E-commerce Dissertation

E-commerce Dissertation on Le6efly.com

Executive Summary

Le6efly.com is a newly established e-commerce platform, which offers advice, ideas and insights into the market for baby products and services. It combines state-of-the-art interactive technology with the knowledge of some of Kuwait’s most dedicated parents and experts, and allow parents to know more about parenting, current products, prices and development. Moreover, the website contains a price comparison search engine and a second-hand billboard, in which Le6efly.com takes an active role in connecting buyers and sellers and providing a wide array of technical services.

The art of parenting is extremely hard to master. Every child is unique in his or her own way, and even long-time parents may experience significant challenges in the quest towards what is best for their baby. Moreover, the market for baby products is extremely wide and shows very high degree of innovation.

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This may be very good news for parents, who can now enjoy products and services that improve every day. It also may, however, bring about confusion, hesitation and reluctance to adopt a product or a service, which may become outdated or even turn out to be harmful for their child.

Le6efly.com is a new ecommerce platform, which may solve many of the problems facing contemporary parents. The central paradigm underlying the business methods described in this paper perceives clients. That is, we aim to provide the means for parents to express their knowledge, opinions and concerns, to ask questions and give answers, and to choose products with a comprehensive set of decision-making tools. 

State of the Company

The newly established Le6efly is a vibrant initiative, led by several young professionals in the rapidly growing Kuwaiti ecommerce sector. Though the incorporation process has not been completed yet, the founders are already working on finalizing the company’s prospective core operation, namely the parenting website Le6efly.com.

At this point in the company’s initiation phase, most of the decision-making and current tasks relate to building (rather than sustaining and/or developing) the managerial and operational frameworks needed to provide effective services. The company’s executive body is rather heterogenic, especially in terms of professional backgrounds, ranging from technical backgrounds to logistics and marketing.

With such a promising array of skills and a multidisciplinary body of knowledge, we (as the leaders of Le6efly) try to approach every decision as comprehensively as possible. Our major decisions and plans provide the major bulk of this report.

Business Environment

The company’s current and prospective operations raise several external challenges, which require proper consideration. As our main intention is to use ecommerce platforms to sell baby and early parenthood products, it would be appropriate to share some insights regarding the market. Such insights are highly valuable for our planning, but need to be taken into consideration by our investors and financing partners.

The success (or failure) of ecommerce activities is fundamentally inclined with the target market’s e-readiness, that is, the extent to which a given market can adopt electronic services as a widespread economic activity1. Needless to say that measurements of e-Readiness go beyond mere technological issues, as culture, psychographic factors and contextual characteristics of specific markets differ substantially even within a region or an economy. Studies of e-readiness in Kuwait show that the country’s current position is rather mediocre compared to markets with similar economic performance2. Nevertheless, this current weakness does not imply that Kuwait is a stagnant market for ecommerce. In fact, ecommerce has a significant potential in Kuwait and the Gulf region3, whereas competition is still low and allow smaller players an easier access than traditional marketing channels.

Another important question regarding the company’s business environment is the demographic state of the market. Notwithstanding the importance of other demographic and/or economic characteristics of the Kuwaiti market for baby products, let us examine one of the most significant comparisons. Recent data4 indicates that with although Kuwait’s birth rate of 21.64 births/1,000 population is ranked only 86th in the world, its extremely high GDP per capita ($54,100, or the world’s 7th) puts it in a unique position:

When comparing Kuwait’s birth rate to the birth rates of the six countries with higher GSP per capita, one will easily find that Kuwait outperforms all other countries in that measure. For example, Qatar’s GDP per capita is 2nd in the world, but its birth rate is about 30% than Kuwait. Along with many other indicators, this data shows that Kuwaiti parents do not only have one of the world’s highest disposable incomes, but their reproduction also outnumbers any other wealthy nation. Thus, we can assume that the Kuwaiti parent is among the biggest spenders (in relative terms) in the world.

Vision and Mission

In the process of defining our vision and mission statements, we have realized the enormous significance of our company, namely the premise of our contribution to nurturing the development, the well-being and the health of Kuwait’s next generation. With about 60,852 newborns joining us every year5, Le6efly.com is not only a promising venture, but also a way for us to do something for the future of our country.

Furthermore, it became evidently clear for us that we need to define three types of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) paradigms: Firstly the parents (as the majority of our target market) as clients, with whom we build a relationship of satisfying needs and wants through our commercial platform. Secondly, since the final users of the products, services and information provided on our website, we must define the parents as partners, in the light of the collaboration between the company and its clients, a collaboration that aims to help us all to grow a great generation of Kuwaitis. Finally, the parents may find our platform as a means to communicate with other users, thereby creating bonds beyond the core services we provide.   

Vision Statement      

Every eight minutes, a new hope is born in Kuwait. Every eight minutes, a new hope is born for Kuwait.

By becoming each and every Kuwaiti parent’s first choice on the Web, Le6efly.com will help to give more to our children, will build a healthier and happier generation, and will make sure that the hope will come true.

Mission Statement      

Dedicated to the prosperity of Kuwaiti babies and their parents, Le6efly will redefine the role of baby products retailer. It will treat parents as partners rather than customers, and will provide products and services never seen before in Kuwait using cutting-edge technologies.

