social media continue to be a trendy business and social tool. The number of Facebook accounts, Twitter users, and other social media users following new brands and products online is rapidly increasing (Neti, 2011). Coupled with unique and captivating experiences that social networks provide to the active youths and businesspersons, online working opportunities like brand advertising, social media may continue influencing social and business life for millions of decades to come (Pradiptarini, 2011). Social media is an all-inclusive advancing technology where all age grou ps have their portion and as the present population gets weary, new generating still admire these experiences. Notwithstanding its great potential in influencing millions of users, emerging issues in the cybercrime and related cyberspace insecurity may continue posing significant challenges to the social network users. Internet hacking activities, cyber bullying, and several other unethical practices associated with social networking are subjecting users to frustrations (Evans McKee, 2010). Since few policies and rules are currently present in curbing cyberspace insecurity and users are becoming used to social networks unaware of the mushrooming dangers, use of social media may face drastic collapse in the occurrence of a major concern (Evans McKee, 2010). Organizations themselves do not have governance and processes for controlling the use of social media within and outside the company. Both Facebook and Twitter have reported criminal challenges and even in their privacy terms, a buse related concerns are not addressed appropriately (Bailyn, 2012). In other websites, cases pertaining to social media crime remain undermined, go unreported, or even lack enough evidence to capture and prosecute the offenders. Conclusion The US is among the nations experiencing a rapid influx of social networking activities with this rise in social media networking providing companies and consumers a gateway to enhanced communication. Advanced beverage companies, exotic automobile companies, and even pastry shops have recognized social media as a powerful marketing tool that connects companies with consumers. Pepsi, Coca Cola, and Nokia technologies are among the American multinational companies that have embraced the use of social media in marketing and successfully witnessed impressive results. They have reported increased brand positive reputation, increased product attention, enhanced customer relationship, and boosted sales turnover. Although most likely to continue facing high risks related to cybercrime, social media marketing may continue influencing marketing strategies of companies as present and maybe future generations will still continue anticipating for these experiences. References Bailyn, E. (2012). Outsmarting Social Media: Profiting in the Age of Friendship  Marketing. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. Evans, D., McKee, J. (2010). Social Media Marketing: The Next Generation of Business Engagement. New York, NY: Wiley Publishing Inc. Neti, S. (2011). Social media and its role in marketing. International Journal of Enterprise Computing and Business Systems, 1(2), 1-15. Pradiptarini, C. (2011). Social Media Marketing: Measuring Its Effectiveness and Identifying the Target Market. Journal of Undergraduate Research, 14, 1-11. Vries, L., Gensler, S., Leeflang, P. (2012). Popularity of Brand Posts on Brand Fan Pages: An Investigation of the Effects of Social Media Marketing. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 26(1), 83–91.

9 Steps to Produce a Professional Business Presentation

9 Steps to Produce a Professional Business Presentation 9 Steps to Produce a Professional Business Presentation The presentation is a very complicated and costly way of communication. It requires time, efforts, creativity and what is worse, it may not work if you have missed at least one important component. At the same time if a presentation is well-thought-out and properly organized it turns from being costly into being cost-efficient. Here are nine steps to create and deliver a professional business presentation, which will astonish your audience. Telling a Story Step 1. The goal should be clearly stated, written down and followed at every further step. Never start with asking yourself questions like: â€Å"What will I be talking about?†, â€Å"What is the best first line for this presentation?†, â€Å"How to capture attention?† Primarily you should determine your goal. Your goal is an answer to the question: â€Å"What do I want my audience to do after I finish?† You might want to be promoted, or hired, or receive a great mark for your project, or make people buy your product, invest money in your startup, you name it. To do: Determine your goal and write it down. Step 2. Find a dilemma in your story. No one likes boring stories like: â€Å"He felt in love with her, she felt in love with him. They lived happily ever after and had no problems. The end.† People want drama. People want you to show them a problem and then to solve it miraculously during your presentation. If your presentation doesn’t have any inner conflict, people won’t listen for long. To do: Apply some drama even when you are talking about microbiology. Step 3. Keep your story integral. Your presentation has the same structure as any good novel â€Å"beginning-stating a problem-peak (solving the problem)-ending.† You might have several smaller peaks, but you should still follow this order. It is better if one presentation is dedicated to one problem, but if you have several issues to cover, find the one uniting all of them. In this case, your smaller problems will be your small peaks. To do: Write down an outline of your story with a thesis in the beginning, peaks, and ending. Making Slides Step 1. Design matters. At this step, you make important decisions about slides. Determine, for example, whether they will be image or text centered and which are the most suitable fonts and colors, etc. To do: Choose fonts and colors, make sure they are matching. Step 2. Visualize. Don’t put huge tables with numbers or piles of text into your presentation. No one pays attention to them, first of all, because it is â€Å"mission impossible† to read and analyze them. Show trends and ideas with the simplest visualization you are capable of. To do: Add well-structured information, but don’t overload your slides. Step 3. One slide one idea. Make your slides concise and integral. One slide should contain only one simple idea, and serve your final goal. If some slide doesn’t complement the target you have determined, delete it, even if you like how it looks. To do: Check if every slide helps you achieve the major goal of the presentation. Delivery Step 1. Clarity is the answer. Focus on making your storytelling straight to the point. Establish organizational framework, for example, define the approximate time of the presentation and tell whether you are going to answer questions during the speech or right after it. To do: Write a clear introduction to your speech. Step 2. Stick to a storyline. It is hard, especially if you decided to answer some questions during the speech. You should balance between improvisation and the major line of your presentation. The easiest way to copy with this is to make repetitions and to understand clearly major peaks of the presentation. To do: Write down 3-5 issues you have to cover whatever it takes. Write 3 sentences about each, add a starting thesis and an ending. Learn all this by heart. Step 3. The audience is more important than content. Whatever your goal for this presentation is, the outcome largely depends on the way the audience perceives your delivery and you in general. People pay attention to what you say when you pay attention to people, not to your slides or paper with text. Talk to the audience, ask some short questions (rhetorical, if you are under time pressure) and make sure to keep eye contact. To do: Relax and try to enjoy what you are doing. Joy and engagement are infectious. Have a great time producing and delivering your custom presentation. We are sure you will rock it!

