The Story of an Hour Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

The Story of an Hour - Essay Example icted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband’s death.†(213) I consider this as an important irony on which the entire superstructure of the story is built. Mrs. Mallard’s authentic reaction to the news of death is one of relief, though she begins to weep immediately as soon as she is told about it by her sister Josephine. This is the irony of her real state of mind and the state of mind which she wants the people around her to believe. Privately, she accepts the news of death as a matter of fact incident but immediately craves internally to live a long life. Thus the irony of the situation is, she considers Mr. Mallard as a constraint or a hurdle to her wellbeing and to live a fully contented life, according to her plan of actions. I see an element of irony in her ‘heart trouble’ that has double meaning. It is connected to her mental ailment. Her private world always craves for experien cing the joy of independence. With the breaking of the news of the death of her husband, latent joy engulfs her that she positively imagines that she has reached threshold of freedom. She feels liberated. It will be even correct to describe that she feels that she is born again. The excellence of Kate Chopin is evident in the manner in which she has succeeded in creating an ironic situation. Mrs. Mallard can’t be condemned for her private joy; rather her reaction is to be pitied, when Mr. Mallard walks back to her life again, hale and hearty. I see this ironic situation takes the full circle in the life of Mrs. Mallard. The greatest irony is, her death as a broken hearted woman, not because Mr. Mallard is alive, but her newfound dream of freedom is snatched away from her. Symbolism is the second literary element that has been used with telling effect in the story. The the story is full of symbols. Mrs. Mallard, on receiving the news of the death of her husband, moves to another room to experience the

Individual Sales Management Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Individual Sales Management Paper - Essay Example Decisions that influence the performance of the sales team eventually determine the level of profitability. The sales personnel dictates the way an organization launches new products into markets, how new customers are acquired, how a business expands though using existing customers and achieving the targets set in revenue acquisition. It is therefore necessary that the team leaders adopt favorable techniques in managing the performance of the sales personnel. It involves understanding the important elements of a sales force and knowing why this be the case. Sales personnel management entails a number of interrelated mechanisms of influencing the fruitfulness of the team. It comprises of many techniques drawn from varying fields in psychology sociology and many others. These techniques include hiring, training, promotion, career development and motivation. Motivation as a way of sales force management entails giving a listening g ear to them and answering by the sales force leaders. It also entails adopting positive feedback verbally. By enriching the salesperson through information motivates the workers. The management can have salary variations as a way to motivate and encourage the sales personnel. Profit sharing and extending bonuses to the sales force also boosts personnel spirit of delivering. It raises self gratification for the personnel by increasing the hourly rate and other benefits. Motivation is therefore one of the mechanisms that the human resource managers employ in coordinating the performance of the sales force (Nicolescu, 2009, 6-12). . Promotion in human resource management entails appreciating the efforts of a person in one rank and rising by grading the level of his job prescription. It entails offering better remuneration to the person as he/she is ranked higher than previous position held. More too rising in ranks, promotion also involves getting involved at higher level of decision making, positions that were previously held by the mana gement team before. This is equally within the sales personnel field where the management ascends a person to higher posts within the same field of sales force, offering improved salary packages as well as involving the individual to decision making processes. Career development entails much more than just offering the sales personnel an opportunity to serve an organization but to grow in the career path. Good management practices for the sales force also involves understanding the need to continuously improve the career path for the sales force as part of the entire human resource. Among other practices that helps improve the career of a sales agent is clear job analysis, understanding and developing a clear career plan and engaging in proper tutorials for the job market. Mentoring entails walking the career path with other professionals in the career, through whom the sales agent, earns how to navigate through the job field. Tutorials and coaching are equally better methods throug h which the management assists develop the careers of their employees. This therefore adds to many other ways through which the sales force is managed. (Nicolescu, 2009, 6-12) Training As part of the mechanisms that the management undertakes in influencing the performance of sales agents, it involves assisting the force access better training through which the performance of the employees gets boosted. We find that managements of firm encourage individual study as part of their strategies to

A Cop’s Life Essay Example for Free

A Cop’s Life Essay In â€Å"A Cop’s Life† Heather MacDonald describes the media’s blinding prejudices when it comes to policing and race and supported it with two different cop’s life stories. First is about a black man who was shot dead by a cop who was trying to restrain him because he was running naked through traffic pounding cars and received only two mentions in the press outside Seattle. MacDonald compared this story to an angry-cop case that has been videotaped slugging a cuffed black teen once in the head who received 370 stories in the event and flooded the nation’s airwaves and presses. The author describes how being accused of racism affects a cop to do his job. In today’s world, due to a continuous competition in news and media industry, it seems like most of the news that is coming out today are reconstructed to a way that it will attract more people. And due to the fact that for some reasons, bad news are more catchy than good news and that influential people like policemen are more interesting to talk about, a lot of people are being mislead by media’s bias information. I would take the example used by the author in this article as my example. It is an incident of a police officer who has been forced to use his power to stop a civilian who is doing an unlawful violent behavior. The whole story was not out in the news which includes the behavior of the civilian before and just after the latter was cuffed. The only video that they represented was when the civilian was thrown on the hood, but the earlier part that should supposedly concludes the reason why the police officer has to do it was never presented. It was this type of bias reporting that left the police officer guilty and no way to defend himself. Being a cop is not easy for it requires commitment, responsibilities and dedication. Civilians look at you as a perfect person who are not allowed to commit a single mistake and that all of the things that you will be doing should be at the right thing, that is why when a cop is linked to an incident wherein the cop’s image is being affected that would make a history and will be talked in news in different forms. Cops will be assaulted, cursed at, assaulted and even shot at but they can never strike back. Bias opinions by the media should stop and the heroic deeds of the cops should be recognized. Part 2 1. Harlem Renaissance started last 1920 in New York as part of the African American History and it gave birth to new talents like Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston and Paul Robenson. 