Organizational Environment and Behavior of British Airways Research Paper

Organizational Environment and Behavior of British Airways - Research Paper Example This research will begin with the statement that in the modern era of globalization Aviation industry is growing rapidly. This industry has many players with a strong competition among themselves. British Airways is the largest airlines company in the United Kingdom. The company was founded in 1974. Its headquarters are in London. Based on the Fleet size British Airways is the largest airlines. In 1972 British Airways Board was established by the government of UK for managing two nationalized airlines company. British European Airways, British Overseas Airways Corporation, Northeast Airlines and Cambrian Airways are the four airlines companies who merged together and formed the aviation company British Airways. Initially, for thirteen years the company was owned by the state government. In 1987 the company was privatized. British Airways is the founding member of the third largest airline's alliance that is Oneworld. This company provides international flights to international destin ations. It has flight service around 550 destinations in all over the world. It gives the customers excellent food service along with many other options for like games, TV, music, etc for satisfying its customers. The company is registered in London Stock Exchange. British Airways has established a contract to combine itself with the Iberia Airlines. The company expanded its business through different acquisitions and mergers. Until 2008 this firm was the largest airline company by the number of passengers. The company has its strong presence in Gatwick Airport. BA CityFlyer is the subsidiary of British Airways and it is the largest operator in London. The success of the company depends largely on the commitment and motivation of its employees. British Airways is a large organization with a huge number of employees. It is one of the largest airline companies in the world. The company provides many benefits to its staffs which motivates them in their work. British Airways creates a s ense of value among its employees which enrich the working environment of the company.

Analyze, discuss, and interpet Machiavelli's Art of War Essay

Analyze, discuss, and interpet Machiavelli's Art of War - Essay Example In this case, through detailed discussion and analysis of the aspects of war, one can apply the theories, mores, virtues, and principles, to that of the nation’s affair and consequently to civilian life. Military and State Since the problem of an ideal society or state has already been exhaustively discussed by Aristotelian and Socratic philosophers; For Machiavelli, the problem that he would like to delve on is how to expand and maintain the power of the state, which must be ordered for the benefit of the greater good of the people. To answer this, Machiavelli always would look back at history i.e. Rome, Sparta, Greece, and discovered a very important pattern—that powerful empires emerge out of violent victories. And it is through this premise that he patterned his ideals of leadership as characterized by his ‘Prince.’ â€Å"For men change their rulers willingly, hoping to better themselves and this hope induces them to take up arms against him who rulesà ¢â‚¬  (Machiavelli, â€Å"The Prince†). Ergo, one of the many important points that could be derived from â€Å"The Art of War† is that military leadership is synonymous to civil leadership. Because war is innate and inevitable as man is in constant conflict with himself, political objectives would be the defining force and or limitation of it. War is fought because of political motives—which again reinforces another premise that Machiavelli made—that civil and military life is inseparable. That the way we function—the mores, principles, and standards that we apply in the military is also applicable or could also govern civil actions. For instance, the discipline of the soldiers could be instilled to workers; the essence of always being prepared for battle—stability under pressure, is a mindset that could be adopted in civilian affairs to be able to handle pressures of everyday life. Military as an Expression of Power Another important poin t that Machiavelli made is that military capabilities of a nation are the direct expression of power. The prince, to be an effective and powerful leader must also have an effective army. To prove his point, he again drew example from history â€Å"Rome remained free four hundred years while armed: Sparta eight hundred: Many other Cities have been dis-armed, and have been free less than forty years.† If a nation does not have an effective army, it must hire foreigners to fight its battle or for it to have someone defending its borders and citizens. But Machiavelli also warned that hiring foreigners for military could pose more dangers, as compared to maintaining your own, as these people could easily corrupt the citizens. When a nation has its own military, it â€Å"has not other fear except of its own Citizens† (Machiavelli, â€Å"Art of War†). Military Strategy and Tactics vis-a-vis Politics According to Sun Tzu, â€Å"the art of war is of vital importance to the state. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence it is a subject of inquiry which

Water Scarcity in Singapore