Security Roles In An Organization Research Paper

Security Roles In An Organization - Research Paper Example It is for this reason that the protection of an organization’s asset is very relevant for the growth and development of the organizations. For most organizations, there are specialized departments and units that take care of the management of their assets. Protection of asset is however seen in most contexts as a security issue and so its management and for that matter protection is left in the care of competent security professionals. In this paper, the results gathered from an interview with security personnel on the role security plays in protecting an organization’s assets are discussed. Professional responsibilities of security directors One of the major aspects of the interview touched on the roles that various security professionals play in the organizations. With a specific emphasis on the security director, it was realized that the role that the security plays in the organization is multi-variant. What this means is that the security director’s role cuts across several aspects of the organization’s asset management. Generally, the security director is expected to protect two major types of asset, namely tangible and intangible assets (Kolsaker and Lee-Kelley, 2008). Tangible assets are those types of assets that can be touched and seen such as vehicles, money, buildings, machinery, computers, manufactured products, and others. Intangible assets are those assets that cannot be seen or touched. These include database, copyright property, human capital, talent pipeline, organizational strategy, among others. As part of protection, the security director is mandated to prevent loss. This means that the security director is obliged to ensure that the quantitative value of the company’s asset will either remain same or they will appreciate. Under no justifiable condition should there be a reduction. To make this position, investigations and other administrative and managerial functions are required. In effect, the security d irector uses a preventive approach to protection so that losses will not occur before means of retrieving losses would even be talked about. Critical skills required for security personnel Having noted the depth of responsibility that the security director and for that matter security had in protecting the asset of the organization, the question of critical skills required for the execution of the roles were asked. It would be noted that the rendering of security service is seen as a professional duty and so comes with some well defined skills and knowledge that a person ought to possess in order to function effectively in that duty (Gray, 2004). The interviewee thus stressed that, observational skills, critical thinking skills, organizational skills, self control, innovativeness, being visionary, and interpersonal relationship were all skills that were needed for a person to function actively. From the skills that were named by the interviewee, there were three major categorization s that could be given to them. The first of these is personal development skills; second is group development skills; and third is organization development skills. In effect, the critical skills required for a security coordinator to succeed should be ones that make the coordinator proactive as a person, gives him the ability to work effectively in a team, and finally take the holistic skill of functioning

WORLDVIEW ANALYSIS Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

WORLDVIEW ANALYSIS - Essay Example The essential center is on issues of system and epistemology that is the routines, ideas, and hypotheses through which economists endeavor to land at learning about investment forms. Theory of mass trading is likewise concerned with the routes in which moral qualities are included in financial thinking. Budgetary thinking has suggestions for equity and human welfare; all the more essentially, financial thinking frequently. However noteworthy moral suppositions that savants of matters in profit making have thought that it was beneficial to investigate. The rationality of matters in profit making is concerned with the cement social presumptions that are made by economists. Scholars have offered thoughtfulness regarding the organizations and structures through which investment movement and change happen. The measurement of the theory of trading and lending that falls inside the rationality of science need to do with the status of financial investigation as an assemblage of exact learning. Logicians are not observational analysts, and in general they are not formal hypothesis manufacturers. There are a few parts of rationality in commercial concerns. To start with, thinkers are generally ready to inspect the coherent and balanced gimmicks of an experimental order. Second, thinkers are overall prepared to consider subjects needing to do with the ideas and speculations that economists utilize for instance, investment levelheadedness, Nash harmony, impeccable rivalry or transaction costs. Logicians can offer helpful examination of the qualities and shortcomings of such ideas and speculations in this manner helping honing economists to further refine the hypothetical establishments of their order. Till now, we have depicted the position of the thinker under worker of the economist. In originality, the line between feedback and hypothesis creation is not a sharp

Togo Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Togo - Essay Example The first elected president of Togo is Sylvanus Olympio on the elections of 1960 by beating Nicolas Grunitizky, the candidate supported by France. On January 13, 1963, the Olympio government is reversed by a military putsch organized by Nicolas Grunitizky and Etienne Gnassingb Eyadema then simple sergeant. After the assassination of Olympio, Grunitizky proclaims president. Its reign will be short, because in 1967 he is relieved by Gnassingb Eyadema who decided to seize power himself. His dictatorial attitude common to many African dirigants enables him to direct the country during 38 years he dies on February 5, 2005, which will enable him to dispute to Fidel Castro the title of "dictator longest in activity". The current president is the son of the former dictator Faure Gnassinbe, having taken the capacity after "elections". From an economic point of view Togo is one of the poorest countries of Africa. The situation could however have been different. The beginnings of the Eyadema reign of were lucky as well on the political than the economical point of view. It is unfortunately an economy made a long time of corruption, amateurism and improvisations. All the models were copied with more or less failure. From the "Chinese" economical plans, without any budgetary provision, to the Israeli co-operative plan, a common point characterizes all its stages: the absence of long-term prospect and ideological or theoretical bases. In 1967 the new port stimulated the economy, the extraction of phosphate had just been grinds and the modest industrialization still started by the first president seemed to succeed. The courses of the cocoa and the coffee were excellent. During 19 years Togo will know a certain stability period and even a relative prosperity because of very great phosphate resources (4th world producer, the resources are exploited by alien companies which pay a royalty to the Togolese government). However at the end of 1982, the country is in crisis and strongly involves in debt. President does not have other choices than respect the conditions of the experts of the International Monetary International Monetary Fund as well as the World Bank and France," The purse being empty". Alas as it is current in African countries, measurements are awkwardly applied with the result that the economic situation of the country is not improved on the contrary. The agricultural revolution for example starts by the president is by a failure, until our days Togo is still not self-sufficing in food goods. It is a result which however was foreseeable; it is indeed foolish to think that one can make pass directly to tractor a farmer who, all its life, ever uses hoe and machete without any preliminary formation. Hundreds of tractors were thus bought while the hangars where they would have being preserves had not been even built. The only positive point of this revolution was a considerable increase in the cotton production, from 1959 to 1989 the production increased: 2000 to 40000 tons. The industrialization or rather the attempt at industrialization of the country was quite as catastrophic. Until the phosphates boom of the country followed a careful course of industrialization which really succeeded, however later the president launched out in a series of useless and very expensive projects which