Because we see parents as partners for success, we will emphasize collaboration at the B2C and C2C levels. Le6efly.com will be at least sparkling as its staff. It will sell, but will not exploit. It will teach, but will not be patronizing. It will be the most competitive service in the business, but it will never, under any circumstances, do anything that falls short of the very best.

Company Physical Description

Online services provide new horizons for efficiency. Le6efly will try to limit overheads as much as possible. The company’s workforce will be mostly comprised from stay-at-home moms, who will provide the major bulk of everyday business activities (e.g. customer service, content management, bookkeeping and shipping) and will enrich the company with their hands-on experience. Parents will be the first choice for other positions as well. In addition, the company will try to minimize risk and costs by keeping only buffer inventory, and only in cases when the suppliers do not have their own inventories at a reasonable distance. Items stored in the company’s facilities will only be accepted under consignment agreements.

Core Competencies and Competitive Advantages

The promising business environment and the unique approach to operations do not guarantee success. In order to thrive, Le6efly must be ahead of the market, to remain innovative and to develop a favorable public image.

The Kuwaiti consumer is more sophisticated and demanding than ever before. When she looks for a product or a service on the Internet, a Kuwaiti mom is interested in a wider array of features than simply quality, price and availability. If the retailer fails to deliver those additional offerings, chances are that no sell will be made. Hence the importance of providing parents with comprehensive knowledge on different aspects of parenting, which facilitate smarter consumption behavior and allow the service to position itself as an authority in the field. 

Le6efly’s core competencies focus on two planes. First, by the virtue of its virtual interfaces, the company’s price competiveness and large variety of products and product categories gives it significant advantages over physical stores. Second, the unique customer experience offered on the website (see next chapter), coupled with flexibility and market responsiveness, help to distinguish Le6efly.com from other potential competitors, who may offer fairly similar products and prices, but lack the company’s special bond with its target market.

Products and Services   

Generally speaking, Le6efly.com is an online parenting portal that provides access to information, insights and products to parents, who want to do more for their babies. As described next, the website offers access to a large number of services, knowledge bases and exchange of ideas regarding every possible aspect of being a parent in the 21st century.

Parenting Services

The major bulk of activities on Le6efly.com concentrate on educating and supporting parents as they experience the difficulties and joys of having children. Through experts’ opinions, direct consulting, blogs and an extensive articles database, parents can get information and ask specific question regarding matters such as:

• Baby products: choosing the products that best fit your baby’s needs and your abilities
• Health: identifying early symptoms, findings pediatricians and specialists, alternative medicine, etc. 
• Child development: tracking normal and impaired development, learning methods to enhance cognition and language
• Safety and prevention: avoiding common mistakes that may risk your baby
• Fashion: making your baby looking like a star
• Technology: choosing and using hi-tech products for the 21st century parent 
• Relationships: building strong relationships with your baby and handling interpersonal difficulties in families

Much of the content will be provided to all visitors. More advanced topics and platforms will be offered only to registered users, whereas a premium service will enable users to contact our panel of experts directly, for a fee, using emails, chats, etc.   

Product Reviews and Price Comparison 

This feature helps users in their purchasing decision-making by showing other retailers’ offerings and prices. It will include a search engine and lists of product categories, as well as time-efficient options to search within and between categories, prices, suppliers and brands. Once a decision has been made, the user clicks on the product of her choice and being transferred directly to the retailer’s order form (see sample image).

The retailers (who pay for their presence on the site and for a margin of their sales, of course) must adhere to Le6efly’s strict consumer protection policy. The main rules and regulations, which aim to sustain strong image to the site, include, among others:

• All product specifications, prices and delivery times appears on Le6efly.com are final.
• No extra costs will be added once the user goes into the retailer’s website.
• The retailer will offer a 30-days money back guarantee to all products.
• The retailer will ship the goods Kuwait-wide.     

Social Platforms 

Le6efly’s B2B platforms were designed to meet parents’ to exchange ideas, share experiences and communicate with parents who may help to solve a common issue. Moreover, these services turn visitors/clients into contributors/collaborators, thereby enriching the website, strengthening users’ loyalty and creating a ‘buzz’ about the site.

The main social platforms will be:

• Forums/ discussion groups  Blogs
• Messaging service (using an internal mail system)
• Feeding system for mini-blogs: these are short feeds (similar to Twitter, but public), in which users can greet the others, tell a brief story or share a moment of joy.

It should be noted, however, that Le6efly’s goals are to help in parenting rather than to entertain. Company’s employees will regulate the activity on the site, to make sure that the platforms are not used for inappropriate purposes. We will not allow any infringement of our users’ privacy, well-being or cultural values.

Billboards  

Le6efly’s Billboards will provide the opportunity for users to carry out B2B ecommerce. Potential sellers and buyers will be able to buy and sell second hand baby product, books, etc. Each ad will be charged a very small fee.

The company will offer sellers and buyers simple user-friendly ecommerce tools, such as money transfer, insurance and shipment. However, buyers and sellers will not be obliged to use these services; if they can and want, a seller and a buyer can arrange for the transaction instead.