Water Scarcity in Singapore Student Name: Rosa   Abstract This report mentioned about the water scarcity in Singapore. There are lots of water problems happened over the few past years. I have searched several websites and some scientific essays about the problem which is discribe as a serious water shortage in Singapore. The hypothesis is that they can improve the situation if they continue to follow their policy, and the final findings actually proved my hypothesis. At last, several solutions are compared and judged, such as using water from another city while developing the water system inside their country. Also, other ideas and factors are concerned in this report. Introduction This is a scientific report which is all about water scarcity in Singapore. It is a serious problem that their usable water is really in a shortage level. Every living life there lived on their limited water resources. These problems mentioned different areas in water chemistry, such as analyzing the elements in the water to make sure if the properties of those rivers are suitable for people to live. In China, it is common to see green water in the city, because of the impurities that came from the factories mixed in the water. (XinHua, 2011)Accorfing to the research, there are only 100 cubic metres available for each person in China. However, in rural places of China, this kind of position is even serious, these are all caused by the environment. To talk about water, aquatic ecosystem is a large factor of this area, it means the whole surroundings, including the living things and the environment in a particular place. Chinese governments had made countless laws to protect the water properties, and had encouraged people in those areas start to take actions to collect rain for desalinating. This way can actually improve the water problem but is not enough for people to use during time passed. From my point of view, the best way of dealing with this problem is to keep the strategy that they are using now, because it will be fine to keep the country going on. Methodology My research information is quite reliable, because they referred many websites from government, academic websites, and also from some famous universities. Several websites and essays are compared together in order to find the best information for my main topic. The causes of polluting water, the local situation of water in China and Singapore, the supply and the demand of water that each country faces, all the problems mentioned above are researched carefully. The reliability of each websites are checked, and the usable factors of information are selected, my hypothesis is supported by these information, so they yshould be brilliant ideas in this report. Findings According to the research I had done, water scarcity becomes the largest problem for the whole world. The increasing of population forces the government to solve water scarcity immediately. After mid-1960s, Singapore started to develop its economy, and this causes the large demand of water but citizens can not paid for it. Hence, this leaded to the water scarcity. Chew Men Leong said that Singapore mostly relied on water from Malaysia since 1927. These countries are always friends because of the relationship of water. Years later, Chew Men Leong indicated that their Singapore government should use the lands wisely and hurry up in the area of water reuse system. Then, they spent years of time working on improving the reuse system, meanwhile, they appeal people to save as much as they can. (INSEAD.edu) The biggest problems happened in Singapore are the reuse of water, and the supply problem. The website shows that it often rains in Singapore, but the lands in Singapore are too limited, there are only few lakes that can store water. Another problem is that the population in Singapore is continuing to raise, although the usable water is providing more and more by the government, citizens still do not have enough water to live. I have done same search on China, it is also a country that facing a serious situation with water scarcity, and there are some relations between these two countries. After research we can see that the government had transform water from Johor to cities in Singapore in order to improve the serious problem. Further more,from 2011, the technique of collecing water had helped Singapore increase 2/3 of their lands so that citizens have more lands to live on. Here listed the problems China has: (Graphic 1) Lagging water resource management reforms Lack of an integrated, efficient, and effective institutional system Weak water resource management Underdeveloped water rights system Slow establishment of water markets Overemphasis on engineering projects compared to management approaches Lack of a stable financing mechanism for environmental investment Insufficient attention to role of natural water bodies to support ecosystems (Glenshewchuck, 2010) Discussion Referred to the findings, the hypothesis is supported. What government did to their citizens is not enough for solving this water problem, because the information I collected had obviously shows that as the development passing, the population of people in Singapore had also raised a lot, and they are still worrying about the supply of water in their country. If this policy is used in China, it also can not solve water