Construction of Gender in Social Media Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Construction of Gender in Social Media - Essay Example This essay stresses that extensive research has been conducted in the past to demonstrate the correlation between gender and media. Some have included studies on different types of media like movies, cartoons, music, and games. There are various methods used in studying the kind of language used by different genders on the social media that include; content analysis and discourse analysis. This paper declares that Herring attempts to bring ideas on computer-mediated discourse as a way to show that the study of the language used in social media is of great concern. Being that most social media sites are modern, Herring acknowledges that human-human communication via computer networks is a recent thing. In her ideas, she focuses on computer-mediated language and argues that is less correct, coherent and complex. Also, she states that the language that is used on social media differs according to the cultural and social context. A careful study of this computer-mediated discourse shows that language use can reveal the identity of the user whether he is educated or not, while he is trying to mask himself. Moreover, on media, especially social media the age of user can be revealed by the content of the message that the user post. Herring assumes that the identity of the gender in social media can be expected easily by the stereotypical behaviors that are attached to each ge nder. In addition to the above studies, statistics of how men and women have been using Twitter and Instagram also holds.

Business plan - CoViTek Essay Example for Free

Business plan CoViTek Essay CoViTek is an Atlanta based company that offers a unique value added service to the $11 billion dollars video rental industry. CoViTek will revolutionize the industry by renting movies through its video vending machines. These machines are already experiencing tremendous success in Europe, where they were invented. Customers will now be able to rent videos twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week in a timely and efficient manner at the lowest price. Our machines can be implemented anywhere, even in locations that are not accessible to our brick and mortar competitors, and we will therefore focus our efforts on all the strategic locations. Reve-lution Int. will offer a unique business-to-consumer service for the rental of videos and DVDs. The technology, containing a fully automated system, will facilitate continuous rental and return of movies bridging the gap between video stores, who only are open 15 hours a day, and services such as the nonexistent Kozmo. com, who offer video delivery for a premium price. The company has a cost-per-action (CPA) pricing structure. CoViTeks target customers will include universities with a student body of at least 10,000 in addition to the rest of the city of Atlanta for the first six months of operation. CoViTek will provide their clientele with a complete set of integrated tools within the machine to make accurate and enjoyable purchasing decisions. CoViTek will give video rental customers the freedom of rental 24 hours a day, seven days a week, all year long. CoViTek will build the worlds truly first convenient and efficient rental system Target Customers Movie rentals have proven to be an integral part of the everyday lives of the American population. With more than $11 billion dollars in rental sales in 1999, we acknowledge the aggregate demand for the video rental industry. Constantly seeking immediate gratification, video rental stores want the most efficient and cost-effective methods of satisfying their customers. CoViTek will make rentals simple by providing consumers the most efficient tools for with which to initialize a rental process. With the killer application technology used in these machines, the customer will be able to conduct multiple searches in order to rent the movie of their desire. CoViTek will further assist them through the provisions of an active preference search, which is currently being used by Amazon. com. This application will determine what the customer rented last and list the preferred movies of that category the customer will like based on past rental behavior. CoViTeks potential customers will represent the bulk of video rental households who value rental outlet convenience and flexible payment plans. CoViTek will strive for the most efficient, cost-flexible payments and active searches for preservation of quality time. Market Growth Perspective According to analyst Paul Keagan Associates, at home movie consumption expenditures will increase approximately 40% by 2005 to $27 billion, almost triple the amount spent in 1990. The vast majority of these expenditures, about 83%, will be for video/DVD rentals and retail. However, movie consumption will also encompass pay-per-view and video on demand (VOD) available through cable and satellite services. Video Production Companies Ninety percent of our videotapes will come from one of the six major production companies: 1. Buena Vista 2. Warner Bros. 3. Universal 4. Fox 5. Paramount, or 6. Columbia-Tri-Star The power of these suppliers is very high, as they hold the exclusive rights to the movies they produce. One of our late competitors, Kozmo. com, has built a unique strategic partnership with these production companies. They have developed a profit sharing system with the major production companies requiring no initial investment in the videos, but agreeing to give 40% of the revenue generated by the rentals to the producer of the movie. We believe that this profit sharing system is financially unattractive, although it will allow us to reduce our initial investment costs; it minimizes our profits which in turn will delay our expansion strategy. We will use an initial video vendor, Video Bicicling, based out of Texas to supply us with our videos and DVDs. They will provide us with the most up-do-date movies for competitive prices. Competitor Differentiation CoViTek differentiates itself from its competitors in several key areas. While companies such as Blockbuster and Hollywood Entertainment offer the same features, only CoViTek will incorporate all of the features described below in a way that gives consumers the ultimate ease of use, active preference search, and extremely convenient locations of operations. Time Availability CoViTeks competitive advantage is based on its time availability for rentals. The machines will be open and available for usage 24 hours a day, seven days a week, all year round. CoViTek will keep customer service readily available even throughout holidays. Strategic Locations CoViTek will implement the vending machines in key strategic locations after performing a detailed demo-geographical analysis of the city of Atlanta. Locations will initially be university campuses and later the urban areas of the city. Each machine will be located in areas where there is heavy human traffic. Payment Flexibility Our pricing will be flexible depending on the amount of time the video is out. Since CoViTek is a system that is open 24 hours a day there are no late fees associated in our model. Our standard rental time for DVDs is midnight of the following day for a price between $2. 50-$3. 00. Each additional day will be between $1. 50-$2. 00. Video Cassettes will be $3. 99 and if returned within 24 hours $1will be credited back. Each additional day will be $1. 99. (Based on new releases) Active Search CoViTek will use an innovative application technology which actively searches for videos categorized by title, actor, new releases, type of movie (action, thriller, comedy), and most frequently rented movies. Relative Competitive Factor Blockbuster Video Hollywood Video Kozmo. com CoViTek Relative Product Quality and Differentiation i i i i Flexible Payment Plan i E-commerce Based i i Brand Recognition % 100% 63% 40% N/A Locations around campuses i i i i Locations on Campuses i i Large video selection.i i Number of employees less than 5/ location i One of the most compelling aspects of the CoViTek model is its portability into untapped realms of video rental opportunities. This will provide the company with a critical advantage-the flexibility to transform itself in response to competitive challenges or to shifts in the video rental market environment. CoViTeks flexibility will give downside protection to its owners by insuring that new, innovative means of generating cash flow can be realized. Future elements of CoViTek may include: National Expansion. Video rental opportunities in selected national markets such as: Washington D. C. , Los Angeles, Miami and Huston. Washington D. C: our second location has similar features to our first city of operation. It has a few large universities, widely used public transportation, and high pedestrian traffic. The schools we target will be American University, George Washington University, and Georgetown University. Our downtown locations will depend on areas where there is an intersection of the public transportation lines and high pedestrian traffic. Data Distribution. Future plans may include the sale of CoViTeks proprietary online consumer data to the major video production companies. Specialized Machine Content Another growth opportunity for CoViTek in the future is the implementation of machines with customized video selection. The content of these machines will be select videos and DVDs targeted toward an audience based on specific themes. These machines will be placed in strategic locations based around their themes. Some possible themed machines may include: classic movie machines, foreign movie machines with Spanish subtitles or dubbing, and award-winning movie machines. The placement of these machines will require careful market analysis and planning, and therefore we plan to wait before implementation to gather enough data about the market and the purchasing patterns of our customers. Investment Needs Michel Khoury founder of CoViTek, has accumulated cash in excess of $10,000 for the development and the start-up cost of the company. CoViTek is now prepared to obtain financing through establishing a line of credit and implementing an equipment loan for its initial machine. It will later apply for loans as needed in order to buy more machines as it expands its operation. Using the machines and earnings as collateral CoViTek should have sufficient funds to obtain a line of credit that will secure its implementation of strategy. The initial stage of funding will be used to complete Web-site development, obtain one machines, invest in computer hardware and software, lease location space needed for the machines and market CoViTek during the first 12 months of operations. After 12 to 18 months of operation, CoViTek will require an infusion of an additional $15,000 to expand its brand image and increase its service offerings at an accelerated pace. Successful development and operation of CoViTek will allow it to be self-sufficient within approximately 9 to 12 months of initial operation. CoViTek will be a for-profit company incorporated in the state of Georgia. CoViTek Start up costs Machines $20,246. 64 Inventory: video tapes $9,210 Cash/ month $2,808 Advertising $8,000 Legal Accounting $7,000 Insurance $3,000 TOTAL $50,264. 64 Management team Michel Khoury Chief Executive Officer Founder While founding CoViTek, Michel Khoury is Assistant Managing Director at Bear, Stearns Co. Inc. He is working hand in hand with the Managing Director of the company in order to implement a system of bringing foreign investment to the company. He has had significance experience with young ventures as he has participated in the creation of several companies nationally and internationally. Michel Khoury is also consultant to the CEO of Santege Capital Asset Management Group in New York City. Michel Khoury graduated in May of 2001 from Emory University with a Bachelor of Business administration with concentrations in Finance, Consulting, Venture Management and Marketing.