2. â€Å"Unconscious† made Sigmund Freud famous as he published books and an article explaining this type of human’s condition. According to him this is a part of an individual’s personality that they cannot control. He also conducted series of Psychoanalysis to people with different ages which supported his beliefs. 3. Watchers might perambulate around the place where the incident happened that is why peace officers protected the throughway. 4. Police officers practice professionalism despite of the large number of tasks being assigned to them. References Heather Mac Donald. â€Å"A Cop’s Life† July 23, 2002. The National Review. http://www. nationalreview. com/comment/comment-mac-donald072302. asp

Aligning Business Strategies and Project Management

Aligning Business Strategies and Project Management Project management has become very important topic all over the world. Literature shows that more than 30 companies fail to accomplish its project with success due to misalignment between business strategies and project management. Many companies face this problem of missing link of business strategies and project management. Alignment is necessary for getting competitive advantage and goals of its business. Top management also play important role in alignment of business strategies and Project management. Keywords: Business strategies, project management, alignment, project portfolio management Introduction: Project management has become very important and also serves as core function in many organizations. Projects are any temporary activities that have starting and finish point, it has performance parameters. Projects face triple constrains (1) time (2) budget and (3) performance. It was assumed that for attainment of organizational goals one has to meet triple constraints of time, budget and performance. Project management plays a vital role in achieving organizational goals and considered as backbone of organization. Project management is knowledge that meets the requirements of projects. Project management plays important role in accomplishing strategies, business goals and desired outcomes. Organizations link their projects with business strategies to achieve the goals and objectives. Strategies are activities that guide and direct the use of the resources to accomplish the organizations vision and goals and sustainable competitive advantage. Mostly these components comprising the strategies of the business like internal analysis, organizational structures, control systems have strong links to project management processes and activities. Project management includes project portfolio management (PPM). PPM is about how organizations controls its projects and align them with business strategies. Many organizations are working on numerous projects and they are conscious to get maximum return of their business. PPM also includes the maximization profit which is main objective of all organization. Basically projects are bases of any organization to build up business strategy and project management relation. When organizations link their projects to their business strategy, they are better able to accomplish their organizational goals. Companies should align their business strategy with the project management action to implement the strategies in the projects. Such alignments are difficult because the objectives of business strategy are sometime not clear and well-communicated with project management. Misalignment may cause an organization to missing goals, communication gap and missing link of business strategy and project management. The lack of alignment of business strategy to the project management leads to the project failure and has adverse effects on organization performance as well. . There is need of systemic approach to align the projects with business strategy. So important in managerial challenges involved that aligning project management and business strategy and encouraging individuals to participate in using emerging strategies to create new ideas and renew existing strategies. Literature indicates that some factors that helps in creating link between business strategy and project management if there is any gap between the bridge of business strategy and project management that should be filled to achieve high returns and competitive advantages. As literature shows that SPL elements such as spirit, strategy, organization, tools and processes that elements should be align between business strategies and project management and in depth understanding of factors that are missing and relationship of these factors with business strategies and project management. Portfolio management play important role in project management and business strategy linking. Implementation of strategies with formulation, receive less attention than formulation so there should be proper emphasis on the implementation as well as. Therefore, this paper examines the linkage between business strategy, project portfolio management, and business success to finish the gap between strategy formulation and implementation and linking them in a bridge. There is seen a lot of importance of project portfolio management in evaluating, prioritizing and selecting projects in line with business strategy. It is choosing the right projects and important part of strategic management in organizations. So there are a few studies exploring single aspects of the linkage between strategies, project portfolio management. Business strategy describes the way in which a firm decides to compete in the market compared to its competitors and close the gap of these strategies with project management. Project Management: Project management has become an important issue for many corporations worldwide. Many implementations of project management have been successful, while others have been considered as failure. Projects in any organization have clearly became a central activity in many companies and considered as a backbone of organization and its success means a lot for an organization to prevail in the competitive arena. A project can be defined as a planned set of