scarcity, especially when the population are too large, because this is the largest cause of a mass of water demand. As the hypothesis described, the government can do more to their country, such as develop more lakes for storage the rain, they had already set up a great water reusing and water desalinating system, and the weather there provides them enough rain each year, if they could use those rain, the problem must be reduced a lot. Water scarcity had disrupted peoples life in Singapore, and nowadays the problem is getting larger and larger, the governments also mad e laws to protect and remind people that fresh water is not countless. Believe that everyone in the world can see different types of advertisements both on the wall and television, they are all about telling people to save water, bacause as we know, there are only 2.5 percent of water can be used by human. In addition, we can easily find that there are some similarities between Singapore and China, although they are not in the same situation, even they are totaly different in the reasons of water scarcity, they are both need an integrated water system. They are both slow in developing water system. (Glenshewchuck, 2010) Hence, the protection and more strategies should be done by every individual in the whole world, Singapore can also use the strategies which China used, firstly compelete the policy of using water, reduce the price of water for poor peole rationaly, and then keep environment clean enough for people store water for reusing. In order to improve the environment, both of them had appeal people to keep rivers clean, and what they can do is to continue this action. Conclusions and Recommendation All in all, the hypothesis is supported by the evidences I provide before. Obviously, there are also a large amount of researches can be done, because the development is moving faster and faster, the demands are also becoming larger and larger, if they do not change this situation, it could be worse. However, there are only references from the Internet, but I think this is not enough, there should be more references from scientific books, because books are published to the public, they can not be changed by anyone. References The world bank. Dealing with water scarcity in Singapore: Institution, Strategies, and   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Enforcement (2006), world bank [online.] Available from:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTEAPREGTOPENVIRONMENT/Resources/   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   WRM_Singapore_experience_EN.pdf [Assessed on 5 October 2016] Hua, Xin. Beijing to fight water scarcity (2011), China daily [online.] Available from:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011-10/08/content_13851695.htm   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   [Assessed on 5 October 2016] Liping, Jiang. How to combat water scarcity in China (2011), China.org.cn [online.]   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Avalable from: http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/2011-03/03/content_22043145_2.htm   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   [Assessed on 6 October 2016] Glenshewchuck. Water scarcity- China (2010), world resources sin center [online.]   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Available from: http://www.wrsc.org/story/water-scarcity-china-0   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   [Assessed on 6 October 2016] Tackling Singapores water shortage, INSEAD[online.] Avaiable from:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://centres.insead.edu/innovation-policy/events/documents/Singapore-WaterShortage.pdf   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   [Assessed on 6 October 2016]

health drinks Essay -- essays research papers

Importance and Effects of Health drinks and Soft drinks in 21st century Introduction: Here we are going to discuss about the relevance and effects of health drinks and soft drinks like coke. We have explained in our study the advantages and disadvantages of these drinks. What are the ingredients of these drinks? How are they affecting every age group in the 21st century? Should they be used or not and if used in what amounts. The importance of these drinks help us to peep into their world and the drinking habits developed by people. According to a study 33% of U.S. adults that are 20 years of age or older are estimated to be overweight. Furthermore, over 58 million Americans weigh at least 20% or more than their ideal body weight. With exhaustion and high stress levels due to hectic lifestyles, many people are relying on energy drinks to give them that second wind. Whether they help to stay awake through a test that day, or revive you for a party that night, energy drinks are much appreciated, and are becoming quite popular. With energy drinks increase in popularity, and high demand, many companies have decided to come out with one. Companies such as SoBe, have SoBe Adrenaline Rush, Starbucks DoubleShot espresso and cream, and Mountain Dews AMP energy drink. Other popular energy drinks include, Red Bull and Rockstar. SoBe Adrenaline Rush has the familiar tangy taste of a grapefruit with a light yellow color. It contains 1000 mg taurine, 500 mg d-Ribose, 250 mg L-Carnitine, 100 mg Inositol, 50 mg Guarana, and 25 mg Panex