The Origin of Emotion Labour

The Origin of Emotion Labour Emotions are feelings that people experience, interpret, reflect on, express, and manage (Thoits, 1989). They arise through social interaction, and are influenced by social, cultural, interpersonal, and situational conditions (Martin, 1999). In many situations in our daily lives, we often find ourselves suppressing feelings and displaying a more socially accepted emotion that is deemed more appropriate. For example, showing excitement about a companys promotion or suppressing fury when being cut off by someone in a waiting line. Regulating individuals emotions to comply with social norms then is referred to as emotion work (Hochschild, 1990; p. 118). When we need to display particular emotions and suppress others, which required by our job roles, we do our emotion management for a wage. Hochschild (1983) termed this regulation of ones emotions to comply with occupational or organizational norms as emotional labour. She defined emotional labour as the management of feeling to create a publicly observable facial and bodily display; emotional labour is sold for a wage and therefore has exchange value (Hochschild, 1983; p.7). According to Hochschild (1983), jobs involving emotional labour possess three characteristics: they require the workers to make facial or voice contact with the public; they require the worker to produce an emotional state in the client or customer, and they provide the employer with an opportunity to utilize some control over the emotional activities of workers (Hochschild, 1983). Based on impression management, Ashforth and Humphrey (1993) defined emotional labour as the act of displaying the appropriate emotion. Their definition differs from Hochschilds (1983), since their definition emphasizes the actual behaviour rather than the presumed emotions underlying the behaviour (Ashforth Humphrey, 1993). According to Morris and Feldman (1997), emotional labour possesses the following characteristics: (a) emotion work occurs in face-to-face or voice-to-voice interactions with clients; (b) emotions are displayed to influence other peoples emotions, attitudes and behaviours; and (c) the display of emotions has to follow certain rules. 2.1.2 Dimensions of Emotional Labour and Its Measures Brotheridge and Grandey (2002) restructured emotional labour into two categories: One focuses on the characteristic of the job and the other emphasizes employees emotion management process. The former is called job-focused emotional labour which includes the frequency, duration, variety, and intensity of emotional labour and display rules. The latter is named employee-focused emotional labour, an emotion management skill that employees use in the course of interactions with clients. This category includes surface acting and deep acting. Brotheridge and Lee (2003) used the similar approach. They developed an emotional labour measure including both job-focused and employee-focused variables. Specifically, their measure has six facets: frequency of interaction, intensity and variety of emotional display, duration of interaction, and surface and deep acting. Emotional labour researchers often ignored spontaneous and genuine emotions, acknowledged as passive deep acting by Hochschild (1983), in the development of the emotional labour measure. Diefendorff, Croyle, and Gosserand (2005) constructed the display of naturally felt emotions as an independent factor and formed a three-dimensional emotional labour instrument: surface acting, deep acting, and naturally felt emotions. In summary, despite many different measures developed, the general view is that job-related variables, such as frequency, intensity, variety, and display rules are experienced as the antecedents of emotional labour rather than emotional labour itself and two acting modes (surface and deep acting), that employees use to match the required emotional display are regarded as the true components of emotional labour (Grandey, 2000 A.A. Grandey, Emotion regulation in the workplace: a new way to conceptualize emotional labor, Journal of Occupational health Psychology 5 (1) (2000), pp. 95-110. Abstract | icon_pdfPDF (1059 K) | Full Text via CrossRef | View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (124)Grandey, 2000). 2.1.3 Servicing Acting Based on Goffmans (1959) dramaturgical perspective of social interactions, Hochschild theorized that service is a show where the service provider is an actor, the customer is the audience, and the work setting is the stage (Grandey, 1999). The work place (restaurant) provides the setting and circumstance that allows actors (wait staff) to perform for audiences (diners). The interaction between actors and audiences is based on their mutual definition of the setting, which can be interpreted as occupational or organizational norms or display rules. Surface acting and deep acting are two types of acting mechanism that emotional labour preformed. 2.1.3.1 Surface Acting Surface acting is a discrepancy between felt and displayed emotion (Ashforth Humphrey, 1993). Surface acting involves employees simulating emotions that are not actually felt, by changing their outward appearances (i.e., facial expression, gestures, or voice tone) when exhibiting required emotions. For example, a hotel front desk employee may put on a smile and cheerfully greet a customer even if she or he is feeling down. In this case, the front desk clerk feigns emotions that are not experienced (Chu, 2002, P.18). Using the surface acting technique, people change the outward expression of emotion in the service of altering their inner feelings. By changing facial or bodily expressions, such as slumped shoulders, bowed head, or drooping mouth, inner feelings can be altered to a coincident state (Hochschild, 1993). 2.1.3.2 Deep Acting Deep acting occurs when employees feelings do not fit the situation; they then use their training or past experience to work up appropriate emotions (Chu, 2002, P.19). Unlike surface acting, deep acting involves changing inner feelings by altering something more than outward appearance. In surface acting, feelings are changed from the outside in, whereas feelings are changed from the inside out in deep acting (Hochschild, 1983). Hochschild (1983) classified deep acting as (1) exhorting feeling, whereby one actively attempts to evoke or suppress an emotion, and (2) trained imagination, whereby one actively invokes thoughts, images, and memories to cause the related emotion (thinking of a wedding to feel happy or a funeral to feel sad). In other words, employees use their training or past experiences to help summoning appropriate emotions or responses (sadness, cheerfulness) for a given scene. By practicing deep acting, emotions are actively induced, suppressed, or shaped (Kruml Geddes, 2000). 2.1.4 Functions of Emotion Labour Zapf (2002, P.248) stated that Emotion work is a part of an overall task and, thus, it helps to fulfil the overall task and increase task effectiveness. Ashforth, B.E. and Humphrey, R.H., 1993. Emotional labor in service roles: the influence of identity. Academy of Management Review 18, pp. 88-115. Full Text via CrossRefAshforth and Humphrey (1993) consider emotion work as a form of impression management because by showing certain emotions the employee deliberately attempts to foster certain social perceptions of him- or herself. Emotion work is done to influence the emotions of the clients either as the ultimate or as an instrumental goal. In the service business, the premise is that customers or clients would be more likely to do business with an organization when they experience the interaction with service providers positively. This should mainly depend on how far the interaction with the service providers either supports or threatens their self-esteem. Emotion labour may help to make the social interaction more calculable and assist to avoid embarrassing situations that might otherwise interrupt the interaction with clients (Ashforth Humphrey, 1993). Moreover, emotion work may help to develop or stabilize the organization-customer relationship for building trust in the organization. This is more important in the service sector than in other sectors; because (1) it is difficult to assess the quality of service; (2), because the service product is immediately consumed and corrections, such as giving the product back, are impossible (Ashforth and Nerdinger, 1994); (3), emotion labour should influence the clients emotions thereby influencing their cognitions and behaviours. (4), influencing a clients emotion may make other things easier. In the entertainment business and in the helping professions, influencing the clients emotion may be the ultimate goal. 2.2 Antecedents of Emotional Labour Antecedents of emotional labour including two characteristics: individual characteristics and job characteristics. 2.2.1 Individual characteristics Emotional labour researchers seem to agree that service workers emotional acting can be explained by personality traits because personal dispositions underlie much of the way that people think and behave (Ashkanasy, Hartel and Daus, 2002). Two personality variables as the antecedents of emotional labour will be examined, which are negative affectivity and intrinsic motivation. 2.2.1.1 Negative Affectivity Negative affectivity is a dispositional personality variable and an individuals tendency to experience discomfort across time and situations (Watson and Clark, 1984). Individuals high in negative affectivity tend to resident the negative aspects of themselves, others, and situations in a generally more negative way and often seem to be anxious, nervous, and afraid (Cropanzano et al., 1993 R. Cropanzano, K. James and M.A. Konovsky, Dispositional affectivity as a predictor of work attitudes and job performance, Journal of Organizational Behavior 14 (6) (1993), pp. 595-606. Full Text via CrossRef | View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (118)Cropanzano, James, and Konovsky, 1993). Individuals low in negative affectivity are typically in states of calmness and peace (Watson, Clark, and Tellegen, 1988). As discussed by Liu, Perrewe, Hochwarter, and Kacmar (2004), negative emotional experiences is aroused by negative affectivity to across time and situations that may obstruct individua ls to regulate their emotional experiences in the service encounter. Such individuals appear to fake their positive emotions when necessary (Kim, 2008). The relationship between negative affectivity and stressors is also supported by the basic theory of heat-affect-overload (Van De Vliert and Van Yperen, 1996). Specifically, employees living and working in hot climates of countries such as Nigeria, Indonesia, and Singapore are high in negative affectivity and experience role overload. It has been proposed that availability of heat or hot climate deranges the thermoregulatory system of the human body and leads to negative affectivity. Such high negative affectivity individuals are faced with higher role overload. According to Osman and Kayode (2008), who studied in emotional dissonance and emotional exhaustion among hotel employees in Nigeria, they stated that even though the hotels may have functioning air-conditioning systems, regular power cut or outages due to poor electric power infrastructure in Nigeria may cause frustration among employees and customers. In addition, the high cost of running alternative power source like generators limits the proper use of the air-conditioning systems in most of the hotels. Frontline hotel employees such as door attendants, food servers, and beverage servers have to serve customers in outdoor facilities, such employees are exposed to direct sunlight and humidity under these circumstances. Most of the frontline employees cannot afford to buy air-conditioning systems in their houses; if they could, they do not enjoy it due to irregular power supply in the country. Furthermore, they may not have sufficient financial resources to buy automobiles having air -conditioning systems. Therefore, such employees usually far from their houses go to work, using modes of public transportation such as buses, which are overloaded and are devoid of air-conditioning systems. Accordingly, frontline hotel employees in a country such as Nigeria are high in negative affectivity and experience-deepened stress. Employees in frontline service jobs of the hospitality industry in Nigeria are expected to manage their emotions by changing their outward appearance to display organizationally desired emotions while the inner feelings remain unchanged and thus are likely to experience emotional exhaustion (Osman and Kayode, 2008). In addition, negative affectivity is widely used in strain-related research and has been linked with emotional exhaustion (Houkes, Janssen, De Jonge, and Nijhuis, 2001). In their meta-analytic work, Thoresen et al., 2003 C.J. Thoresen, S.A. Kaplan, A.P. Barsky, C.R. Warren and K. De Chermont, The affective underpinnings of job perceptions and attitudes: a meta-analytic review and integration, Psychological Bulletin 129 (6) (2003), pp. 914-945. Abstract | Article | icon_pdfPDF (244 K) | Full Text via CrossRef | View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (78)Thoresen, Kaplan, Barsky, Warren, and De Chermont (2003) reported an estimated mean population correlation of .54 between negative affectivity and emotional exhaustion. According to Spector, Zapf, Chen, and Frese, (2000), the perception mechanism also proposes useful guidelines for developing the relevant hypotheses. That is, the perception mechanism states that high negative affectivity individuals tend to perceive their jobs as s tressful and experience high levels of strains. It means, high negative affectivity frontline employees in the hotel industry are susceptible to higher emotional dissonance and emotional exhaustion. 2.2.1.2 Intrinsic Motivation Another personality variable used as the antecedents of emotional labour is intrinsic motivation. To date various personal resources or personality variables (e.g., self-efficacy, optimism, and locus of control) have been examined with regard to emotional dissonance and emotional exhaustion (Ito and Brotheridge, 2003). As a personal resource and a key personality variable, intrinsic motivation has not received much empirical attention in the hospitality management and marketing literatures (Karatepe and Uludag, 2007). Intrinsic motivation refers to an individuals feeling of challenge or competence derived from performing a job (Keaveney, 1992, p.151). Intrinsically motivated employees have better problem-solving skills and are innovative (Miller, 2002). Grant (2008, p.49) states that intrinsically motivated individuals feel naturally drawn, or pulled, toward completing their work, are process focused-they see the work as an end in and of itself, and are present focused-they are concerned with the experience of performing the work itself. Consistent with the Conservation of Resources Theory, intrinsic motivation is one of the personal resources that can be used for coping with emotional dissonance and exhaustion. As a personal resource, intrinsic motivation can affect employees willingness and perceived effort to manage emotional experiences in the service encounter. Such a personal resource can also be invested in aiding the process of stress resistance and can contribute to the maintenance of res ource reservoirs (Hobfoll, 2001). Consequently, employees with personal resources have mastery that enables them to cope with demanding or forbidding conditions more effectively and thus prevents them from experiencing emotional exhaustion (Xanthopoulou, Bakker, Demerouti, and Schaufeli, 2007). Recently, Karatepe and Uludag (2007) also demonstrated that intrinsic motivation lowered emotional exhaustion for a sample of frontline hotel employees in Northern Cyprus. 