interrelated tasks to be executed over a fixed period and within certain cost and other limitations. Project management is often termed as the science and art of organizing the different project phases which may be launch of new service, a marketing campaign, building a an entire new floor of a building or a wedding. According to Milosevic and Srivannaboon (2006), the essence of project management is to support the execution of an organizations competitive strategy to deliver a desired outcome. Project management is defined as management that supports the execution of an organizations competitive strategy to deliver a desired outcome. Six-step approach can be helpful course that avoids the worst storms: Step 1: Identify the project Step 2: Determine the desired outcome Step 3: Describe each of the projects component tasks Step 4: Identify the key players. Step 5: Determine a time lines for each project component. Step 6: Review, revise and reallocate. Successful initiation of projects and its execution mostly depends upon strategy. Many companies are suffering from misaligned projects and a lack of a systematic approach to align project management with the business strategy. When organizations link their projects to their business strategy, they are better able to accomplish their organizational goals. Project strategy should be related to the projects goals and objectives in order to attain the preferred position in its competitive environment. Business Strategy: Strategy is defined by Patton White (2002) as a comprehensive set of actions or activities, which guide and direct the use of the firms resources to accomplish the organizations vision and goals and enable sustainable competitive advantage. Turning strategy into action to operationalize strategic objectives to achieve competitive advantage includes in the strategic management. Several scholars suggest that the success of project should be considered in the context of the achievement of the strategic goals of the organization (Dietrich Lehtonen, 2005; Kenny, 2006) and that organizations are better able to accomplish their goals when they link their projects to their business strategy. To ensure strategies are translated into actions they should be operational and includes some of the characteristics like structuring an organization to support successful performance and enabling success through the way in which the various resource areas like people, information, Finance, IT, etc. of an organization. Better implementation of strategic plans results in the better performance of sales growth, earnings growth, deposits growth, return on assets, return on equity, return on sales and return on total invested capital than those companies that do not implement their strategic plans. However, in any organization there are different levels of strategies presented by different level of a business which includes Corporate Strategy: It involves high level of strategic decision making and purpose of this strategy is to achieve the expectations of the stakeholders. Business Unit Strategy: The purpose of this strategy is to achieve the competitive advantage for the services and products which are produced and the decisions in this level is concerned with the choice of products, gaining competitive advantage, to meet the needs of the customers and create new opportunities. Operational Strategy: Its concerned with the coordination and improvement of resources which results in the effective and efficient implementation of the business unit level strategy. Implementation of strategies requires actions and completing tasks, and should focus on how to realize these strategies. Implementation must include attention to the following key points: Executing the work requires allocation of resources such as funds, people, and equipment. Organizational resources are limited. Implementation process requires project supportive organizational structure. A project selection and priority system to ensure strong linking between projects and the strategic plan. Managerial challenges involves aligning project management and business strategy which encourages individuals to participate in using emerging strategies to create new ideas and renew existing strategies. There is no such research regarding the framework for aligning project management and business strategy comprehensively. The literature has highlighted that there are many projects which have been executed without implementing the strategies as it has been formulated by executives in the corporations level without the involvement of the project manager. Aligning Business Strategy and Projects: Aligning the companys projects to maximize their contributions to strategic objectives takes a highly coordinated effort. Integration requires a process for prioritizing projects by their contribution to the strategic plan. The organizations to become more competitive, efficient and profitable they will need a business and project management experts working together to attain the business goals. Both, business and project management experts will work towards aligning projects with business strategy. Alignment of business strategy and project management is a major concern for any organization. Such alignments are challenging because the objectives of business strategy are not always clear or well-communicated or consistent with project management actions. Misalignment may cause an organization to miss goals and objectives. Understanding the alignment may be one of the major challenges to effective project management process. Alignment is not a onetime task but it is achieved through p rogression, which demands dominant leadership, top management support, efficient communication, collaborative work environment, trust, proper prioritization, technological setup and comprehensive knowledge about the operations of the business (Luftman, 2000). In order to achieve desired outputs from the selected projects organization should have the ability to build up competencies and then allocate those competences to the preferred projects. To help make sure the corporate projects are aligned to corporate strategy following can be kept in mind: Is the corporation committed to using project management strategically? In most companies, hundreds of projects are underway at any given time so there must be corporate commitment to the art and science of managing projects Is there a policy of formally preparing project charters? Since projects are the means by which corporate strategies are executed, it is critical that they be guided by the original corporate philosophy, strategy, and intent. Project charters are the instrument for doing this. Is there synergy between the business group and those responsible for project implementation? There needs to be early involvement by project implementation people. While this principle may seem sound, the practice of it presents a challenge. First, business planning people may prefer to plan without the help of perceived outsiders. Then, theres a good likelihood that the right project people might not be sitting about just waiting to brainstorm and analyze the early stages of a