Ginseng. This drink including many others is not recommended for children, pregnant women, or persons sensitive to Caffeine. Starbucks DoubleShot espresso and cream in caramel in color, and tastes very similar to the coffee frappuccinos Starbucks has in the glass bottles. It is definitely a great drink to waken up with in the morning. AMP energy drink (from Mountain Dew) contains matodextrin, Ginseng, Taurine, B vitamins and Guarana. It is sour and tangy and tastes like fruit snacks. Like mountain dew, AMP is a lime green color. Red Bull is a yellow drink with a sour, tart taste. that includes, 1000 mg taurine, 600 mg glucuronolactone, and 80 g of caffeine. The benefits you get from drinking a Red Bull include, improving your performance, concentration, and reaction speed, vigilance, emotional status. It stimulates your metabolis... ...ng obesity and bone weakening has the potential to synergistically undermine future health. Adolescents and kids don't think long-term. But what happens when these soft-drinking people become young or middle-aged adults and they have osteoporosis, sedentary living and obesity? By that time, switching to water, milk or fruit juice may be too little, too late. To curb this problem the only solution is to provide access to healthier drinks and snacks and prohibits soft drinks contracts in schools and eliminates school advertising and promotional events that promote unhealthy snack and beverage choices. Alternative acceptable beverages include water, unsweetened flavored waters, 100% fruit juice, 100% vegetable juice and low fat plain and flavored milk. Conclusion: From this we can conclude that fizzy drinks and the health drinks both can be injuries to health if use in excess. Every thing that is used within its limits is useful rather then consuming it over and over. Health drinks or energy drinks have a better substitute like pure 100% juices etc... Health drinks can be used but to a proper extent. But a fizzy drink like coke has no better effects to the health rather worsens it.

Chrysalis module four behaviourism Essay

‘Behaviourists explain maladaptive behaviour in terms of the learning principles that sustain and maintain it. Discuss this statement and show how a behaviourist’s approach to therapy is in stark contrast to a psychoanalytic one’ In this essay I will first of all explain the main principles and theories that underpin the behaviourist approach to psychology. I will subsequently outline how behaviourist theory can provide therapists with some insight into both the causes of maladaptive behaviour and how that behaviour might be sustained and maintained. Having discussed the main behaviourist principles and how they relate to maladaptive behaviour, I will then compare and contrast the behavioural approach with the psychoanalytic (Freudian) approach. I will also comment on ethical issues especially as they relate to behaviourism and some of the experiments on which the theory is founded. Behaviourism is a school of psychology that emphasises the scientific study of obs ervable behaviours especially as they relate to the process of learning. It was highly influential and dominated psychological theory for some thirty years between the early 1920’s and 1950’s. The early formulation of behaviourist theory was in the work of an American psychologist John B Watson. In some respects, his research was a response to the prevailing psychoanalytic approaches to therapy at the time. In his work ‘Psychology from the Standpoint of a Behaviourist’ published in 1929, Watson believed that behaviourism, ‘Attempted to make a fresh, clean start in psychology, breaking with current theories and with traditional concepts and terminology’ (www.britannica.com). His vision was one of psychology becoming a purely objective branch of natural science, where the only admissible conclusions were those that could be obtained by independent observers of the same object or event, as would be the case in scientific experiments. Behaviourism is concerned with explaining how behaviour arises and is maintained. Also to identify and characterise influences on behaviour and to explain how, under certain conditions, behaviour can change. The roots of behaviourist theory can be found in the work of Ivan Pavlov, a Russian scientist. He researched what is known as reflex, an automatic reaction to a particular stimulus. Specifically, his research looked at the reflex that stimulates the production of saliva in dogs when given meat. The meat is the stimulus for the reflex, but what Pavlov noticed was that the dogs in his experiments would start to salivate even at  the sight of the person who regularly fed them. In his famous and now well- known experiment, Pavlov then introduced the sound of a bell every time the food was presented. He found that just the sound of the bell would produce the same reaction in the dogs even if there was no food. He concluded that the dogs had learned that the bell signalled food. Watson brought Pavlov’s findings to the attention of fellow psychologists and then conducted his own experiment involving a young boy, Albert. This came to be known as the ‘Little Albert’ experiment. Watson initially presented Albert with a tame rat and observed his response; at that st age the boy had no fear of the rat. Watson subsequently observed Albert’s reaction to a loud noise when