2.2.2 Job Characteristics 2.2.2.1 Interaction Characteristics Customer satisfaction depends on the quality of the interpersonal interaction between the customer and frontline employees (Bitner, 1990). Hochschild (1983) argued that job characteristics such as numerous interactions with customers are likely to increase service providers emotional labour. Brotheridge and Grandey (2002) found that frequency and variety of emotional display were positively related to surface acting and deep acting and that duration was positively related to deep acting. In the article by Brotheridge and Lee (2003), frequency and variety showed a positive relationship with surface acting and deep acting, although duration was not related to either acting. Diefendorff, Croyle, and Gosserand (2005) reported interaction characteristics (frequency, duration, and routineness) were not significant predictors of surface acting but mostly related to deep acting. Specifically, duration had a positive impact on deep acting and routineness showed a negative influence on deep ac ting. The most popular theory regarding the relationship between customer contact variables and emotional labour strategies originates from Morris and Feldman, 1996 J.A. Morris and D.C. Feldman, The dimensions, antecedents, and consequences of emotional labor, The Academy of Management Review 21 (4) (1996), pp. 986-1010. Full Text via CrossRefMorris and Feldmans (1996) conceptual work. The authors argued that the more often a work role requires socially proper emotional displays, the greater the companys demand for emotional regulation and the greater employees emotional labour; frequent changes in the variety of emotions to fit in different situational contexts require more planning and anticipation on the part of service employees, thereby entailing greater emotional labour; and emotional displays of long duration require more effort than short duration, leading to greater emotional labour. This notion suggests the possibility of frequency, variety, and duration increasing emotional labo ur in general (both surface and deep acting). However, previous findings especially regarding duration seem to suggest that duration largely leads to deep acting. Deep acting may be the strategy of choice during long interaction because it becomes difficult for employees to fake emotion for a long period of time (Diefendorff et al., 2005). 2.2.2.2 Job Autonomy The hospitality literature has shown that job autonomy can mitigate the level of hospitality employees emotional exhaustion (Kim, Shin, and Umbreit 2007). Morris and Feldman (1996, 1997) suggested employees who have less autonomy over their behaviour should feel more emotive dissonance, which likely leads them to fake feelings (surface acting); and those who have more autonomy experience less emotive dissonance, therefore they are likely to express their natural emotions. According to their rationale, job autonomy is not related to emotive effort (i.e., deep acting). 2.2.2.3 Display Rules According to Hochschild, 1983 A.R. Hochschild, The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, University of California Press, Berkeley, CA (1983).Hochschild (1983), service occupations involve strong norms and/or expectations regarding displays of emotions. Research has shown that display rules have a positive relationship with emotional acting (Brotheridge and Lee, 2002). Some studies separate display rules into positive and negative rules. Positive display rules evaluate service providers recognitions on expressing positive emotions and negative display rules evaluate the recognitions regarding suppressing negative emotions at work. Brotheridge and Grandey (2002) showed that both types of display rules were positively correlated with both types of acting. Diefendorff and Richard (2003) hypothesized that perceived demands (positive and negative display rules) would be positively related to emotional display, but the result indicated that emotional display only led by positive rule demands. Diefendorff et al. (2005) found that positive display rules were positively correlated with deep acting and negative display rules were positively correlated with surface acting. The authors explained that positive rules (what to express) clarify expectations better and result in good faith attempts (deep acting), whereas negative rules (what not to express) lead employees to just go through the motion and fake their emotions (surface acting). In hospitality organizations such as hotel companies, distinct norms are often included in the job description and employees are trained consistently (e.g., showing a smile with a mirthful greeting). Hence, it seems plausible that hotel firms display rules increase the likelihood of hotel personnels emotional regulation, leading to emotional acting either surface or deep acting. Therefore, in harmony with Brotheridge and Grandeys (2002) work, it is predicted that display rules, regardless of the type, will affect both acting strategies. 2.3 Consequences of Emotional Labour Ashforth and Humphrey (1993) described emotional labour as a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it can facilitate task performance by regulating interactions and precluding interpersonal problems. On the other hand, it can impair performance by priming expectations of good service that cannot be met (Ashforth and Humphrey, 1993). The following section discusses the positive and negative consequences of performing emotional labour, and particularly, its effects on employees psychological well-being. 2.3.1 Negative Consequences 2.3.1.1 Fusion of Self and Work Role In the emotional labour literature, substantial research in this field addresses unfavourable outcomes. The most-often-cited outcomes are burnout and job dissatisfaction (Morris and Feldman, 1996). Other impacts on the individuals psychological well-being are also discussed in the literature, such as poor self-esteem, depression, cynicism, role alienation, and self-alienation (Ashforth and Humphrey, 1993). Wharton (1999) suggested two reasons why the regulation of service providers emotional displays is problematic. First, to ensure service quality, employers often implement behaviour scripts (such as smile, eye contact, body position, tone of voice) for service providers to follow. This restrictive script prevents service providers from interacting with customers based on spontaneous intuition, but on a script drawn up by employers. That is, workers own complex for interaction may be suppressed and replaced by an organizationally sanctioned response (Wharton, 1999). Second, service providers may have different interests vis-à  -vis the outcome of the interaction. That is, employers believe that service providers emotional displays are instruments of service excellence. While front-line employees may sometimes share those objectives, they do not always do so. In these instances, workers interests may be sacrificed. Hochschild (1983) theorized about the consequences of emotional labor based on service providers capacity to strike a balance between the requirements of the self and the demands of the work role. Sustained performance of emotional labour may produce a fusion of self and work role, an estrangement between self and work role that comes at the expense of the self, or a separation between self and work role that comes at the expense of the work role (Hochschild, 1983). The fusion of self and work role can be seen as the service providers inability to depersonalize and detach themselves from the work roles. Research has shown that workers in human service occupations, such as social work or counselling, are often too identified with their work roles and lose the ability to maintain sufficient psychological distance between the emotional requirements of their job and their sense of self. For example, hotel service providers use deep acting techniques to conjure up desired positive emotions and to suppress felt negative emotions. But after awhile, many these service providers reveal that they have a hard time recovering their true feelings once their shifts are over. They begin to lose track of when they are acting and when they are not (Hochschild, 1983). 2.3.1.2 Emotive Dissonance Contrarily, another potential consequence of emotional labour is the estrangement between self and work role. Just as workers on the assembling lines become estranged from their bodies, service providers may become estranged from their true feelings (Hochschild, 1983). Hochschild claimed that most of the negative consequences of performing emotional labour have its roots in this estrangement. The estrangement between oneself and the work role is often presented in the forms of emotive dissonance or unauthenticated, which can be seen as a result of surface acting. Similar to cognitive dissonance, emotive dissonance reflects a gap between felt emotions and expressed emotions. For example, a front desk employee greets a customer in a cheerful and enthusiastic manner but indeed, she or he feels down and unhappy. The inconsistency between expressed emotions (cheerful and enthusiastic) and felt emotions (down and unhappy) is emotive dissonance. Based on the assumption that people are motivated to maintain and enhance their sense of self as being meaningful and authentic (Erickson Wharton, 1997), the experience of emotive dissonance may cause the individual to feel false and insincere. Researchers suggest that the regular occurrence of emotive dissonance may be harmful in terms of employees personal and work-related maladjustment, such as poor self-esteem, depression, and alienation from work (Ashforth Humphrey, 1993). Hochschild (1993) suggested that emotive dissonance is most harmful to employees psychological well-being when it comes at the expense of the self, and is less harmful when it is at the expense of the work role. When emotive dissonance comes at the expense of the self, employees blame themselves for displaying fictitious emotions and feelings of unauthenticated. Thereafter, this estrangement of oneself leads to negative consequences such as depression (Ashforth Humphrey, 1993), drug or alcohol abuse (Hochschild, 1983), and low self-efficacy (Seeman, 1991). Antithetically, when emotive dissonance comes at the expense of the work role, employees ascribe this false emotion or inauthentic expression to the demands of the job rather than to the desires of the self (Wharton, 1999), and thus it may be less harmful in terms of their psychological well-being. In an interview with a waitress, Paules (1991) documented how one waitress does not overextend herself into her work. The waitress says that when she distances herself from her job she does not feel bad about it (Paules, 1991, p.286). 2.3.2 Positive Consequences Although substantial literature on emotional labor implies negative consequences, some researchers have suggested positive consequences for both organizations and individuals. 2.3.2.1 Organization For an organization, regulating employees emotional display in a highly scripted manner can ensure task effectiveness and service quality (Ashforth and Humphrey, 1993), and increase sales and repeated business (Rafaeli and Sutton, 1987). Also, the positive aspects of emotional labour include financial rewards (i.e., tips or salaries) (Rafaeli Sutton, 1987); increased satisfaction, security, and brand loyalty (Wharton, 1993). 2.3.2.2 Individual Although customers are major stress-producing figures for front-line employees, customers also provide employees with many entertaining and satisfying moments in their working (Tolich, 1993). One reason for this satisfaction is that customers enliven otherwise monotonous tasks. Most of the entry-level jobs in the service industry are highly routine and standardized (i.e., supermarket clerks or food servers). Because of the variety of customers, their presence, even when annoying, is only somewhat distracting, and can be stimulating (Tolich, 1993). Rose (2001) recognized the positive function of emotional labour because interaction with customers serves as a comic relief; he conducted an extensive qualitative study on waitresses working-life. He described the sources of satisfaction for wait staff as below: Some waitresses gain satisfaction from contributing to a customers enjoyment (you supply nurturing and sustenance, the things that make life pleasurable). Some respond to the hustle and stimulation of a busy restaurant, the sense of being in the middle of thingsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦some like the attention (the spotlights on you)à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦..some comment on the pleasure of the attenuated human interaction: though well never get to know each other, theres a really nice feelings that go back and forth (Rose, 2000, p. 19). Roses (2000) case studies offer some support for the argument that performing emotional labour is not always psychologically damaging. The interaction with the public, being at the centre of attention or a sense of joy when knowing ones work is altruistic in nature all bring some intrinsic rewards to ones job when performing emotional labour. The reward or benefit aspect of performing emotional labour receives some empirical support. Wharton (1993) found that workers employed in jobs requiring substantial amounts of emotional labour experience higher job satisfaction and lower emotional exhaustion than other workers (Wharton, 1993). Adelman (1989) found a similar result for table servers. She concluded that, contrary to Hochschilds estrangement assumption, performing emotional labour does not adversely impact employees psychological well-being, but enhances their job satisfaction (Adelman, 1989). 2.4 Moderators of Emotional Labour 2.4.1 Successful Recruitment and Selection Karatepe and Aleshinloye (2009) pointed out that in order to fill vacant positions in organizations, managers should use effective recruitment and selection tools. It is significant that managers should consider the personality traits of candidates in the selection process, focus on candidates who are intrinsically motivated, and try to hire those who can manage their felt emotions matching organizationally desired display norms in the service encounter. This should be a far-reaching practice among hospitality managers. By doing so, managers can go some way to making such frontline employees manage problems associated with emotional dissonance and exhaustion. Another implication for practice is that employing mentors in the workplace appears to be inevitable, since younger, less educated and less experienced employees are confronted with emotional dissonance and exhaustion (Karatepe and Aleshinloye, 2009). Mentors could help such employees alleviate their emotional dissonance and exhaustion by listening to employees problems and their expectations from the management of the hotel and providing support and guidance (Lee and Akhtar, 2007). 2.4.2 Adequate Training Karatepe and Aleshinloye (2009) also suggested that frontline employees should be trained continuously to learn how to cope with problems that stem from emotional dissonance and emotional exhaustion. This is significant, because effective and continuous training programs in the hospitality industry are not abundant. Therefore, managers should foster social support arising from both supervisors and co-workers in the workplace during these training programs and train their frontline employees in the areas of complaint handling procedures and genuine customer care. Such training programs would also comprise of potential empowerment practices frontline employees would use to deal with customers complaints. The final implication is associated with promotional