business proposal. The value for the organization to aligning projects with business strategy in a research by the Athabasca University was conducted in more than 60 organizations around the world and results showed that there were some benefits the organizations which include: Saved money and resources Increased profitability Retained customers Increased market share Prioritizing a project on the bases of its contribution to strategic achievement does not provide guarantee of project success but consistent allocation of resources is also a major task (Hrebiniak, 2006). A key point to make sure the alignment between project management and strategy included as: to carry out the appropriately chosen projects in an efficient ways organizations should make sure that have ability to do deliver the projects and programs. Top management plays a major role in projects alignment. Role of Management: Management is of central importance for the success of projects. Pinto and Slevin (1998) suggested that all the researchers agree that absence of support from management especially top management and by important stakeholder are most important among all other factors. Hacker and Doolen (2007) role of top management was studied in the perspectives of vision of the project and alignment of the scope with business strategy and project sponsorship and its impact on the triple constraint of the project i.e. cost, performance and cost. Researchers various different views about the extent of knowledge of senior managers should be in relation to project management. Some researchers suggest to the technical expertise and knowledge about the projects necessary for senior managers to develop and implement projects. Others felt that determine the line of control and to make available all relevant resources for project managers are the main functions of the senior management. There are different methods of how senior managers can be involved in the project management process. One of the approaches is not to interfere in which the project manager to all the rights of the planning to the implementation of projects. Responsibilities of project managers and executive managers is that project managers are primarily responsible for projects that are being implemented while the executives of the strategic alignment of business functions and projects with the organizations goals. Top managers should possess same skills and expertise as do the project managers Top management must carefully analyze which project should be prioritized in the allocation of resources. Resource allocation is one of the critical parts of the project management. These resources include financial, human and other resources necessary for the successful completion of the projects. Top management should carefully analyze which project should be prioritized in terms of resource allocation. Resources must be allocated to projects that are aligned with corporate strategies of the organization. More simple criteria for prioritizing compliance can be or should do projects should receive the highest priority, then the strategic projects, and then the other. With the start of the training programs, coaching and mentoring for project managers, top management can help build leadership skills, so that they can manage project activities responsibly and effectively. Problems of Alignment: Often projects fail to support business strategies and business goals it is due to the missing link, so that it should be align. Some processes factors that affect the business strategies and projects linking such as communication, top management support, competency of project manager are some of the major factors are the necessary ones to consider which solves or even creates hurdles in the alignment process. Business directors and top management are responsible for the three processes such as business planning, portfolio management and prioritizing projects while the project managers are responsible for the process of planning and executing the projects. Prioritizing projects Portfolio management Business planning Project Project portfolio management, business planning and support of business manager to the project manager while project manager is responsible to handling the projects. Choosing project from the AMCs projects and aligning that project with the business plans and top managers suggestions. When these processes are aligned the strategic elements like goals, objectives, vision, mission, values and norms feeds the portfolio element, the portfolio element feeds the project management element like strategies, organization processes, culture, and the project management element feeds projects and the teams execution of project. But in many cases, these processes are not aligned; as a result, organizations may fail to tie their projects either to their business strategy or to their portfolio, which may cause them to terminate the project or to continue executing projects that do not contribute to the organizations goals, thus wasting important organizational resources. Project Portfolio Management: The project portfolio is defined as a group of projects that compete for scarce resources and are conducted under the sponsorship or management of a particular organization. The three main well-known objectives of portfolio management are, the following: maximizing the value of the portfolio, linking the portfolio to the strategy and the continuous monitoring/assessment of the portfolio. Project portfolio selection is an important management task activity of the organization, the project team should consider all details carefully to enhance performance of organizational assets and customize them with the strategic objectives of the organization, although there are usually several projects available for selection than can be completed within the physical and financial limitations of fixed, so choices must be made to make up a suitable project. Management problems are related to the following factors, selecting, portfolio strategy and appropriate plans. The following reasons can be related with the difficulties on managing, and on selecting, the proper projects to the portfolio a) no relationship between project selection: projects entirely with the organizations strategic goals are not related to the impact on organization performance b) poor quality portfolios: organizations, generally, applicable to underdeveloped ideas for projects selected is not fair quality. To work on the building, d) scarce resources, lack of attention and executive skills, resources properly balance, often causing pressure to multitask ; f) Information overflow and lacking quality of information: Regardless of the quality and sophistication of the portfolio selection and decision tools, it is fundamental to obtain the proper information to make accurate decisions; g) Decision making based in power: Usually the decision is an exercise of power, whi ch means that there may be situations in organizations where decisions tend not to reflect the organizational future success. The portfolio management team is normally concerned and overwhelmed with issues like the prioritization of projects