Social Media Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Social Media - Research Paper Example It is just less than a decade since social media has emerged as an effective marketing tool. â€Å"Before the social media boom, marketers thought social media marketing was just another fad that would soon likely pass, something in the vein of pyramid and networking scams.†It was from the immense popularity of Facebook that the companies started realizing the potential of social media for effective marketing. It especially helped the startup companies that did not have huge cash piles to shell out for marketing their products. Social media marketing for products and services is usually built around the users sharing the information with fellow users in their social circle. Users generally mean anyone with an access to internet services. The increasing popularity of social networking websites like Facebook, Twitter, Google + etc has taken the whole process of social media marketing to another level. The users ‘reposting’ or tweeting’ the product ad’s and brochures give the organizations wide exposure at a cheaper price compared to TV ads. The wide use of mobile phones with an internet connection has also helped the companies to be in constant touch with their customers, prospective or existing, and to interact with them on a real-time basis. This has enabled them to provide constant updates and to gain instant feedback.The popularity of video search engines like YouTube has also helped organizations to share videos of their products with customers.

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

Discussion Board 1-1 - Essay Example Examples of common tragic events that lead to crisis include and not limited to terrorism, suicides, earthquakes, tornadoes and hurricanes, financial meltdowns, job termination and deaths. Crises have three main elements namely, stressor event, perception of the event and effects and inadequate resources or incompetent strategies to absolve the given problems. Usually, psychologists gain interests to study life events after realizing associated negative effects of the events on human survival. In the same manner, the interest to study crises related to their effects on human life. The objectives of such studies are to find reasonable and reliable interventions to avoid and suppress human suffering due to the tragic events. Ideally, crisis intervention strategies differ from other counseling therapeutic intervention in certain ways. Compared to other counseling therapeutic interventions such as Structural Theory, Cognitive Behavioral and Systems theory among others, crisis intervention can take place at any place and setting and can be formal or informal. For example, depending on the severity of a stressing event, counselors might find it necessary to start crisis intervention in a chaotic and disorganized environments such those just hit by hurricanes, suicides or serial shootings. This form of intervention sounds informal and may not work with other counseling interventions. Another difference between crisis interventions from other counseling therapeutic interventions is that many counselors with different expertise can work as a team to handle single case of treatment (Jackson-Cherry & Erford, 2014). This is difficult especially with Structural, Systems and Cognitive Behavioral Theories that are mostly effective when implemented by single counselors. For instance, crises intervention for a tragic event such as earthquake that leaves people in various problems may need various expatriates in Cognitive Behavioral, Systems, Psychoanalytic, Experiential and

Social Media Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Social Media - Research Paper Example It is just less than a decade since social media has emerged as an effective marketing tool. â€Å"Before the social media boom, marketers thought social media marketing was just another fad that would soon likely pass, something in the vein of pyramid and networking scams.†It was from the immense popularity of Facebook that the companies started realizing the potential of social media for effective marketing. It especially helped the startup companies that did not have huge cash piles to shell out for marketing their products. Social media marketing for products and services is usually built around the users sharing the information with fellow users in their social circle. Users generally mean anyone with an access to internet services. The increasing popularity of social networking websites like Facebook, Twitter, Google + etc has taken the whole process of social media marketing to another level. The users ‘reposting’ or tweeting’ the product ad’s and brochures give the organizations wide exposure at a cheaper price compared to TV ads. The wide use of mobile phones with an internet connection has also helped the companies to be in constant touch with their customers, prospective or existing, and to interact with them on a real-time basis. This has enabled them to provide constant updates and to gain instant feedback.The popularity of video search engines like YouTube has also helped organizations to share videos of their products with customers.