Prosperity and Violence in Developed vs Underdeveloped Countries Essay

Prosperity and Violence in Developed vs Underdeveloped Countries The best examples of the trade off between prosperity and violence are attributed in Bates to the early developers, whose' success story stands in contrast to the prospect of the late developers who's situation is fundamentally related to their historical relationship with the developed nations. In order to come to an understanding of the trade off between prosperity and violence it is therefore necessary to establish the terms of distinction between developed and underdeveloped countries. This paper will therefore establish the cause of the trade off between prosperity and violence in order to highlight its impediments. In doing so this paper will argue that the history of early developers is characterised in Bates by the interplay between prosperity and violence and their respective roles in inspiring the great transformation. It will be argued that the trade off between prosperity and violence passes through distinct stages which has implications for the prospects of late developers. From agrarian beginnings in which a fragile peace was established via the threat of privately wielded violence to the feudal period which sees monarchs engage in wars, the trade off between prosperity and violence is the outcome or solution of the exigencies of the time. There is then a stark contrast between the histories of the developed nations and the modern histories of the late developers. Following Bates, it will be argued that the trade off between prosperity and violence has not yet effectively taken place within the developing world. The impact of global economic forces coupled with the impact of the cold war has negatively impacted the late deve... .... However, there is no doubt that the late developer?s ability to undergo the ?great transformation? has been perverted by the post war political and economic environment. Insofar as the course of the late developers direction has diverted from the norm established by the early developers, the trade-off between prosperity and violence has not been accomplished. References Bates, R, (2000), "Prosperity and Violence: the political economy of development", W. W. Norton and company, New York and London] Todaro, M, (1997), ?Economic development?, Sixth Edition, London Longman Valenzuela, J.S and Valenzuela, A., (1978) "Modernisation and Dependency: alternative perspectives in the study of Latin American Underdevelopment", Comparative Politics 10 Kothari, U and Minogue, M, (2002), "Development theory and practice: critical perspectives", Palgrave Prosperity and Violence in Developed vs Underdeveloped Countries Essay Prosperity and Violence in Developed vs Underdeveloped Countries The best examples of the trade off between prosperity and violence are attributed in Bates to the early developers, whose' success story stands in contrast to the prospect of the late developers who's situation is fundamentally related to their historical relationship with the developed nations. In order to come to an understanding of the trade off between prosperity and violence it is therefore necessary to establish the terms of distinction between developed and underdeveloped countries. This paper will therefore establish the cause of the trade off between prosperity and violence in order to highlight its impediments. In doing so this paper will argue that the history of early developers is characterised in Bates by the interplay between prosperity and violence and their respective roles in inspiring the great transformation. It will be argued that the trade off between prosperity and violence passes through distinct stages which has implications for the prospects of late developers. From agrarian beginnings in which a fragile peace was established via the threat of privately wielded violence to the feudal period which sees monarchs engage in wars, the trade off between prosperity and violence is the outcome or solution of the exigencies of the time. There is then a stark contrast between the histories of the developed nations and the modern histories of the late developers. Following Bates, it will be argued that the trade off between prosperity and violence has not yet effectively taken place within the developing world. The impact of global economic forces coupled with the impact of the cold war has negatively impacted the late deve... .... However, there is no doubt that the late developer?s ability to undergo the ?great transformation? has been perverted by the post war political and economic environment. Insofar as the course of the late developers direction has diverted from the norm established by the early developers, the trade-off between prosperity and violence has not been accomplished. References Bates, R, (2000), "Prosperity and Violence: the political economy of development", W. W. Norton and company, New York and London] Todaro, M, (1997), ?Economic development?, Sixth Edition, London Longman Valenzuela, J.S and Valenzuela, A., (1978) "Modernisation and Dependency: alternative perspectives in the study of Latin American Underdevelopment", Comparative Politics 10 Kothari, U and Minogue, M, (2002), "Development theory and practice: critical perspectives", Palgrave