and the continuous distribution of personnel from the different projects to overcome the urgent crises. Although, most of the time, however, there are no resources available and when they were redistributed it often produced negative effects on unexpected places in the project portfolio. Project Selection There are more than one hundred tools and techniques for project portfolio selection hence it is not difficult for organizations to select suitable tools. It is important to adapt or develop an appropriate framework to evaluate project proposals and select a project portfolio which is aligned with the corporate strategy. Recent literature focuses on approaches rather than tools and techniques. Common principles from these approaches can be described as followings: Firstly, they suggest dividing the project proposals into subsets (Englund Graham, 1999; Sommer 1999; Cooper et al., 2001a; Rădulescu1 Rădulescu 2001; and Crawford etal., 2006). Each project subset can be a group of projects which will share the same strategic buck as discussed by Cooper et al (2001a) or different categories of projects which have similar characteristics (Crawford et al., 2005, 2006). This will help the organization easily compare projects by same criteria or same tools and techniques. T his is similarly applicable to ensure the balance of the project portfolio. Framework by Englund Graham (1999) 4 steps producing interrelated outputs make this approach truly systematic. The 4 steps are described as follows: a. What the organization should do: Upon identified to lead the process, the team members start listing newly proposed and on-going projects. They, then, clarify or develop the expected goals of projects, taking into consideration of organizational strategies (vision, mission, objectives) and current as well as potential capabilities (either developed or acquired). It is advisable to classify projects into categories for the benefit of looking at projects from the view of big picture inclusive of out-of- the- box thinking, completeness, gaps, opportunities and compliance with strategy. Projects classified/organized into the strategic buckets (e.g. extent of product change: new- enhancement; and extent of process change: new incremental) enable the team focus efforts on selecting the best set of projects within the categories, which constitute the right and balance mix. In order to facility decision making process, a set of criteria with weight or score reflecting requirements of orga nizational objectives (e.g. market positioning, available capacity, etc.) should be determined, modified and agreed upon for comparison and choices of projects. b. What the organization can do: the team members critically screen and evaluate projects based on consolidation and analysis of current or historical data, as a result certain new projects will be eliminated and ongoing projects will be adjusted or terminated in respect of strategic priorities; availability of resources and technology challenges, etc. The authors describe the critical few with n screen subject to criteria sets agreed upon in step 1 e.g. screen 1- fit to goals; screen 2 market size, competence etc. c. Analyze and decide on projects: based on the comparison between resources available and resources required, projects are analyzed, prioritized and selected. The team should consider opportunity costs, project benefits before costs, return value when making decisions. With the sets of criteria agreed upon in step 1, the AHP (Analytical Hierarchy is recommended. Dedicated resources and contingencies should be committed to ensure the successful implementation of selected projects. Besides, communication loop should be developed and utilized to keep changes updated. d. Implement the plan: staffing and allocating committed resources for implementation selected projects. A database should be created for monitoring, reporting and sharing. The plan is used as a communication tool to help management team and those who are involved quickly respond to change and take corrective actions in terms of identifying new opportunities and leveraging resources. It can be interpreted that completion of the first 3 steps in this process reflects the achievement of the three goals determined in the project portfolio selection by Cooper (2005): step 1 with should representing project portfolio in alignment with strategy; step 2 with can representing portfolio value maximization using most effectively its resource and capability; step 3 analyze and decide representing right balance and mix of projects; and step 4 with implement belonging to the next phase of execution and management in project portfolio management. The 4 steps reveal a loop of continuous stages, which is recognized as systematic approach. Challenges in Project Portfolio Selection Organizations face many problems such as lack of information, unreliable data of cost, time to completion, availabilities of resource, and benefits of projects. Project proposals are randomly arriving, not at one time. This requires the model or process to be flexible so that organizations can select projects without waiting until annual planning meetings. In large organizations with many business units, each business unit has its own list of priority and preferences. Besides, project portfolio selection is not always rational but it is biased by human being factor such as lobbying. People resist when there is absence of strategy or vague strategy or they find difficulties in pursuing the strategies. Changes necessary for the aligning the projects with the strategy might win approval of all the members of the organization, but when it comes to implementation, no one will be ready to take the lead. Ten Reasons why Strategy Implementation Efforts Can Fail: 1. The so-called strategic plan is nothing more than a collection of budgets and vague directions that do not provide clear guidelines for action. 2. The strategy does not correspond to market realities because it has been developed by strategic planners with no grass roots input. 3. The strategy does not enjoy support from and commitment by the majority of employees and middle management because they do not feel consulted in the development of the strategy. 4. Middle management does not think the strategy is the right one, or does not feel it has the requisite skills to implement it, so it sabotages the implementation. 5. Insufficient top management time is spent on communicating about, selling the new strategic direction, and managing the organizational changes involved. 6. No provision is made for developing the new skills and competencies required by the employees successfully to make the transition and operate within the new strategic direction. 7. No provision is made for instituting the appropriate organizational systems for the selection, motivation and reward of people in accordance with the new strategy. 8. No provision is made for creating a close fit or coherence between the business-level strategy and the various functional-level strategies that can operationalize it. 9. There are factions in the organization which disagree with the strategy because if implemented it would reduce their power and influence, so they sabotage it by deliberate actions or inactions. 