Deceptive Advertisement in Tobacco Industry Essay

Deceptive Advertisement in Tobacco Industry Introduction            Managerial decisions form an important element in business success. Griseri & Seppala, (2010,p.45) note that the primary function of a business should not only be geared towards profit making but also strive to check the social implication of the business activities The process of decision making is thus governed by the business ethics, moral frameworks and the Social responsibility. This paper will examine decisions made in a tobacco industry, effect on the living and environmental conditions and evaluate if they conform to the moral frameworks of decision making.            Tobacco companies have constantly employed deceptive advertising strategies. One of them is the use of celebrities from various fields such as sports and media to market their brand. This choice paints a picture of success and pride in using tobacco products and smoking. Moreover, these companies fail to give more details of the tobacco product use and effects. This is in violation of the ‘rights approach’ moral framework in dealing with ethical issues. The rights approach is a traditional moral approach which demands that the rights of individuals (consumers) must be upheld in decision making (Brooks et al 2010, p.197).            Consumers have fundamental rights as highlighted in John F Kennedy (1962) Consumer bill of rights. One right found in the bill is the Consumers right to safety. Businesses should not knowingly sell to customers products that might harm the customer. Secondly, consumers have a right to be informed. Devenney & Kenny (2011, p.10) say that products information should provide detailed facts on the product ingredients, the risks involved and instructions for usage. By failing to inform consumers of the health risks associated with tobacco consumption, the companies are infringing on this rights to life which are at stake.            The companies seem to embrace preference utilitarianism. This is a type of Utilitarianism that states that the right action is that which will produce the best results but the best results are those that will satisfy personal preferences (Krantz 2002, p.28.). By not labeling their products and use of celebrities, the company is able to prey on consumers who lack knowledge on tobacco. Tobacco injects money worth millions into the economy, a fact that cannot be disputed. The companies’ duties to ethical practices are overshadowed by the desire to accumulate more wealth at the expense of health concerns of consumers.            These deceptive strategies have masked the adverse effects of tobacco consumption to health, living and environmental conditions of the users. Tobacco use increases the risk of cancer contraction for vascular diseases and other illness. This results into higher expenditures on medical, lowers productivity and increases premature deaths. The short term effects on living standards include diversion of family income. A research conducted in shanghai china (1995) among 2716 households revealed that 17% of family incomes were spent on cigarettes            Social responsibility is a major function of any business. Tobacco industries in use of deceptive advertisement have demonstrated unethical practices that raise questions on the commitment of these industries in maintaining a striking partnership of its business core functions and the social responsibility. Governments, human rights activists and stakeholders need to put up laws to regulate the extent at which business may exploit consumers. Without laws, it will be difficult to tame tobacco industries as the moral frame work principles and social responsibility cannot guarantee complete ethical practices in this business environment. References DEVENNEY, J., & KENNY, M. (2011). European consumer protection: theory and practice in Europe. Cambridge, Cambridge Univ. Pr. GONG YL, KOPLAN JP, WEI FENG et al (1995) Cigartette smoking in China prevalence, characteristics adnd attitudes in Minghan District. JAMA GRISERI, P., & SEPPALA, N. (2010). Business ethics and corporate social responsibility. Australia, South-Western Cengage Learning. KRANTZ, S. F. (2002). Refuting Peter Singer’s ethical theory: the importance of human dignity. Westport, Conn, PraegerJohn F. Kennedy’s speech, Public papers of the United States, Public Messages, Speeches and Statements of the Presiident, 1 January to 31 December, 1962, pp, 235-43 Brooks, Leonard J., and Paul Dunn. 2010. Business & professional ethics for directors, executives, & accountants. Mason, OH: South Western Cengage Learning. Source document

Memoir of Mom

A mother can be both a mentor and a best friend to her little girl. A mom is a person who her daughter can have trust and faith in, someone who one can create a deep mutual bond with. I see my mother as role model. She is inspirational to me because she is an outgoing, funny and enthusiastic person. My Mother is the person who I go to for advice, she is the right person and I know to go to her right away. I’m the only girl in my family and having three brothers can at times be very difficult.Thinking back through all the struggles and obstacles that have temporarily stood in the way of my happiness, there was always one person who helped me get through whatever hardship I may have been going through at the time; that person was my Mother. My mom always told me â€Å"Don’t let others affect you deeply, because if they do, you’re the one who is going to lose†. What she was trying to let me know there was that I should not let gossip hurt me, because if I, or anyone else, pay attention to others then trouble will be knocking at your front door.I specifically remember one time, when I was in high school as a sophomore and I had a group of friends who just loved talking nonsense about others. If my group of friends saw a girl â€Å"not matching† and wearing a foolish outfit, they would criticize that poor student and laugh at them when they’d pass by. I would be embarrassed of their absurdity, so I would just tell them I had to go to my next class. I’ll admit it I would also laugh at other people but the only reason I did such a thing was because I wanted to be cool and be part of a group in high school.My mother always gave me this advice, don’t make fun of any other person that crosses your way because if you do then you’re not showing respect and respect is what you want in return. I was that type of student who didn’t really have true friends, only fake ignorant drama queens that I had made a space for in my life. Until I decided one day that enough was enough, after what had happened between me and my friends, I blocked them out completely from my life and never said a word to them or even made the slightest hesitation to step into their lives again.A few months before that, I would be bullied by this girl on my bus, and I didn’t have the slightest clue as to why she did that. Afterschool as I walked to my bus, she would yell names at me every day. I would turn around to see who that was and I knew that it was her. Never in my life did I talk to this girl, so I didn’t know why she was calling me such rude names. Had I done something to this girl that affected her without me knowing? But then I remembered what my mom said and didn’t pay attention to her.I kept telling my mother that this girl kept calling me names; she asked me â€Å"Want me to go and talk to the principal, so the principal can talk to her? † I told my mom â€Å"No please, th at girl and her friend will think I’m being a snitch. † My mom was pretty upset that I told her not to go and talk to the principal. I would repeatedly nag at my mom that they kept bothering me and she would again tell me â€Å"Mija, I’ll go talk to the principal, so they can stop† and I would reply back no. While this was happening, my so called friends found out that this girl was bothering me.I thought they would tell her to stop bothering me because that’s what friends do right? Well I was wrong, instead of doing that, I found out by my best friends were also talking behind my back. I was enraged by the idea of my friends talking behind my back and I didn’t want it to continue. So I told my mom and dad I was tired of their childish behavior and that I had to take this into my own hands. I told my mom I was going to fight her so she can stop. My mom said that that wasn’t a very well thought out idea.Well eventually I got the chance to fight her, and I took advantage of it. I didn’t listen to what my mom had said the previous day and I paid the consequences for my actions. Those consequences were that I got suspended for an entire week, preventing me to go to my Six Flags Great America trip. Looking back I regret not listening to my mother’s advice, because that same week I would of been having fun at Great America and not at home making up labs for the roller coasters and timing them in a YouTube video.Since that day, I have always listened to my mother’s guidance and intelligence. The best part that I love about my mother is that I can talk to her like she’s my sister, because she acts like one of us my brothers and I; very cool, calm and optimistic. Also what’s funny about us is that we are always told if we’re sisters and my mother would start laughing and say yes to that person and I would get mad. I don’t know why, but I think about it and I shouldn’ t be getting mad.That’s my mother and they’re telling her that she’s a young beautiful woman and it makes me happy when I see her laugh. I love my mother; I can say she is a one of a kind that I would never want to lose. We have this kind of emotional connection, because if one of us is sad and feels like crying, we feel the sadness in us and we’re there crying next to each other like mother and daughter should be; taking care of each other, making sure we’re okay.

Books and Their Importance for Students and Children

Books and Their Importance for Students and Children Books are our Best Friends for Students Children Humans cannot live alone. They need friends in life. This book can be our best friend. The book company provides pleasure for people and companies of nature. This book is a great blessing. Life is not easy to live without friends. As for books, you can be a good friend forever. Good books enrich our minds with good thoughts and knowledge. We can not feel alone in a book company. As we read good books, we gain knowledge and learn many good things. Books written by good and experienced characters help us become better people and inspire us. It teaches how to serve society in the best way. Books are the best time for us to be alone, start reading with a sense of comfort with a book, and provide knowledge. Books are always best friends because they encourage us to do great things in life and help us overcome failures. I learn a lot from books like good friends. Books can be good or bad, but it is our responsibility to choose books wisely. Friendship with a good book becomes a good person, and friendship with a bad book becomes a bad person. There will always be books in bad times. The book teaches us to dream good things in life. It brings positive thinking and good value to our lives. Some love the company of nature and others love the company of the book. Books are a map of human life and nature. Every page of a great book is a storehouse of the finest and noble thoughts of human beings. The library will meet all the great minds of the world. Today, however, all books are good and innocent. The book is overflowing and the flood is always bad. Even the flood of tears is bad. How then can a flood occur? You should be careful about this. Do not run away with this flood. It is good to live in a bad book company. But falling into a bad book company is bad. Through the influence of bad books, you can develop bad habits by not knowing it. Therefore, you must choose your partner carefully. So its up to you how you choose it wisely. But even the best books can not give you everything. A book company can give you knowledge, but it can not give you wisdom. No book can be a good scientist. Newton was not born in the library. He did not read much but instead lived in a company of plants and flowers. So the library can not make you a great poet or thinker. Even books you choose can only be made from bookworms. Obtain only indirect information. You can not really be great unless you listen with your eyes. It is therefore sometimes necessary to come out of the world of books and live in a company of people and nature. The life of man and nature must be combined with the book company.