Two creation story Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Two creation story - Essay Example Having read through Genesis 1-2, I came with the idea that there are two different creation stories in the bible. The above table gives us some of the ideas that can clearly show us that there are two different stories regarding creation. If you read biblical stories expecting them to tell you exactly what happened, be prepared for a shock as you won’t find the reality less you dig deeper in chapter one of the book of genesis. People are often surprised to realize that God is given two different names in Genesis 1 and 2: God and Lord God. This is not due to some conspiracy by those that translate the Bible into English. â€Å"God† in the first story and the â€Å"lord God†, in the second are used consistently in Hebrew. The different story tellers are just but people. Looking at the way these stories are told, the first story is rather orderly. In that account, God speaks and something comes into existence or being, God sees that it is good, and there is evening and morning respectively: day one ( or two, three, e.t.c) I like to picture God in Genesis 1standing offstage with microphone, booming the lines, â€Å"let there be†¦..† In speaking things into being, instead of being right in our midst, God comes across as somewhat removed. Theologians describe this representation of God as being transcendent. In the second story of creation according to me, Lord God creates things in a slightly different order than what we see in Genesis chapter 1. There are no days that delineated in this account , and God Lord does not speak things into being. This account could almost start with, â€Å"Once upon a time†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬  Here Lord God seems to be right in the middle of things,. Even using hands but the question is, â€Å" does God really and really have physical

United States History Essay Example for Free

United States History Essay 1. Compare and contrast the U.S. experiences in World War I and World War II. War have become an inevitable part of the United States History. So far, the U.S. have engaged in numerous wars dating back to the civil war to the present Iraq war. However, it was in the First and Second World Wars that the U.S. had a major participation that resulted in the restoration of peace and order all over the globe. During World War I, the U. S. held a neutral stand for quite a long period during the early 1900s. At first, World War I was perceived by many Americans as a European conflict but when they realized that their economy and even the lives of some Americans were being adversely affected, they gradually shifted to a warring mode. At that time, U.S. economy was largely dependent on overseas trading but when the war broke out, it dramatically halted economic trading because they were no longer able to sell goods to other countries particularly to Britain and Germany. This event negatively influenced the economy of the United States. More so, the Americans became more agitated when the Germans attacked passenger ships that led to the death of numerous prominent Americans. However, it was the alliance between Mexico and Germany that triggered U.S. to be directly involved in the war because it imposed an imminent threat since Mexico was geographically close to American soil (Hardgrove United States Involvement in WWI). On the other hand, the U.S. participation to World War II had some similarities with their involvement during First World War. In both wars, U.S. started with a neutral stance but the intensity of their involvement in World War II was heightened because of the direct attack at Pearl Harbor. The entire period of WWI, U.S. was only at the sidelines that was carried on to the early part of WWII. At first, Americans aid was mostly confined at providing supplies to the allied forces through the Lend-Lease Act. But when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and Germany and Italy declared war against the Americans, U.S. launched a massive offensive alongside with the British and Russians in Europe and Asia (Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia War comes to the United States). Clearly, U.S. involvement during World War II was more prevalent than in the First World War. Americans exhausted all their human and material resources during WWII to the point that it resulted to millions of casualties and thousands of deaths (Digital History Learn About World War II). 2. Explain how the Great Depression seemed to bring the U.S. to the brink of revolution and why you believe a revolution did or did not occur. The Great Depression was the time when the economy had an â€Å"immense disparity between U.S. productive capacity and the ability of Americans to consume.† At that time, the stock values at the New York Stock Exchange was at an all time low, many businesses have closed, several factories and banks have shut down. Also, there was a meager disposable income for an average American and the unemployment rate have catapulted ( Modern American Poetry The Depression in the United States). These were the economic consequences brought by the participation of the U.S. in WWI who became a â€Å"major creditor and financier of of postwar Europe.†Aside from the economic distress, depression also brought significant implications in the American political system. The presidential reign of Franklin Roosevelt allowed several modifications in the economy by increasing government regulation and massive public-works projects to facilitate rapid recovery. In spite of these initiatives, â⠂¬Å"mass unemployment and economic stagnation† persisted.( Modern American Poetry About the Great Depression) It seemed at this point that the Americans were already tired of waiting for the government to take bold actions in order for them to be instantaneously removed from the sinking hole of economic downfall. But the realization of the New Deal policies which focused on mitigating the effects of the depression and the outbreak of World War II have   hindered the possibility of having a revolt against the American government (Modern American Poetry The Depression in the United States). 3. How did World War II led to the Cold War and how was actual warfare between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. avoided while the two powers competed? Prior to the WWII, the U.S. had illustrated the Soviet Union as   an evil nation but during the war, the two became allies because of their common enemy which were the Germans. However, their alliance was filled with doubts and distrusts that became very apparent at the end of the war. Actually, Gen. Patton, an American General, expressed his desire to lead the Allied army against the Soviet Red Army. More so, many were agitated particularly Americans and British when Gen. Eisenhower, Supreme head of the Allied Command, conceded to the demand of Stalin that the Red Army would be the first to invade Berlin. America was threatened of Stalins vast and powerful Red Army, while the Russians were very cautious of U.S. advance weapons capabilities. This relationship facilitated the emergence of the Cold War (Trueman What was the Cold War). Because of the Cold War, the world was divided into three main groups. The West which is   comprised of democratic countries while the East was spearheaded by the Union which is composed of communist countries (GlobaSecurity.org Cold War). Since both nations acknowledged each others competencies in the field of war, they opted to have a cold war to prevent a massive catastrophe from happening. They were both afraid of each others nuclear weapons in which if used, it could destroy the whole human population. So instead of directly fighting, Russia and the U.S. agitated each other through other means such as by supporting â€Å"conflicts in various parts of the globe† and by setting up a propaganda war against each other (GlobaSecurity.org Cold War). Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union used client states to forward their indirect war against each other. These client states are countries who fought for the the Americans and Russians on their behalf. Such as in the case of North and South Vietnam and Afghanistan. Americans supplied the anti-communist South Vietnam with weapons when they were at war with Communist North Vietnam who was on the other hand used weapons from the Soviet Union. Also,Afghan rebels were helpe d by the Americans when the Russian invaded their country in 1979 (Trueman What was the Cold War). 4. Explain how motion pictures are documents of American culture and society. Films are useful tools in understanding a particular culture. More so, Hollywood have dominated the global industry of movie-making. It is because of their status as the most powerful country in the world that projected them to be the front runners in this field. Furthermore, since many admire the American way of life, American filmmakers used this opportunity to showcase the American culture through movies. From then on, numerous films   were made that had an American-theme. An example would be the movie Reality Bites. This film is about the dilemmas that most college graduates experience such as looking for work or determining their purpose in life. Also, it depicted the American modern yuppie life in an urban setting. Another example is the movie Titanic. It showed the economic disparity between the rich and the poor of the American society. Though the setting was multicultural, it focused mainly on two American characters who were separated in love because of their different social status. These are just few samples that depict the American culture and society. Some of the themes adapted showed the typical suburban family life, the X generation lifestyle which is defined by technological gadgets and invention of new colloquial terms and others. Also, it seems that movie goers are entertained and at the same time educated by these American-oriented films. Most of the motion pictures produced by Hollywood utilizes American culture, society and history to impart to audiences from within and outside the U.S. the richness and distinctness of their knowledge,   customs and civilization. More so, it is a subtle way of reinforcing their socio-economic and political status as a powerhouse nation.