Delivery Services 

Finally, the delivery service offers parents, who live in remote regions and/or having difficulties arriving at a physical shop, the possibility to get products directly to their homes. This service may solve some discrepancies between parents’ needs and the current state of Kuwaiti ecommerce. For example, a mother in need for a specific nutrient (e.g. lactose-free milk powder) and cannot find it in a store in her area, can ask us to buy and deliver the product directly to her.

The Website

Providing cutting-edge technology may be sometimes quite tricky, because excessive technology may reduce users’ compliance and compatibility. In order to provide as wide access as possible, Le6efly.com will be a bilingual service, will keep a simple, clean design, and will avoid plug-ins or applications which are not compatible with older and/or Mac operating systems.

All other platforms except the price comparison section will present short word-ads, which relate to keywords on the page. A discussion on bottles, for example, will be accompanied by direct links to the bottles comparison page. In addition, users’ activities in their personal accounts (e.g. the messaging service) will offer links to similar discussions, blogs, or products.   

The Implementation

By this stage we have arrived at the most important decisions regarding the company’s structure, operation, service bundle and so on. We are now ready to go ahead and do your best for our shareholders. This section will briefly describe the tasks we intend to carry out in the near future.

First, we are going to launch a beta version of Le6efly.com within the next several days. The idea is to test the technical models, as well as to see initial public response, using patterns, etc.

Second, two business development teams are now working with providers of content (e.g. physicians and other experts) and business partners (i.e., online retailers), to build a network for the main operations. Recruitment efforts are under way as well, mainly in internal services such as translation and bookkeeping.

Third, although Le6efly is not a very capital-intensive business, we as managers must ensure that the initial stages of operations will not suffer from lack of finance. Hence, we must work closely and openly with our investors and financiers. Together with them, we are building now our financial and budgeting plans, and try to reach realistic expectations in terms of ROI.

Finally, once the beta testing period will be over (approximately one month after launch), the introduction of the full website will be coupled with a small, though effective promotional campaign.

The main promotional tools we intend to use will be direct marketing in hospitals and child clinics, online ads and banners, and a word-of-mouth (pseudo-informal) campaign on existing channels (such as parenting forums).

Conclusion

Le6efly’s business model enjoys the growth potential of ecommerce in Kuwait, as well as the relatively high expenditure on baby products in the country. Instead of merely competing with other retailers on offerings and prices in this growing market, we take a different approach. We offer parents to be our partners, to learn and to teach, and to improve their competencies as parents and consumers.

This novel business approach is a direct consequence of the opportunities offered by the interactive communication technologies on the Internet. In particular, we intend to use the premise of allowing consumers to express themselves and to choose their solutions from a wide range of alternatives. Thus, Le6efly will personalize user experience, educate parents, and make a good business that also contributes to the future of Kuwaiti society.

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Dissertation on Organizational Structure

Organizational Structure Dissertation

The fast-paced and ever-changing business environment has given the world innumerable ideas and technological accomplishments which have pushed civilization to unparalleled limits. The industrial revolution, which began to turn its wheels of progress in mid-1700’s London (Hudson, 1992), created  a precedent that is reverberating throughout the world today. Implementing the standardization of production, efficiency, labor and logistical support, paved the way for today’s multinational conglomerates to flex their corporate muscle and reward their shareholders with plentiful dividends. Countless recessions, wars, political and social upheavals, natural disasters and a myriad of other variables have not been able to completely crush the corporate world’s drive to succeed and derive profits from any adverse environmental factors that could damage its capabilities.

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Although the corporation and the organization have been around for over a century, the internal structures have changed dramatically due to external changes. The organizations, that were capable of changing with the times and surviving the external environment have blossomed into the top dogs of their respective industries. One such organization, General Electric (GE), was significantly streamlined as a ‘new and improved’ organizational structure.

GE’s Jack Welch, transformed the company into a modern, twenty first century powerhouse, focused on innovation and progress. Welch had introduced a very competitive and brave approach to GE and always aimed for instant improvement. He tried and experimented with various ways to make both the efficiency and the productivity better and was never truly satisfied with the achieved results.

Immediately, he set the #1 and #2 standards for all of GE’s departments in a clear order to make them lead the market, then kept those who really succeed to follow through with the plan. Welch managed to reduce the wasteful workforce and unnecessary departments, with that, he brought in the “work out” system, which let the employees be "closer" to the management, being able to take a symbolic part in the company’s decision-making process and politics; in turn, this gave GE more as a family-like atmosphere, which improved one’s motivation and productivity. Welch also checked the competitor's advantages and struggled to beat most of them with efficient training programs for his employees: seminars, training, teaching…that significantly raised the quality standards which indeed made his way to the international market much more easier and smooth (altogether with his admirable ability to analyze the proper investments opportunities overseas). (Christopher A. Bartlett, 2005)

Allowing an open flow of ideas within a company and giving it an open environment, seems to be working for many organizations these days. When comparing the Mechanical Organization to the Organic Organization, it shows that the more flexibility an entity will have, the greater are its chances of surviving a sturdy shaking, as opposed to a rigid structure. (Cole, 1995) Hence, companies that did not adjust themselves accordingly to the quickly changing times of a flat world, (Friedman, 2006) would have to suffer the consequences. The need to outsource, in source, open source and other fundamental cost-cutting moves are vital steps for an organization to stay ahead of the competition.