How humans are economicly rational but not ecologicly rational Essay

How humans are economicly rational but not ecologicly rational - Essay Example Human beings are also more concerned with how to consume goods without destroying the systems that support life. From this argument, it is warranted to argue that human beings are directed towards self satisfaction over societal welfare. Princen argues that individuals in the society need improved ecological systems that will support economical use of resources in the society. However, most individuals do not seem to have a keen interest in the well being of the environment, like abundant soils, water, or even means of food production. On the other hand, individuals believe in the growth of economic systems that would allow them have a productive and sensible life in the society. In any case, individuals are more concerned with their lives in the society, and how they are going to gain economically. In as much, humans are more concerned with the economical, Princen (pp.76) argues that destruction of the sources of income would reduce the society to an unproductive place. In this cont ext, therefore, Princen presents a situation that gives individuals an option of either choosing to destroy the sources of production, or maintaining a sustainable society. He continues to argue that obliterating the sources of income would mean that the identity of the society would be destroyed completely. Princen (pp.76) as an adherent of sustainable environment, states that the environment is separate from human beings, and must be managed if it has to be utilized to the maximum. Individuals must attempt to utilize the ecological resources to the fullest, if they have to attain economical sustainability. Human beings cannot be alienated form nature. Their practices determine whether the society will be sustainable or unsustainable. Sustainability should ensure that the environment is reliable ecologically. He continues to argue that the existing economic system depends on continuous production and maintenance of the sources of energy that in turn lead to economically sustainable environments. In his work, Princen (pp.71) indicates that sustainability is a collective effort by all individuals in the society. Sufficiency deals with environmental sustainability. This means that individuals will have to conduct activities in intensities that satisfy them, careful not to over exploit resources. In this context, therefore, sustainability and sufficiency is attainable. Sufficiency works on the grounds that structures must be put in place so that, human beings will not rely on their own perceptions to recognize need for sustainability. Princen (pp.73) continues to argue that by having enough does not necessarily mean that individuals are sacrificing too much. Instead, this is the first step towards a sustainable environment. Individuals must have behavioral instincts that allow them act towards what is suitable and sustainable for the environment. He condemns the fact that most individuals focus much on their economic suitability, not considering the fact that the environment is the source of their economic prosperity. He continues to argue, that spotlight is more inclined to what suits them, as individuals, alienating the society’s welfare. He compares selfish ambitions of personal gain to person that does not consider the future. In as much, that individuals put their economic needs at the peak of their scales of preferences, the future may turn

A Tour to Maasai Mara Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

A Tour to Maasai Mara - Assignment Example At first, I was worried because I had never taken a flight in such a big airplane. I also had the phobia of heights. My parents seemed relaxed probably because they were used to flying. Air hostesses were moving around the plane checking whether the passengers required any assistance. We were even served with drinks. My brother and I took coffee while my parents took wine. After eight hours, the plane landed on Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta international airport. â€Å"We are now in Kenya† bellowed my dad. There were two guys waiting for us at the airport and were holding placards bearing my parents’ name. They took us to a waiting van that drove us into a hotel in the city center where were to stay. The two guys were from a tour company with which my dad had made reservations prior to our journey. People from this city looked friendly and were always willing to help us. We were to visit several tourist destinations in Kenya and later Tanzania, a country that neighbor’s Kenya. We first toured Maasai Mara, a region is known world over due to the great wildebeest migration. The aircraft landed on a small airfield in the middle of the lowlands amidst lions and running giraffe. What I saw in Maasai Mara perplexed me. I had never seen a movement of animals as huge as the wildebeest migration. Our tour guide explained that over three million wildebeest migrate from Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park to Kenya’s Maasai Mara National Reserve in search of pastures. This we were told happens annually in the months of July through October. The migrating wildebeest crossed the Mara River where crocodiles would prey on them. It was the largest massacre of the wildebeest and the largest feast for the crocodiles. It was a sight to behold. The wildebeest would dither for hours on the riverbank, striding reluctantly into the river as they calcula ted the risks in the waters.

Health society and sustainability Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Health society and sustainability - Essay Example estimates by the WHO, show that a total of forty two million children under the age of five years were overweight or actually obese globally as at 2012. In Australia alone statistics as at the year 2008 showed at least one obese child in every four. Things are getting any better and this is a particularly worrisome trend considering the negative health effects both mentally, physically and physiologically. My objective in this paper is to highlight the social determinants of childhood obesity and why the problem is important to modern health systems. Obesity comes with adverse health impacts and such placing a huge economic burden to families as well as healthcare systems. As such therefore, childhood obesity is increasingly becoming an important concern for health not only in Australia but internationally. The problem is a result of various sociological determinants which are interrelated; factors in the environment, family socio-economic factors as well as behavioural elements. There are referred to as sociological health determinants and they revolve around those conditions in which individuals were born, brought and where they live & work. From a broader perspective therefore, they represent elements of people’s social contexts significant to their health outcomes. Grouping the sociological health determinants of Obesity is therefore an important of building of knowledge that will help address the issue in our society. According to the Australian Institute of Statistics, childhood obesity is on the rise and this is particularly because of intake of foods high on fats and sugars, and having less time for physical exercise. Research shows that children who become overweight or obese have an increase likelihood of staying obese into their adulthood and developing associated medical conditions such as cardiovascular conditions and type 2 diabetes. In the year 2008 alone the problem of obesity cost Australia a whopping $ 58 billion in terms of health services,

Financial Analysis for Managers Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Financial Analysis for Managers - Essay Example The WACC takes into consideration the relative weights of each element of the capital structure and presents the predicted cost of new capital for an organization. In this way the WACC is important for any firm or organization operating as it not only helps them identify the minimum returns they need to earn but also helps them maintain a constant stock price. The WACC also provides greater accuracy and stabilizes fluctuations (Robert Libby, Patricia Libby, 2005). The WACC is also an important decision variable in investment appraisal and capital budgeting. Every company or firm wants to increase its wealth and earn profits hence it invests wherever it sees an opportunity. To find the profits that would be earned in the future through the investment at present WACC is a very effective tool. WACC helps a firm take on greater range of projects, because with a lower WACC, more projects will have a positive NPV plus it provides greater firm value, and therefore, greater Stock Price, beca use you discount cash flows by a smaller number. Capital expenditures are the allotment of resources to huge, long-term projects. The capital budget is a declaration of the intended capital expenditures. It is far more than a straightforward listing, and is not the "budget" in the common sense. Provided the nature of capital expenditures, the capital budget is thought of as a declaration of the goals and strategy of the firm. Formation of the capital budget is an essential assignment that affects and is affected by all other areas of decision-making in a firm. Current and future business situations are the opportunities and constraints through which the goals of the firm are formulated. The goals force the strategic decisions of capital budget and financing but likelihood and uniformity with the mutually dependent financing and capital budget decisions must be measured in situating the goals. For projects that are similar to the normal operations of the firm and have a similar risk profile the opportunity cost can be estimated by the firm's weighted average cost of capital (WACC) (Paul D. Kimmel, Jerry J. Weygandt, Donald E. Kieso. 2006). The WACC is the rate of return that just meets investor expectations, leaving the worth of the shares of the firm unaffected. WACC is computed by initially approximating the rate of return compulsory to meet the obligations for each basis of capital. These obligatory rates are then weighted according to the objective capital structure of the firm to attain the in general rate of return required to meet the mutual obligations. This is the return that could be achieved by reinvesting the finances within the company. What are the risks and uncertainty related to capital budgeting There are plenty of risks and uncertainty associated with capital budgeting, Capital budgeting involves a lot of analyzing and studying because a wrong decision can be fatal for a firm. Mostly projects that have a positive NPV are selected to be undertaken. Capital Budgeting involves the risk of losing the invested money. As capital budgeting involves future investing decisions hence constraints such as

WRITTEN INTERVIEW Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

WRITTEN INTERVIEW - Essay Example The World is a mixture of people who are different from each other and that is what makes it so interesting to get to know about each other. In this reference I conducted an interview of a person who is a part of a different culture. The main reasons were to study the different characteristics that a person possesses and the things he or she acquires while growing up in a different culture. I would not disclose the name of the person that I interviewed due to his request but would like to mention the culture where he comes from. The person belonged to a Muslim family. The person had proper good schooling and claimed a Bachelors degree later in Business Administration. He also had a Masters degree in the same field and was working in a reputable organization since the past four years. The person highlighted some major issues relating to people of his age group in their culture concerning problems like physical, cognitive and psychosocial developments. The first aspect of physical development is related to the food that is been given to the person and as most Muslim countries are third world countries hence physical development has always been a problem. Early deaths, improper growth these have been problems related to the Muslim community. Though physical development has not been a major problem for the Muslim community but it has been a reason to hinder their success and development. The thinking ability of most Muslims is seen as of extremism and is also thought of as conservative all over the globe but in reality it’s not the same. The Muslims are very open to every aspect of life and this negative bias that has been created is due to some people who do not actually know what are the morals of the Muslim culture. According to the interview people of thi s culture are very good and concentrated thinkers. They follow the rationality principal and all the set of ideas that they believe on come from their Holy Book Quran. These set of

Religious Values in War and Peace Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Religious Values in War and Peace - Essay Example Most often, a war that is based upon religious ideology will not end until one faction subjugates the other. Religious ideologies that are in conflict more than likely will never find true resolution and peace. Two very different places in the world where this is in evidence is in Northern Ireland and Israel. These two places have been host to factions who are in constant conflict with each other. Generations pass and yet the conflict continues because it is not the individuals that are in conflict, but belief systems. According to Brinkley, â€Å"Staunch belief in something greater than ourselves is an essential building block in the construction of a personal reality† (83). When a personal reality is violated, a reactionary violence can be the result. In believing so strongly in the right of one doctrine, the acceptance of others who don’t share that doctrine can threaten the reality that has been created through a system of beliefs. The very existence of other avenues of thought can be perceived as a threat to a way of life. The rise of the modern secularized state has helped to minimize the number of conflicts that arise because of religious belief. Up until the rise of the ideologically founded political system of the United States that firmly situated the acceptance of faith as a personal choice, rather than a state dictated set of national beliefs, most nations were built on a foundation of religious, political and warfare structures in which exclusionary policies promoted conflict. The needs that a civilization had for religious sacrifices were one of the first causes for war in history. The Aztecs based much of their warring on the need for human sacrifices and the Maring based their cyclical warring on the need for pigs to sacrifice to their gods (Wade 128). There is an innate conflict within the Christian religion between the promotion of war for its cause and the desire for peace as is interpreted through the teachings of

FINAL QUESTIONS Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

FINAL QUESTIONS - Assignment Example Then the users of the systeme are determined and the manner in which they are going to use it in order to know what to put in place. Moreover, input system data and output data system is also established. The requirement validity is also assessed at this stage. At this stage the guidelines are followed from the requirement specification manuscript. The system requirements are divided in software and hardware as stipulated by the requirement specification manuscript. Furthermore, the overall system building is defined thus marking a design specifications manuscript. The code is developed at this stage and is very crucial as it is the main focus of the system developer. The system design manuscript dictates the division of modules which leads to the start of coding. The process takes a lot of time. The code is the main thing tested after implementation. The code is tested against the requirements mentioned in the requirements analysis. The requirements must be fully functioning and solve the requirements needs as system and integration testing are conducted. The CEO’s role at the IT steering committee is to take responsibility of every operation that takes place in the company. The CEO makes and implements decisions and initiatives on behalf of the board of directors and the company. The CEO also ensures a smooth operation of daily operations in the company. In many instances the CEO is also the president of the company and a member and director of the board of directors. The CFO is under the CEO. The CFO’s role at the IT steering committee is to appraise financial data incurred by the IT department and even the company itself. He/she is also responsible for the reporting of IT department’s financial performance in that he/she supervises expenditures, costs and organizes the budget to be used by the IT department. The CFO also provides IT department’s financial wellbeing and veracity to bodies like the Securities and

