Case study Caterpillar Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Case study Caterpillar - Essay Example Hence, community services were not in its agenda in the initial years of its establishment in the city of Piracicaba in Brazil. (Griesse, 39) Piracicaba is located in the deep interior of the state of Piracicaba which is the most industrialized as well as agriculturally advanced area of Brazil. Caterpillar entered the city of Piracicaba in 1970s as the first international firm setting up a business there. The setting up of a branch of a internationally known firm like Caterpillar came as a surprise to the city as the time when the big corporate house of United States made its entry into the city, the city was encountering a lot of economic and political problems. The decision of setting up business of Caterpillar in Piracicaba of Brazil under such turbulent economic and political scenario was not, however, random. A number of factors induced the world leader in the construction business and in the production of mining equipments, Caterpillar, to venture into the city of Piracicaba. Actually the location of the city and its small town environment attracted the executives of the firm to set up their branch in    Piracicab a. Apart from these, the officials from Piracicaba also undertook huge effort to convince the firm to set up a business there by saying that the process of industrialization could only solve the problems facing the city. (Griesse, 39, 40, 41)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In its initial years, Caterpillar went through a number of challenges in the form of several social and political movements that took place in Brazil in late 1970s and early 1980s. During this turbulent socio-political scenario, the company put its major focus on strengthening its feet in the city. Hence, it was little responsive to the process of volatile developments of the city in its social and political spheres. During its initial years of establishments, the company found it beneficial for its

Annual Reports for Organization Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Annual Reports for Organization - Essay Example Even the clarity of the information and the data presentation will be analysed through the annual reports of the concerned companies. The analysis is generally based on the annual reports because by analysing it we can come to the decision that whether the operational and financial activities are in tandem with the policies laid for the same (Weng, 2011, p.9). Difference in the approach each organization presents in its annual performance Steel industry is very popular as far as occurrences of fatal injuries are concerned in factories. Thus Arcelor Mittal has improvised the steps in the prevention of the fatalities and injuries of the workers because this also leads to increase in the LTIFR (lost time injury frequency rate). So health and safety has been the main focus in the present annual report of the company. Since the prevention measure has already been achieved by US Steel they are targeting a zero LTIFR. In the recent annual report the main focus of US Steel Corp. is the inves tments made for coke and coke substitute products which will take care of both their purpose of long-term self sufficiency as well as environmental performance. Thus both the companies’ area of focus is different from the other in the sense that while Arcelor Mittal is more concerned about the preventive measures; US Steel is concentrating towards the achievement of the environmental performance. Clarity of data presentation and information Presentation of data and information is more systematic and is clearer in Arcellor Mittal as compared to US Steel Corp. Different department of the steel industry has been bifurcated in the annual report of Arcelor Mittal and a proper explanation follows the same which can be even understood by the investors who may not have much idea about the steel industry. The data sufficiently supported by charts makes the presentation of Arcellor Mittal much more acceptable in comparison to US Steel Corp. In US Steel Corp the data though presented in tandem with the information is not easily understood by investors not having much knowledge in this field. Thus Arcellor Mittal is clearer than US Steel Corp. with respect to data presentation and information. Goals, Challenges and Plans emphasised by the organisation in their discussion The study of Arcelor Mittal gives a clear understanding regarding its goals which are, to be the safest steel and mining company in the world, to be the most preferred supplier in iron-ore and coal industry with huge customer base and long duration of contracts, strengthening linkage between company and its employees, to lead in the field of manufacturing, processing and marketing of steel and all metallurgic products. The main challenges of Arcellor Mittal is in maintaining reliable records related to safety of the employees, reviewing the cost structure of the company on a regular basis, work more closely with upstream businesses to manage stocks better in order to reduce the cyclical volatility of the company in the share market. Recruitment of right personnel for the correct designation at right time is another challenge faced by the company and lastly lack of transportation infrastructure and environmental concerns may be a debacle for the company. The plans of Arcelor Mittal to be