Furthermore, a company without new and innovative ideas will still be stuck in the twentieth century, which in today’s world is not sustainable for a firm. Unfortunately, to have new and innovative ideas, the environment must be ripe for them. They must be nurtured and allowed to be expressed freely, if that does not happen, this will be a major source for problems.

Lately, emphasis on teamwork has played a major role in a company’s structure. It is an excellent concept which can increase productivity and efficiency; it can create a greater feeling of community within a team or a department, like the Pioneer Phase of an organization, the employees can have excellent relationships with themselves and focus solely on the customer. Unfortunately this can lead to a lack of independence among the staff members. Moreover, a situation like this one can create ‘group think’, a theory, which states that under certain circumstances, new ideas, or dissent are suppressed for the interest of group harmony. In cases where a group is under a lot of pressure and the situation seems hopeless, where there is a directive leader who sways the opinion of the group towards his ideas without allowing for dissent. In these cases a group will feel invulnerable and conformity pressure will arise. A few things that managers can do to reduce ‘group think’, is to assign a ‘devil’s advocate,’ who will tell it like it is, encourage critical evaluation, subdivide the group in order to get a few differing ideas, a manager should be impartial and let every idea flourish, critiques from outsiders should be welcomed and are encouraged before implementing the idea and second-chance meetings should take place just to go over the final details. (Safire, 2004) Incentives, are also a great way to motivate people to create new ideas. In forms of cash, stocks, promotion status and recognition, incentives can work miracles for an unmotivated group. Ideas will come and the rewards will be reaped, however, this will be something that can create a new culture, whereupon the staff are dependent on their incentive bonuses. In case incentives are minimized or eliminated completely, the chances of previously higher levels being attained are improbable and will leave the team to regress to group think and lack of motivation. In cases like these, where there is a team environment, the most important cause a manager can take up, is the reduction of ‘group think,’ and the encouragement of intercommunication between the staff and the managers, along with other departments.

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Every student who strives to reach the highest academic degrees has to prepare a great dissertation which is mostly the summary and the crucial moment of more than five years of studying at a university. After defending your Bachelor’s degree you will surely demonstrate your ambitions and apply for achieving MA and even PhD degrees. In order to achieve them you will have to show your intelligence, professional skills and knowledge in a good dissertation on a certain discipline. Unfortunately, many students find it problematic and often fail their dissertation writing. If you want to hand in a high-quality dissertation and look like a smart disciplined student, you are welcome to look for extra Dissertation Writing Help in the web. Students who can not organize a good dissertation themselves rely on professional help of numerous custom dissertation writing services in the Internet asking: ‘Who will do my dissertation writing successfully?’

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Managing Diversity Dissertation

Dissertation on Managing Diversity

Factors Affecting the Employment of People of the Black and Minority Ethnic Population
Introduction

Affirmative action, mandated by Executive Order no. 11246 in 1965, was a huge step forward in the promotion of employment of minorities and females (Leonard, 1984). Due to the events that transpired the factors affecting the employment of the black and minority ethnic population have changed for the better, but not completely. The management of diversity allows for the resting circumstances, which differentiate from those of regular management to be analyzed and responded to.

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It is wise to say that there is importance in paying attention to the methods of management of diversity in order to run a successful business. This is evident in today’s society, as one company can employ people who were born, educated and raised in countries all over the world. As a manager, how does one accommodate to an ethnically diverse staff? The changes in the workplace that have occurred over the past century have been drastic and many changes have been set in order to accommodate those who have been systematically excluded.

This dissertation will focus on the roles that factors such as race, ethnic background, and cultural differences can play in one’s career path and choices. It can be argued that it is more important for a potential employee whose people have been historically disadvantaged to understand these barriers.

However, finding the answers to these questions is vital to organizations as well. This can be attributed to reasons such as the growth of internationalization and the labor market’s impact on organizational strategies, reasons we will explore later on. This dissertation will also attempt to realize the ways in which an organization can acquire a competitive advantage while treating employees of ethnic minority fairly.

Historical Analysis

From a social standpoint, Western civilization has made huge leaps in human rights and equal opportunity employment. In reference to the employment of Black people, Norgren and Hill stated the following: “…It is evident that the non-discrimination clause in government contracts was virtually unenforced by the contracting agencies during the years preceding 1961.” This is because, on March 6th, 1961, President John Kennedy issued Executive Order 10925, which mandated federal contractors to take affirmative action and respect the clauses and sanctions with which this intervention was associated (Leonard, p. 48, 1990).

From this point onwards, there was little debate on the obligation not to discriminate with regard to sex, race, color or religion. This undertaking, along with others of similar nature, had positioned the United States as a pioneering country in the diversity movement. Due to recent large-scale population movements, the rest of the world, including Europe, Asia and the Middle East followed suit shortly thereafter (Konrad et al., p.1, 2007).

Nevertheless, the plan to stimulate the certainty of equal opportunity employment through affirmative action was exceptionally controversial. The use of the words goals, timetables and quotas irked people the wrong way (Leonard, p. 48, 1990).  Even so, this was a necessary endeavor that ensured affirmative action was indeed an action and not just a theory.