To the Unknown Painter, Anselm Kiefer

To the Unknown Painter, Anselm Kiefer To the Unknown Painter, a painting made of oil, acrylic, latex, emulsion, and shellac, was created by Anselm Kiefer in 1983 (Figure 1). A palette adorned upon a pedestal sits in a vacated space surrounded by tattered columns while casket-like shapes seem to lay on the ground around the pedestal. Dark colors envelope the horizon while reds, browns, and whites color the columns. The palette sits directly in the center, almost unrecognizable, with a thin pedestal that matches the dark blue and black of the horizon. Straw is stuck on with a planned randomicity, giving it a scratchy and messy look. Although the area is physically empty, it is filled with Kiefers own victimhood and memories of traumatic events during Nazi Germany[1] Empty interiors of Nazi architecture, specifically referring to the courtyard of Hitlers Chancellery in Berlin designed by Speer, are used as a space for traumatic memories that will not be mourned or a space of internalization. Kiefer, a German himself, was born shortly before the Holocaust ended, so he did not experience much of the horrors many people lived through. The walls of columns suggest the Nazis and German rule keeping hidden the actions they had committed against millions of victims. Whereas the palette represents himself, a painter, who is stuck among the past and judgments of the present. The messy and scratchy texture simulates how Nazis would destroy artwork that were not in agreement with the German power. The painting speaks towards not only about himself, but towards the Germans and the Jewish. The empty space holds a memorial for traumatic memories of the Holocaust. Suspended in the center, the palette mounted on a pedestal becomes a memorial for Kiefers own sense of victimhood[2]. The palette, representing the victim, appears to look like it is trying to rise above the past and move on from those horrific events. Because he is German, he imagines himself as the victim of a burdensome historical legacy, unable to be unselfconsciously German because of the judgements passed on from others[3]. The painting brings people to the attention that not only what had happened was horrible, they shouldnt continuously badly judge and criticize current Germans who had no control of their ancestors choices. While the palette is reminiscent of a helmet resting upon a gun, it relates to a fallen soldier in a battle. Memorializing his life and what he went through. The battered architecture brings us back to remember that it is also a painting as well as a representation of memories being held within the space. Although the space seems to hold memories, the columns seem to be breaking and letting the memories go so they can be mourned and remembered instead of being repressed. The architecture reaches to the back with a one point perspective as if it is reaching towards the past. There could be two different interpretations from the painting from two different audiences, the Jewish and the Germans, or himself. The Jewish could interpret this as a way to memorialize the victims during the Holocaust, those who died because of German power. Casket-like shapes on the ground could represent these victims. Kiefer made a problematic claim that he and other Germans are victims as well because of the claims that they are still like theyre ancestors, so they will continue to carry around the burden of being German. The painting brings the attention of more about the scene of repression and how people shouldnt hold in the memories and be able to mourn them and let them go. Kiefer painted this along with a few others in a series, one of which is Tomb of the Unknown Painter. Doing research, this painting and To the Unknown Painter both came up when trying to find information, although more sources were available for this one[4]. Both of the paintings are similar in that they both use the same materials and contain a scratchy texture, attained with straw. Instead of a palette on a pedestal, a tomb sits upon stairs within a similar looking space. They represent similar things, traumatic events and a memorialization of those victims. The colors are dark, representing the dark past, mixed with strokes of bright colors such as red and yellow. Overall, Kiefer displays a controversial topic about the German victimization that has an impact on millions of people and can open peoples eyes to the reality of stereotyping and judgement upon them. His point is to get across that people should not continue to blame others for their ancestors actions, rather mourn the past and move on with a rebirth of a society. Word count: 814 Figure 1. To the Unknown Painter, Anselm Kiefer. 1983. Dem unbekannten Maler. Oil, acrylic, emulsion, shellac, and straw on canvas. 208 x 380cm[5]. Bibliography Saltzman, Lisa. Anselm Kiefer And Art After Auschwitz. Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1999. Arasse, Daniel. Anselm Kiefer. New York; Thames Hudson, 2015. [1] Lisa Saltzman. Anselm Kiefer And Art After Auschwitz. (Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1999), 68. [2] Ibid, 68. [3] Ibid, 69. [4] Daniel Arasse, Anselm Kiefer (New York; Thames Hudson, 2015), 70. [5] Ibid, 70.

