The Role of Separation

Appointing a mission-wise Chair: Role separation resolves a potential conflict of interest arising from the fact that the CEO is the primary manager of a company and the chairman is the head of the board, which oversees management (Hodgeson, 2014). Separating the roles strengthens the system of checks and balances and enhances the appearance of board independence. Splitting the roles is widely considered to be a best practice in corporate governance, though its benefits remain controversial in some circles, notably in parts of the mainstream, corporate America. (Tonello, 2011). The mission relevance of the chair's role has long been recognized in the non-profit sector where facilitating mission delivery, through managing and organizing the governing board's mission-related work, has always been central to the chair's role (Akpeki, 2006). Appointing a new board chair, then, may come to be seen as a potential milestone for mission preservation in social entrepreneurships. The chair's role is central to successful corporate governance, and the influence of the person fulfilling this role can be critical to the maintenance of mission within thriving social entrepreneurship. It stands to reason that, through choosing a chair who understands and backs the social mission, organizations can strengthen mission stewardship in the boardroom and thus help avert mission drift. Commitment to carrying the torch of the mission is only a starting point for a chair. The chair's skills, personality, and behavior will determine his or her effectiveness. A capable chair should come with first-hand knowledge of the sector or industry the business is operating in, proven leadership skills and an understanding of board process. In social entrepreneurships, the chair will also need a firm grasp of mission in the practical sense, experience in delivering mission in a business context and a commitment to ensuring that mission has its place in board discussion and decision-making at every level (Shekshnia ; Rowley, 2014). A mission-capable chair will know how to keep the mission on the agenda, how to generate productive group discussion around mission and how to foster a positive board culture with a shared sense of purpose.