1990 United States Census data indicated that less than 5% of African-American men and only 2% of African-American women were self-employed. Meanwhile, Korean-American men and women experienced a 28% and 19% self-employment rate (Fairlie and Meyer, p.758, 1996). One could gather from this that the resting population is either unemployed or employed by an organization. As the percentage of African-American self-employed people is rather small, it is important to consider the factors and dynamics that affect the employment of this group.

Although many injustices were eliminated with the development of affirmative action, there were still alarming statistics and trends that affected the black and ethnic minority United States population. As hiring practices became more diversity-sensitive, different problems arose. Research indicated that African-Americans were at a great disadvantage in regards to upward mobility in the workplace (Davidson, p.12, 1997). Although the quotas and goals were being met, there were many cases of problems within the office, once a black or ethnic minority person was in power. The problems included social mobbing, continual racism, which led to feelings of loneliness and a lack of motivation to improve (Davidson, p.5, 1997).

The Employment Process

Every company has a human resources department and most of the time, follows a standard process of recruitment, screening, hiring, and training. In order to understand which factors affect black and minority ethnic populations, we must briefly review the general employment process first. Factors such as education- of business etiquette and academics, motivation and will and access to transportation, are just some of the obvious factors that can determine the employment of any individual. It would be illogical to ignore the obvious factors just because they apply to all people instead of only to the black and minority ethnic population. It is important to analyze these factors and apply them to the circumstances with which our public must comply. To exemplify this point, let us analyze the costs of employment.

  

An organization must incur expenditures in the hiring process that allows the aforementioned activities associated with hiring an employee to transpire. The costs of training a productive staff include explicit and implicit costs. For instance, explicit costs in training include hiring trainers and the costs of materials used during training. Implicit costs derive from the use of an existing employee to train the new employee, the trainee’s time spent in training, and the resulting loss in productivity (Ehrenberg and Smith, p.132-133, 1994).  In the case of a minority ethnic population, this can be especially applicable. Many managers and administrators in charge of hiring may assume that even with experience, the training that an immigrant received in his or her home country was different and therefore requires more of an investment than a native of that country. This, along with other traditional labor practices, may create an unwarranted barrier in the employment of the subjected public.

Exploring Barriers

Understanding the barriers that come along with diversity is a difficult task on its own. However, it is also vital to identify which barriers are the most crucial and which ones warrant attention. Essentially, the term diversity refers to matters of difference and inclusion (Konrad et al., p.1, 2007). The task at hand is to differentiate between the factors that are detrimental and those that are beneficial to people in the workplace. One factor that is clearly detrimental is the concept of wage inequality. This refers to the variance in earnings people who have attained the same level of education receive based on their race/ethnicity. A research study completed by the Minesota Private Colleges proved that the patterns in the United States show a gap exists depending on race (Boyles, n.d).

Difference in race and ethnic origin possess different levels of importance depending on the subjected country. The trend is that various countries attribute value to certain aspects of diversity in diferent ways. Being North African in Western Europe may pose greater obstacles than being North African in Canada, where linguistic differences are the major cause of prejudice (Konrad et al., p.3, 2007).  As we defined diversity as a matter of inclusion, we can also conclude that there may be different types of inclusion, with assimilation and cultural pluralism being two favored avenues of thought. Both routes offer solutions and at the same time, can pose problems (Konrad et al., p.4, 2007).

  

Therein lies a problem. One who is a visible minority does not have a choice whether or not they are seen as a minority. The invisible minority, which includes Natives and some ethnic and minorities, is faced with a dilemma of a decision whether or not to make their differences public. This group of people is not limited to ethnic differences as religion, sexual orientation, or mental health and disability issues are also factors that contribute to the invisible minority. One can have a skin tone that does not indicate any particular ethnic origin and this person’s cultural identity is often overlooked. Sometimes, people feel being able to hide these invisible traits is an advantage. At other times, these types of people can feel excluded or neglected because of their own unwillingness to make their differences public.

The decision to announce one’s own differences can be faced with critique depending on the philosophy of the receivers of any given message. A manager who is an assimilationist may value and affirm diversity, but as a supporter of assimilation, may perceive the announcement as unnecessary and get the wrong image of the potential employee. This manager can be referred to as colour blind and most probably focuses on shared humanity. On the contrary, a manager who supports cultural pluralism but is merely tolerating diversity can accept this announcement and refer to an employee program catered to this ethnicity (Konrad et al., p.8, 2007).  There is a fine line between these two approaches and it is difficult to determine which one, if either, is of greater moral value. It is the reaction of the hiring manager that can affect the potential employee.

The Advantages of Diversity in the Workplace

Until now, we have mostly spoken about the tribulations and obstacles that coincide with diversity in the workplace. However, it is not all bad. There are also many advantages that can come out of effectively managing diversity, as well as disadvantages of not doing so. For example, an employee who prefers to work for a firm that values diversity will also prefer to purchase products from this organization (Cox and Blake, p.49, 1991). This concept is vital for community leaders, current and prospective employees and social workers to know and point out to employers.