Benefits of Cloning vs. Antiquated Religious Beliefs Essay -- Argument

Benefits of Cloning vs. Antiquated Religious Beliefs   Ã‚  Ã‚   When one thinks of cloning, what comes to mind?   Movies such as "Multiplicity" can give the lay person a very distorted image of cloning.   In this particular movie, actor Michael Keaton plays a father who cannot handle his crazily busy lifestyle.   In an effort to be the perfect father, husband and employee, he has himself cloned fairly easily at a nearby medical center.   The three clones each have their own personality: one is sarcastic and bitter, one is sweet and sensitive and one is a half-wit- but all are identical.   This cloning process is completely false.   At this time, scientists have cloned animals including Rhesus monkeys, mice and probably the biggest breakthrough: sheep.   Cloning could mean hope for so many different diseases.   The advancement of cloning in a medical laboratory should be encouraged.   Cloning could save transplant candidates.   According to Larry Reibstein and Gregory Beals, companies such as Alexion Pharmaceutical are already beginning to experiment with ways to grow hearts and kidneys in pigs that will not be rejected in transplants (58).   Perhaps another reason to encourage cloning is for the treatment of spinal cord injuries.   Cloning could give hope to couples unable to have children of their own.   By advocating cloning, doctors may find a way to cure or even prevent genetic diseases.   Perhaps, though, the most important reason to advance cloning in the laboratory is to treat leukemia's and cancers.   Very possibly, through cloning and genetic engineering, the growth of poorly formed cells could be stopped immediately.      One reason to clone is hope for organ transplants.   Currently organ transplantation is considered by some to ... ...sweek.   18 May 1998. Cohen, P.   "Dolly Helps the Infertile.   World Wide Web.   AOL 19 May 1999 [www.newscientist.com] "Human Cloning." World Wide Web. AOL. 24 Apr 1999.   [www.humancloning.org/] Masci, David.   "The Cloning Controversy."   The CQ Researcher.   9 May 1997: 409-431. Mikos, Antonios G. & Mooney, David J.   "Growing New Organs." World Wide  Ã‚   Web. AOL.   17 May 1999.   [www.sciam.com/1999/0499issue/0499mooney.html] "New scientist."   World Wide Web.   AOL 25 Apr 1999. [www.newscientist.com/nsplus/insight/clone.html] Ostrander, E.   "Seattle Researchers Zero In On Location of Gene For Inherited Prostate Cancer..."   World Wide Web. AOL. 23 May 1999. "Spinal Cord Repair."   World Wide Web.   AOL. 19 May 1999. [www.sciam.com/explorations/081897spinal/zacks.html] Woodward, Kenneth L.   "Today the Sheep..."   Newsweek 10 Mar 1997: 60.

How Mildred Taylor uses the Characters and Events to show the Prejudice

Mildred Taylor, the author of 'Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry' clearly depicts racism in her novel. She skillfully uses the characters and events in the novel to show prejudice in Mississippi in the 1930s, when the book was set. At the time Mississippi was renowned as one of the worst states for racism. Taylor has created many situations in her novel were several of the characters are victimized as well as discriminated against. Throughout the novel white people form an irrational judgment on the black race, innocent people are burnt and lynched. 'Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry' is a novel which ventures on how hatred, humiliation and degradation fill the gap between the two races that are separate from each other, the races of the black and white. Taylor uses one of the main characters in this novel, Cassie Logan to show how racism impacted on their everyday lives. When Cassie goes to Strawberry for the first time, she is put out of her comfort zone and into the real world. Through these episodes Taylor shows us that Cassie had to grow up, and learn that being defensive cannot always solve the problem. As Cassie angrily confronts Mr. Barnett as she has not been served, he angrily ?recoiled? and told her to get her ?little black self? away from the counter to wait. As Mr. Barnett tries to get rid of Cassie he bellows, ?whose little nigger is this? leaving Cassie feeling ashamed and confused. Taylor uses this incident and characters to show that black people were considered, by some, to be less important than whites, since Cassie had been waiting for nearly an hour. The language spoken by Mr. Barnett is strongly patronizing, and it expands the portrayal of racism. Another point where Cassie is complete humiliated is when she bum... ...hool every day, whilst the white school bus goes past and sprays them with red dust. This also shows segregation, whites and blacks had to be as far apart as possible according to the whites. In the novel we see segregation many times: when Big Ma parks the wagon the other side of the field, the different schools and different buses. Taylor does use strong and powerful language through her characters and events to portray the racism. She also had a clear structure, some may find it confusing at times, but overall it does not affect how prejudice is portrayed as events follow each other. I think that the final message of the novel, perhaps, is that survival is possible, but that there are inevitable losses along the way, and that whatever race we are should not matter. Taylor uses memorable characters and big and small events to show prejudice in 1930?s Mississippi.