Groupon Analysis

1. Research process As the secondary data on evaluation of customers in Vietnam with regard to groupon are not available, the method to be used in this study is almost research employing a combination of qualitative and quantitive approaches. Problems de? nition Quantitive research Research design Qualitative research Questionnaire online survey Sampling Fieldwork Data analysis Managerial implications Figure : the stages of customers evaluation research Normally the starting point of any research process is the research problem and research objectives.The next stage is to design plans of getting information of both quantitive and qualitative ? gures. Then the the objectives transform in to questionnaire. In the survey both quantitive and qualitative questions are used. Multiple choices with scale measure is used on the other hand question with open answers are use to identify the quantitive problems. Information to be obtained should be determined prior to the building of questionnai re. Table 1 shows how information is to be collected. Each variable have 5 question to determine. Variables Reliability! Who to ask Customer!What to get How is the customer valuation of groupon companies’s reliability ! How is the customer valuation of groupon companies’s responsibility!! How is the customer valuation of groupon companies’s assurance! How is the customer valuation of groupon companies’s empathy! ! How is the customer valuation of groupon companies’s tangibles! Responsibility Customer Assurance Customer Empathy! Customer! Tangibles Customer! The next step after questionnaires were designed and sampled, ? eldwork was executed that involved the completion and return of questionnaire. Data analysis can start after the returned questionnaire were checked.Finally, the research process ends with the most important part that is the managerial implications. 2. Quantitative study The purpose of the quantitative study is to identify the relat ionship between 5 factors reliability, responsibility, assurance, empathy and tangibles and the quality of groupon companies’s services. The details about sampling, data collection and data analysis methods are described in the next part. a. Sampling †¢ Sample size: a sample of 390 people was drawn from residents living or working in some districts in Hanoi and some part of districts 1 Ho Chi Minh city. 90 people answered some question to classify in 3 groups which are the people have used groupon service, the people never use groupon service but they know about it and the people never use groupon and do not know anything about it. As expected, 50 percents of people who were asked to do survey are student because large number of people who use groupon to buy product and services is low income people; 30 percents of that is white collar worker the reason is that they have to work with computer and internet in plenty hours in a day and they want to buy product with low cos t lso and the last group of people the survey focusing on is housewives which is have 20 percents in total sample. Sample should include both women and men, belonging to 5 groups of age (from 18 years old to over 55 years old). †¢ Selection criteria: the selection criteria for those participating in the study were age (between 18 and over 55 years old), income ( at least more than 1 million Vietnam dong per month), ability to use computer and the internet ( because almost all groupon companies are working base on internet environment).In addition, respondents should not be acquaintances of each other because they can share the same attitude about some services and companies. b. Data collection The questionnaire consists of 25 questions to determine 25 items which belong to 5 factors. These factors were developed from the study model Serqual . The Likert ? ve-point scale was used for those items that aimed to measure consumer’s evaluation and felling. †¢ Factors 1: r eliability have 5 questions which were designed to explore customer’s belief †¢ Factors 2: responsibility was aimed to ? d out the felling of customers about responsibility of the companies whether they can respond the requirement of customer immediately or with some delays. This factor was determined by 5 questions †¢ Factor 3: Assurance is the factor which have 5 question to measure the security of the companies’s service. †¢ Factor 4: empathy use 5 question to explore if the staff of companies try to help and understand customer or not. †¢ Factor 5: tangible have 5 question to determine like the last 4 factor. Those question use to evaluate the appearance of the companies such as the website, voucher or uniforms of staffs.Every question uses multiple choices with ? ve-point scale from 1-5 which mean terrible, poor, average, very good and excellent. The questionnaire was translate into Vietnamese and pre-test on 5 respondents to ensure the correct understanding and the ease of answering. Pretest results were satis? ed. The questionnaire were distributed to 730 persons in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh city via online survey which is designed by Google and send by email, direct message and social networking(Facebook, Twitter). (Appendix Phu luc bang hoi )Of 730 person sent survey 390 returned result, of which 163 were usable (163 respondents use groupon as the media to shopping). The valid questionnaire must (1) not having more than ? ve missing values; (2) not selecting all â€Å"1† or all â€Å"5† for all questions. The distribution of questionnaires and the collections of returned ones were carried out from 8th October to 20th October 2012. c. Data analysis Answers from the respondents were reviewed for completion and usefulness. Accepted questionnaire were coded and the raw data input in the SPSS package version 20 for Mac.The reliability of measurement scales was evaluated using Cronbach’s alpha value. A scal e is reliable if the alpha is higher than 0. 6. Descriptive analysis is used to describe the variables in term of frequency. Due to the small size sample, subgroup analysis is not meaningful. Analysis variance (ANOVA) or cross tabulation results therefore were not used. The lis of codi? ed variables is shown in Appendix phu luc cac bien Factor analysis was used to reduce the number of variables and to identify the underlying common dimensions.Factor scores were then analyzed using multiple regressions, through linear relationships between a dependent variable and various independent variables (predictors) were determined. 3. Results 3. 1 Sample pro? le Groupon-buying discount products or services online are consumed by a large number of population due to the development of the internet past 10 years. Sample includes 46 men and 117 women, aged from 18 to over 18 years old with the majority being the age group of 18-24 years old. Of 162 respondents 20. 2% using groupon for their work, 64. 4% using for their personal purpose and 15. % using groupon to buy products and services for both purposes which are personal and work. More than 60% of people who are asked have a low income which is less than 5 million Vietnam dong per month, it can be reasonable when most of groupon customer have a low income and it may explain that price is very importance when they decide to buy somethine. And a large number of the respondents are student which are a young generation. They can easily using internet and modern way of shopping. Figure : Gender distribution Figure : Purpose distribution 15% 28% 20% 72% 64% Man Women Personal WorkPersonal and work Figure : Age distribution Figure : Monthly income 1% 7% 13% 16% 11% 12% 79% 9million 5-9 million other 61% 18-24 25-29 30-40 40-50 Figure : Job distribution 150 100 50 0 Student New employee Employee Housewife Other Table show the demographic characteristics of the sample with regards to gender, age, income, job and voucher’s value. Table : Summary samples’s characteristic Percentage (n=162) Female Gender Male 18-24 25-29 Age 30-40 40-50 less than 5 million 5-9 million Monthly income more than 9 million other Student New employee Jobs Employee Housewife Other 1. 500. 000 11% 16% 69. % 12. 3% 15. 3% 1. 8% 0. 6% 17. 8% 69. 9% 9. 2% 1. 8% 1. 2% 7% 1% 61% 12% 28% 79% 13% 72% 3. 2 Descriptive analysis In the study, ? ve factors were used to measure customer evaluation and felling. For the statistical purpose all variables were described in term of frequencies (percentage) and average values (means). Finding related to customer’s evaluation and felling are summarized in tables. a. ! How customers trust groupon companies services in Vietnam, those thing can show up by some factors such as the quality of products what companies guaranteed and the punctuation of delivery. Consequently, the result will show how customer believe in companies and their goods. Groupon companies always sale all product w ith a very cheap price so this factor explore how is the customer’s belief. Table : Customer’s belief in groupon companies Percentage (n=163) Terrible/ poor 2. The customer’s belief in discount price 3. The customer’s thinking of products and services qualities 4. Delivery’s punctuation 5. Customer care staffs’s knowledge 6. Customer care staffs’s respond 22. 6% 21. 5% 17. 8% 19. 6% 22. 7% Very good/ excellent 30. 7% 31. 3% 55. % 42. 9% 34. 7% Average value (means) 3. 08 3. 10 3. 53 3. 29 3. 21 As can be seen that customer belief indicator is more than 3 but still below than 4. The respondents accepted and trust those companies. b. How customers evaluate the responsibility of Vietnamese groupon companies: Online shopping is very different from traditional shopping because clients can pay money and have goods or services immediately so that responsibility is a very important factor to rate ? rms’s qualities. It can be seen that customer evaluate ? rm’s after sale service is poor .It is probably due to many groupon companies in Vietnam think that responsibility which is taking care customers after they had bought products and service belong to suppliers, they only have to sale goods. It may lead to 47,9% of respondent thinks ? rm’s responsibilities are terrible and poor. Table : Response to companies’s responsibility Percentage (n=163) Terrible/ poor 7. Staffs's enthusiasm 8. Companies solve your problems actively 9. Hotline for customer care 10. Recheck customer’s information to ensure fast and correct delivery 11. After sales services 16. 6% 26. % 31. 3% 23. 9% 47. 9% Very good/ excellent 40. 5% 27. 6% 33. 8% 44. 1% 19. 6% Average value (means) 3. 28 3. 08 3. 06 3. 29 2. 60 From the table it can be concluded that ? rm’s responsibility is acceptable but they some aspects are poor for instance hotline and after sales services. c. How customer rate companies’s assura nce: Not as tradition transactions, online shopping should have a more secure transaction. Most of payments for groupon company are electronic payment which have many potential risk. As the result keep customers’s personal and payment data is very essential.Vietnamese people do not care much about security but in the modern life but when credit card, online wallet etc†¦ are becoming more popular everyday it has to be a factor to evaluate service qualities Table : Customer evaluation of transaction assurance Percentage (n=163) Terrible/ poor 12. Trading process is quick and exactly 13. Privacy of transaction 14. Company always keep clients's data safe 15. Contrasts are sensible and clear 16. Reputation of companies 22. 1% 10. 4% 17. 2% 11. 7% 14. 7% Very good/ excellent 44. 1% 56. 4% 52. 5% 55. 2% 40. 5% Average value (means) 3. 33 3. 9 3. 54 3. 60 3. 29 Every items belonging to assurance factor are shown on the table. It is believed that respondents rate this factor pret ty good. d. How companies and their staff empathize customers: This factor was designed to uncover customer’s felling about companies’s empathy. There is an idiom that â€Å"customers are always right† so that communication between sellers and their customers is very importance . Those 5 questions explore how respondent think about staff attitude and empathy. Table : Customers’s evaluation of companies’s empathy Percentage (n=163) Terrible/ poor 17.Staffs’s behavior and attitude 18. Companies's staff pay attention of customers's private requirement 19. Customer always feel convenient and satisfied of services 20. Company makes improvement after client’s complain 21. Clients don’t have to wait for a long time to user service 14. 1% 27. 6% 21. 5% 31. 3% 21. 5% Very good/ excellent 46. 7% 35. 6% 33. 1% 20. 9% 41. 1% Average value (means) 3. 37 3. 09 3. 14 2. 88 3. 31 The table show that customer’s evaluative criteria is une ven, some items have a high value some is quite low.Respondents evaluate that improvements of company after their complain are poor, 31. 3% think that it terrible and poor. e. How is the tangibles of companies: Although almost all groupon companies do not impress their customer by a fancy shop or building but there are some aspects to evaluate their tangibles such as their vouchers and websites whether they are beautiful or ease of recognizing. Respondents think that about these 2 things groupon companies do well and they probably appreciate that. However there is a aspect having a low evaluation by respondents which is staffs’s uniform.It can be a result of companies category which is online company because of that they do not think staff’s uniform is the serious problem. Table : Customers’s evaluation of companies’s Tangibles Percentage (n=163) Terrible/ poor 22. Transaction place 23. Vouchers design 24. Website designed 25. Staff uniform 26. Transporte rs have transportations to deliver products to clients quickly and safe. 19% 11. 6% 8. 6% 33. 2% 16. 6% Very good/ excellent 45. 4% 59. 5% 64. 4% 24% 46. 6% Average value (means) 3. 42 3. 66 3. 74 2. 85 3. 41 4. 3 Factors in? encing groupon services quality a. Evaluation of the measuring scales In the reliability analysis, items that have total-item correlation smaller than 0. 6 were removed from the scales but in this sample there is no variable was eliminated. All items were tested for reliability. The resulting Cronbach alpha of each scale is presented in Table . Table : Alpha values Codi? ed variables Reli1-Reli5 Res1-Res5 Assu1-Assu5 Emp1-Emp5 Tan1-Tan5 Number of items 5 5 5 5 5 Alpha value 0. 804 0. 831 0. 863 0. 826 0. 856 Measurement Scale Reliability!Responsibility Assurance Empathy! Tangibles b. Factor analysis Twenty four variables were submitted for factor analysis. The extraction method used was Principal Axis Factoring, accepting all Eigen values which are higher than 1. The rotation method was Oblimin with Kaiser Normalization; rotation was coverged in 9 iteration. The factor analysis resulted in e Component 1 Tan1 Tan2 Emp5 Tan5 Tan3 Tan4 Assu3 Assu2 Assu4 Emp1 Assu5 Emp4 Res5 Res3 Emp3 Emp2 Res4 Reli5 Res1 Reli4 Res2 Reli2 Reli1 Reli3 Assu1 Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis.Rotation Method: Varimax with Kaiser Normalization. a. Rotation converged in 9 iterations. 2 0. 767 0. 760 0. 742 0. 714 0. 699 0. 561 0. 803 0. 771 0. 732 0. 552 0. 542 3 4 5 0. 521 0. 708 0. 609 0. 580 0. 550 0. 502 0. 524 0. 772 0. 754 0. 723 0. 564 0. 784 0. 746 0. 549 Eigen values and variance of each factor are indicated in Appendix Ph? l? c Eigen. The factor correlation matrix (Appendix Ph? l? c ma tr? n tuong quan) illustrates that the correlation between factors is insignificant (correlation coefficient are smaller than 0. ). This is an underlying assumption required for multiple regression. For those variables that load on two factors, the higher loa d on two factors, the factor with higher value is selected. However if loading difference is not significant (that is not more than 0. 3) the variable will not be used for multiple regression (Tan4 and Emp2). Table Nr :Factor nomination Factor name Transaction place Vouchers design Clients don’t have to wait for a long time to user service 1 Tangibles Having transportations to deliver quickly and safe.Website designed Staff uniform Company always keep clients's data safe Privacy of transaction 2 Assurance Contrasts are sensible and clear Staffs’s behavior and attitude Reputation of companies Company makes improvement after client’s complain After sales services 3 Responsibility Hotline for customer care Customer’s convenience and satisfaction of services Attention of customers's private requirement Customer care staffs’s respond Staffs's enthusiasm 4 Staff quality Customer care staffs’s knowledge Companies solve your problems actively Factor componentNr Factor name Factor component The customer’s thinking of products and services qualities 5 Reliability The customer’s belief in discount price Delivery’s punctuation The above 5 factors were considered independent variables in the multiple regression model and the dependent variable was â€Å"Quality of groupon service†. Multiple regression results are presented in the next section. c.Multiple regression Multiple regression is use to identify the relationship between the dependent variable and many independents variables. The multiple regression model has the following form: Y= ? + ? 1X1 + ? 2X2 + ? 3X3 + ? 4X4 +†¦.. + ? nXn The relationship between the dependent variable â€Å"Quality of groupon service† and the factors identified through the above factor analysis is determined using multiple regression. Table shows the variance of this analysis. Tab