Report will focus on analysing the existence of power Essay

Introduction This report will focus on analysing the existence of power, control and resistance within an organisation with particular reference toward Australia’s largest and most successful telecommunications provider, Telstra (Telstra, 2013). Applying widely recognised theoretical frameworks and concepts against these focus areas, a critical analysis has been conducted and assessed with the findings referenced throughout the report determining the positive and negative impacts each are having on Telstra the organisation and its stakeholders. The three focus areas of power, control and resistance are major influences within any organisation and critical to its success. Power and control can be perceived as being the same within an organisation, however there are key differentiators between the two that is important to identify and understand. Both power and control of an organisation can have various levels of influence on its stakeholders depending on a companies geographical or workfor ce size and culture. A level of power labeled as â€Å"Domination† identifies the way that an organisation can ultimately shape the preferences, attitudes and even political outlooks of its stakeholders (Sadan, 1997). The area of control stems from the introduction of â€Å"scientific management† introduced by (Taylor, 2007). Taylor’s methodologies of control are still predominant in many modern organisations that adopt various means to maintain a controlled workplace. Such means can consist of forms of surveillance such as email and phone scanning, remote working arrangements and segmentation of skills. Jermier, Knights, & Nord refer to resistance within an organisation as constituting forms of power that’s exercised by subordinates within a workplace. Example forms or â€Å"faces† of resistance are refusal, voice, escape and creation. With an understanding of the theoretical frameworks and concepts of these three focus areas, various stakeholders of Telstra have been interviewed to construct a comprehensive analysis on what impact power, control and resilience is having on the organisation and its stakeholders. Methodology Being one of the largest organizations in Australia, power, control, and resistance is spread throughout the companies multiple functions and sectors. It is these elements that aid in shaping the way Telstra operates. This fact has led to various methods being utilized to collect and critically analyse information on Telstra regarding these three aspects of organizational behaviour. Both primary and secondary research was conducted for this report. Primary sources include conversations with Telstra stakeholders in conjunction with online secondary research. Stakeholders include employees of Telstra as well as the customers themselves. By learning about their experiences with Telstra a better understanding of the organization was created as well as how power, control, and resistance are evident in Telstra. The use of primary and secondary research allowed for power, control and resistance to be critically analysed in Telstra. A number of theories were also addressed in the analysis of Telstra. Relevant aspects of power, control, and resistance were explored and applied to Telstra to develop this report. As power, control, and resistance are different elements of organizational behaviour, a range of theories needed to be used in order to properly analyse Telstra. This also led to the stakeholder interviews being less formal due to questions having to cover such as large industry and often transparent elements of organizational behaviour. To address the issue of power in Telstra, a number of cases were used to identify the scope of power itself in Telstra and how those in power are at times abusing it or using it as a tool for manipulation. In some cases, the extremities of Telstra are clearly shown. Alongside this evidence and research, the theoretical framework of the ‘four faces of power’ derived from Lukes (1986) and Foucault (1977) was used for analysis of the company. As Telstra is a very large company, appropriate control systems and management of control is essential throughout all the functions of the business. To analyse how control plays a critical role in Telstra, different functions of the organization and their appropriate control mechanism were explo red. This was done through researching into examples and cases of how Telstra has managed it’s control systems. Similarly to the use of the ‘four faces of power’, resistance was also analysed using a comparable framework. The framework used was the ‘four faces of resistance’. This framework helped to highlight areas where employees show resistance and how far they can take it. Research and cases gathered coupled together with the four faces of resistance aided in presenting and analysing the various issues of resistance and how it exists in Telstra. Organisational Power â€Å"Power is derived from owning and controlling the means of production and how this power is reinforced by organisational structures and rules of governance† (Weber and Marx, 1948) Telstra as an organization consists of management hierarchy comprising of numerous Directors and Executives that hold responsibility for the direction and public image of Telstra. These positions at times are extremely demanding as their everyday decisions can, and will have an effect on the business profits and customer satisfaction levels. Power is crucial amongst these ranks as it is required to make necessary changes and improvements to policy and procedure in the highly competitive industry of telecommunications. Ultimately the responsibility of the performance of Telstra resides with the CEO (David Thodey) and the supporting Directors (executive and non-executive). As the ‘Top-level manager’, David Thodey makes decisions affecting the entire company. He does not direct the day -to-day activities of the company; instead he sets goals for the organization and directs the company to achieve them. An example is the announcement of a strategy of market differentiation and a renewed focus on customer service and satisfaction (Telstra Website, 2009). Top managers are ultimately responsible for the performance of the organization (Simmering, 2007). Following the top-level management group is the middle-level managers, who set goals for their departments and other business units. Middle managers are charged with motivating and assisting first-line managers to achieve the company’s objectives. They also play an important role by communicating and offering suggestions to the top managers, as they are more involved in the day-to-day workings of the company. The next level of management is the first-level. This level is responsible for the daily management of the employees who actually produce the product or offer the service. Although first-level managers typi cally do not set goals for the organization, they have a very strong influence on the company, as they are the managers that most employees interact with on a daily basis. Telstra’s use of coercion internally has become evident in various situations. By assessing the four faces of power we can see how intimidation towards workers has resulted in a number of public outbursts. An unethical and undisclosed strategy was introduced by Telstra during 2008 whereby 15,000 employees were targeted to sign up to Australian Workforce Agreements (AWA) before the ban on agreements was to be imposed by the Government (Eastley, 2008). A confidential Telstra document showed that managers were given 29 pages of tips on how to best convince workers to signing up to AWA’s (Hawley, 2008). The document urged managers to use psychological profiling of employees when considering who to target and were rewarded with bonuses once successfully signing workers up to workplace agreements. This method of power is an example of coercion. Telstra has clearly done something unethically in this situation. The company’s actions have demonstrated a coercive environment that maximises pressure through psychological manipulation. Domination is a level of power that identifies the way in which an organisation can ultimately shape the preferences, attitudes and even political outlooks of its stakeholders Lukes (1986). Telstra’s domination of most communications markets and its ability to leverage market power across markets is a consequence of its structure. The result is the failure of competition affecting all consumer groups. The ideal solution is a form of structural separation of Telstra. This objective can be achieved through the creation of a regulatory package that delivers as much of the benefit as possible that would be derived from structural separation, while acknowledging the limitations of real separation to address the core incentives of Telstra to favour itself (Competitive Carriers’ Coalition Inc, 2005). Workplace bullying is a widespread issue that can only be resolved through an implementation strategy targeting all employees. Employers need to be held accountable and have a str