10. No attempt is made to analyze the culture of the organization and identify Literature review examines four selected models that assist organizations in bridging the gap between organizational strategic objectives and project management: Model #1 Model of strategic project management is comprised of four main aspects of higher-level project management practices: 1. Strategic alignment of project: This practice refers to the extent to which an organization ensures that the projects it pursues are directly tied to the organizational strategy. This is very important in terms to see whether the project going to start is intact with the strategies of the organization for its successful implementation. 2. Project portfolio management. This practice refers to the identification of a project investment categorization scheme to assist the organization with prioritizing projects. Project portfolio management forms one of the building blocks in relating projects to strategy and can be considered as a key driver for aligning projects or programs to organizational objectives. It also helps in prioritizing and in the selection process of a project for its successful alignment. 3. Program management. The Project Management Institute (2004) defines the concept of program management as the centralized coordinated management of groups of projects to achieve the programs strategic objectives and benefits. Program management practices are inherent within the pursuit of strategic project management and are demonstrated as the management of groups of projects and the management of interactions between projects (portfolio coordination). 4. The business results of projects. Since projects are financial investments, organizations should estimate and measure project impacts on organizations from a business results perspective which may include return on investment, sales growth etc. Model #2: Project managers contribute to competitive advantage due to their skills in managing relationships and an organizational willingness to foster these skills and leverage them throughout the organization, and learn from them how to manage people and relationships across organizational functions and boundaries. Greens model of strategic project management is based on the constructs of competitive advantage, strategic capabilities and tacit knowledge management. Model #3: Model suggests that adopting strategic project management to select, manage and support multiple projects gives companies the best chance of moving the organization forward by keeping the company vibrant in the marketplace and returning maximum value for shareholders. Further, it identifies the following key characteristics of strategic project management: 1. Alignment of the following key business processes: strategic planning, strategic goal setting, and enterprise project management 2. Functions as a well-managed portfolio of investments as it: (a) allows for the most effective use of constrained resources; (b) ensures a high return on investment since projects are managed collectively; (c) it maintains alignment between the projects and the organizations short, medium and long term goals 3. A new management process embedded between strategic planning and project execution that manages project investments strategically and combines business planning and management with project management best practices Model #4: The term strategic project management as the management of those projects which are of critical importance to enable the organization as a whole to have competitive advantage There is a gap between aligning project management competencies to the selection of projects that will give organizations a competitive edge. Specifically, strategy is formulated at the senior management level and for it to be implemented; it should be broken down into discrete projects. Project management becomes a source of competitive advantage when an organization outperforms other companies through the experience and knowledge built up over time through managing projects. Also, project management yields competitive advantage through the actual selection and prioritization of projects that organizations engage in and secondly, through implementation and execution of the projects. Furthermore, project portfolio management is essential and the prioritization of projects should be based

Smoke Signals by Sherman Alexie Essay -- Movies Native Americans Histo

Smoke Signals by Sherman Alexie Smoke Signals is a movie written by Sherman Alexie and directed by Chris Eyre that deals with many social issues in modern Native American cultures. The film follows the journey of two Coeur d’Alene Indians, Victor and Thomas, as they travel from their reservation in Oregon to Phoenix, AZ in order to gather the personal artifacts of Victor’s father who has recently died. Along the way, Thomas helps Victor to understand and forgive his father, who left the family when Victor was a young boy. Victor’s father, Arnold Joseph, saved both of the boys from a fire that he inadvertently caused on the 4th of July when the boys were mere babies. Although the boys were saved, Thomas’s parents both died in the blaze. Since then, Arnold Joseph has carried the guilt of what he has done silently, using alcohol to try and bury the memory. As the years progress Arnold Joseph begins abusing his family, which finally leads to his wife telling him that there will be no more dr inking after she realizes what it is doing to their son. Arnold Joseph once again runs from the situation, much like he did the night of the fire, unable to handle the consequences of his actions. Arnold flees to Phoenix, AZ where he carries out the rest of his days, never speaking to his family again, but silently wishing that he could go back home. He dies before overcoming his feelings of guilt, and upon hearing of his death Victor decides to go to Phoenix to retrieve his fathers personal artifacts. Victor has no money with which to fund his trip south, however his friend Thomas offers him enough money to make the journey provided that Victor brings him along. Together, they set out on a bus to Phoenix, and along the way, with the help of... ...ld. On the surface of the movie, we see two young Indian men, traveling south together on a journey that will lead to the healing of their friendship, as well as one of them coming to terms with his past. But deeper in the movie, we are left to find our own story, if we so choose; one that will vary from person to person if you care to ask. For me I found that to this day, the Native Americans still lead a rough life due to what the white man has done to them in the past. However, instead of buckling under the pressure of centuries, much of their culture still struggles and lives on inside each successive generation. I would recommend this movie to anyone, and I'm sure that I will end up sending it to my family back home. Not only would I recommend watching the movie, but I would urge all to see beneath the surface story and find the hidden messages underneath.