Machine Language Essay

1- Machine independent languages The high level programming languages are machine independent, which means they don’t rely on specifications of a particular machine. Brookshear (2012, p.242) indicate that â€Å"Since the statements in a third-generation language did not refer to the attributes of any particular machine, they could be compiled as easily for one machine as for another†. Since machines can understand and execute instructions written in machine language, then a program has to be machine-specific, although the program source code language may be machine-independent, but the compiler target specific machine output. Brookshear (p.243) â€Å"A program written in a third generation language could theoretically be used on any machine simply by applying the appropriate compiler†. The pros of compiling code into machine-specific output is to perform optimizations on the output for the target machine on which the program will run, such optimization won’t be doable if the program is compiled to run on unknown target machine. Machine-independent language may offer optimization in their abstract concepts like structures, objects, loops and conditions, those are machine independent, but the most effective optimizations are those that best exploit special features of the target platform. E.g.: Instructions which do several things at once, such as decrement register and branch if not zero. Wikipedia(2013). 2- Four programming paradigms. Imperative paradigm: is the traditional approach and also known as procedural paradigm. the process of programming is a procedure has one or more actions or commands executed in sequence. the commands or steps are derived by an algorithm in order to produce the desired result. it describes the details of HOW the results are to be obtained, in terms of the underlying machine model. Functional paradigm: functional programming is to do computation by calling or applying functions. each function is an abstract of single or multiple expressions which can be evaluated. Brookshear (p.245) define how functional programming is constructed by having smaller units connected in order so that output of each unit is used as an input in another unit till the desired overall output is obtained. the functional paradigm is simple functions are nested together to build to build main one. As per (Laird ,2009, p.17), The main ideas of functional programming are high-order and pure functions, recursion, evaluation of equations, and pattern matching. Logic paradigm: This paradigm logic based and is different from other main programming paradigms. It’s designed for Artificial intelligence to deal with problems that requires extraction of knowledge and training driven from facts and making use of rules and relations. Nà ¸rmark(2010) highlighted one of its characteristics in program execution becomes a systematic search in a set of facts, making use of a set of inference rules Prolog language is one of the languages that uses logical paradigm. (Laird ,2009), In logic programming, set of facts and rules are analyzed in each step, referred as clauses. Prolog is the widely known language of logic programming. Object Oriented paradigm: Any top language is known by its support of object-oriented programming (OOP). it has gained great popularity in the recent decade. It has 3 main features: Encapsulation: classes are types that are self-contained modules and an instance of the class is an object. Inheritance: Classes could have relationships and organized in hierarchies, inheritance passes the structure and methods in one class down to child classes in the hierarchy. Polymorphism: common types can be presented by using a uniform interface. These features facilitates programming process when programs become larger and complex. Brookshear (p.247) in OOP a software system is represented as a collection of objects,each object is capable of performing actions or requestion actions from others objects. These objects interacts with each other to work out the domain problem. As per (Laird ,2009), All four of the main programming paradigms are useful in their own way, but pure programmg languages of only one paradigm are known to be slightly more limiting. Object-oriented design is currently the most versatile and widely used programming paradigm. 3- Machine language vs. assembly language Assembly Language: is the first step in the evolution of programming languages. (Rajaraman , 1998) â€Å"In an assembly language, mnemonics are used to represent operations to be performed by the computer and strings of characters to represent addresses of locations in the computer’s memory†. There’re one-to-one correspondence between assembly statement and machine code instructions. Thus, assembly language is machine dependent as it’s matched to a particular processor structure. A program written in assembly language has to be translated by an assembler to set of machine code/instructions, thus it can be executed by computer. a disassembler performs reverse function. Machine language: called machine or native code, is the lowest level representation of program. every program is made of a series of instructions executed directly by CPU. Machine language is set of instructions executed directly by CPU. every task has one or more specific instructions. Wikipedia(2013). â€Å"Unfortunately, writing programs in a machine language is a tedious task that often leads to errors that must be located and corrected (a process known as debugging) before the job is finished.† Brookshear (p.240). Although assembly language is low-level language, but is higher level than machine code. It’s more logical and human readable than machine code.

Meaning and Origin of the Surname Chavez

Meaning and Origin of the Surname Chavez Chaves is an ancient Portuguese surname that literally means keys, from the Portuguese Chaves  and Spanish laves (Latin  clavis). Often an occupational surname was given to someone who made keys for a living. Chavez is also an alternate spelling of the Chaves surname, which in Portugal was often a  habitational name from the town of Chaves, Tras-os-Montes, from the Latin acquis Flaviis, meaning [at the] waters of Flavius.   Chavez is the 22nd most common Hispanic surname. Surname Origin:  Spanish, Portuguese Alternate Surname Spellings:  CHAVEZ Famous People With the Surname Cesar Chavez: American civil rights leaderHugo Chavez: President of VenezuelaNicole Chavez: Hollywood celebrity stylist Where in the World Do People With the Surname Live? According to surname distribution data from  Forebears, Chaves is the 358th most common surname in the world- found most commonly in Mexico, with the highest density of the surname present in Peru. Chavez is also a common last name in Bolivia, where it ranks 18th most popular in the nation, as well as Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Philippines, Honduras, and Nicaragua.  WorldNames PublicProfiler  also has the surname as most common in Argentina, especially Northwest and Gran Chaco, as well as New Mexico in the United States, and southwest Spain (Andalucia and Extremadura provinces). Genealogy Resources for the Surname CHAVES Family DNA ProjectA Y-DNA project focused on family and genetic relationships between the various Chaves families around the world. This includes the Chavez and Caceres surnames of Spain. Chavez Family Crest - Its Not What You ThinkContrary to what you may hear, there is no such thing as a Chavez family crest or coat of arms for the Chavez surname.  Coats of arms are granted to individuals, not families, and may rightfully be used only by the uninterrupted male-line descendants of the person to whom the coat of arms was originally granted. Source: Cottle, Basil.  Penguin Dictionary of Surnames. Baltimore, MD: Penguin Books, 1967. Dorward, David.  Scottish Surnames. Collins Celtic (Pocket edition), 1998. Fucilla, Joseph.  Our Italian Surnames. Genealogical Publishing Company, 2003. Hanks, Patrick, and Flavia Hodges.  A Dictionary of Surnames. Oxford University Press, 1989. Hanks, Patrick.  Dictionary of American Family Names. Oxford University Press, 2003. Reaney, P.H.  A Dictionary of English Surnames. Oxford University Press, 1997. Smith, Elsdon C.  American Surnames. Genealogical Publishing Company, 1997.