Joining the Navy Essay Example for Free

Joining the Navy Essay It was a rainy, humid morning on Wednesday, October 8, 2008, a day I could never forget. I turned over calmly and realized it was 4:30am, time to get out of bed. It was the big day. All these thoughts were racing through my head. What am I doing? Am I sure this is right for me? Will I succeed in this? I was timid, excited, and fluttered all at the same time. It was the day Id no longer be a civilian. Eight weeks from that day Id be calling myself a United States Navvy Sailor. As I woke up and started to get ready, I could feel goose bumps Jitter up my spine. What occupied my mind was the thought of leaving my family. I was the last child still living at home. My brothers were already gone. Would my parents be able to cope? I know my dogs would miss me terribly. It was time to depart to the recruiting office. From there, NCI Valencia had to drive me to the Military Entrance Processing Station. That day felt like a surreal blur. NCI Valencia would give me advice with a big grin on his face, and I would hear him, but not listen. My nerves were overpowering my body and I couldnt manage them. I then pent the whole day in a building completing all these exams to make sure I was hearty and robust to leave. That day was the longest day of my life. Looking around, I felt at ease. All the other recruits were giving out the same body language I was giving. We were all feeling the same feelings and thinking the same thoughts. I wasnt alone. It was time for the Oath of Enlistment Ceremony. A few men in sailor uniforms brought all the recruits into a room with a variety of flags. My family was the only family that attended to take pictures of the big event. I then elevated my right hand, hile standing in the position of attention, and reiterated after Chief, l, Amanda Lazcos, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America and Using my peripheral vision, I noticed my mother crying. Keeping my emotions intact was extremely arduous. Think about this: I was embarking on a new Journey and leaving the two most important people in my life at the age of 19. This was the first time I would be away from my parents for a long period of time. It was a life-defining moment. The event had come to a close. It was now time to say my farewells. At this point, it was nearly impossible to even glance at my family. Looking at them would make me realize how much they mean to me. I tried to make it quick and simple so I wouldnt shed a flood of tears. The last scent I reminisced on my mother was her Sunflowers perfume. She adored (and still does) that perfume. My father had this truly glorious look in his eyes. I knew he was so delighted to see me doing something positive towards my future. At the same time, I knew he was going to miss me a lot. In an instant, I was on the bus, and off to the airport along with 37 other recruits.

Whether The Marketing Mix Contributes on the Success of Wal-Mart

Whether The Marketing Mix Contributes on the Success of Wal-Mart Introduction The marketing mix, as a paradigm, has been keeping applied in business since it was merged more than 50 years ago. Many companies are still using it as a guide in marketing (Zineldin, 2007) to gain more competitive power in the market. The activities integrated in marketing programmes to create, communicate, and deliver value for consumers were classified into product, price, promotion and place in marketing mix tool by McCarthy (cited in Davies et al., 1995) in 1960, and Kotler et al. (2009) defined the sub activities of each element of the 4Ps: product variety, quality, services, etc for Product; list price, discounts, allowances, etc for Price; sales promotion, advertising, public relations, etc for Promotion; and channels, coverage, locations, transport etc for Place. By using the guide and adjusting the elements and the sub activities of them, companies can find a marketing strategy suitable for both the industry and the organizations. Although the application of the marketing mix seems to be different among industries, it still has influences on the businesses in extents. To see whether the marketing mix can work to the achievements of the organizations, the strategies and the application of the marketing mix of Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the world, can be a great choice to analyze. As a well known hypermarket business leader, Wal-Mart serves customers and members more than 200 million times per week at more than 8,650 retail units under 55 different banners in 15 countries (Anonymous, 2010), and it is still extending its business globally. This essay will analyze the contribution of the marketing mix on the success of Wal-Mart, and a brief scheme of improvement will also be looked at. Product As a retailer, the term product can be divided into two parts, the retailing service to suppliers, and the products and services to customers. Since both suppliers and retailers are pursuing a low-margin, high-volume strategy (Kotler et al., 2009), the stable and high-volume