it was made behind his head. Not surprisingly, the child cried at the sound and tried to move away from it. Watson then presented the rat to Albert just before making the loud sound. This time the child reacted by moving away from the rat thereby demonstrating to Watson a change in behaviour as a result and linking the rat to the loud noise. Watson’s experiment showed that Albert had learned to show a defensive reflex reaction. This came to be known as classical conditioning and this approach to understanding behaviour was described as stimulus response psychology. These days the ethics of this experiment would be highly questionable however, subjecting a child to fear in this way and conditioning his response as a result would not acceptable. Several contemporaries of Watson were also working in this area of behavioural research. The work of Edward Thorndike and B.F. Skinner made a huge contribution to behaviourist psychology. Thorndike pioneered the study of animal behaviour with his ‘puzzle boxâ €™ into which he placed a hungry cat. Food was placed outside the box and he found that the cat learned to manipulate the door catch to get out of the box to obtain the food. Unlike Pavlov’s dogs, the cat in his study had some element of control given that being able to get the food was conditional on the cat opening the door. The consequences of the cat’s behaviour (getting the food), Thorndike argued, altered the cat because it learned to open the door. As the cat was ‘instrumental in opening the door he called this instrumental conditioning. Skinner, who was influenced by Thorndike’s work, argued that learning through reinforcement is common to all species not just animals. Much of his work involved studying the behaviour of rats and pigeons. He conducted several experiments using a special device he designed called the ‘Skinner  box’. This provided a controlled environment in which animal behaviour could be observed in a systematic way. His experiments were designed to shed light on how behaviour is initiated, maintained and how under certain conditions it can be changed as a result of consequences of the beha viour. He argued that behaviour takes a particular form because it has consequences that both give rise to it and maintain it. When the consequences change, so does the behaviour he said. Skinner placed a hungry rat in the box where it had to negotiate a maze to find the food. At first the rat would run up blind alleys in the maze but with experience it gradually learned how to negotiate the maze to find the food more quickly. Behaviourists like Skinner believed that the principles involved in these learning processes were applicable to people and underpin complex human behaviour. Skinner proposed that behaviour changes as a result of its consequences and that behaviour is also reinforced by reward. Behaviour that is reinforced will also increase in frequency Skinner suggested. Similarly, he argued, negative reinforcement works in the same way as positive re inforcement. For example, if a loud noise is made every time a rat pokes its nose through its cage, the rat would stop doing it. He promoted the idea that as humans are just another species, giving praise for desirable behaviour in a child would reinforce that behaviour in the same way that getting food by pressing a lever in a box would reinforce behaviour in a rat. Skinner went further by suggesting that there is no such thing as free will; he called it the principle of determinism, the assertion that all human behaviour is determined by what went before. Skinner’s hypotheses created widespread debate amongst psychologists and not surprisingly, his critics pointed out that humans are very different to animals and that results from experiments conducted on rats in a laboratory couldn’t just be applied to human behaviour. Behaviourist critics reasoned that human behaviour is immeasurably more sophisticated than animal behaviour, rooted in language and operating within complex cultures. Humans have insight into their behaviour and have conscious awareness, they contended and therefore are able to make conscious choices. Skinner fell out of favour in the 1970’s following the publication of his book ‘Beyond Freedom and Dignity’ where he urged society to reject the assumption that free will is the main determinant of behaviour. In contrast to the psychoanalytic school of psychology, behaviourists regard  all behaviour as a response to stimuli, with the underlying assumption that what we do is determined by the environment we are in that provides stimuli to which we respond. Also that the environments we have been in in the past, caused us to learn to respond to stimuli in particular ways. ‘Behaviourists are unique amongst psychologists in believing that it is unnecessary to speculate about internal mental processes when explaining behaviour’ (psychlotron.org.uk). Behaviourists believe that people are born with some innate reflexes such as fear and rage which do not need to be learned, but that all of a person’s complex behaviours are as a result of learning thr ough interaction with the environment. It is therefore assumed that the individual plays no part in choosing their own actions and behaviour. Today only a few psychologists would label themselves as behaviourists and the arguments about free will and conscious choices still