ategy in place to protect the employees from this offence. Unfortunately this is not always the case, in some instances the employer is the one orchestrating the bullying. A recent case in which the Administrative Appeals Tribunal overruled Telstra’s decision not to pay compensation to an ex-employee for stress and psychological injury shows that it is possible to resist intimidation (Sdrinis, 2012). Mr Sami was successful in wining his compensation claim against Telstra for work-related psychological injuries and in particular in relation to bullying and harassment by his manager over a period of time. This case underlines that management’s often-used tactics of subtle bulling and harassment to push people out the door has a human cost which the law is prepared to recognise. Within most major companies, including Telstra, workers have to live with the threat of losing their jobs and this case should encourage workers to stand up to workplace harassment and, if victimized, seek legal advice and compensation. Organisational Control In order to regulate and manage organisational activities and resources, so that accomplishing goals and objectives are possible, organisations need control. It is a significant part of running any business so that a targeted element of performance remains up to organisational standard. There is a considerable amount of responsibility that goes into managing control, as there are many different levels and areas in which organisations define control. Information Resources is an area of control in which include sales forecasting, environmental analysis and production scheduling. In a recent article, Telstra has reported a 12.9 per cent increase in net profit, reaching $3.9 billion, and an increase in revenue up two per cent to $26 billion (Bartholomeusz, Technology Spectator, 2013). Telstra chief executive officer David Thodey said it was the â€Å"third consecutive year of significant customer growth for Telstra mobile, driven by $1.2 billion of investment in the network during the y ear.† As profit results slightly bettered expectations, this can only leave a positive impact on employees, shareholders and the organisation itself. For instance, as a result of meeting organisational goals and objectives, employees get to keep their job, and keep the shareholders content. In any organisation, operations control is needed to control the processes used to transform resources into products and services. As Telstra is constantly aspiring to grow as a company and are faced with new business opportunities, changes in operational processes takes place as a result, workers find themselves jobless. The terminal decline of Telstra’s once-dominant telephone business and the rise of new business opportunities have forced the telco giant into a major operational restructure that will affect half the company’s 30,000 strong domestic workforce (Bingemann, 2013). (Telstra Chief Operations officer Brendon Riley, is likely to see hundreds of jobs cut from the te lco as it transitions its operations and IT divisions from infrastructure-based businesses to more of a software and services future (Bingemann, 2013). Although this may mean good news for Telstra advancing as an organisation, this change in operations control is affecting the lives of 30,000 loyal employers and their families. Telstra’s financial control plan has an upside and a downside. Like most organisations, a budget control provides a way of measuring performance across different aspects within the company. Also control the financial resources as they flow into, are held by, and flow out of the organisation. Telstra while having generated some $2 billion in savings has punished workers by cutting 1,000 net local jobs over the past two and a half years (Bartholomeusz, Business Spectator, 2013). Although the savings are benefiting Telstra’s fast-growing mobile business, the price to pay is substantial for those 1,000 workers who need to make ends meet. Telstra has insisted that it can simultaneously cut costs while improving customer service b y reducing errors, queries and complaints that allow it to, for instance, reduce call centre staff (Bartholomeusz, Business Spectator, 2013). As technology advances, so does the way people do things. With the new possibilities of using apps and online resources to ask questions, queries and form complaints, the need for call centre workers reduces sizeable Organisational Resistance Within the multinational telecommunication company Telstra, numerous accounts of resistance both internally and externally have risen from management decisions by the company’s head. Several incidents have occurred in which the public and workers have raised their voice in resistance against some of the giant’s actions. By assessing the four faces of resistance, we can see typical and expected responses from the public and workers. One incident occurred earlier this year in February. Telstra slashed over 700 jobs from their Sensis network, which resulted in mass rallies and protests by union leaders and workers alike (Conifer, 2013). This method of resistance is an example of ‘voice.’ By publicly displaying and enforcing their dissatisfaction against the loss of their jobs, the union workers are resisting Telstra’s actions. The rally and protests have been constructed to highlight the unsatisfactory methods of Telstra. As Telstra grows as a company, many Australian jobs are being sent offshore, particularly to Asian nations. The rapid growth of the company forces management and corporate heads to expand the company to increase revenue and profits, at the expense of Australian jobs. In July of this year, over 170 jobs were sent offshore to India, which lead to widespread union outrage (Bingemann, www.theaustralian.com.au/business, 2013). The Communication, Electrical and Plumbing union, as well as the Community and Public Sector unions protested and demanded negotiations in regards to job losses. The fact that unions stood up and resisted to sacrifice their jobs highlights an internal voice of the company. This resistance from the unions demonstrates a type of power that workers have within their job, to stand up against unsatisfactory managerial decisions. (Bingemann, www.theaustralian.com.au/business, 2013) The third face of resistance represents the ‘escape’ side of work. This face is made up of three tools: cynicism, scepticism and dis-identification. Dis-identification refers to the disconnection from ones identity and the work environment. In an incident that occurred in April of 2007, a young girl committed suicide after been given unrealistic work goals and hassled by management staff of Telstra to return to work during her stress leave (Masanauskas, 2007). This amount of pressure lead to her suicide, and the change from her once â€Å"vibrant personality† was transformed into a â€Å"nervous wreck† (Masanauskas, 2007). The young women’s parents described the Telstra staff to be treating their daughter â€Å"like a machine.† From this tragedy, the union demanded realistic work goals and targets. The dis-identification from ‘human’ to ‘machine’ within the workplace highlights the third face of resistance, to escape work. However, this escape was much more serious and punishing, for it was not just a mental escape from work, but a suicide. Conclusion Throughout this report it is made evident that the three focal behavioral characteristics of organisations can have a major impact on its stakeholders. Although these impacts can be both positive and negative it is clear from the examples provided that a balance between what’s positive to both an organisation and its stakeholders remains a huge challenge to maintain. Telstra has been used as a case organisation due to its operational size and market reach throughout the country and spreading to different cultures internationally. Various methods were used to gather and analyse information specific to the affects of power, control and resistance from both internal and external stakeholders of the company which formed the basis of or report. Power of an organisation over its stakeholders is seen almost always as a negative characteristic but is critical to an organisations success. It was found that power in Telstra is delegated down through a hierarchal management structure to manage staff and performance. This lead onto analysing which control methods are being used within Telstra such as performance goals and project deadlines, which have been founded to be a major cause of many bully and stress related complaints. Due to the mismanagement of power and control various cases of industrial action and even suicide has been reported as a form of resistance from stakeholders. This resistance has a negative impact on the public image of the organisation and can potentially affect its market value. It is critical for organisations to achieve a balance between economic growth and ethical practices. Until this happens cases such of those highlighted in the report will continue causing restraint and harm to both the organisation and its stakeholders.