Software Requirements Specification Essay Example for Free

Software Requirements Specification Essay 1. Introduction 1.1 Purpose Online Shopping Software main purpose is to provide customers with the possibility to perform online purchases on products already on store. Customers are identified properly and are able to perform online transactions using three kind of methods: either using credit card or banking documents, but also through PayPal account. Online Customers are divided on two categories upon user account types: basic and business. Basic accounts beside other attributes contain a specific one named Fidelity which deals with the number of years the user has been joining the online shop. On the other hand is business plan which is characterized uniquely by the Volume attribute that is the total amount of transactions performed within the online shop. The customer is able to operate throughout the system after properly authenticated. He is able to create a cart and add products to it or delete them as well. Then he decides whether he might go on with the checkout operation and complete the purchase. Once the user decided upon the plan to use: basic or business, he is given the alternatives to pay through the previously mentioned methods accordingly. Once the purchase is confirmed by the customer and admitted by shop commission, customer details come into use in order to define the shipping address and other supplementary information. Customer is given the possibility to view and print some information regarding his activity on the shop. For instance he can print the number of purchases completed by him from eh beginning of the current year. He can print the status of previously performed purchases and decide whether to cancel or not a specific purchase if it is still in â€Å"Not available† status. During the process of product selection and addition to cart specifying correspond quantity the system automatically checks if the product is available within the quantity or not. In case of negative response the system generates a request to the product supplier. Stated in short terms this is the overall situation on hand. 1.2 Document Conventions Specific terminology is used throughout the specification of the system. User Profile: stands for the profile of the customer (person) opened in the software. One person can have multiple profiles using different emails. A profile can be linked to none or one account type. Person: defines an real person who has an identity defined by class attributes. A person can have multiple profiles and consequently multiple accounts. For instance a person can have a basic and a business account. Account: defines an entity that enables the user to operate throughout the system and perform purchases. It is the super class of two other classes respectively: Basic and Business which extend the super class. Payment: defines an entity that enables an account to perform a payment transaction using one of alternative methods. Purchase: defines an entity that encapsulates a purchase object. A purchase is specified by a unique number and status thus using the Status class. Cart: stands for a container that holds selected products during the session and is included by a purchase. Cart Products: as the name itself defines an entity that makes possible operations of addition, deletion, and selection of products in and from the cart. Bank Transfer: stands for a payment method when using a basic plan. Credit Card: stands for a payment method using a credit card when using a basic plan. PayPal: defines a payment method when using business plan. In this case it includes a PayPal service using a previously configured PayPal account. 1.3 Intended Audience and Reading Suggestions The system is worth using by an audience that is interested on buying online products and benefit from facilities offered in such a case. Facilities are: saving time, saving money by selecting the best offer, comfort circumstances, safety of money transactions etc 1.4 Project Scope The scope of this project is to design and develop a system that is necessary to shops when they need to operate online, sell products online. The shop can keep an electronic history of all purchases and transactions. This gives more control over the operations that the company offers. The system can be adapted to a range of shops from simple small ones to big markets. A shop can outsource the function of shipping to another external company or can handle it itself. Project scope also includes financial transactions that call for other third party services like PayPal. Project scope from customer perspective, limits the range of customers to only those who have internet connation on some form and have a bank account in hand. The aim of this project is to promote an efficient, user-friendly, time-fashionable, safe way for customers to bye and receive products without being physically at a shop thus using virtual money. 2. UML Diagrams 2.1 Use Case Diagrams Online Shop from user perspective use case Description: This use case provides the viewpoint for the whole process from user perspective. Customer sees only the necessary functions that the system must define. Actors: Online Customer Preconditions: Customer must have a bank account. Base Case: 1. Customer must log in and authenticate 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Customer must choose the type of purchase to perform Customer can view and select products Customer can perform a purchase Customer can cancel a purchase He can view additional information regarding the purchase Alternative Flows None Post conditions: Customer performs transactions based on defined accounts. Additional Info/Issues: None View Products Use Case Description: View products use case describes the whole operations a user can perform on a product currently on the store. It also describes an exceptional case when a product is not available on the quantity required. Preconditions: Customer must login and authenticate firstly Base Case: 1. Customer can view the products 2. he can select the products 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. he can add the products to cart he can define quantities on ordered products system checks whether the quantity is satisfied or not system responds to client with approving the purchase system generates an automatic order to products supplier Alternative Flows None Post conditions: Customer performs transactions based on defined accounts. Additional Info/Issues: None Make Purchase Use Case Description: This use case defines the cycle when customer makes a purchase. When deciding to perform a purchase the customer proceeds to the checkout operation and then to the payment method and according verifications. Preconditions: Customer must confirm the final form of the cart and products already in. Base Case: 1. Customer must complete with the cart 2. he is taken to the checkout step 3. he is forwarded to a payment method based on the purchase type that he decided beforehand. Alternative Flows The customer may cancel the purchase when it is in â€Å"Not Available yet† status. Post conditions: Customer performs transactions based on defined account. Additional Info/Issues: Includes third party accounts like PayPal or supporting bank documents. Payment Use Case Description: Payment use case deals with the cycle of performing a payment through on of the methods mentioned. Preconditions: Customer must authenticate and decide upon the type of purchase to commit. Base Case: 1. Customer decides on the type of method to pay using either credit card or providing bank documents in case of basic type of purchase. 2. he decides upon PayPal method to pay if he decides on business purchase type. 3. each of the methods forward the user to the corresponding sites where he can enter credit card info, or upload a document or confirm a PayPal account. Alternative Flows None Post conditions: Customer performs transactions based on defined account. Additional Info/Issues: Includes third party accounts like PayPal or supporting bank documents.

Mustang vs Camaro Essay Example for Free

Mustang vs Camaro Essay The Mustang and Camaro have been compared since the Camaro first came out in the late 1960’s. The Mustang was pretty much the only sports car that was also a muscle car. Well, of course Chevrolet had to compete with Ford so they came out with the Camaro. The release of the Mustang was followed closely by the release of the Camaro a few years later. There is no doubt about it that the team from Chevrolet had stolen a magnificent idea and plan. These two muscle cars began the path for a revolution in pony cars and racing. America fell in love with the Mustang and Camaro, which allowed Ford and Chevrolet to sell millions of them in just a few years. Ford has continuously been selling a large number of Mustangs ever since the beginning. Chevrolet had to stop their production of the Camaro. In 1961, the vice president and general manager of Ford, Lee Iacocca had a dream. He envisioned the Ford Mustang. It took several months to get approval for funding to go towards the Mustang through multiple discussions, meetings and market surveys. The funding was granted in 1962. The Mustang’s parts were mainly borrowed from the Falcon to help keep the costs of production low. The car offered a variety of options for the exterior, interior, etc. Buyers were able to choose if they wanted their mustang to be fast, fancy, economical or plain. Ford wanted the Mustang’s design to appeal to everyone and anyone. It was advertised as â€Å"the car to be designed by you†. The Camaro was based off of another Chevrolet car, the Nova. The Camaro had been designed to compete with Ford’s Mustang. Its code name was the Panther, before any information about the Camaro was ever leaked into the public. Chevrolet had wanted to keep their cars name’s beginning with the letter C. A few options for the Camaro had been Chevy II, Chevelle, Corvette, etc. Somehow they decided on Camaro, which a product manager of Chevrolet answered when asked what a Camaro is, he said â€Å"a small, vicious animal that eats Mustangs†. It was reported that General Motor researchers found in the French dictionary that Camaro was slang for friend or companion. Though is was rumored that the Ford Company had researched and discovered some other definitions to the word Camaro, such as â€Å"a shrimp-like creature† and an arcane for loose bowels. On March 9 of 1964, the first Mustang which was a white convertible with a v-8 engine came out of Dearborn Michigan. Then a month later the Ford Mustang came out in the world with its debut at the World’s Fair in Flushing Meadows, New York. The first Mustang that came out of the assembly line was in April of 1964. This first model of the Ford Mustang, which was the early 1965 or also known as the 1964  ½, was available as a convertible or coupe. It had a 170-cubic inch six cylinder engine with a three-speed floor shift transmission. A V8 engine was optional with a four-speed manual transmission or a three-speed automatic with a cruise transmission. The day of the grand opening for the Mustang over twenty two thousand were sold. Within its first twelve months, Ford sold close to four hundred seventeen thousand Mustangs. In eighteen months, roughly a million Mustangs had been sold. It was a huge hit with America. The first Camaro came out in September of 1966 but was the 1967 model, as it is referred to as. When it was first available there were hardly any extra or special options for the car. That changed within the next following years and so forth. The Camaro offered a V6 or V8 engine in convertible or coupe. When the 1969 Camaro models were introduced, the car had improved greatly. A new power option was a Z28 package which had formally been known as the RPO Z28 Camaro Special Performance Package. The Z28 was one of the first special options and it was originally designed to compete in the Sports Car Club of America, which is a racing club. There are four generations to the Chevrolet Camaro. The first generation was from 1967 to 1969. That model was offered in a coupe or convertible with the option of a 4.1 L, 4.9 L, 5.0L, 5.4L and a 5.7L in a V8 engine. The second generation was from 1970 to 1981. Chevrolet changed the styling to a wider and larger vehicle which produced a heavier Camaro. The third generation was from 1982 to 1992. They were the first model of Camaros that offered fuel injection. The fourth generation was from 1993 to 2002. It held onto the same basic characteristics as the original; a couple or convertible, rear-wheel drive and the choice of a V6 or V8 engine. For thirty five years Chevrolet had been producing the popular Camaro. Chevrolet claimed that they stopped production of the Camaro due to plant overcapacity, slowing sales, and fading market for sports coupes. Just recently in 2009, Chevrolet released the 2010 Camaro. We will see how they do this time around. The Ford Mustang currently has five generations. With each generation Ford made sure to improve the horse power. The first generation was from 1964  ½ to 1973. The second generation was from 1974 to 1978. It was originally based off of the Ford Maverick but instead they used the Ford Pinto in the end. Because of the way the economy was going at the time, Ford needed to build a smaller and more fuel-efficient Mustang. Not only did they need to do this to appeal to customers still but to also to capture people’s eye as the Energy Crisis erupted. The third generation was from 1979 to 1993. This generation model was based off of the ‘Fox’ platform. It had originally been created for the 1978 Ford Fairmont and Mercury Zephyr. The interior of the third generation was meant to be more comfortable even though the back seats were smaller. The trunk was larger though, as well as the engine bay. This allowed the car to be easier to work on and service. The body styles were coupes, at the time was also referred to as a notchback, and a hatchback. A convertible was not available until 1983. The fourth generation is from 1994 to 2004. This generation underwent the most drastic redesign in over fifteen years. It had been code named SS-95 by Ford. It was also a more recent and updated version of the Fox platform. This new styled generation took several styles from the earlier Mustangs. A new twist was that it was the first time since 1973 that a hatchback coupe was not available. The V6 was a 3.8 engine for the models of 1994 and 1995. Unfortunately, Ford stopped using the 5.0L V8 for the GTs. The 5.0L had been used for around 40 years, it was a drastic change. But the 5.0L was used last on the 1994 and 1995 models. The new GT engine would be a 4.6L. For the 1999 to 2004 models the Mustang had a new edge styling theme for the body. It included sharper contours, creases in the bodywork and even larger wheel arches. The chassis and interior design remained the same was the previous model. And last but most definitely not least is the fifth generation which is the current generation from 2005 to present. At the 2004 North American International Auto Show, a new Mustang was introduced. It had been codenamed S-197. This new generation closely resembled the fastback Mustangs from the late 1960s. This new model was called as â€Å"retro-futurism† by Ford’s senior vice president of design. The V6 now had a 4.0L engine instead of a 3.8L engine. A brand new option that was first available for the 2009 Mustangs was a glass sun roof. The 2010 Mustang was unveiled by Ford before the Los Angeles International Auto Show. The 2010 Mustang mainly held the same look as the previous year’s model but with a modified exterior. Ford was looking for a leaner and muscular appearance for their 2010 Mustang. For the first time ever the Mustang had a reverse camera system to help drivers while backing up. Though, this feature is not available on basic V6’s. The 2011 Mustang should be out around the spring of 2010 and it is a very anticipated model. It will closely resemble the 2010 model, with perhaps some slight changes to the rear. It is hard to find information on the upcoming 2011 Mustang. One thing is for sure though, Ford is bringing back the 5.0L engine for it which excites many. Still to this day the Ford Mustang is running strong. The Mustang has even more varieties, variations and options. There is no other vehicle out there that has as many options as the Mustang does. So many different types branch off of the â€Å"Mustang†. Several examples are: Cobra, Shelby, Super Snake, Saleen, Mach 1, Fastback, California Special, Bullit, High Country Special, Boss, etc. They are never ending. There are so many differences and similarities between these two famous and popular pony cars. There is even so much more that a person can compare and contrast about Mustangs and Camaros. Not only because of the years, numerous changes, and that it is – after all – a car, but also because they have had a heated and natural rivalry since the very beginning. Oddly enough, it was rather difficult to find a lot of information and details on the Camaro, especially compared to the Mustang. The Mustang had numerous of information that was able to be found. And, remember the Mustang started it all in 1964, and has not stopped since!