continue. However, studies since the 1950’s have in fact brought an increasing recognition that conditioning probably occurs more widely than was previously understood. It is recognised for example that drug or alcohol use can be triggered by environmental cues – places and situations where drug taking or alcohol consumption is present. Contemporary therapy for some types of psychological distress owes much to insight derived from behaviourism. Children who self -harm can be treated with techniques of re inforcement for non- harming behaviours for example. Apparently one of the techniques used for treating people with obsessional and phobic disorders involves identifying and removing reinforcement for behaviour that is excessive and reinforcing the more positive behaviour with praise. The behaviourist approach is also relevant in understanding addiction and habitual behaviour – whether it be smoking, drugs, alcohol, drugs, gambling or sex etc. With this type of maladaptive behaviour there is a strong and fairly immediate positive reinforcing consequence of the behaviour. Whereas the unpleasant consequences of the behaviour are delayed i.e. potential serious illness in terms of smoking for instance. It is also recognised that someone who regularly exhibits violent or aggressive tendencies may well have grown up in a violent household where violent behaviour was modelled and reinforced. The psychoanalytic approach to counselling and psychotherapy has its roots in Freudian theory which essentially espouses that it is repressed memo ries and sexual wishes that are the root of psychological problems. In the  psychoanalytic approach there is an assumption that client’s difficulties have their ultimate origin in childhood experiences and that the client is not usually aware of the motives or impulses behind their actions. Prior to Watson and Skinner’s experiments, psychology had almost entirely been based on a psychoanalytic approach – the study of what happens in people’s minds. In therapy, people would report what was on their mind and this was documented and analysed by psychologists such as Freud. This approach to understanding people’s behaviour was considered highly subjective and unscientific by behaviourists. Freud espoused a range of theories to account for maladaptive behaviour; he argued that in early childhood three phases of psycho sexual development set the stage for a series of conflicts between the child and its environment, its family and most importantly its parent. He proposed that that the way in which parents responded to th e child would have a powerful influence on the later personality of the child and a significant impact on adult relationships. Psychological problems according to Freud arise because a person’s impulses and drives are driven underground and continue to influence the person subconsciously. There is significant emphasis in psychoanalytic theory on the quality of the relationship between child and parents. The fundamental viewpoint shared by all psychoanalytic counsellors and therapists is that in order to understand the personality of an adult client it is necessary to understand the development of their personality through childhood. Freud did not suggest however that that childhood experiences directly influence adult personality; he stated that the influence occurred in a particular way through the operation of the unconscious mind. This is perhaps where there is the most stark contrast between the behaviourist and psychoanalytic approaches. Behaviourists concern themselves with actual, observable behaviour rather than internal thoughts processes. Freud however not only advanced the idea of the unconscious mind, he also developed a complex theoretical model explaining the human mind as comprising three regions which he labelled the id the ego and the superego. The id being a reservoir of primitive instincts and impulses that are the ultimate motives for the behaviour; the ego which is the conscious rational part of the mind that makes decisions and deals with external reality and the superego a sort of store house of rules and taboos, mainly an internalisation of parental attitudes. Conflicts between  these elements can lead to stress in Freudian theory. An individual’s behaviour can be understood according to Freud, as being under the control of forces such as repressed memories, childhood fantasies which a person cannot acknowledge. The role of the psychoanalytic therapist is to look for ways of getting beneath the surface of what the client is saying and what is immediately observable. One could of course explain t he ‘forces’ mentioned above in behaviourist terms; that a person has simply been conditioned to do, act, say things in a certain way. A child repeatedly subject to violence or witnessing violence may well be more prone to aggressive behaviour in adulthood for example. But in Freud, I feel there is a richness not found in behaviourism. People and relationships are complex and therefore some emotional problems equally complex. In my view a psychoanalytic approach attempts at least to reflect this complexity – where therapy aims to enable clients to become more aware of their inner emotional life and therefore be more able to control feelings in an appropriate manner and gain the freedom to behave differently. A key aim of psychoanalysis is to achieve client