orders from Wal-Mart can meet the needs of the suppliers. However, only large orders are not enough in current business, according to Hansen (2009), a service-centered philosophy and service quality are crucial for building long-term relationship with suppliers. To keep a high quality of service, Wal-Mart is innovative and a pioneer in technology development. It is among the first retailers using computers to track inventory (1969), adopting the bar codes (1980) and wireless scanning guns (late 1980s), and introducing EDI for better coordination with suppliers (1985) (Johnson, 2002), which developed the efficiency of distribution and turnover of goods so that it can meet the requirements of suppliers. To individual customers, not only selling products of suppliers, Wal-Mart has private-labels such as Great Value, OlRoy, Partents Choice etc, which provides products in wide fields. Kumar et al. (2007, cited in Geyskens et al., 2010) argued that private-label products are positioning at mid-quality, and they are as good as national brand offerings but cheaper. However, Wal-Mart focuses on the quality rather than only mimic other brands (Neff, 2009), trying to meet the needs of most customers focusing on cost performance. Because of the efforts Wal-Mart made, customers are increasingly relying on the private labels (Rae, 2009). Also, according to Min (2010), customers evaluate the service with product quality, which is followed by cleanliness of the store, competitive price, product variety and fast checkouts. By making collection of customer information and IT innovation, these factors are getting focused on by Wal-Mart, which keeps the service quality and satisfaction of customers. Price The price factor of Wal-Mart can be looked at by the view of both B2C and B2B businesses. For the pricing strategies towards individuals, a lower price can capture more market share even competitors build price wall to fight in the market (Chiu et al., 2009). Wal-Mart has a great advantage in the competition among retailers because of offering a lower price and promising it the lowest among all, but lowering the price does not definitely lead to a cut in the profit. Wal-Mart uses a broad line and low value added product lines to keep prices low and raise the volume that is increased greatly enough to make up for the low margin (Kotler, 2009). However, there is always a risk: if the added revenues from the increased demands cannot cover the loss of margin, it will diminish the profit (Nijs et al., 2007). By using and collecting a huge database of consumption of products in large regions and super centers, according to the law of large numbers, the demands of the products could become stable and predictable. With a prediction of consumer behavior and risks, an aggressive pricing strategy helps Wal-Mart gain huge advantages and profitability. Place For Wal-Mart, a company that has been focused on discount merchandising and growth (Graff, 1998), cost is always a key to it. With mature management and decisions on places the products available to customers, distribution and channels, Wal-Mart gets phenomenal growth and excellent performance. First of all, considering the size, majority of Wal-Mart supercentres are located in nonmetropolitan counties and get around the distribution centers (Graff, 1998), which can make Wal-Mart benefited from a low land-rent cost and a more efficient distribution. However, a great negative impact on Wal-Marts market share occurred because of the factors of the growing maturity of internet retailing industry and lower prices offered by on-line retailers (Bock et al., 2007). In order to keep the market share and the customer satisfaction, Wal-Mart launched its own retailing websites and planned to build multichannel. This shall benefit the giant retailer as researchers found that the adoption of inte rnet and a multichannel strategy will be more profitable for retailers than traditional strategies (Zhang, 2009; Bock et al., 2007). Other than the location of supercentres, the performance of distribution of Wal-Mart is outstanding. Firstly, by geographical segmentations, distribution centers, around by supercentres, are located in appropriate regions. Suppliers make most deliveries to distribution centers, and retailer then ferry goods between the regional centers and individual stores using its own trucks (Burritt et al., 2010), which reduces the cost of transportation and enhances Wal-Marts control on the whole inventory and process of delivery. Also, a mature IT system weighs greatly for Wal-Mart: hand-held computers used by employees can collect the information of products such as storage, packaging and shipping, and a satellite communication system set up in 1983 helps managers to track sales and inventories in stores across the country (Chandran et al., 2003), which keeps the distribution under control and improves the efficiency. In addition, Wal-Mart puts a great concern upon the suppliers and the integration of supply chain. Because great volumes of products are sold through Wal-Mart, suppliers are delighted to do business with the retailer at a lower price because of the large orders, which increases the bargaining power of Wal-Mart. As what Davies et al. (1995) found: strength