Ford Motor Company and Ambition

Dusty Bowles Mrs. Farmer English 102 10 September 2010 Ambitions As I started out to write a paper based on ambition I had to question myself what ambition really was. What makes people get that extra push to be ambitious, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of being an ambitious person? At first, I must admit it was very difficult to comprehend. In the American Heritage dictionary it states that ambition comes from the Middle English word â€Å"ambicioun,† meaning â€Å"excessive desire for honor, power, or wealth. † After reading this meaning I understood what was stated, but it still did not make a clear meaning to me what ambition was.I have found that after reading a quote by Henry Ford my understanding started to all come together. Henry Ford once quoted, â€Å"Whether you think you can or can’t, you’re right. † This quote in itself explains to me that it is a self motivated decision made by one individual. It is ambition that makes us think we can be successful, and lack of ambition that makes us think that we cannot. Many people have different ambitions in life so the word ambition would have different meanings depending on which you ask and how one defines it.An ambition is an eager, and sometimes an inordinate desire for honor, superiority, leading power, or the attainment to seek a goal that is immensely desired. Ambition is something that anyone, no matter his or her age or cultural background has instinctively. Ambition can push towards a driven force for success or in altering views a road to failure. Without an ambition we, human beings, have no purpose to be self driven individuals. Ambition in other words is that motive force needed to propel all to work towards our cherished goals in which we set.Ambition is the explosive inner force that has led many people from all walks of life to make a new path, set a new vision. Ambitious people are those with the hopes of one day conquering their ambition. Am bitious people are confident and because of this, they feel there is nothing that they cannot accomplish. There are many people from many different parts of life that have had ambitions and accomplished them. For example, Donald Trump is someone I admire and is a very ambitious person in my book. Trump is listed as number 33 on the Forbes Top 100 list. Trump did not start out as successful as he is today.Back in Trump’s prime he set ambitions to achieve for what today we call his success. Trump started out going to school and got a degree in â€Å"Bachelor of Science in Economics with concentration in Finance. † School was just the start of Trumps ambitions to learn more, today he is a very successful business executive and entrepreneur. Donald Trump is someone that I respect and gives me that extra push when reading his autobiography. Being able to know that ambitions all start out as a dream until someone makes them a reality makes the possibilities endless. Ambition s can be as easy as a thought away from what the actual turnout can be.To me ambition is a burning desire to achieve ones goals or succeed. Ambition in my theory is related to dedication, motivation, and time. At my age, twenty years young I have many ambitions to achieve in a set period of time. For starters my education, I would like to complete my Bachelors in Marketing with a minor in Finance within the next four years. Time motivates me to achieve my ambitions because I strive to be well accomplished by the age of twenty-five. Ambitions are a big part of my young adult life because I would like to accomplish a lot of things before I get older.Without ambition I cannot achieve a greater milestone in my walk. Everyone has a chance to tell you their own personal story based on their walk. Without ambitions one cannot achieve a greater tomorrow. Understanding the limitations and compromises that come with obtaining any ambition is overwhelming. Putting forth and obtaining an ambiti on is self constructed. With hard work, experience, and overall self control, ambitions are not too far out of reach for any person to grasp. Any one person can achieve their ambitions if they set their mind to it and that gives me the reassurance that I can make it.Depending on whom you ask lets us knows the trials and tribulations one goes through while accomplishing their ambitions. After reading Donald Trumps story and the simple quote by Henry Ford that turned the light bulb in my head on, my understating of ambitions became clear. Ambitions can all be the same or they can all be different. Everyone has their own ambition and how to accomplish them. If one has ambition, one can achieve any goal.Works Cited â€Å"Ambition | Define Ambition at Dictionary. com. †Ã‚  Dictionary. com | Find the Meanings and Definitions of Words at Dictionary. om. Web. 10 Sept. 2010. . â€Å"Donald Trump: Biography from Answers. com. †Ã‚  Answers. com: Wiki Q&A Combined with Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus, and Encyclopedias. Web. 10 Sept. 2010. . â€Å"#33 Donald Trump – Forbes. com. †Ã‚  Forbes. com – Business News, Financial News, Stock Market Analysis, Technology & Global Headline News. Web. 10 Sept. 2010. . Google, By. â€Å"†Whether You Think You Can or Can't, You're Right†Ã¢â‚¬â€œHenry Ford |Strategic Business Lawyer. †Ã‚  Small Business Advice from the Champions of Small Business. 23 Jan. 2006. Web. 10 Sept. 2010. .