Mamee Double Decker Went Global Marketing Essay

Mamee Double Decker Went Global Marketing Essay The purpose of this assignment is to analyze and study the marketing case in Malaysia, particularly, a Malaysian company must be chosen and our choice of company is Mamee Double Decker Berhad. Various aspect of study under the subject matter has been considered. This includes the target marketing mix considerations which is the product, pricing, promotion and distribution decision. Target market analysis is also included. In order to analyze the internal and external problem facing the company, we have done a SWOT analysis (strength, weakness, opportunity and threat)This is to highlight and raise several problem or issue facing the company locally or internationally. Market research on comsumer behavior and compettion have also been carried out through a survey questionnaires and the summary or report of the summary have also been done. Mamee Double Decker Went Global Background of the company The company chosen for this case analysis is Mamee Double-Decker Malaysia Berhad.. Mamee was founded in 1971 by Datuk Pan Ching Hin and headquartered in Malacca. Mamee Double Decker is Malaysia food processing, snack and diary product company. It mainly produces and sells instant noodles, snack, confectionery and beverages. Mamee Double Decker not only sells its product locally but had penetrated the international market as well. Today Mamee products are exported all around the world to more than 80 countries and area it serve includes Asia, Middle East, Africa, America, Europe and Oceania. Products produced by mamee are popular and well known to most households especially children. Marketing practice from Islamic perspective When mamee first came into existence its product are only mamee monster noodle snack and double decker snack.. Mamee later had gain recognition from several countries because of its distinct and unique feature of the snack that is square-ish noodle like and the adorable face of monster on its packaging while the double-decker snack , is a flavored snack with a choice of prawns chicken and cheese. The company then goes through a major diversification when it produces carbonated drink under the brand cheers. Mamee instant noodle later was produced. However different instant noodles are provided to cater different countries, For example mamee bihun, express noodles, and mi goreng are only available in Malaysia as it suits the mlaysian taste, while these products are not made for the overseas market. The company had produced mamee oriental noodles for outside market. Marketing Mix Consideration Decission made by the company regarding to the price, promotion and distribution are the marketing mix consideration in making a decision. . Product decision. Initially, mamee mainly focus in producing snacks, but it had diversify its product in producing beverages such as soft drinks, cultured drinks and recently the new products by mamee a juice under the brand Rio Fiesta a healthier options for drinks produced by mamee. All product produced by mamee comply to the standards required. The company had obtained Hazzard Analysis and Crtical Control Poiint (HACCP) certificate. This obtainment of this certificate means that mamee had adhered to food safety from raw material production, procurement and handling, manufacturing, distribution and the consumption of the finished product. From Islamic point of view, mamee had free from gharar or uncertainty by providing adequate products description and specification of all its product. This includes complete labeling and nutritios information, ingredient used and its expiry date. At the same time other products evolve in the market under mamee double decker are nutrigen, is acultured drink for children. Mister Potato was out of the market later after that, Now, Mister Potato had officially become the global snack partner with Manchester United. Latest product by Mamee double decker is corntoz, corntoz is a crunchy snack came with different flavours and shapes. The main concern under this food processing, beverages and diary product industry is about the whether the product are halal (permitted). Since this company mainly sell their products in Malaysia and in other Muslim countries, therefore mamee double decker product must be certified halal. As reported in Malaysia Halal Directory Mamee double decker had obtained the halal certificate for all of their products. Their products are free from additives made from animal sources that are forbidden in Islamic Law. Stabilizers, Emulsion and colouring used in their production process are deemed as halal. Promotional Activities Mamee Double Decker, like many other companies in this competitive environment are driven to adapt an aggressive promotional strategies in order to gain market share.Mamee Douible Decker had use various promotional tools including advertising and sales promotion to capture the market. As reported in The Star newspaper July 17 2002, Rm40 million was allocated solely for promotional activities in Malaysia. On the same year, mamee had made an aggressive advertising in Myanmar and china to create brand awareness to familiarize their products in these markets. Recently, mamee had become an official snack partner with Manchaster United. This joint-venture is important as it aims to boost its market share in Asia. One of the interesting activities that has been carried out through this partnership was The Ultimate Manchester United Experience contest. Lucky winners had been treated to a trip to Manchester united to meet their favourite football players. Mamee had also use Malaysia local celebrities, such as Mawi, Felix and Amalyea as ambassadors for mamee sllrpp products in Malaysia. In the recent festive season hari raya, Malaysia celebrity Shahizi sam was featured in mamee sllrrp advertistment and they had conduct a mamee kusayang contest. This shows that mamee double decker had made several aggressive promotion activities throughout the years. Its promotional activities adhere to the basic Islamic principle of business and mamee had ensure its product reach the target market in all around the world. Any promotional activities to stimulate the demand from consumers are permissible as long as it does not exaggerating or breaching the Islmaic principle. Activities like free samples, cash rebates, joint promotion and contest conducted by mamee are therefore deemd permissible. Pricing Decission Pricing of mamee product are reasonable and affordable for the interest of all.This pricing strategy enables it to capture the market share of various market segments. For example in Malaysia, mamee monster snack only cost 30cents and mamee Double decker snack cost only RM2.50. Mamee had made no price discrimination for all of its product. The company Charge same price for same good irrespective of different markets. Therefor mamee pricing strategy is considered fair(Adil) and just. Distribution The distribution channels of mamee food and beverages in Malaysia consist of three stages (producer,retailer,consumer). Mamee which is the producer will sell its products in bulks to retailers (Giants, Tesco,etc) , and eventually retailers will sell it to the consumers. In international level, the distribution are being done through appointed subsidiaries. Mamee has favourable acess to distribution networks in Malaysia. Mamee Double Decker has 13 distribution centres and have about 150 vans for deliveries to about 1000 point of sales. Mamee Double Decker currently has five manufacturing facilities in Malaysia and one in Myanmar. Mamee double decker have centralized marketing and distribution system while mamee have assigned an export manager in each manufacturing subsidiary. . There are three companies under Mamee Double Decker responsible in producing each of their respective lines and products for example snack food and chilled products (KMM), instant noodles (PP) and beverages (MDDB). Target Market Analysis Target Market Mamee Double Decker (M) Berhad is good in quality and unique brand which targeted to all group of people according to the product offered. As the company began with a single product and consistently grown to 50 products, targeted people become more. The product that already household names, for example, Mamee Monster, Mamee Instant and slurp, and Mamee snacks, are targeted to people whose age is from 6 to 30 years old. In addition, students also being targeted because most of the time they need snacks and drinks while studying to get away the stress especially female students. They always need something to chew and eat during study time or after lecture. The second group of people that Mamee Double Decker (M) Berhad will target is people with healthy lifestyle. This is in line with the recent product addition that is Nutrigen Cultured Milk Drink. Geographically, the company will focus on every area that has grocery shop, petrol station or shopping complex. Moreover, people from lower income to higher income will be targeted as well because of the reasonable price and within their budget. From the family structure perspective, a mother with atleast 5 childrens, usually will buy more groceries and household products. Children love to have snacks like Potato Chips, Potato Crisps and Cheer Beverage because the products are very convenient and it comes with different taste based on their preferences. Furthermore, the company targeted people who like to spend their spare time with picnic and party. It is very clear that the size of the companys target market is very large and high. Everyone may be used and consume the product offered because it comes with varieties of food, snacks, beverages, instant noodles and to name a few. SWOT analysis Strength One of the strength pose by Mamee Double Decker (M) Berhad is as reported in recent mamee double decker (M) Berhad annual report, the company had experienced 57.3% growth of profit before tax from 9.6 million. Mamee Double Decker(M) Berhad strength also lies in its ability to expand their business network by penetrating into new exports market. This is proved to be true as mamee experienced a growth of 6.2% in 2002 in its effort to venture to new exports market. The second strength of mamee is it has a good reputation among customers, since has become part of the choice made by household largely in Malaysia, mamee so far had not fail to impress its consumers all over the world by providing a tip-top service from the process of production to distribution, we can see that mamee products reach consumer easily as it is easily available in store from a small grocery store to large super markets. The third strength of mamee double decker is we can say that it has a quite strong brand name as according to their annual report, mamee had won several awards locally and internationally. The two local awards that mamee has honoured to receive are first, the chief minister awards for Promising local Company Awards in recognition of Mamee Double Decker Berhad (M) to local industries and the second award is by Malaysian Manufacturer packaging Council of Malaysia, given to one of Mamee Double Decker (M) Berhad product, that is Nutrigen Liteyo. Internationally, mamee had also been rewarded internationally recognized ISO 9002 togethe riwth China Awards Certificates. Weakness This includes the internal and external problem of Mamee Double Decker (M) berhad. The external problem pose by this company is as reported in the star newspapers 2007, mamee has not yet succeed in gaining a market share in China as there is a negative growth in Mamee double decker operation in China particularly,Mamee Double-Decker Food(Suzhou)Co. Ltd, demand for Mamee in China is low, thus generating low sales and revenue and consequently the company had incurred higher loss. however the company did not loose hope and have confidence in its China operation and Mmaee had appointed a consultant to resolve this issue. The second external problem face by Mamee is high dependency of raw material from Europe as such when there is a rise in Euro against USD the mamee double-decker earnings is affected since some of mamee products ingredients such as Mister potatao crips are imported from Europe, ,thus when the price of raw material increases, this gives pressure to its profit margin. In order to overcome this problem, mamee needs to do more reaseach and development to reduce its dependency from outside. One internal problem in mamee double decker lies in its small number of manufacturing facilities, considering that mamee products are marketed all over the world, with only five manufacturing facilities , limited production can be made per day. If mamee want to extend its product line, it will be restricted as there is a limited space for production. Oppurtunity Since now consumer are becoming more health conscious, one opportunity for mamee double decker is to come up with a product that is more healthy as it will give customer a more options for healthy good food. Mamee double decker plans to obtain health food supplier in an effort to expands its product line.Mamee had identified several suppliers and the company plans to negotiates with this suppliers in providing health supplies of food Threat As customer becoming more educated and conscious about the food they consume, consumer tend to compare prices and quality of products with other brands. Currently in market there are various brands and product they offered similar to Mamee double decker. Thus, the threat of mamee double decker is the competitors in market like for example, Munchys, nestle, unilever foods. Mamee do not only pose an internal threat, external threat in terms of competitors in china is also obvious. Mamee face a greater threat and especially in Shanghai, this is due to the complexity of market in China in addition to variety of snack food products produced by them. IN Shanghai, mamee had to face competitors that have a greater market share like. REPORT ON CONSUMER BEHAVIOR FOR MAMEE DOUBLE-DECKER In order to evaluate the consumers preferences on Mamee Double-Decker products, a survey has been conducted within a population of 100 respondents and 30 out 100 were taken as a sample to this research. There were 17 male and 15 female involved in this sample. A set of 22 questions were asked during the survey session which majority of the respondents came from different background and the survey were conducted online. Before the surveys were taken in place, a short description of the company was given so that the respondents somehow know what they would be expecting during the session. Questions were separated into three parts started with the personal background information then likert scale questions which evaluate their decision making in making purchases and the last part of the questionnaire cover their own given answer accordingly. Result follow suits right after the research conducted was done. Majority of the respondents were Malays which covers 91percent of the total sample taken. This is explained by the major ethnic in Malaysia is Malay followed by Chinese with 6percent and others 3percent. As for income level, most of the respondents categorized as middle class earners because their income level is range between RM1001 to RM3000 with 47percent are in this group while the remaining 44percent belongs to lower income earner like students and jobless teenagers. Within this sample, most of the respondents are in their bachelor degree staying in urban area and living single life which eventually led them to such consumption with the ration of 63:84:97 for all categories. 84percent of these respondents also admit that they enjoyed eating snack food and beverages with a typical consumption of 1 to 2 packs a day. Why this happening is because during the earlier age like teenagers in university, they are prone to having a quick and light food as on the go. This somehow explained the viability of the result. When it comes to factors to decision making questions, the result was significantly expected. Almost all the respondents agreed that they are very cautious in choosing their favourite snack foods and beverages because this factor has to do with their taste buds. While pricing became the second factor that influenced the decision making; 35percent agreed that price do play a vital role in their purchasing power. Morever, 55percent of the respondents were also somewhat agreed that Mamee Double-Decker do became their preferred brand and offer wide range of products under one roof with their given competitive pricing on the products compared to other brands. So most likely consumers can easily make decision in making purchases and less confusion. Unfortunately, Mamee Double-Decker wasnt still at the par in offering good taste for their products because only 47percent out of the total respondents were somewhat agree with the companys taste performance but the remaining disagree with it. However, 41percent of the respondents agreed that Mamee products are reachable in the market which eases them in making purchases. Majority of the respondents bought Mister Potatoes and Mamee Monster snack which are two of the most popular snack foods from Mamee Double-Decker and they usually bought it at convenience stores like 7-eleven and hypermarkets like Tesco. As for substitution for Mamee brand, they usually go for Jack n Jill brand and Nestle which are two of the top snack foods and beverages producers in the world. Thus this is threat for Mamee Double-Decker because of the stiff competition from these giant producers. Mamee Double-Decker should improve their products taste and perhaps packaging in order to stay competitive in the market despite having cheaper price strategy. In a nutshell, Mamee Double-Decker is a proud home-grown snack foods and beverages producer that went global. However, Mamee Double-Decker cannot be relied truly on domestic markets with their currents products either domestic market or international market, instead they should keep doing product development program in order to come out with new line of foods and beverages that suits the preference of the consumers worldwide. REPORT ON COMPETITION FOR MAMEE DOUBLE-DECKER A survey has been conducted in order to evaluate the competition for Mamee Double-Decker products. Mamee-Double Decker (M) Bhd, which has made a name for itself with its snacks and confectionery products. A survey with a population of 50 was targeted and a sample of 30 was chosen for this research. Respondent consiste of 16 males and 14 females.The survey was a close ended survey requiring customers to answer a multiple chouce question with a 5 asnwer options. A set of 15 questions have been asked regarding their brand preferences. Mamee Double Decker have various competitors on market for example, Munchys, Nestle, Unilver Food. Under this company they too had offered various consumer or food products for example, maggi, a brand for instant noodle.Mamee to had rival branding for their beverages particularly cultured drink, for example, nutrigen cultured drink are competing against other various brands like yakult, vitagen and solivite. In a brief summary, 40% of respondents are quite loyal and repeat buyer for mamee products while 60% of them are somewhat in a middle as they also have other preferences and branding in buying consumer goods products. Based on the survey conducted, consumer prefers brand yakult and vitagen more compared to nutrigen which come from Mamee products. This is believe due to the reason that yakult are better in terms of quality as they contain probiotics . On the other hand their champions products like Mamee Monster, Mamee Noodles, Mister Potato, Double Decker and Nicolet Swiss Herb Candy are more preferred by consumers. In a survey, 65% od consumers prefer more of these products because of it tastes and the prices are affordable as compared to other products such as Pringles, Indo Mee, Maggi and etc. However, the remaining percentage of 35% do prefer other snacks brands like Pringles,Lays, Doritos as they may have perceive this brand are better in quality and tastier compared to mamee products. .