Shakespeare Moot Court Project Essays -- William Shakespeare

Shakespeare in My Canada Desmond Manderson and Paul Yachnin created the Shakespeare Moot Court Project in 2002, aimed at exploring the interpretative nature of law and literature in relation to Shakespeare. In this court, Shakespeare is law; his plays and sonnets form a body of law used to argue cases of various topics. In 2003-2004, the project took on the issue of same-sex marriage in â€Å"Love on Trial: Same Sex Marriage and the Law of Shakespeare.† Halpern v. Attorney General of Canada, a case from 2002 that challenged the heterosexual definition of marriage in Ontario, was the starting point of the project. The legality of same-sex marriage according to Shakespeare was considered in relation to the meaning of the institution and the necessity of heterosexuality within it (Manderson 479). The case was initially decided in favor of same-sex marriage, and later was appealed and heard for a final time on 27 September 2004 at McGill University to a packed audience, an event which is the subject of this paper. While â€Å"Love on Trial† is an exercise in the connections between law, literature, and the social function of Shakespeare, it also performs a cultural function in its connection to a contemporary Canadian social issue. The blending of Canadian concerns regarding same-sex marriage and the authority of Shakespeare are joined in this project to create a forum to discuss the national issue in a literary context. The arguments for both sides of the appeal were previously published in the McGill Law Journal and are thus referred to here. Desmond Manderson’s first argument for the legality of same-sex marriage is the â€Å"Armenian argument†: both same-sex marriages and marriages between Armenians do not occur in Shakespe... ... issue that was nonexistent in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Though the trial is interested in looking at law, literature, and the interpretations of both through Shakespeare, in this case it becomes a forum to discuss a particularly Canadian issue. Thus Manderson’s and Yachnin’s adaptations of Shakespeare are related to issues of the nation. This tie between Shakespeare and Canada has been present throughout the history of the country, and â€Å"Love on Trial† suggests the continuing importance of Shakespeare in Canada. 6 Works Cited: Fischlin, Daniel and Mark Fortier. â€Å"General Introduction.† Adaptations of Shakespeare. Fischlin, Daniel and Mark Fortier, eds. London: Routledge, 2000: 1-22. Manderson, Desmond and Paul Yachnin. â€Å"Love on Trial: Nature, Law, and Same-Sex Marriage in the Court of Shakespeare.† McGill Law Journal. 49.3 (2004): 475-514.