insight into the true nature of their issues/ problems. Genuine insight usually being attained as result of the quality of the relationship between client and therapist. There is little reference to the quality relationship between client and therapist in the behaviourist approach. In the psychoanalytic approach there is as much emphasis on what the client doesn’t say as on what he or she does say about his or her problem – Freud wrote about what he termed defence mechanisms, which seek to protect an individual from emotionally disturbing or threatening unconscious impulses. These defence mechanisms might include such things as repression , denial, projecting one’s unacceptable thoughts and feelings to another person; or displacement, where an individual might channel impulses to a different target or regression where an individual responding to internal feelings triggered by an external threat, might revert to childlike behaviour from an earlier stage of development. This aspect of Freud’s theory provides powerful insight I feel into certain maladaptive behaviours. Of course the work of the proponents of behaviourism such as Watson and Skinner and Freud’s psychoanalytic theories have been developed and redefined over the years. In my opinion both approaches can have a valuable role to play in understanding maladaptive behaviour in spite of  their very different emphases, depending on the type of behaviour being treated. Behaviourism was the precursor to social learning theory developed by Albert Banduras and this emphasises both the social and physical context people find themselves in and how children in particular learn by observing and then imitating others who effectively act as models. This is more complex than simple stimulus response theory and it can be very important and enlightening for a therapist to understand the current and past social contexts of a client and its potential impact on their behaviour. Equally important, in my view, is the recognition that people have a complex inner mental life and an emotional inner world and responses that sometimes can’t be explained by environmental factors alone. In the same way that behaviour theory has developed, psychoanalytic theory has also a dvanced. The work of psychologist Melanie Klein for example, who researched the early relationship between mother and child, concluded that human beings are motivated by the need to establish and maintain relationships. This suggests to me that the quality of relationship between client and therapist is of significant importance. This thinking has little or no place in behaviourist approaches to therapy. Even contemporary cognitive behaviour therapy, which has its roots in behaviourism, places less emphasis on the relationship between client and therapist. Whereas the psychoanalytic counsellor would emphasise exploration and understanding, the CBT approach would be more orientated towards demonstrable action to produce change. It would seem sensible, in treating stress and anxiety to try to combine both approaches. A client suffering from anxiety is more likely to respond positively to a therapist with whom they have a trusting relationship; without that it would be very difficult for a client to face fears that may be buried in their subconscious. And for the therapist, it would be necessary to be able to establish/ understand the potential environmental and social triggers or stimuli (both current and historic) for the client’s anxiety. This could involve exploring the clients past in terms of their relationship with their parents perhaps and also searching for other relevant information about the situations that provide the cues for the client’s anxiety. In conclusion, although the assumptions made by early behaviourist psychologists seem overly simplistic nowadays , this work laid the foundations for more extensive research that has advanced our knowledge  about social learning and how this can affect behaviour. Although behaviour modification therapy doesn’t necessarily sit easily within a collaborative counselling relationship, some of the principles of behaviourism can be applied and adapted to understanding maladaptive behaviour. Behaviour modification therapy has been shown to be very effective with certain types of disorder such as obsessive compulsive disorder, eating disorders, addiction, anxiety disorders, fears and phobias. Sources: Mcleod J. (2008) Introduction to Counselling, third ed, Open University Furnham A. 50 Psychology Ideas You Really Need to Know, Quercus Publishing Hayes N. (2010) Understand Psychology, Hodder Education Ltd Chrysalis Year Two, Module Four course notes. www.britannica.com 17/11/2014 www.wikipedia.org/behaviourism 17/11/2014 www.psychlotron.or.uk 17/11/2014

Goods Spend Analysis