Male Superiority In Math: Fact or Fiction? Essay -- Argumentative Pers

Male Superiority In Math: Fact or Fiction? One true mystery of mathematics is the small number of female mathematicians. When most people think of mathematicians, they automatically assume that they are male. This leads to the idea that boys are mathematically superior to girls, which has long been a popular belief. Recent studies, however, may prove this to be wrong. The fact is that there are numerous female mathematicians who have made very important contributions to the mathematical world throughout history. Although they may not be as famous as some other comparable male mathematicians, their work is very important simply because they did significant work in a field that has always been assumed a man’s domain for some reason or another. Despite this, they still worked on mathematics because of the importance that they place on it. One possible explanation of there being more male mathematicians than female is the place that a mathematician has in society. It is a very honorable career, but in the mind of a girl, it may seem undesirable, especially at a young age. Many girls think that being a mathematician is a man’s job. They also believe that if they study mathematics, guys may view them as being "braniacs," and give up studying math at a very young age, thereby limiting their futures and career choices. A study was conducted by Gilah C. Leder whose primary objective was to "examine whether the fear of success (FS) construct, which grew out of attempts to understand the conflicting sex-related findings in achievement motivation, was helpful in explaining observed sex differences in mathematics, achievement and course participation" (4). The study was conducted with 258 boys and 233 girls in various grades. ... ...ew mathematical careers in different ways, and they may have superiorities over each other in certain areas of mathematics. However, the fact that they are different by no means proves that one sex is better at mathematics than the other; if these studies prove anything, it is that girls indeed are equally good at mathematics as boys. Bibliography 1.Volpe, Betty. Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School. http://www.nctm/org/mtms/1999/02/olympiad.htm. (10/26/99) 2.Fennema, Elizabeth. The Use of Spatial Visualization Mathematics by Girls and Boys. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 16(1985), 184. 3.Fennema, Elizabeth. Mathematics Learning and the Sexes: A Review. Journal for Research in Mathematics, 5 (1974), 126-139. 4.Leder, Gilah C. Mathematics Achievement and Fear of Success. Journal for Research in Mathematics, 13(1982), 124-135.

The Stand Essay -- essays research papers

The Stand by Stephen King was a very detailed, and engulfing story about a possible end to mankind. This â€Å"extermination† is caused by a man-made variation of the flu that is 100% fatal and spread through the air. It wipes out 99% of the world’s population in a month, leaving around 1 million people in the entire United States. The story is about how the population is split between good and evil and the battle that goes on between the two colonies. The story is presented from many different point of views, because there are around ten to fifteen different main characters.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Of all the characters, Harold Lauder is probably the most interesting and developed in the whole story. His personality changes drastically from one extreme to the other throughout the book....

Addendum to Independent Study in Sound Design and Sound System Component Operation :: essays research papers

Addendum to Independent Study in Sound Design and Sound System Component Operation This past year (2000) I have been working in the sound booth for The John Lyman Center for the Performing Arts. Here at the John Lyman Center (JLC) we have been going through a time of transition. The former resident technical guru who had taken care of JLC's happenings had retired, leaving the JLC in a semi chaotic state. The dance school season was just about to start which happens to be our busiest time of the year. The administrative staff here at the JLC was franticly trying to find a replacement while interim Chris Hudacs fought his was through the perilous dance school season. Finally, when all the hullabaloo was over David Starkey, formally serving as Technical Director of the Theatre Department at Southern Ct. State Univ. was named the new title of Events Manager. When David was still working in the theatre department I had approached him when it was pointed out that there was no one person on staff who knew how to fully operate the sound system. The idea I had come up with was to design an independent study which would allow me to be in the sound booth and empirically discover how to operate the sound system and all of its support components. He agreed that it was a good idea because Greg had never explained anything but remedial board operation. Since I first started working at the JLC I had wanted to work on the sound system, now I was being given the chance. The independent study was written up as follows: Independent Study in Sound Design and Sound System Component operation Objectives: -To demonstrate competence in properly operating the sound system and all its individual components in Lyman Auditorium. Which includes but is not limited to the following:  ¨ Sound board  ¨ Tape player  ¨ DAT player  ¨ Mini disk player  ¨ Compact disk recorder  ¨ Compact disk player  ¨ Digital effects processors  ¨ Patch bay  ¨ Wireless microphones  ¨ Digital synthesizer -By the 8th week be prepared to work with the head sound designer in developing a sound design for the crescent players fall production of "three penny opera". The sound design should incorporate as many of the listed devices as possible to ensure that a high quality production is obtained. The learning process I have been going through has included help from many people. I would sit and pick the brain of every sound engineer that came through here. Finding out what you did with an Omni DriveÃ’ or how to use the feedback detector and the graphic equalizer to get rid of feedback.