Changes represented in Sky High

Changes represented in Sky High Sky HighSky High is an incredible piece of writing, and after dissecting each metaphor and sieving through the many similes, I have come to the conclusion that Sky High highlights the very essence of change - that at some stage in life, you must yield to it. As Hannah showed, changes are bound to happen, and can often alter the world you live in to such an extent that childhood and adulthood seem centuries apart.The main change Hannah discusses is the coming of age. In the first paragraph, she is an older person, reflecting on memories of her childhood. She slowly paints the picture of her memory, bit by bit, filling in tiny details to give us an appreciation for how the child's mind works, and how it sees things in a different light. She reflects on the washing line that was, as a child, her favourite object to climb.English: A typical day Aviary Place, , Leeds. Clea...To some extent, I believe that the washing line represents the girl's life, and she demonstrates how she once felt about life before she changed. This is further examined in the second, fifth and sixth paragraphs of the story.Hannah includes the use of metaphors and personification in her first paragraph. In the last line, she refers to the clothes hanging on the line as 'coloured flags in a secret code.' In the last paragraph, where she is an adult once again, she refers to the clothes as having 'semaphore secrets,' indicating that her mind is older, and her way of thinking has changed because she is now able to process her thoughts more intelligibly.In the second paragraph, the composer is still writing in the first person, although she is now writing as though she is a child once more. Reference is made to her smooth hands,

Assignment 4B Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Assignment 4B - Coursework Example Foundations enable community schools to establish a board of directors (BOD) with a particular focus on raising funds for the school rather than the operation of the college. The members can turn out to be crucial donors for the college. The foundations manage alumni relation, solicit gifts and also drive scholarship programs and special events. Foundations also maintain focus, market colleges, create donor choice, and invest endowment funds. The separate foundations also establish management structure for investment portfolio of college, brand the colleges and create a separate fund pool and limit liability. They also separate finances for community colleges (Bers, Head & Palmer, 2014). The approach used by philanthropy, particularly private foundations, to assess community college financial health is appropriate. Community college leaders must work towards ensuring fiscal viability for their colleges. As such, performance-based funding is a critical way of ensuring that the colleges remain sustainable and that they do not over rely on tuition fees. Colleges need financial advice to succeed (Barr & McClellan, 2011). It thus remains important to assess the effectiveness of colleges both on the dimension of education and fiscal performance. The approach by philanthropy and private foundations ensures accountability on part of the colleges amidst numerous financial challenges that they

Nursing Project Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Nursing Project - Essay Example The evidence definitely supports the use of this program and s presented in this paper. Continuous quality problems and spiraling costs in healthcare have lead to widespread interest in solutions that are effective and well supported. Evidence based practice has taken hold as an answer to the problem that makes sense (Coleman, 2003) EBP is sometimes viewed as an ideology, however, as far as practice goes it's goal is to supplement professional decision making with the latest research. It is sometimes argued today that to treat someone with a practice that the efficacy has not been shown is not ethical (Kind,2007). That would leave many healthcare treatments today as unethical. This paper will discuss nursing transition to evidence based practice in the realm of patients and transitioning. The question would be, "What are the most effective interventions for improving care coordination" Many Medicare dollars are spent on a small percentage of beneficiaries with chronic conditions and those people are in and out of the hospital many times, many within short periods of time. The causes of this are numerable but some of them are inadequate care, poor communication among primary caregivers, specialists, and patients, weak adherence by patients, and failure to catch problems early. There are three types of intervention being looked at closely at this time to try to solve these problems. Transitional Care, self managed education intervention, and coordinated care interventions are being considered as effective but requiring further study (Coleman, 2003). Transitional care is first engaged in the hospital, followed intensely post-discharge and receives comprehensive post discharge instructions on medications, self care and symptom recognition. Reminder calls are made to assure that the patients follow up with primary care providers as required. Effective transitional care is targeted for patients with specific diseases such as CHF. This is guided by APN's and is usually a twelve week intervention that is highly structured with protocols (ncga.gov.) It requires a one year post discharge follow-up. Statistically it has shown to reduce hospitalizations by 34% and lower overall costs by 39%. APN's in this case are the transitional coaches and there are tools given for cross site communication. Self management education is a term used for collaboration with patients and families to identify patient goals, improve self management, expand sense of self efficacy, and assess mastery of skills (ncga.gov). Much of this is done in group sessions of limited duration. The targeted patients are usually forty or older and have heart disease, lung disease, stroke or arthritis. There are usually seven weekly group sessions on exercise, symptom management, techniques, nutrition, fatigue and sleep management, use of medications, dealing with emotions, communication and problem solving. Statistics show that these patients have 1/3rd fewer hospital stays. Coordinated care on the other hand is considered teaching patients about self care, medications, how to communicate with problems, monitor patients symptoms, well-being, and adherence between office visits and advise patient on when to see their physician. A full report is given to the patient's physician (ncga.gov). This would also include arranging for social support

A serial-killer investigation in a Korean rural setting in Memories of Essay

A serial-killer investigation in a Korean rural setting in Memories of Murder - Essay Example The story follows a linear structure that is typical of detective films. It starts with the first body found, and then revelations of the bodies of other victims. Detectives Park and Seo work with other cops to examine the evidence and crime scenes. Slowly, they learn more about the killing methods of the killer (i.e. using the things of the victims to kill them, such as panty hose for strangling their necks, putting their panties on their faces, and tying hands with the same knot) and his preferences in his victims (i.e. almost all are sexy, beautiful, and wearing red dresses walking at rainy nights). The investigation, in addition, slowly reveals more information about the personality of the detectives and their society. Inspector Park is shown as the contrast of Seo. Park is biased and unsystematic, almost apathetic to the victims, while Seo is scientific in his approach and committed to his job. The film also shows the setting’s socioeconomic and political issues. For inst ance, the rice fields show that the main livelihood of the people is agriculture. The surroundings also show rural poverty and political chaos. The mise-en-scene captures wide rice fields and old buildings. The police station and other interiors of buildings are shabby. The people’s costumes also demonstrate their poverty with faded clothing. The sharp contrast is seen between the first parts of the parade, where high school students wear traditional Korean dresses, but it rains, so they go for cover, and the next scene, which shows a riot against the president.

Journal entries Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Journal entries - Essay Example I felt good about myself after having given up my seat for the elderly lady. I felt happy and I saw the day for all the possibilities and opportunities it could give me. It was not my conscious choice to give my seat up for the elderly lady. When I saw her looking around for a seat, it was an immediate reflex on my part to offer my own. It was only when she said â€Å"bless you, child† when my act of kindness registered in my consciousness. I felt that such a reflex was a major part of my upbringing. I was taught to do the right thing by anyone, especially those who are vulnerable. I also felt that I did the act of kindness because I felt that in the future, I too might need acts of kindness from strangers. In a way, I was hoping that I too would deserve a good turn of kindness when my time to be old and feeble would come. I babysat my friend’s toddler for a few hours while she went to a job interview. Closing in on the weekend, I got a text message from a childhood friend, who was also a single mother, asking me to babysit her 2 year old daughter because she had a job interview. My friend explained that her babysitter unexpectedly came down with the flu and was unable to babysit her child. I knew the job interview was very much important to her because the burden of supporting her daughter was solely in her hands. Although I was supposed to meet up with friends at about the same time my friend issued here request, I knew that she really needed my help then. So, I said yes. I babysat her child for two hours. I basically played with her and entertained her. It was a task I was familiar with because I often played with the child whenever I visited my friend. When my friend came back, she felt relieved that all was fine with her daughter – that the baby did not act up or cry while she was a way. I also felt good about myself for having done the act of kindness for my friend. At first, I was a little bit