Individual Assignment Goods Spend Analysis Prepared by: Anjela Li Date: January 13, 2012 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Introduction3 2. Goods Spend Analysis: How is it conducted? 4 3. Key Triggers5 4. How spend analysis fits the procurement strategy6 1. Introduction Spend analysis  is the process of collecting, cleansing, classifying and analyzing expenditure data with the purpose of reducing procurement costs, improving efficiency and monitoring compliance. It can also be leveraged in other areas of business such as inventory management, budgeting and planning, and product development. There are three core areas of spend analysis – visibility, analysis and process. By leveraging all three, companies can generate answers to the crucial questions affecting their spending, including: ? What am I really spending? ? With whom am I spending it? ? Am I getting what’s been promised for that spend? Spend analysis is often viewed as part of a larger domain known as  spend management  which incorporates spend analysis, commodity management and  strategic sourcing. Companies perform spend analysis for several reasons. The core business driver for most organizations is profitability. In addition to improving compliance and reducing cycle times, performing detailed spend analysis helps companies find new areas of savings that previously went untapped, and hold onto past areas of savings that they have already negotiated. Benefits of Spend Data Management: [pic] 2. Goods Spend Analysis: How is it conducted? 3 major components of a spend analysis: Component |Activity |Typical deliverable | |(a)Opportunity assessment |Collect and validate category spend data/diagnose |High level spend analysis | | |company spend |Savings opportunity ranges | | |Analyze industry/market trends |Sourcing project plan | | |Prioritize and sequence opportunities |Sourcing maturity assessment | |(b)Creation of category profile |Define category spend by supplier, spend, |Detailed baseline spend analysis | |(c)Marketplace assessment |region/customer |Preferred parts list | | |Determine category requirements, specifications, |Industry and supply market analyses | | |forecast |Total cost components | | |Determine total cost components |Potential switching/change out osts (ex: replacement cost| | |Conduct detailed supply market and value chain analysis |of propane tanks when switching suppliers should be | | |Determine supplier universe and identify potential |considered when creating a sourcing strategy and in the | | |suppliers |analysis for potential savings) | | |Collect feedback from stakeholders regarding supplier | | | |performance | | 3. Key Triggers ? Spend by type of goods: provides visibility of what the money is spent for and enables further analysis to apply 80/20 rule to define the top 20% of goods that represent 80% of spend. A proper spend analysis by type of goods typically requires splitting main product categories into subcategories to provide visibility of â€Å"hidden† costs ? Spend by a Business Unit: provides visibility of spend by end customer, i. e. ho spends the money, compliance rate to the possible existing preferred supplier agreements and whether or not the spend is fragmented within the organization ? Spend by Supplier (enterprise view): allows understanding of who the money is spent with, how fragmented spend is within the supplier base and whether an opportunity exists for volume concentration ? Spend by Supplier (by Business Unit): allows visibility of the breakdown of spend among suppliers within a specific Business Unit. This helps to define whether there are common suppliers that are being used across all Business Units and whether an opportunity exists to gain a better price leverage by consolidating the volume for specific products across all Business Units. This type of analysis also prompts sourcing specialists to engage with stakeholders to understand whether there were any supplier performance concerns that might potentially impact distribution of spend and therefore, should be addressed and considered at the stage of building new strategic sourcing strategies 4. How spend analysis fits the procurement strategy A proper spend analysis allows to build effective sourcing strategies, which can be leverage oriented, relationship oriented or a combination of both (see Figure 1 below). The sourcing strategy for the category will depend on three factors: a) How competitive is the supplier marketplace? b) How aligned are your organization’s users on the need versus opportunity to test incumbent relationships? ) What alternatives to a competitive assessment exist for your organization in this or connected categories? Typically, if there are categories with High/Low Business impact and Low Market complexity the left side of the Sourcing Gemstone will be used: Volume Concentration, Best Price Evaluation or Global sourcing. If more complex markets are confronted (Ex: sole source supplier situation, single source supplier due to complexities in the product specifications and/or industry regulations, lack of substitute suppliers or products, other suppliers vs. the incumbent had critical performance issues in the past, long term industry shortage due to the economic downturn in the global market, etc. we may want to consider Product Specification Improvements, Joint Process Improvements or Relationship Restructuring strategies. It is also important to acknowledge that commonly, the higher the maturity of a specific category, the lower is the opportunity to capture high net dollar savings through a competitive event effort and the more is the need to focus on strengthening the relationship with your preferred supplier and reap the benefits of a joint effort in areas related to the right hand side of the Gemstone (Ex: p roduct standardization, electronic invoicing, product innovation, etc. ) Figure 1 [pic] Supply Market Complexity (High) ———————– High Business Impact