Organizational Systems and Quality Leadership Essay

A. Complete a root cause analysis that takes into consideration causative factors that led to the sentinel event. (This patient’s outcome) The terms failure analysis, incident investigation, and root cause analysis are used by organizations when referring to their problem solving approach. Regardless of what it’s called there are three basic questions to every investigation: 1. What’s the problem(s)? 2. Why did it happen? (the causes) 3. What specifically should be done to prevent it? (Galley, n.d., ∂ 1) In the case of Mr. J, these were multiple issues that led to and contributed to his unexpected demise after what is usually considered a routinely performed procedure in an emergency department setting. The JCHAO (Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare) defines a sentinel event as â€Å"an unexpected occurrence involving death or serious physical or psychological injury†, (Frain, Murphy, Dash, & Kassai, ∂ 1) and in the case of Mr. B, his death would be considered a sentinel event which would warrant a review by a team of interdisciplinary members of the hospital. In this particular case members of the team would include one or more ED physicians, the RN in the scenario and the LPN, a respiratory therapist, a nursing supervisor, a hospital administrator, the ED nurse manager, a hospital pharmacist, and a risk manager. More staff nurses from the ER could also be involved. A credible and successful root cause analysis will identify all of the elements that contribu ted to the event, an action plan will be developed to prevent the event from reoccurring and ensure that those actions are completed. Action plans should be based on best practices and appropriate standards. (Frain et al., ∂ 10) The scenario presented starts out as what  appears to be an average afternoon shift in a small 6 bed emergency department in a rural hospital. Staffing consisted of one emergency room physician, one registered nurse (RN), on licensed practical nurse (LPN) and a secretary. Due to the size of this particular ER, there appears to be limited staffing and therefore limited resources to handle large volumes of patients and or critical patients. There are two patients already being worked up in the department at the time of Mr. B’s arrival and they are stable, have already been evaluated and they are awaiting further treatment or orders. Mr. B is brought to the ED by private vehicle complaining of left leg and hip pain after losing his balance and falling over his dog. The triage nurse noted that other than the patient displaying tachypnea, his vital signs were otherwise within norm al limits. The patient states his pain level is severe, a â€Å"ten out of ten†, and physical examination finds a shortened left lower extremity with calf swelling and ecchymosis. In triage it is noted that the patients leg is stabilized and he is subsequently moved into a patient room where the admitting RN, Nurse J, takes over and gets a more thorough history of this patient, noting impaired glucose tolerance, prostate cancer and chronic back pain. Mr. B regular medications include Atorvastatin and also Oxycodone for his chronic back pain. The doses and how often he takes these mediations is not provided. Although there is no mention of any radiology studies being performed on Mr. B after his arrival, it is assumed that this was performed before the ER physician completed his evaluation and ordered 5 mg intravenous diazepam to sedate the patient to perform a manual reduction of a dislocated hip. After waiting for 5 minutes, the physician then instructed the RN to administer 2mg of hydr omorphone, a powerful narcotic analgesic. The staff waits five more minutes, after which the physician then instructs the RN to repeat both doses of diazepam and hydromorphone because he is not satisfied with the patient’s level of sedation. It is after these medications are administered that the physician notes patient’s weight and history of opiate use. Five minutes after the last dose of medication is administered a successful reduction of the left hip takes place and the patient remains sedated. The reduction procedure, which initially began at approximately 16:05, ended at 16:30. Although Nurse J is monitoring this patient, she is alerted that EMS (Emergency Medical Services) is bringing in an elderly patient with reported acute  respiratory distress. Nurse J, an experienced critical care nurse, elects to place Mr. J on an automatic blood pressure machine with a pulse oximeter. Although not stated, it is likely that this is a portable machine and is not hooked up to any wall monitors. It does not have continuous EKG monitoring. It does not have end tidal CO2 monitoring. Nurse J then elects to leave the patient in the company of his son with a blood pressure of 110/62 and an oxygen saturation of 92% on the portable machine. The patient is breathing room air and does not have any other monitoring. The ambulance patient has arrived to the department and both the RN and LPN are involved in stabilizing this new arrival and discharging the previous patients as the lobby is now becoming congested with more patients seeking care. There is no mention of anyone suggesting that additional staff should be brought in to help with the load. During this time the pulse oximeter alarm fires off in Mr. B’s room showing at saturation of 85%. The LPN enters the room and resets the alarm and repeats a blood pressure, but there is no mention of the LPN assessing the patient’s respiratory and or mental status. At 16:43, almost forty minutes after Mr. B’s procedure had begun, the son who is at the bedside with him states the monitor is alarming. Nurse J finds a Mr. B in respiratory arrest and a stat code is called. A code team arrives and the patient is connected to a cardiac monitor for the first time. The patient is in ventricular fibrillation, CPR is begun, and according to this scenario he is intubated before he is defibrillated. After thirty minutes of interventions, this patient is resuscitated to a normal sinus rhythm with pulses, but is unable to breathe without a ventilator. He has fixed and dilated pupils and no spontaneous movements. Most likely due to the facility being a small rural hospital, they must transport this patient to a higher level of care, and he is flown out to another facility where the patient was ultimately determined to have brain death and was taken off of life support. A-1 Discuss the errors or hazards in the care in this scenario Causative factors in this scenario appear to include poor staffing to patient ratios, inadequate adherence to hospital policy for moderate sedation, and an obvious lack of communication between peers /coworkers. The human factors point to failure of staff to follow an established protocol, possible  fatigue, possible inability to focus on the task, and a lack of utilizing critical thinking skills. There did not appear to be any equipment problems other than the fact that the appropriate equipment that was available was not accessed. The environmental nature of emergency medicine lends itself to hazards in the fact that a department can go from being quiet and mellow in one moment, to being volatile and hectic the next moment. It is an environment of unpredictability and bestows care to a wider population of patients than any other department in the hospital. Common environmental issues to all emergency rooms can include poor location and accessibility of equipment, overhead paging systems that no one hears, security risks, lighting and space issues, lack of privacy due to patients being placed in hallways and other open areas not designated as patient care areas. Organizational factors may include budgeting limitations, staffing to patient ratios and contingency problems. Dealing with unexpected sick calls, inability to fill those calls, power outages and electronic documentation systems that fail, external environmental disasters, rapid influxes of unexpected patients and the media are all common factors that can disrupt hospital care. Well written policies are a must to guide staff in continuing to provide quality care while minimizing errors and hopefully avoiding sentinel events. Potential hazards and errors can be avoided by learning from the literature and past experiences of other emergency departments. Specific protocols for procedures performed in the ER are developed for this very reason. In the given scenario there is the issue of proper staffing which posed a hazard to the patient who eventually expired. Nurse to patient ratios in this scenario were inappropriate due to the fact that a patient who had received moderate sedation was not closely monitored and ideally should have received one on one nursing care for the duration of his procedure and until he met discharge criteria. This would have been possible had the RN asked for back up which was apparently available. Looking back on the scenario, it was noted that immediately after the joint reduction of Mr. B had been performed, a critically ill ambulance patient had arrived and the RN was responsible for that patient as well. In the emergency department, or any department for that matter, nurses are continually subject to frequent interruptions, the need to multi-task, and reliance on â€Å"work-arounds† because of inadequate systems  support. (Cherry & Jacob, 2011, p. 473) In the case of nurse J, she may have been fixated on completing other tasks, such as stabilizing the ambulance patient, thus distracting her from the ongoing developments with Mr. B. who appeared to be resting comfortably with his son at the bedside. Assuming the patient was safe with a family member, the RN missed the opportunity to reverse the downslide of events that unfolded. Not anticipating the need for additional help is a hazard when staff become overwhelmed but continue to proceed as if help is not needed, because they may be accustomed to being understaffed and working only with what they have. Therefore, this presents the issue of the culture of safety, or lack thereof. It did not appear that there was any organized culture of safety and the communication between staff members appeared to be minimal. Possibly there was an environment of distrust between coworkers, or an intimidating environment in which the RN was afraid to speak up to the ERMD regarding the management of the patient’s pain and sedation. Perhaps the LPN was intimidated by the RN and did not chose to inform the RN of the abnormal vital signs. It appears that inconsistent or absent communication skills among the staff present that day contributed overall to a hazardous situation. And lastly, possible poor training and education of staff creates a hazardous environment and the lack of critical thinking skills demonstrated in this scenario suggests that this is an area that needs to be examined closely at this hospital. There is no mention of what the LPN’s responsibility is in assessing the patient but it is difficult to comprehend how an experienced health care worker in an ER would not investigate a poor pulse oximetry reading further than simply resetting the monitor. Educational requirements and experience of the staff needs to be reviewed and revised by the interdisciplinary team as part of the improvement plan. Errors made in this scenario that contributed to this sentinel event include the fact that there was a specific protocol for conscious sedation and it was ignored. Although Nurse J was ACLS (advanced cardiac life support) certified, and she had completed the hospital’s training module, she did not follow the guidelines in the written protocol which more than likely would have prevented any of this event from happening. Perhaps she did not understand the protocol, perhaps she was accustomed to taking short cuts, or perhaps she was drug or alcohol  impaired. Another possibility is that the nurse was not able to find the online protocol on the hospital portal. Perhaps the portal was difficult to navigate and the policy was difficult to locate. Being under time constraint, a nurse might decide to forgo looking up the policy because it is too time consuming to look for it. Only Nurse J. would be able to provide us with this critical information. It is not clear as to why an experienced critical care nurse with no history of negligence did not follow proper procedure. Other errors include the fact that sufficient monitoring equipment was available and not utilized, including use of supplemental oxygen and possible end tidal CO2 monitoring. Furthermore, no one in the department called for any back up, such as a nursing supervisor or a respiratory therapist to help manage the patient. The ER physician who ordered the medications did not communicate with the nurse before the procedure about the risks associated with this patient, including the patient’s home use of opiates for his chronic pain. Polypharmacy, possible use of supplements, adherence issues, and the potential for adverse drug events all posed potential hazards that needed to be addressed. (Williams, 2002, ∂ 1) The RN did not question the physician about the orders and the physician in turn, did not question the nurse if she had any concerns. There was no â€Å"time-out† procedure performed by the staff, which would have given staff members the opportunity to voice concerns. The doctor also failed to notice that the patient was not being appropriately monitored, and along with the rest of the staff he did not appear to display a teamwork mentality. The key to a successful root cause analysis is to search for answers as to what system errors and failures need to be corrected, and not to pursue blame on any one individual. Individual blame centers around forgetfulness, inattention, or moral weakness. It is punitive. A systems approach examines the conditions under which health care workers work and sets up defenses to avert errors or mitigate their effects. (Cherry & Jacob, 2011, p. 473) The goal is to bring staff together to design and implement processes that provide uniform standards of treatment and care and provide safety to all involved and minimize the likelihood of harm or a sentinel event. B. Improvement Plan By requiring the staff of the emergency department to reexamine its actions on that day, a dialogue is created that hopefully will create a strong motivation to seek out better and newer ways to handle patients that require sedation and monitoring. If the participation is not there, then the motivation will not be created and change will not occur. One way of developing an improvement plan would be to apply the theories of change developed by physicist and social scientist Kurt Lewin in the 1950s. His change