Dickens and a Christmas Carol Essay

Here Scrooge is taken by a spirit to see himself, as a child, in his school. It is Christmas time and Scrooge was left in school instead of being with his family and friends, this shows spiritual poverty, whereby Scrooge is deprived of his family at Christmastime and therefore deprived of their love and kindness. Another example of spiritual poverty can be found on page 69. The spirit shows a vision of a Christmas yet to come, in which Scrooge has died. Nobody cared for Scrooge, because he was so cruel himself, and so members of his staff are selling his clothes. This is spiritual poverty because it demonstrates a total lack of respect for the dead in preference of financial gain. On pages 48-49, there is an example of material poverty. The Cratchits are having their Christmas dinner. It is a small, simple meal consisting of a goose, instead of a turkey, which is normally eaten by the rich, and also a small pudding. Despite this, the family were still happy and content. This is material poverty because it shows that poor people, who have no luxuries, are still able to make the most of what they do have, and be thankful. There is a further example of material poverty on page 61, where Scrooge is again taken by a spirit to visit a part of the city which he had never been to before. It describes in vivid detail the poverty and deprivation in this area. The stench in the quarter was awful, the area was filthy dirty and reeked of crime and misery. Material poverty is evident here because there is obviously no money in this area for people to forge better lives for themselves, or to enhance or repair the environment in which they live. We can tell that this story is located in a particular time in history by a number of reasons. The story is published in 1843, as stated on the cover. The book is largely centred around the concept of poverty which was widely in evidence during this era. At about this time, a writer called Thomas Malthus wrote an essay entitled, â€Å"Essay on Population†. This argued that the population was too big and that there were too many people being born. This point is emphasised when Scrooge is talking to the charitable gentleman about making a donation for the poor and Scrooge’s reply is to let the people die in the workhouse to reduce the surplus population. At this time, the Poor Law amended the Act of 1834 which abolished outdoor relief and established workhouses for the poor, which resembled prisons. Conditions were extremely poor. The work was tedious and the food was insufficient. Men, women and children were divided and the system was feared by them all. Dickens also thought that this system was inhumane. He attacked this system in â€Å"Oliver Twist† and highlighted the attitudes which had created it in â€Å"A Christmas Carol†. This shows that the book was written at this time in history because it coincided with the Poor Law amendments which features in â€Å"A Christmas Carol†. The attitude of Charles Dickens to the poverty he describes is one of disgust and sympathy. This is partly because he has himself experienced poverty and understands the impact that it can have on oneself. He seeks reform and in his books he has tried to highlight the issues of poverty and to point out why change was essential. This is why Dickens uses a Christmas theme in his book, hopefully to bring out the better qualities of people. Christmas being a period normally associated with kindness and goodwill to all men, he obviously hoped and believed that this would make people aware of the plight of the poor and hopefully change the attitudes of many who despised the poor and were not interested in their well-being. Many people actually profited from the exploitation of the poorer classes, particularly in the workhouses. Dickens wanted to ensure that this type of exploitation became impossible in the future, which was largely the reason why he highlighted these issues. An example of this is on page 56-57 where the spirit turns Scrooge’s own words against him saying, â€Å"Are there no prisons or workhouses? † This is in reference to the Want and Ignorance children, that the spirit is showing Scrooge. The children are ragged and dirty and Scrooge is shocked to the core by their appearance and realises what he has done by ignoring the needs of the poor. Although Dickens did not really succeed in changing the lives of the poor at this time, his efforts did help to bring about improved conditions and reform from the 1870’s onwards.