More specifically, this work dynamic can attribute to a firm by providing a competitive advantage in six areas:

1. cost,
2. resource acquisition,
3. marketing,
4. creativity,
5. problem solving
6. and organizational flexibility (Cox and Blake, p.45, 1991).

To exemplify this hypothesis, let us look at a few of these arguments, particularly the marketing, creativity, and organizational flexibility arguments. In terms of marketing, an ethnically varied staff can help both multinational and domestic operations. Cultural sensitivity and insights prove to be useful in marketing to sub-populations as well a in the internationalization process. The level of creativity should improve as the level of diversity of perspective rises. A diverse perspective creates less emphasis on the norms of the past and conformity (Cox and Blake, p.47, 1991). As for organizational flexibility, the knowledge of native language can help in business deals. In this case, visible minorities may have an advantage when doing deals with other visible minorities of the same origin. Furthermore, scheduling of shifts may be easier due to the flexibility provided by different customs and traditions in association to work. For instance, a Jewish employee would have no problem working on Christmas and a Muslim employee would have no problem working on Hanukkah.

A 2005 research study performed by the Society for Human Resource Management explores this idea in greater detail. It goes on to strongly affirm that differences in the workplace are assets and not liabilities. The study, summarized in “Figure 3” explored the ways in which more than 300 organizations see diversity as an advantage in the quest for competitive advantage. The affected areas included employee recruitment, access to new markets, and the integration of diversity into the organization’s business strategy (Lockwood, 2005). The following graph goes into more detail in regards to this subject.

(Lockwood, 2005)

Diversity Management: Employer Policies and Practices

There are various policies and practices that are associated with human resource management to which a manager must adhere. These policies and practices determine the way in which factors such as culture, work structuring, performance management and resourcing will be utilized (Sparrow et al., 1994). Diversity management is a concept which results from the creation of equal employment opportunity and affirmative action law. It has seen many policies and practices that have helped minorities in the workplace to be instated. When management addresses diversity, it is usually due to government requirements as oppose to an initiative taken by the management in the quest to add organizational value (Gilbert, 1993).

  

One of these practices is called anti-discrimination enforcement, which is coupled with anti-discrimination law. The most prevalent dealings affected by this include grievance procedures, formal hiring and promotion systems, and systematic recruitment schemes (Kelly et al., p.88, 2001).  When these requirements first came into being, these changes did not go unnoticed and were sometimes heavily criticized and companies’ did the bare minimum in order to comply with government standards. However, it is now widely accepted that it is in everybody’s best interest when diversity management policies create an inclusionary philosophy in the organization. These inclusionary measures usually include a regulatory address of fairness, empowerment, and openness and are executed through multiple efforts, constant reinforcements, and broad-scale change initiatives (Gilbert, 1993). Restructuring jobs, modifying training materials, engaging unions, and changing supervisor and co-worker attitudes are just some of the initiatives that can be taken in order to maintain good diversity management.

Conclusion

The past experiences of the black and minority ethnic population can suggest that there is still inequality and prejudice in the workplace. In order to understand how these inequalities come to fruition, one must analyze labor economics and the general employment process and apply its factors individually to the public in question. With the proper management and understanding of these factors, the firm will benefit and so will the employees. The largest threat that the black and minority ethnic population faces stems from the lack of education of managers in terms of the benefits of managing a diverse staff. Although much progress has been made in the administrative sector, these are still factors that affect the subjected public at heart and within the working environment. This is mostly a humanistic variable that, with assistance from community leaders, can be resolved by the people themselves.

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Project Management Dissertation

Dissertation on Project Management

Risk Management: Definition and Processes

When an individual or a group of people is working on a project, it is crucial to think through all the possible obstacles, which may occur in the process and the ways they can be eliminated. According to Turbit (2005), a risk differs from an issue in a probability of an event to occur. An issue has a 100 percent of a probability to happen, while a risk has less than 100 percent (however, more than zero percent). Therefore, the ways, in which both of them are managed, also differ.

A risk is also defined by the consequences that it has on a project as a whole. If a project completion has serious discrepancies from an initial plan, the events, which have caused these discrepancies, are considered to be risky. Even if those events do change the process of a project’s completion; however, do not harm it, they are not considered to be of a risk.

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Risk management is a tool, which assists in predicting the risks, which might occur during the process of the project’s completion and cause harm. Risk management allows to save money, avoid the delays in the completion and to increase the quality of the project. According to Turbit (2005), generally, there are four stages, which each team has to go through when working on a project, in order to prevent all the possible risks and threats.

The stages are:

• Risk identification
• Risk quantification
• Risk response
• Risk monitoring and control

The first step, which has to be taken, is identifying what are the possible risks that a project might be facing in the process of its completion. It is the best to involve all the people, who participate in the process, in order to review the steps, which need to be performed. Every department must examine the possible difficulties, which might occur in their specific tasks and to report them to the management team.

Usually, there are two types of risks: business and generic. Business risks include, for example, financial risks. Those are “[…] ongoing risks that are best handled by the business” (Turbit, 2005). Generic risks are the risks, which occur due to inability of a team to complete certain tasks or to complete them on time.