management model, known as Unfreeze-Change-Refreeze, refers to a three stage process of transitioning through change. Lewin believed that to begin any successful change process, one must first understand why the change must take place, and this is where the motivation for change begins. He stated that one must be helped to re-examine many cherished assumptions about oneself and one’s relations to others. This is the stage known as â€Å"unfreezing†. (Thompson, n.d., p. 1) In the case of the emergency department, the entire team needs to be compelled to change the way sedation procedures are performed, as well as how patients are handled before and after the procedure. In addition to reviewing the procedural sedation protocol, the team needs to look at overall hospital care of those receiving any medications that cause respiratory depression. This should not be too difficult to promote since the procedure performed that fateful day resulted in harm and subsequent death of a patient. Not only was the patient and his family harmed, the entire organization was harmed and is liable for this incident. The hospital and its emergency department’s community reputation is going to suffer. Knowing that the staff that day is probably emotionally traumatized and possibly fearful of the consequences, the environment is ripe for change and the unfreezing stage can begin with a review of the sedation policy and why it was not followed. Each individual there and staff that were not there that day need to be made aware and can meet one on one with the department manager to voice their concerns and questions. Barriers hopefully will be identified as to why the sedation protocol was not followed that day. The hospital already provides an electronic educational module on conscious sedation procedures which would have a required date for staff to complete. This module should be reviewed for any inconsistencies  and updated and it should be made easily accessible on the computer portal. The actual written policy should also be easily accessible on the portal as well as in print form in a binder at the nurses station, should staff not have access to the computer. An analgesic protocol could be developed in which there would be a minimum time lapse between opioid doses (for instance 10 minutes versus 5) and the use of a hospital approved sedation scoring system should be in place. Patients in addition to requiring continuous pulse-oximetry monitoring should also be on continuous end tidal CO2 monitoring as well, long considered a more effective way of measuring effective ventilatory status. A new electronic training module on the use of end tidal CO2 monitoring would be mandatory for nursing staff to complete and equipment in the ED would be upgraded to provide for this type of monitoring. A representative could come and demonstrate the use of this type of monitoring and sign off employees for a mini-education module. Although many emergency departments have upgraded their documentation to all electronic, it might be helpful for staff nurses who are continuously monitoring patients at the bedside to use paper forms to document the pre procedure requirements including consents, time-outs, intra procedure medications and response to those meds and vital signs as well as post procedure Aldrete scores and recovery notes. This would be advantageous for simply the reason that not every bed has access to a computer. Health care providers certified in Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) must be in direct attendance with the patient throughout the entire course of the sedation and until the patient is fully recovered. Their primary responsibility is to monitor the vital signs including heart rate and rhythm, blood pressures, respiratory rate and oxygen saturation, as well as the patency of the patient’s airway. The RN managing the patient should never leave the patient unattended or engage in tasks that would compromise this continuous monitoring. The RN is responsible for taking the leading role in assuring that the care provided is safe. Proper airway equipment and drug reversal agents should be at the bedside and this must be documented. In order to unfreeze the staff and help them to change their behaviors, the ED could hold mock sedation procedures to practice their skills in managing a sedated patient. Annual skills days should be held with  review of the policy and equipment used. Staff would be signed off annually on this module. Certifications for BLS(basic life support), ACLS, PALS(pediatric advanced life support) and possibly TNCC (trauma nurse core curriculum), should be up to date and the hospital should offer these courses on campus to make it easier for their employees to maintain their certifications. Staff members whose scope of practice do not require them to practice ACLS or PALS should be reeducated on what normal vital signs are, how to set parameters on the cardiac monitors, how to take vital signs on the cardiac monitor and they need to review basic BLS skills by attending their own skills day. Teaching should include basics on what normal vital signs are for different age groups, and how medications can alter these vital signs. If the hospital has the funds to open a simulation lab, all nurses and allied health personal could practice simulated scenarios on mannequins and even videotape them. This would be a huge asset for the staff of all the patient care departments. Another part of the improvement plan would include classes for staff on communication and critical conversations. Learning how to communicate as a team and voice concerns about patient safety is a skill that requires practice, confidence and no fear of retribution or intimidation. Staff members who deal in stressful and hectic environments may at times be uncertain when they see behaviors that are unsafe and therefore may elect to say nothing when they believe the care of a patient may be compromised. In the case of the LPN who turned off the SPO2 alarm, I would wonder if perhaps there was a communication barrier between her and the RN and or the MD, or was it simply a knowledge deficit. An action plan needs to be in place for a saturated emergency department in which additional staff can be called in with a less than 30 minute wait time, or perhaps float other available qualified staff from other departments, such as the critical care unit or the telemetry floor. Because critical care nurses are accustomed to working in a 1:1 environment with their patients, it would have been ideal to float a CCU nurse to the department when Nurse J realized she could not take care of the rest of the department without leaving Mr. B unattended. Of course this may not have  been feasible since we do not know the census in the CCU. Chart reviews are also an invaluable tool for improvement. The manager will assign nurse in the ED to perform a monthly audit of all sedation charts with checklists of what was done correctly and what was not. These audits are important for providing data on how the ED needs to improve its performance and safety measures. This data will be provided not only at ED staff meetings but at quality improvement meetings involving the nursing director and hospital administration. If there is a problem convincing the hospital to provide safe staffing levels, the ED must provide strong data in order to show administration that there is a need to provide additional nursing. After the uncertainty of the unfreeze stage has occurred, change then begins to take place. Staff will start to believe and act in ways that support the new growth of the department. The transition will not happen rapidly as people take time to learn and embrace new ways of doing things and for each individual the rate of change is personal. In order to accept the new change and contribute to its success, staff will need to understand how the changes will benefit them and not every person will feel this way. Most healthcare workers probably feel that if healthcare delivery is made safer and better for their patients, then they will buy in to the need for changes and produce those changes. Unfortunately some of these people may feel harmed by change, and it is possible to notice some folks not participating in meetings, outside events, or educational updates. They may voice discontent with the whole process and complain that the changes are unnecessary. They may feel the status quo is being challenged and are threatened if they are unable to adapt to the changes. They may eventually leave the department or even the hospital environment as a whole. These are the people who may require the most encouragement and handholding to get them through the transition. Time and communication are of utmost importance and as staff gains understanding of the changes, they also need to feel connectedness to the organization throughout the transition period. (Thompson, n.d., p. 3) Lewin’s third stage of change, or Refreezing, takes place when the organization has identified the barriers to sustain the changes made, and when it has identified what makes the changes work. Employees feel  confident and comfortable using new communication techniques, they participated in learning the new procedures and feel supported by their peers and leadership. There is an established feedback system for employees to participate in regarding their education and training, in which they can voice what works and what doesn’t. Changes are now used all of the time and are incorporated into the normal day to day operations in the ED. If the changes are not used regularly and not anchored in to the culture of the ED, the refreezing state cannot occur and employees may get caught in a â€Å"transition state† where each person is not sure how things should be done and there is no consistency for policies and procedures being followed. For the refreezing states to be successful, the department should celebrate its success with the change. Employees will need to have a sense of closure and management needs to help them feel appreciated for enduring an uncertain and uncomfortable time. It is important to encourage staff to believe that the contributions they have made have made the changes a success. (Thompson, n.d., p. 4) Continuing to provide support and transparency keeps employees informed and motivated to preserve the new changes in place. Allowing staff to voice their opinions and participate in how changes are rolled out is part of this process. Overall, a team approach to care is of utmost importance in the ED and each individual should be encouraged and reminded regularly how important their contributions are to the whole. Reward systems to encourage pride and enthusiasm for work well done can be included at monthly staff meetings. One or two employees might receive a gift or a trophy for hard work, these recipients would be nominated by their peers who anonymously write a nice note about someone who did something nice for a patient or a staff member or just did a particularly great job that day. Team building activities can also include an organized activity outside of the ED where employees and their family members can socialize together and relax. Nursing leaders and managers should strive to build environments that are conducive to friendships, facilitating and promoting good communication and respectful communication between nurses, physicians and administrators. (Blosky & Spegman, 2015, p. 34) Trust is the cornerstone of good communication, which was sorely lacking in the ED that day. C. Use a failure mode and effects analysis to project the likelihood that the  process improvement plan you suggest would not fail. (Identify the members of the interdisciplinary team who will be included in the RCAS and the FMEA) FMEA is a step by step process used to identify all possible failures in a design , a manufacturing or assembly process or a product or a service. FMEA was started by the US military in the 1940s, and was further developed by the aerospace and automotive industries. (American Society for Quality [ASQ], n.d., p. 1) It has been adopted by the healthcare industry successfully as a tool to identify areas of healthcare processes tat may fail, in order to prevent harm or sentinel events before they occur. â€Å"Failure modes† are the ways, or modes in which something may fail. Failures are errors or hazards, which affect the customer and in healthcare the customer is usually the patient. These errors or hazards can be actual, or potential. Effects analysis is the study of consequences of those failures. Failures are prioritized in order of how severe the consequences are, their frequency of occurrence, and their ease of detection. The purpose of the FMEA is to eliminate or reduce the percentage of failures, starting with the highest priority areas. (ASQ, n.d., p. 1) In the scenario of Mr. B, unfortunately the FMEA cannot change the outcome, but it will be a proactive method of developing a new policy and procedure for how sedation cases are handled in the emergency room setting. The FMEA will be used to evaluate the new protocol for sedation procedures as well as staffing protocols related to monitoring 1:1 patients. This evaluation will occur before the actual implementation and will be used to assess its impact on the existing protocols.