Compare the representation of class and status for 3 music videos

The task we have been asked to do for our coursework is to pick three music videos and analyse them for representations of status and class. The three videos I have chosen for my coursework are: Nelly Furtado – Manos al Aire, Wiley ft. Mark Ronson & Daniel Merriweather – Cash in my pocket and Jamiroquoi – Virtual insanity. I have chosen these three videos because they are all good to compare in how they have shown class and status. Jamiroquoi – virtual insanity In this video, JK is wearing a dark blue jacket with the collar up, black trousers, black shoes with white laces and a tacky top hat. It looks quite smart although he isn't wearing any make up and he hasn't shaven which makes him look a bit untidy. This connotes that he is some sort of witch doctor which can be backed up when he says â€Å"magic spells† and makes the chair move towards him. The untidiness of him makes him lower in class but magic is a good way to be high in class and status. It is one long shot to begin with and the camera is angled so it shows the whole room that he is dancing in. During this, Jamiroquoi is all over the place, always on his feet dancing to the music which is very upbeat and hip. He looks like he is a laborer because of his clothes and tacky top hat but the room he is in looks like a mental hospital because there isn't much in the room apart from a few leather chairs and the white drawers on the wall. The backup dancers are wearing white and are in unison. They could be workers in the hospital. All of the white connotes that everything is sanitized and clean which is how a hospital should be. The leather chairs look quite expensive which suggests that Jamiroquoi could be in a rehabilitation center for something. Because these things are expensive, it means that JK must have a lot of money which tells us that he is high in status and class. There isn't much in the hospital but everything looks expensive and brightly lit. It costs quite a bit to go into rehab so Jamiroquoi has a lot of money which shows him as high in class. He is also high in status because everybody would be attending to his needs to get him off whatever it is he is in there for so he runs th e show. The backup dancers are only on for ten seconds but during this time, they are all looking at the floor and are perched over slightly like none of them have any control over what they are doing. When they reach the end of the hallway, it's like they spring back into life and they all spin off out of the shot. This connotes that JK is using his magic to control them and to be able to do such a thing, he must have a lot of power and people with power are usually very high in status and class. Nelly Furtado – Manos al Aire I have chosen this video because I think that Nelly's persona is good at showing her class and status. She is shown as someone working in the army, we know this because she is wearing an army uniform and driving a jeep which is an army color. The camera is angled looking up on her most of the time which shows that she is high in status in the army. She isn't smiling which connotes that she is pretty sad and her cap is casting a shadow over half of her face and her eyes which shows she is low in class. She is with her husband seeing a counselor and then when she is in her jeep, she takes a picture of him, looks at it and puts it down again with a depressed look which suggests that she is unhappy with him. She has a load of stuff in the back of her jeep like boxing gloves which she throws out onto the road and doesn't give a second look to. She is singing about the man and she says â€Å"I surrender† and â€Å"I want to love you† This connotes that she is lower in status than the man otherwise she wouldn't be singing stuff like that to him. The video is set in a village but all of the houses look built up and expensive. We don't know that Nelly lives there but at the end of the video when she turns up at the man's house, it is in that built up area so it shows that he must have a lot of money. He is fully clothed and she is wearing shorts and a vest top which shows he is high in class and status because he can afford to live in such a nice area and can be in casual clothing. I think that the narrative of the video is that Nelly and her husband are having problems so they are seeing a counselor. They break up and Nelly goes to give him all of his stuff back but then on the way she realizes that she still wants to be with him and throws herself upon him which proves that she is lower in class and status than the man. Wiley ft. Mark Ronson & Daniel Merriweather – Cash in my pocket In this video, a character shows his class and status before the music even starts by saying â€Å"I feel sorry for these people, maybe I should throw some of my money at them. That will make them smile† Wiley portrays himself through other people throughout the video. This connotes that he is high enough in class and status to get other people to do his video for him and he doesn't need to be in it. The people in the video are mimicking the words to the song as he sings. They are all dressed smart by wearing suites or smart clothes which helps to show that they are high in class and status. The characters body language and facial expressions suggest that they are all happy and like to have a laugh in their place of work. The camera is looking up at some people and down on others. The lighting on the people is bright which connotes that they are high in status and class because if it was dark, they would look like hobos or something. The camera looks up at the people who are singing to the camera and down at the people who are sitting down in separate rooms. This shows that the people who are dancing to the camera are higher in status and class than the people who are sitting down. The people who are sitting down are probably doing the jobs that nobody wants to do but their facial expressions and body language still connotes that they are happy with what they are doing. At the point in the video where it starts singing about cheese, a man in a mouse suit comes along and starts dancing to what the lyrics are saying. The camera then moves onto four pretty women spinning around in chairs and another woman walks past them pushing a cart with Champaign and gold foil on the bottles. Gold connotes wealth and wealth shows high status and class for the company. Some people were having a meeting in a room with a big expensive flat screen T.V with a Chinese man on it talking to them. The T.V had a webcam on the top and behind the Chinese man; there was some Chinese writing on a board and a Chinese calendar. The man had a glass of water with him and he was sitting at a desk. All of this connotes that he is involved in the meeting and the company has another branch in China which shows that the company has a lot of money and class and status. Towards the end of the video, everybody is parading through the halls because they are going home and they are very happy. The camera is looking up at them the whole time which shows they are all high in class and status. Conclusion These Three videos are all good to compare because the situations are similar in the way that everybody is portrayed to be either high or low in class and status through camera angles, lighting ect. But they all have different story lines. Nelly is trying to get her husband out of her mind, JK is in rehab and the people in the Wiley video are getting through a day in the office. They all compare well in how different status and classes can be used in different situations. Jamiroquoi is high in status while Nelly is high in status but lower than the other people in the video and although Wiley isn't actually in his video, his puppets do a pretty good job of showing that he is high in status.