While identifying the risks, a team must examine the causes of a certain risk and its impact on the project. Project managers must think of how to try to both eliminate the initial threats as well as the results of the certain events. By doing so, a team will be better prepared for meeting any kinds of risks at any point of the project’s completion.

After all the risks are identified, it is necessary to evaluate them in order to know, how dangerous they can be for the project and what is the probability of them to happen. The potential events are rated in two dimensions: a probability of a risk and its impact on the overall performance. Depending on the rates of each dimension, a risk can be: low, medium, high, and critical. (Turbit, 2005)

A third step is a response to the risk. Generally, there are four things that a project management team can do about the risk.

These steps are:

• Avoiding the risk
• Transferring the risk
• Mitigating the risk
• Accepting the risk.

By avoiding the risk, a team can take certain steps in order to eliminate it. For example, it can use other materials, suppliers, partners, etc. Transferring risk means making someone else to be responsible for a certain risk. Mitigating the risks is making their impact on the project less harmful and effective. This means that a team could make some extra agreements (e.g. with suppliers) for securing the process of completing a project. Finally, a risk can be also accepted by a team in case it is considered to be not serious and harmful for the project.

Finally, the last stage of a risk management is a risk control. While three previous steps need to be done once for a single project, controlling the risk must be a continuous process. Changes can occur throughout the entire completion process, and, consequently, so can risks. In addition, new risks can always occur on different stages of a project’s completion.

Case Study: Royal Bank of Canada

An appropriate example for a risk management could be a case of a Royal Bank of Canada, which happened in 2004. A company was faced with a serious breakdown in its operational system, when it was trying to carry out a project of upgrading a new software program. This case illustrates both strong and weak sides of the bank’s management (especially risk management) and the way it has handled the occurred threat.

In 1995 Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) became one of the first banks to install software for its online banking operations. In 2004 software needed to be upgraded. The next day after an upgrade a failure in the system was noticed, and the entire business went out of control for almost a week. As bank has reported to the public later, the failure was caused by an incorrect data, which was entered during the upgrade by one of the workers. However, there was another reason to the occurred event. A code, which was required for a system to be upgraded the day before a breakdown, was not tested properly before the usage.

Considering the four stages of the risk management, it becomes clear that a company has made several obvious and very serious mistakes before and, as will be mentioned below, after the event. Upgrading online banking software in such institution as Royal Bank of Canada is an extremely important and complex project. A bank has millions of clients, who use its services every day. After a breakdown people could not reach their accounts for almost a week.

The first serious mistake made by RBC was the date, on which an upgrade took place. The upgrade took place on May 31, in the end of the month, when every bank is usually faced with the largest amount of transactions. According to the first stage of a risk management process, when RBC was planning on having an upgrade, its first issue was supposed to be a choice of a right time. Taking into consideration the fact that any upgrading process can go out of control, bank’s management team was supposed to plan a project to the middle of the month, when the amount of transactions is much lower. A failure in the system is the risk, which has both a high probability and a high impact not only on the completion of the project, but also on the overall performance of the bank. Therefore, management had to pay the most attention to it.

Another mistake of RBC was upgrading the system both on the main and backup systems at once. Backup facility was the only way to recover from a breakdown; however, since the upgrade was applied to both systems, both of them got broken. Therefore, all the files from a backup system became unavailable and could not be used as a system’s recovery. RBC had to make an upgrade separately in order to ensure that there will be at least one program, which would contain the entire bank’s information.

There were also mistakes made by the bank after the breakdown has occurred. Apart from the IT professionals’ inability to fix the problem immediately, there was no single person responsible for communicating the problem to the public. Bank’s CEO has left the country during the time, when RBC was facing serious problems and needed an authority to solve its problems. The breakdown in RBC was not only unidentified in advance as a risk, but it also was not evaluated correctly when it appeared. For several days bank was reporting to its client that a problem would be fixed the next day, instead, it took RBC a week to handle it.  

Despite of the bank’s failure to go through the first two stages of the risk management, it has handled the last two successfully. The response to a risk was as quick as possible, considering the breakage of a backup system. In addition, RBC has issued a formal apology to its customers and has given a detailed explanation of the occurred problem. In order to control any future risks and threats, RBC has made IBM Corporation its consultant in all the existing and future technical issues. Finally, a bank has offered refunds to the customers, who have seriously suffered from the incident.

Even though Royal Bank of Canada did not take all the necessary steps in order to prevent the possible risks and threats, it has responded to a risk in a good and professional way. In case a risk management would be handled correctly even before the incident, it would be significantly easier to repair the system after the breakdown (if any would appear).

Total Quality Management 

Total Quality Management is concentrated on providing a long-lasting success for an organization through creating customers’ satisfaction (ASQ.org). According to this method, every employee in an organization participates in this process. There are certain steps in this method, which give organization guidelines, which assist in boosting success for an entire company.

According to PHCC Educational Foundation (1996), there are twelve steps, through which an organization has to go in order to improve its performance.