Source base questions - KMT-CCP rivalry Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Source base questions - KMT-CCP rivalry - Essay Example This was the classic method of raiding a village. Sometimes we killed and carried away little pigs weighing around thirty catties. We took corn, rice, potatoes, taro. Did we take money? No. There was no money to be had anyway. e.g. in Source A, the cartoon shows us that the KMT (Kuomintang or Nationalist Party) officers were totally on the side of the rich landlord demanding greater taxes. Exploitation of the peasants took various forms. Not only were heavy taxes levied, many of which were collected in advance, but also peasants were forced to provide carts, animals and farm produce. The source also shows one such officer in hostile action against a peasant and his family. Judging from their poor attire and the fact that the loss of the two bushels of food grain represented a great loss to them, we understand that this family is a very poor one. The officer is commanding the peasant to hand over grain to the landlord. The peasant is very angry at the unfair demand, which is evident by his clenched fists. It also shows his impotence to offer any stiffer resistance to the officer and the landlord due to the overall cloak of oppression that has smothered the populace during the domination by the KMT regime. The peasant’s wife is beseeching the landlord to have mercy as they need that food for their family, especially the crying child. In response, the obese landlord is pointing a jocular finger at the wailing child meaning that he does not care about the wellbeing of a brat like that. The cartoonist is telling us that despite the oppressive hardship and poverty of the peasants, the corrupted KMT government was still exploiting them unmercifully. Source A seems to drive the message that the communists were sympathetic about the hardship of the people and this is in stark contrast to the corrupt Nationalists. Source A is also a communist cartoon and thus may be a propaganda tool to incite the sense of anti-KMT feeling among the peasants and thereby

United Technologies Corporation - a Program of Compliance and Global Case Study - 6

United Technologies Corporation - a Program of Compliance and Global Ethics - Case Study Example The biggest hurdle that the company faced is the incorporating of a huge number of employees and who were composed of a variety of world’s cultures. Basically, the ethics of Chubb plc were nowhere near those of UTC- United Technologies Corporation. Just before embarking on this stand-alone case, it is of a high essence to look at a short background description to enable the reader has an easy time while studying the situation. UTC was a global corporation constituting of USD31 billion in terms of its value and this value was a combination of seven business undertakings and a single research center that was held responsible for any research concerning the divisions in entirety. This world’s conglomerate employed approximately 205,700 workers. After the acquiring of Chubb plc, it would lead to a situation where 138,000 of these workers would be sourced from beyond the USA borders. This corporation had above 4,000 locations in about 62 nations. Its business operations covered around 180 nations. In the year 2002 alone, 55% of the aggregate revenue of UTC was generated from foreign and the net income stood at USD2.2 billion and had an asset base of USD29.1 billion. In the year under focus (2003), UTC took position 49 in the Fortune 500 companies’ list. UTC’s first business can be traced back to 1853. One major name tarnishing event was the 1980s’ scenario. UTC was during that period the US’s major government’s contract with the Department of Defense being party to this and the case still remains. In the middle of this decade, the US’s DOD- Department of Defense was facing hard times due to the accusations of waste, fraud, and abuse. One of the divisions of UTC by the name Pratt & Whitney was put in the spotlight in connection with the same reputation tarnishing scandals. This ended up costing UTC an amount of USD 40 million from profits.