Consequentialist Versus Deontological Ethical Systems

What is â€Å"good†? How does a person decide what is good? Over the course of history, various thinkers have tried to develop systems which guide human thought on this question. Some of the most important ethical theories are the â€Å"normative† theories — that is ethical theories which try to establish authoritative standards by which conduct can be judged. Under the general heading of â€Å"normative,† two of the most important schools of ethical thought are the â€Å"consequentialist† and the â€Å"deontological schools of ethical thought. (â€Å"Normative Ethics† n. d. )Consequentialism is the school of thought which asserts that the morality of a given action is to be judged by the consequence of that action. If the consequences are good, the action is good. Consequentialism is generally divided into a number of theories, including: utilitarianism and ethical egoism. Utilitarianism holds that the right action is one that produces the greatest good/pleasure (and least pain) for the greatest number of people. Utilitarianism has its root in the seminal figures of Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, and Henry Sidgwick.Classic utilitarians developed a system which is could best be described as â€Å"hedonistic act consequentialism. † Their system was â€Å"consequentialist† in that its proponents claimed that an act is morally right if the act causes the greatest good. To calculate this, one had to compare the total amount of good that the act caused, minus the total amount of bad that the act caused. If the net total net amount of good was greater than this net amount of good for any other act that the agent might have performed, then the act was good.Their system was â€Å"hedonistic,† in that they claimed that pleasure was the only true â€Å"good† and pain is the only true â€Å"bad. † This system was summed up in the common statement, â€Å"the greatest happiness for the greates t number. † (Kemerling, 2002; Hollinger, 2002, p. 31-34: â€Å"Normative Ethics,† n. d. ; Lee, 2000, â€Å"Utilitarianism†; Sinnott-Armstrong, 2006) As Mill articulated this system, utilitarianism was consequentialist rather than deontological because included certain key points of denial. Utilitarianism denied that the moral rightness of any act depended on anything other than the consequences of the act.This left the utilitarian system open to attack because of the hedonism it advanced. (Hollinger, 2002, p. 34-36; â€Å"Normative Ethics,† n. d. ; Kemerling, 2002; Lee, 2000, â€Å"Utilitarianism†; Sinnott-Armstrong, 2006) From the beginning, critics of hedonism attacked utilitarianism. They criticized John Stuart Mill as trying to degrade the value of human life to an animalistic level. One of the more commonly used arguments was that vulgar acts, such as orgiastic sex might produce greater transient pleasure than some disciplined higher act such a s studying fine poetry. (Hollinger, 2002, pp.34-36: â€Å"Normative Ethics,† n. d. ; Kemerling, 2002; Sinnott-Armstrong, 2006)Mill tried to respond to these charges by setting up a distinction between lower and higher qualities of pleasure. (Mill, 1861, 56) This did not satisfy Mill’s critics, who contended that in the end, utilitarianism supported hedonism. Critics find these systems overly technical and confusing, and utilitarianism fosters an â€Å"end justifies the means† line of reasoning. Further utilitarianism does not accept the notion that some acts are absolutely ethically wrong, so that potentially it can be warped into a system justifying any means.Hollinger, 2002, pp. 34-36; â€Å"Normative Ethics,† n. d. ; Kemerling, 2002; Lee, 2000, â€Å"Utilitarianism†) Egoism is the view that a moral person is a self-interested person. The primary exponents of ethical egoism, include Epicurus, Adam Smith, and Ayn Rand. Critics charges that the eth ical system of Epicurus leads to an austere hedonism. Adam Smith’s â€Å"invisible hand† would cause the most productive state of an economy to be reached by allowing all of the people in the economic unit each to pursue his own self-interest.Ayn Rand professed a view of rational self-interest, saying that altruism was irrational. (Hollinger, 2002, pp. 28-31; â€Å"Normative Ethics,† 2002; Sinnott-Armstrong, 2006) Deontological ethical theory takes its name from the Greek root â€Å"deon,† meaning â€Å"that which is obligatory. † It is ethical theory based on a concept of duty or obligation. Turning then to principled ethical systems, stem from Socrates, who felt himself duty bound to accept the ruling of the court in Athens, which had ordered him put to death.From Socrates, one can move ahead to Immanuel Kant, whose philosophical system led to his system of the â€Å"categorical imperative†: â€Å"Act so that you treat humanity, whether i n your own person or in that of another, always as an end, and never as a means only. † To develop his â€Å"Categorical Imperative,† Kant looked to the roots of morality in humanity's rational capacity and meticulously developed a system based on moral absolutes. He argued that these are inviolable duties, rules which must be followed absolutely and in every possible situation. (â€Å"Normative Ethics,† n. d. ; Hollinger, 2002, pp.37-39)Another school of deontological thought is the contractarianistic school exemplified by John Rawls or Thomas Hobbes. This theory asserts that moral acts are those act that all people would agree to if they were completely unbiased. (â€Å"Normative Ethics. † n. d. ) Finally, there are philosophers such as John Locke, also considered deontological, who presented the idea that all men are endowed with certain inalienable rights. (â€Å"Normative Ethics. † n. d. ) Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) set forth what is generally a ccepted as the most advanced theory of deontological or duty-based ethics.Contrary to the consequentialism of Mill, Kant’s theory judges morality by examining the nature of actions and the will of agents rather than the goals sought or the ends achieved. To describe this in general terms, this deontological theory focuses on the inputs leading to actions rather than outcomes produced by those inputs. This does not mean that Kant did not care what the outcomes of his actions were. Like other men, he wished that things would go well. But Kant insisted that as far as the moral evaluation of our actions was concerned, consequences did not matter.  (Hollinger, 2002, pp. 37-39; â€Å"Normative Ethics,† n. d. ; Kemerling, 2002)In his philosophical studies, Kant tried to establish a rational principle that would stand as a categorical imperative for ethical judgments. He insisted that the imperative, or duty, had to be categorical, not merely hypothetical, or conditional, be cause true morality could not depend on such things as individual likes and dislikes, abilities, or opportunities. These were mere the â€Å"accidents† of history, and an ultimate principle of ethics had to go far beyond such incidentals.Eventually, Kant developed his categorical imperative, which he articulated in several different versions, including: Always act in such a way that you can also will that the maxim of your action should become a universal law. and Act so that you treat humanity, both in your own person and in that of another, always as an end and never merely as a means. The first version of the categorical imperative emphasizes an idea important to Kant’s thinking of the idea that any rule was valid only if it could be applied universally. The second statement of the rule stresses the importance of respecting persons as more important than things.(Kay, 1997)Deontological ethical theories are strongest in the areas where utilitarian theories face the g reatest difficulty. Ethical rules based on duty have the great advantage that the ends can never justify the means. For example, suppose a ruler wished to revive the Roman practice of public crucifixion of criminals. Even if it was determined that the general populace was so caught up in a blood lust that the pleasure of the masses who would watch the agonies of the condemned far, far out-weighed the suffering of the victim, the categorical imperative demands that individual human rights be acknowledged and held inviolable.No matter how much the public wants this spectacle, it must be dismissed from our moral deliberations. (Hollinger, 2002, pp. 38-39: Kay, 1997) Putting Kant’s categorical imperative into practice, however, has presented a number of serious problems. First, the categorical imperative gives only absolute results. Actions are â€Å"good† or â€Å"bad. † There is no room for â€Å"gray areas. † For example, lying is always wrong — eve n the â€Å"polite lie† or the lie told for noble reasons. Second, duties often come into conflict, and the categorical imperative gives no means to resolve these conflicts.Utilitarianism permits a ready comparison of all actions, and if a set of alternatives have the same expected utility, they are equally good. Conflicting duties, however, may require that I perform logically or physically incompatible actions, and my failure to do any one is itself a moral wrong. (Hollinger, 2002, p. 39: Kay, 2002) Because neither theory is satisfactory in its pure form, I am compelled to use a blend in real life. I follow a utilitarian approach in the sense of trying to maximize the good that I bring to people, but with an awareness that there are categorical situations beyond which I will not go.