These steps are:

• Obtain CEO commitment
• Educate upper-level management
• Create steering committee
• Outline the vision statement, mission statement, & guiding principles
• Prepare a flow diagram of company processes
• Focus on the owner/customer (external) & surveys
• Consider employee as an internal owner/customer
• Provide a quality training program
• Establish quality improvement team
• Implement process improvements
• Use the tools of TQM
• Know the benefits of TQM

There are, however, difficulties in using Total Quality Management. One of the biggest issues is changing the philosophy of the company, making customer a priority. According to its methods, the success of an organization is improved by concentrating on the customers and improving the conditions for them (both internally and externally). Since every employee in an organization plays an important role in the whole process, another issue is making them willing to go through these changes by explaining the importance of the new implementations. Separate departments need to be gathered together to work toward the same goal.  

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This is a small excerpt from dissertation on Project Management topic. As free dissertation samples and dissertation proposal examples are plagiarized we recommend you not to use it in your own dissertation or thesis paper. Why not to get online dissertation writing help on Project Management from professional dissertation writing company? Top-rated PhD academic writers will write a custom dissertation on any topic and discipline from scratch!

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Dissertation on Sociology

Sociology, being a dynamic science, captures all the past and contemporary trends, which find their reflection in all spheres of our life. The biggest excitement in sociology for me is the way how the social ties affect the behavior of an individual and what consequences may follow.

Primarily, I would like to comment on some scientific methods used in sociology for that they comprise a certain interest for me personally. The research is an integral part of any sociological study, because observations and statistics play the crucial role in gaining the knowledge in sociologic science. Besides the common research methods used for centuries, the new ones emerge now and make up the visual sociology, a branch of the science reinforced by the development of technology.

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According to Macionis (2009), images and photography help either to study the individuals described on these images or understand people’s points and opinions on the topic highlighted with these visual aids. The film industry also contributed significantly to the development of sociology. Now it is possible to make conclusions about the social life of the people even on other continents, and I view this as a certain step toward global integration and improvement in communication. Even better in-depth view is achieved by the film directors who manage to disclose the functioning of a certain social unit or institution from the inside emphasizing on both individual challenges and social hierarchy. We refer to such works as documentaries.

An outstanding collision occurs between two sociological theories: positivism and humanism. As for me, it is arguable why both are almost equally relevant. One may see that positivism rests upon objectivity that is the basis of any research. The positivistic studies deal with observing natural processes and declaring the outcomes. Each scientist pursues no personal goals in doing a research, that’s why the outcome is supposed to be unbiased and credible. On the other hand, humanistic stance appears to be more individual for each researcher and contradicts the idea of objectivity at the whole. At the same time, the scientist may not be enough objective if he or she does not participate in social processes which are the center of the study. Participant observation is highly valuable in sociologic studies. Besides, Macionis (2009) mentions that scientific methods are only tools to complete the research, while the explanation is generated by the researcher who has to apply knowledge and creativity as well as to gather the data I order to come up with a relevant conclusion or solution.  

So that I have mentioned some research tools, I would like to switch now to the global approach. It is obvious, that the historical background plays an important role in sociological findings. When observing the societies, we proceed through the development of the human race from the primitive level and up to the highly organized societies with infrastructure, technical advancement and social security. Biological sciences only distinguish the steps of human development calling it evolution, while sociology classifies the same according to different principles (Macionis, 2009). One of the most outstanding definitions of society according to the Oxford English Dictionary suggests on the absence of choice for a human when staying with other individuals. That is how we come to a conclusion that a person does not have much influence on the society – on the contrary, mostly the society with its culture chooses for the person. The next case presents addition opinion for this idea. 

In the modern world, diverse cultures usually co-exist even in terms of one country or one region. Nowadays our society is not as biased and prejudiced as it was in the previous centuries, though some cultural phenomena still take place in the contemporary society. An interesting suggestion is made by Theodor W. Adorno in his ‘critical theory’ (Adorno, 1976), which also finds its reflection in the book of Macionis, J. (2009). The theory studies the ways how individuals are subjected to intrusion of ideology in terms of their own society. According to the theory, the culture obtains certain traits that apply to all members of the culture without exceptions, so an individual is not able to refuse the cultural ideology or suggest on his own. Each individual is just a part of such system and lacks self-regulation. I would say that this may be inherent to any culture through its definition of a large-scale involvement.

Finally, I never thought of the suicide from the perspective of a social phenomenon. While some people consider this a fully personal decision, the statistical data impress: more than twice more people in the world for the last fifty years committed suicide and much more people had unsuccessful attempts (Macionis, 2009). The most widespread profile for a person who is about to take his life for the last century is a young male individual who usually possesses economical freedom and the freedom of choice. This results in the loss of connections with the society, so nothing keeps the person from self-murder. Previously I had a suggestion that young girls are more subjected to suicide due to high sensitivity and psychological disorders as a consequence.

Sociology is an effective tool not only in studying the anthropogenic processes but also in leading and even manipulating the masses. Precise observation may show how closely it is interconnected with political, legal, economical, technological and even ecological factors from our everyday life.

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This is a small excerpt from dissertation on Sociology topic. As free dissertation samples and dissertation proposal examples are plagiarized we recommend you not to use it in your own dissertation or thesis paper. Why not to get online dissertation writing help on Sociology from professional dissertation writing company? Top-rated PhD academic writers will write a custom dissertation on any topic and discipline from scratch!

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