E-Business Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

E-Business Management - Essay Example The highly dynamic and competitive characteristics of e-businesses offer to generate revenue streams in various ways. As Dave (2003) noted, â€Å"all electronically mediated information exchanges, both within an organization and with external stakeholders supporting the range of business processes†, organization needs improved e-business technologies in order to formulate a sustainable business strategy. Innovation among e-businesses usually occurs through new exchange and transaction mechanisms not found in traditional organizations. Due to lack of geographical boundaries, virtual markets are reachable to a huge number of people and products. It is also economically viable for firms to outsource their services quickly and cheaply to the developing countries. Over the last few decades, the dynamics of highly competitive global industry have forced organizations to rethink and re-evaluate the way they design competitive strategies in accordance with the fluctuating demand and d iverse technologies. According to Robert Grant (2005), â€Å"When the external environment is in a state of flux, the firm itself, in terms of its bundle of resources and capabilities, may be a much more stable basis on which to define its identity†. ... Strategic Application of E-CRM and E-Marketing According to Lee-Kelley, Gilbert and Mannicom (2003), â€Å"e-CRM refers to the marketing activities, tools and techniques, delivered over the Internet (using technologies such as Web sites and e-mail, data-capture, warehousing and mining) with a specific aim to locate, build and improve long-term customer relationships to enhance their individual potential.† The adoption of e-commerce has long-term impacts on business profitability. Larger customers reach and existing customers’ base has potential for increasing revenues. Additionally, electronic service greatly reduces the operational costs such as staff, transport and materials reducing the purchasing costs. It also helps to improve communication and relationships with workforce, suppliers and customers. Complex business processes get simplified and standardized increasing the speed of access to information. Integrated business processes improve reliability, accuracy and also shorten the delivery time. After the advent of World Wide Web, firms are using digital technologies such as intranets, extranets, online purchasing and e-government services to promote sales. Companies experienced increase in their stock prices by adapting to the internet. For instance, the web store of North West Supplies is online since 2002. In the first six months of website launch, the company had increased sales by ?20,000 through application of pay per click advertising. In order to reduce further advertising costs, the company redesigned its website and implemented Search Engine Optimization (SEO). The improvements in website design and marketing methods added to the NWS brand value increasing the annual turnover from ?250,000 to ?350,000. For

Departmental Meeting Report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Departmental Meeting Report - Essay Example On Wednesday the 17th of September, we held a department care plan meeting together with the MDS coordinator, the nurse and social worker to discuss the discharge plans with patients. Four patients were scheduled for discharge three of which were males and one female. Patients were brought to the meeting on their wheel chairs. After everyone present introduced themselves the meeting began and the pre-discharge plans were discussed. The therapist addressed the various issues the patients as well as every other member might need to know while the social worker addressed the plan of discharge including preparation for discharge. It was noted for instance the patients could need walkers as the go home. Overall care plan was also discussed in the meeting under the coordination of the nurse. Issues stressed included the importance of individualized informal meetings with patients and their families at different stages of their care plan which should focus on rehabilitation so as to guarantee a safe professional discharge for patients. Teamwork is very important for success of care plans and the importance of interdepartmental meetings was noted as a strategy to foster a team approach at haven discharge plans with each patient, informing patients of their recovery stage as well as how they are progressing with therapy. We also discussed collaborating with patients’ families to share information as not all the patients were given the date of discharge. This was informed by the fact that discharge date and communication of such information to patients depends on their stage of therapy and as such only those patients deemed ready were given the discharge