Cultural Diversity in the Management Hierachy Research Proposal

Cultural Diversity in the Management Hierachy - Research Proposal Example Diversity covers various aspects of the employees ranging from gender, physical ability, social background, age, educational qualifications, race, color, ethnic origin etc. Cultural diversity basically deals with diversity in the cultural backgrounds of employees, which comes from factors like race, color and ethnic origin. In contrast to the confined definition of cultural diversity, the topic of this[not sure why you say your approach is in contrast Do you mean that you're being inclusive of both approaches], cultural diversity in this proposal encompasses all the factors that come in the preview of generally accepted aspects of equal opportunity. Diversity of late is not just a matter of following rules or of being a 'good thing' to do, but an inevitable requirement in the light of recent global developments. Many organizations are now operating in a more global environment either because of their direct involvement or indirect involvement through their value chain. The end customers are also becoming more and more concerned about the treatment afforded to the employees of an organization before purchasing their product or availing their service. All the pointers clarify the urgency with which diversity management programs and equal opportunity policies have to be rolled out at an organizational as well as at a national and indeed international level. Now that the requirement to recognize and value cultural di... The cues may be taken from existing research on diversity management and specifically in the middle - eastern countries. Enforcing diversity related policies in the middle - east throw up a different set of challenges from the rest of the world. The context of enforcement should comply with the strong religious sentiments that exist in these countries. For example, rights of women pertaining to driving, family law etc are different in different middle - eastern countries. They have varying degrees of restrictions or freedom regarding several social aspects which in turn affect the work life balance. UAE in particular has been more exposed to the global world through active participation in trade. Hence the strategies may be slightly different in UAE, though the middle - eastern influence cannot be ignored. There is some form of diversity management mainly initiated by the Multi-National Corporations (MNC's) as a part of their company policies. In the absence of set legislative rules for enforcement, existing practices by the MNC's from the Middle East and outside may be used as a benchmark to analyze t he current situation of UAE. In general there have been several developments in diversity management in organizations. The status of diversity management policies and programmes has moved from a purely HR responsibility to the strategic level. The well being of an organisation in terms of effectiveness and performance could be said to be largely dependent on the changing demographics (Duffy, 1994) [if you believe this to be the case, you need to support your argument with evidence, or at the very least to say somethings like 'as I will go on to demonstrate']. This can only be achieved, with the representation of all the demographics

Dell Computers - Supply and Demand Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Dell Computers - Supply and Demand - Assignment Example Consumers have an option of purchasing cheaper products because there are numerous suppliers in the market. Moreover, the monopoly force is low within the industry. Customer service affects demand especially within an industry that is experiencing stiff rivalries. This is because customers are likely to purchase from industries that offer satisfactory services. Consequently, elements such as online services and convenient procedures have the potential of affecting the demand of Dell’s products. Lastly, an improved economy leading to increased consumer income would increase the demand of Dell’s products (Mankiw, 2011). The main factors affecting the supply of Dell products include state of technology, political disturbance, the future price level, and the price of related products (Mankiw, 2011). Technological development is likely to reduce the cost of production as manufactures utilize economical and efficient procedures. This enhances production rates, which increases supplies. Furthermore, political disturbances affect supplies because they affect the product’s production and distribution. Political instabilities discourage the production and distribution of products causing a decrease in supplies (Frank & Bernanke, 2012). Future expectation of increase prices leads to shortages in supplies because distributors are likely to hold products. Lastly, changes in the prices of other related products may increase or decrease the supplies of Dell’s products depending on the relationship (Mankiw,

Journal entries Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Journal entries - Essay Example I felt good about myself after having given up my seat for the elderly lady. I felt happy and I saw the day for all the possibilities and opportunities it could give me. It was not my conscious choice to give my seat up for the elderly lady. When I saw her looking around for a seat, it was an immediate reflex on my part to offer my own. It was only when she said â€Å"bless you, child† when my act of kindness registered in my consciousness. I felt that such a reflex was a major part of my upbringing. I was taught to do the right thing by anyone, especially those who are vulnerable. I also felt that I did the act of kindness because I felt that in the future, I too might need acts of kindness from strangers. In a way, I was hoping that I too would deserve a good turn of kindness when my time to be old and feeble would come. I babysat my friend’s toddler for a few hours while she went to a job interview. Closing in on the weekend, I got a text message from a childhood friend, who was also a single mother, asking me to babysit her 2 year old daughter because she had a job interview. My friend explained that her babysitter unexpectedly came down with the flu and was unable to babysit her child. I knew the job interview was very much important to her because the burden of supporting her daughter was solely in her hands. Although I was supposed to meet up with friends at about the same time my friend issued here request, I knew that she really needed my help then. So, I said yes. I babysat her child for two hours. I basically played with her and entertained her. It was a task I was familiar with because I often played with the child whenever I visited my friend. When my friend came back, she felt relieved that all was fine with her daughter – that the baby did not act up or cry while she was a way. I also felt good about myself for having done the act of kindness for my friend. At first, I was a little bit

Dell Computers - Supply and Demand Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Dell Computers - Supply and Demand - Assignment Example Consumers have an option of purchasing cheaper products because there are numerous suppliers in the market. Moreover, the monopoly force is low within the industry. Customer service affects demand especially within an industry that is experiencing stiff rivalries. This is because customers are likely to purchase from industries that offer satisfactory services. Consequently, elements such as online services and convenient procedures have the potential of affecting the demand of Dell’s products. Lastly, an improved economy leading to increased consumer income would increase the demand of Dell’s products (Mankiw, 2011). The main factors affecting the supply of Dell products include state of technology, political disturbance, the future price level, and the price of related products (Mankiw, 2011). Technological development is likely to reduce the cost of production as manufactures utilize economical and efficient procedures. This enhances production rates, which increases supplies. Furthermore, political disturbances affect supplies because they affect the product’s production and distribution. Political instabilities discourage the production and distribution of products causing a decrease in supplies (Frank & Bernanke, 2012). Future expectation of increase prices leads to shortages in supplies because distributors are likely to hold products. Lastly, changes in the prices of other related products may increase or decrease the supplies of Dell’s products depending on the relationship (Mankiw,

The Differences Between an Associate Degree Nurse and Bachelor Degree Nurse Essay Example for Free

The Differences Between an Associate Degree Nurse and Bachelor Degree Nurse Essay Throughout history, a nurse has been defined as a person caring for the sick(Merriam-Webster, Inc. , 2004, p. 853). At the completion of school, whether from an Associate Degree in Applied Science or a Bachelor of Science Degree, all candidates must pass the national licensure exam. This enables the new graduate nurse to practice as a registered nurse. This new R. N. graduate is permitted to work in health care facilities in entry level positions. Both begin their career similarly with an extended orientation period being mentored by a seasoned colleague. Orientation is a probation period which grants the new employee time to become acclimated to the new facilities policies and procedures, as well as time for the facility to evaluate the new employees progress. Close supervision is required, as well as hands-on-hours, to order for the graduate nurse to gain confidence in the new work environment. (Goulette, 2010, p. 2) Is there a difference between the nurse with an associates degree and the nurse with a bachelor degree since the RN licensure test is the identical and both begin their employment with an extended orientation, as well as tight supervision? One difference is the amount of education. ADN programs, offered by junior or community colleges, can be completed in two to three years. BSN programs, college or university offered, take four years to complete. Time is not the only difference in their schooling. The BSN program places emphasis on general education requirements in the first two years. It is the latter two years where nursing is the center of attention. The criteria needed for the baccalaureate program includes liberal arts education, patient safety, quality of care, research based practice, health care funding, collaborative care, and preventive medicine in communities. (American Association of Colleges of Nursing [AACN], 2008, p. 3) The ADN or technical programs essentially delete some of the generalized educational courses and devote the attention exclusively on nursing which correlates to more hands on experience. This focus is adapted to primarily prepare the ADN student for more day to day nursing activities. In 1952, Mildred Montag, in response to the nursing shortage, designed a program to counter the college level nursing programs. An associate degree was the end result. (Haase, 2006, p.1) To answer the question posed: Is the nursing education level a contributing issue in the deliverance of quality care and patient safety? The American Association of Colleges of Nursing believes that baccalaureate prepared nurses like other health care providers, practice at a higher level. Nurses processing a Bachelors Degree are molded to adapt to the changing health care environment and its demands. This can be accomplished by leadership development, as well as critical thinking emphasizing health promotion and disease prevention across all environments of care. (American Association of Colleges of Nursing [AACN], 2012, p. 1) With the health care system changing so rapidly, it is important that nurses are autonomous. It is necessary, as patient advocates, that we understand the cause and effect of all entities involving our patients. Critical thinking and making the correct judgment call clinically is vital. A patient situation which comes to mind is an 86 year old female, weighing 50kg, Vital Signs: Blood Pressure: 80/50, Heart Rate: 102 (Sinus Tachycardia), Respirations: 20, Saturation: 94% on room air, Hemoglobin: 7. 0 and trending downward over the last three days. The patient complained of chest pain, mid-sternum radiating to jaw, and shortness of breath. This assessment differs from the initial assessment at the beginning of the shift. The nurse informed the physician, placed the patient on oxygen, administered intravenous fluids, removed any nitrate patches, performed an electrocardiogram, suggested that blood be obtained for type and cross to be sent to the lab. The RN remained at the patients bedside, continually monitoring the vital signs and assessing the patients condition. The bedside nurse is exhibiting proficiency in the ability to think critically by making a nursing diagnosis, initiating nursing interventions, and evaluating the results. In the above example of critical thinking, it remains difficult to conclude whether level of education or years of experience are the determining factor in the delivery of patient care. For many years there has been an ongoing debate throughout the nursing community on the importance of knowing that versus knowing how. What seems clear is that vast general, as well as nursing knowledge can only benefit the profession and the patients we serve. ? References American Association of Colleges of Nursing. (2008). Essentials of baccalaureate education for professional nursing practice. Retrieved from www. aacn. nche. edu American Association of Colleges of Nursing. (2012). The Impact of Education on Nursing Practice. Retrieved from http://www. aacn. nche. edu/media-relations/fact-sheets/impact-of-edcation Creasia, J. L. , Friberg, E. E. (2011). CONCEPTUAL FOUNDATIONS: The Bridge to Professional Nursing Practice (5th ed. ). St Louis, MO: Mosby Inc. , an affiliate of Elsevier Inc. Goulette, C. (2010). Nursing (Job) Shortage. New Grads are Finding the Job Hunt Tough. â€Å". Retrieved from nursing. advanceweb. com/ Haase, P. (2006). The origins and rise of associate degree nursing education. Retrieved from www. noadn. org Merriam-Webster, Inc. (2004). Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. In F. C. Mish (Ed. ), Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Eleventh Edition, p. 853). Springfield, Massachusettes, USA: John M Morse.