(IHI, 2015, p. 1) The process that needs to be evaluated and improved specifically to the case of Mr. B, would be the moderate sedation policy and its specifics to requirements of staff during the procedure and the recovery period. Some of the failure modes that may occur or have the potential to occur would be staff resistance to change, inexperienced nurses or practitioners with lack of education, inadequate ability to staff the ED appropriately during influx of patients, sick calls, or inadequate equipment or equipment failure. (Study Mode, 2014, p. 12) The key to a successful FMEA will be the involvement of a interdisciplinary  team, which would most likely consist of the some of the same members of the RCA. An emergency room physician, preferably the director, director of respiratory therapy, the hospital pharmacist, the ED nursing director, a risk manager, a head administrator who can lead the group in decision making, one or two ACLS certified staff nurses from the ED that perform sedation procedures, head of anesthesiology, and possibly even members from other departments where moderate sedation is performed. The team will need to meet regularly and be committed to providing continuing support during the course of implementation. C1: Interventions With the unfortunate scenario of Mr.B, it is now up the the interdisciplinary team to begin testing interventions that will or may be integrated in to the new plan for management of moderate sedation patients, with the goal of improving safety and eliminating adverse events. Once the established team has focused their aim, their next step would be to test a change or a few changes in the ED. This would be done with subsequent procedural sedation procedures which are commonplace in the ED. A small but major change to test would be the mandatory presence of an ACLS certified RN in 1:1 care of the patient from the beginning of the procedure and throughout it to discharge. The goal of this change is to prevent adverse events from respiratory depression in 100% of all patients receiving sedation in the following 6 month period. Performing this test several times will enable the team to see if the staff is actually complying with the new protocol and what barriers there are to prevent it from being successful. Staff will give feedback later as to what is working and what is not, and what they think needs to be done to make the changes work. An effective way to implement testing would be to utilize a PDSA cycle. The Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle is known as shorthand for testing a change by planning it, trying it, observing the results, and acting on what is learned. (Institute for Healthcare Improvement [IHI], 2015, p. 1) According to the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, the reasons to teats changes are as follows: To increase ones belief that the changes will result in improvement To decide which of several proposed changes will lead to the  desired improvement To evaluate how much improvement can be expected from the change To decide whether the proposed change will work in the actual environment To decide which combinations of changes will have the desired effects on the important measures of quality To evaluate costs, social impact, and side effects from a proposed change To minimize resistance upon implementation The Institute for Health Improvement lists these steps in the PDSA cycle to include: Step 1: Plan Plan the test or observation, including a plan to collect the data State the objective of the test: â€Å"Minimize or eliminate adverse events from respiratory depression while being monitored in the ED under conscious sedation† Make predictions about what will happen and why Develop a plan to test the change (Who, what, when where? What data needs to be collected?) Step 2: Do Try out the test on a small scale: maybe only perform the test in a 3 week period, on sedation procedures performed between the busiest times of the ED, for example between noon to 6pm. In a 6 bed rural ED, this might actually be the busiest time period. Carry out the test Document problems and observations, unexpected and expected Begin analysis of the data Step 3: Study Set aside time to analyze the data and study the results, for example: a biweekly or monthly meeting of the FMEA team. Complete the analysis of the data Summarize and reflect on what was learned Step 4: Act Refine the change, based on what was learned from the test. Determine what modifications should be made. Prepare a plan for next test, probably on a larger scale. For example, test all sedations over a month , for actual 24 hour periods in the ED. In addition to performing the PDSA cycles, the ED could appoint a volunteer or volunteers from the department to form a safety committee with a leader being the liaison who would have the authority to come up with quick solutions to certain problems that are encountered in the department on a daily basis. The liaison would take care of fixing broken equipment or replacing it, ordering new equipment and providing user training, communicating with staff about safety concerns and bringing these concerns to management and the FMEA team. The safety liaison would be trained in Human Factors Engineering, the science of why people make mistakes. The staff will need to be reassured that this person is their ally and not an informant or disciplinarian. (Institute for Healthcare Improvement [IHI], 2015, ∂ 1) This is a person they should feel comfortable reporting their concerns to. This person could take an active role in the PDSA testing and collect data as which could be added to the monthly chart audits of all the conscious sedation procedures performed since that fateful day with Mr. B. C2: Presteps: Discuss the pre-steps for preparing for the FMEA. Step one in preparing for the FMEA in regards to revising the sedation protocol involves selecting a specific process to evaluate. While there were many factors that contributed overall to the sentinel event that occurred , the FMEA should be focused on a sub process. Conducting an FMEA on a combination of the sedation protocol, the staffing ratio issues, the communication problems between staff members, knowledge deficits of staff and equipment issues would be an overwhelming task, so instead we will consider individual analysis of each variant. In this case, we are going to focus on creating a better defined policy on how to safely perform conscious sedation in the emergency room setting in order to prevent further sentinel events. We want to define in the policy what licensed and certified personnel is to be present and performing the procedure, and step by step spell out what is required of those team members from the time of informed consent to the time the patient is discharged from the ED. The policy needs to be easily accessible and there needs to be a standard way of making sure staff has read the policy and understands how to follow it. The goal is to make sure that the patient has 1:1 care at all times with qualified  personnel and leaves the ED in stable, improved condition. The second pre-step is to recruit the multidisciplinary team, including everyone who is involved at any point in the process. Be clear that not all people need to be included on the team throughout the entire process, but should be part of the discussions in which they are or did participate in the process. For example, In the case o f Mr. B, radiology was probably at the bedside performing pre and post reduction films, in which the RN clearly would not have remained at the bedside unless he or she was wearing a lead apron. Pharmacy may have become involved if they had to mix any post resuscitation drips for the patient after he returned to a sinus rhythm from ventricular fibrillation. The secretary was involved in calling a rapid response team, and members of that team may be able to provide valuable insight as well. The third pre-step is to have the team meet together to create a list of all of the steps in the process. Every step should be numbered and be as detailed as possible. Note that this may take numerous meetings to complete this portion, due to all of the variables and complexities. Using flowcharts helps team members to visualize the processes more clearly and create a more understandable outline of the steps. There needs to be a group consensus that the outlined steps of the FMEA correctly show the process. By creating a step by step flow sheet the team will be able to visualize the scenario in detail and begin the process of elimination of what does and does not work and move on to pre-step 4. The team will now begin to list all of the possible failure modes. Possible failure modes include absolutely anything that could go wrong, such as the following: Staff not trained in protocol Staff not knowing how to properly use equipment Monitor not connected to patient Equipment not plugged in Medications not reconciled Communication problems between peers Assessments not completed Ancillary staff not educated IV fluids not running Patient experienced respiratory arrest These are just of the few of the possible failure modes that could be listed. For each of these failure modes, the team must list a cause. For example, in the case of Mr. B, he was never connected to a cardiac monitor until he went unresponsive, so the team must try and explain the cause of this. Prestep #5 , for each failure mode, the team will need to assign a numeric value which is called the Risk Priority Number or RPN. The RPN is a measurementof three variables: the likelihood of the failure occurring, of it being detected, and its severity. This is a scoring method that assists the team in determining what areas need the most most focus on improvement. C3 Three Steps: Once again, assigning numeric values to three separate variables assists the team in determining the issues which should be prioritized in order of importance, or the need for improvement. The three topics are as follows:( IHI, 2015, p. 4) the likelihood of occurrence: In other words, how likely is it that this failure mode will happen† A score between 1 and 10, with 1 meaning â€Å"very unlikely to occur† and 10 being â€Å"very likely to occur†. In the case of Mr. B, had a FMEA already been in place prior to his visit to the ED, the likelihood of his demise would have been much more unlikely to occur. But the system had failed him and due to all of the multiple mistakes that did occur that day, the likelihood of what happened was higher up on the numeric scale. the likelihood of detection: If this failure mode does happen, how likely is it that it will be detected? † A score between 1 and 10, with 1 meaning â€Å"very likely to be detected† and 10 being â€Å"very unlikely to be detected.† On the day of Mr. B’s demise, there were multiple opportunities for the staff to detect that there was a potential problem, but they did not. No one noted the lack of staff, communication was poor, and proper equipment was not utilized. So, this question goes back to the Root Cause Analysis and in the FMEA the team will need to determine how the staff can detect these failures before harm occurs again to someone else. the severity: If the failure mode happens, what is the likelihood that the patient will be harmed? † A score between 1 and 10, with 1 meaning â€Å"very unlikely that harm will occur† and 10 being â€Å"very likely that severe harm will occur†. According to the IHI, a score of 10 often means death. In Mr. B’s case, the consequence that resulted from the  failures in the ED that day was his untimely death. So the severity rating for that particular day would be a 10. D. Discuss how the professional nurse may function as a leader in promoting quality care and influencing quality improvement activities: The professional nurse plays a critical role in hospital quality improvement, since nurses are the primary caregivers in the system of healthcare. They are pivotal in improving the processes in which care is provided. According to Cynthia Barnard, MBA, the role of the professional nurse in quality improvement is two-fold: to carry out interdisciplinary processes to meet organizational QI goals, as well as measuring, improving and controlling nursing sensitive indicators affecting patient outcomes specific to nursing practices. She states that all levels of nurses, from the direct care at the bedside, to the chief nursing officer (CNO), play a part in promoting QI within the healthcare provider organization. (HCpro, 2010, p. 1) Ms. Barnard lists the following levels of nursing and their professional responsibilities: The CNO: The CNO sets the tone for the nursing departments participation in QI. As an administrator, the CNO is responsible for integrating nursing practices in to the organizational goals for excellence in patient outcomes by communicating the strategic goals to all the levels of staff. The nurse manager (NM) or nursing director: The NM or director is responsible for communicating and operationalizing the organization’s QI goals and processes to the bedside nurse. The NM identifies specific nursing sensitive indicators that need improvement according to the organization’s specific patient population and coordinates QI processes to improve these at the unit level. The direct care nurse: The bedside nurse is the key to quality patient outcomes, carrying out the protocols and standards of care shown by evidence to improve patient care. Important to this provision of quality care is the fact that professional nursing leaders are the key factor in setting the tone and providing an environment in which all health care staff feel empowered to uphold these expectations. If nursing leadership and administration feel that they have less than adequate engagement of staff, it may be simply because the staff may not always understand the rationale and momentum  behind particular quality improvement initiatives. For nurses to be involved in delivering high quality care, it is imperative that leadership allows the participation of staff nurses into the design and implementation of processes by continuously educating and informing them, instead of simply telling nurses what they are supposed to do. A hospital culture that encourages quality as everyone’s responsibility is most likely to achieve sustained and noticeable improvement. Because nursing practice occurs in the context of a larger team, the impact of other departments and practitioners must be included in leadership’s efforts to improve quality. (Draper, Felland, Liebhaber, & Melichar, 2008, p. 4) By having every staff member engaged, including the other members of clinical staff, ie; physicans, respiratory therapy, even housekeeping and dietary management, accountability for patient safety and quality becomes a group effort and does not rest mainly on the shoulders of the nursing population. References American Society for Quality (n.d.). Failure Mode Effects Analysis (FMEA). Retrieved July 3, 2015, from http://asq.org/learn-about-quality/process-analysis-tools/overview/fmea.html Blosky, M. A., & Spegman, A. (2015). Communication and a healthy work environment. Nursing Management, 46(6), 32-38. Cherry, B., & Jacob, S. R. (2011). Contemporary nursing; issues, trends and management. Available from https://online.vitalsource.com/#/books/978-0-323-06953-3/pages/52165015 Draper, D. A., Felland, L. E., Liebhaber, A., & Melichar, L. (2008). The rrole of nurses in hospital quality improvement. Retrieved July 3, 2015, from http://www.hschange.org/CONTENT/972 Frain, J., Murphy, D., Dash, G., & Kassai, M. (n.d.). . Retrieved, from Galley, M. (n.d.). Basic elements of a comprehensive root cause investigation; three steps and three tools that organize and improve your problem solving capability. Retrieved June 29, 2015, from rootcauseanalysis.info HCpro (2010). Ask the expert: Understanding nur sing roles in quality improvement. Retrieved July 6, 2015, from www.hcpro.com/NRS-248978-868/Ask-the-expert-Understanding-nursing-roles-in-quality-improvment.html Institute for Healthcare Improvement (2015). Failure modes and effects analysis. Retrieved July 3, 2015, from