How strategy maps could be a useful management tool and system to Essay

How strategy maps could be a useful management tool and system to monitor and control the performance of organisational or business units - Essay Example Strategy maps could effectively be used as a management tool and system to monitor and control the performance of business or organizational units (Meyer 202, p. 184). In the current business environment, strategy maps do have an immense advantage in the sense that they help in a systematic organization of strategy and the commensurate allocation of budgetary resources, they help in capturing and conveying the quintessential crux of the contrived business strategy, help elevate the overall business discussion in an organization from the level of operations to strategy and they facilitate a better management of business performance. Strategy maps allow the managers to contrive a visual and structured organization of the contrived business strategy and help the managers decide as to in a given strategic scenario, what are the actual drivers of performance in a business or organizational unit (Ward, Tripp & Maki 2013, p. 227). Strategy maps help in the identification of objectives imminent in a business strategy and thereby they allow the managers to decide as to which objectives need to be optimally developed before the salient business measures are taken. Using the strategy maps in the management of a business or organizational unit assures that the concerned managers will chose only those measures that happen to be optimally appropriate and that are poised to aid the achievement of salient business goals. Strategy maps do assure the success of any contrived strategy as they help the managers to capture, convey and manage the overall strategy to the salient stakeholders in a business or organizational unit in an optimal and better way (Fitz-enz 2010, p. 27). A well contrived strategy maps is an effective tool in the sense that it immaculately captures the thought process and vision of a management team in any viable business or organizational unit. Strategy maps help the managers effectively convey to the incumbent stakeholders as to how an envisioned

Republic of Kazakhstan Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Republic of Kazakhstan - Essay Example The background of Kazakhstan is a unique one considering the fact that the natives were nomadic before the formation of the state(King 23). Certainly, the Kazakhs are a blend of the Mongol and Turkic ethnic groups that settled in the area around the 13th century period. Although the two tribes were nomadic in nature, they failed to unite to make one nation for many centuries up to the formation of the Soviet Union(Abdelal 56). Around the 18th century, Russians conquered and colonized the region called Kazakhstan before it finally joined the Soviet Union. Soon in the mid-20th century, agriculture became the major economic activity through which the Kazakhs derived their livelihoods(King 23). They cultivated the northern pastures that were the ‘Virgin Lands’ before the area experienced an influx of immigrants mainly from Russia. Currently, the focus of the government of the Republic of Kazakhstan is to unite all tribes and ensure a stable economic and political environment through various strategies.As far as the politics of Kazakhstan is concerned, it is critical to mention that the presidential system of government accords the president executive powers. In this respect, the president is able to make sovereign decisions on behalf of Kazakhstan and its citizens, particularly on domestic and international matters. In essence, the president is the â€Å"symbol of national unity† and he or she represents the all the cultures and communities within the jurisdiction of Kazakhstan State.

Managing Conflict In A Project Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Managing Conflict In A Project - Research Paper Example Kerzner (2010), states that managers spend as much as 42% of their time resolving conflicts. It is therefore necessary that project management include effective study of conflicts and sound conflict resolution procedures. This paper will look into managing conflict in a project. Definition of a project. A project can be defined as a specific undertaking within a given timeframe aimed at producing a unique product or products, service or results. In science or marketing, a project may be defined as a corroborative undertaking between individuals or teams usually involving design or research that is carefully planned with the aim of achieving a particular objective (Kerzner, 2010). In carrying out a project, the aspect of project management involves harmonizing and organizing all the project activities with an aim to enable timely completion of the project and its success. In order to appreciate the reasons why conflicts may build up in course of the project development, it is importan t to discuss briefly the various stages of a project and the key role players in each stage. Stages of a Project. 1. Project Initiation. During this stage, the initial scope of the project is determined, estimates about cost and time of completion are done, the degree of complexity of the project is determined and material implications studied. A different aspect of initiation also involves building customer relationship, setting up the project team and establishes a project workbook (Ohlendorf, n.d.). 2. Project planning. During this phase, the project work is broken down into specific activities for specific role players. Material sourcing and supply is done, clear channels of communication between the various entities is done such as relationship between the project manger and the quality assurance team, or the flow of work procedures between the project engineers and the logistics teams(Ohlendorf, n.d.). Risk identification and evaluation is done at this stage. Conflict may aris e if any of the teams differ with another team, such as suppliers and quality assurances teams. 3. Project execution This is the most practical and most noticeable level of the project. It involves the actual processes of construction, supply of materials, evaluation of work procedures, management of changes to procedures and decisions, reporting of progress to stakeholders or sponsors as well as customers, and preparation of the project for the next phase (Ohlendorf, n.d.). 4. Project control This stage involves refining the aspects of the project that hinder proper realization of its goal. In this stage additional installation maybe done, specific installations removed, decisions changed or made and input from the end consumers or the stakeholders sought. The stage is characterized by radical decisions and is very vulnerable to conflicts (Ohlendorf, n.d.). 5. Project closing. This is the final stage. Here the project is put together and it should function. Evaluation of team membe rs, project review and consumer contact are usually done in this phase. Conflicts may still arise in this stage