in bargaining power positively relates to commercial success. It seems that Wal-Mart keeps a superior power upon its suppliers to squeeze the cost. However, Even suppliers treat Wal-Mart as a primary customer perform worse financially (Bloom, 2001), there may still be benefits for suppliers to keep a long-term relationship with a higher performing channel member being efficient and aggressive to attract consumers to suppliers products, because the revenue with a high volume sold might cover the squeeze, and some suppliers hope it might help them expand their market share (Bollm, 2001; Erdem et al., 1997). By cutting the cost in the B2B part, the prices of products could be lower and more advantages Wal-Mart can gain in the market. Also, with a thought that putting the volume together of both itself and its suppliers are buying from one supplier can reduce costs (Muntaner, cited in Boyle, 2010), Wal-Mart has been trying to team up with suppliers to purchase the raw materials, like teaming up with Pepsi to purchase sugar together from one sugar supplier at a lower price, in order to reduce the cost of private labels so that more attractive prices can be offered to customers. A good management of the place factor improves the efficiency of distribution and lowers the cost of the company. Promotion The element of Promotion was divided into sales promotion, including reduction of price, discount etc, and communication, including advertising, public relations, store design etc (Van Waterschoot et al., 1992; Davies, 1995). In sales promotion, Wal-Mart uses reduced prices to increase the sales of the inventory in order to keep a high turnover rate and release the problem of stocking of inventory. Also, as it was found that a slight change in the price will lead to great improvement of business performance in a high price-elasticity product (Driussi, 2007), Wal-Mart uses short-term discounts on particular products to stimulate the consumption of products. Concerning about the communication of Wal-Mart, with an increasing budget on advertising from $405 million in 1999 to $2.3 billion in 2008 (Norman, 2009), the brand name and the slogan of save money, live better, formerly always low prices are getting widely known, which leads to a greater awareness of public and an increase in brand equity (Keller, 1993). Also, it uses diversified advertising methods such as TV, websites and newspaper, which is crucial to the success of any advertising campaign (Scott, 2009). In addition, according to Ataman (2010), by making efforts on advertising can improve the customer loyalty to the companies, which might also be an important reason for Wal-Mart being attractive and well accepted by publics in either new or existing market. It seems that Wal-Mart focuses greatly on communication with customers and trying to get more strength of brands. However, there are still some factors that Wal-Mart needs to take into consideration. First of all, although Wal-Mart is widely accepted by the public, the public relationship and the social image from the public tell a different story. With a history of anti-union tactics and worker disputes, including an ongoing gender discrimination lawsuit (Bustillo, 2010), Wal-Mart is getting into a social issue negatively affects its social image. Society worries about Wal-Marts lacking of consideration to health, life and rights of employees. However, Wal-Mart has been trying to making efforts on its CSR while the public does not realize. It offers a better health care plan than the retail average, in which 80% of its US workers can get health coverage while only 58% for the retail sector as a whole (Bustillo et al., 2010). This phenomenon shows that Wal-Mart needs to make effort o n PR to change the biases made by the society. In addition, with a development of customer perspectives, physical environment and social cue, factors influencing customers feelings and satisfaction (Bitner, 1992; Hu et al., 2006) are getting more focused. Wal-Mart can try to collect more customers preference to the store environment such as store designing and employees behaviours in order to build a welcoming feeling to customers and serve customers better. Integration of The Marketing Mix Although each element of the marketing mix Wal-Mart focuses is analyzed, the marketing mix should be treated as a whole. An application of the marketing mix upon the business needs the coordination among departments of a company, not only marketing department, and part-time marketers who are not working for marketing department but have connect with customers need to be greatly relied on to generate and disseminate the market intelligence (Davies et al., 1995; Grà ¶nroos, 1994). It can be shown from the above analysis that the elements of the paradigm influence each other such as price and PR, supply chain and price, cost and distribution etc, and Wal-Mart controls them in a macro vision. With an interaction among the departments, Wal-Mart can get advantage in each element of the marketing mix by using resources widely and efficiently. Conclusion By analyzing the concentration of Wal-Mart upon the marketing mix, it not only treated the paradigm as a guide, but also applies it upon the strategy and management of the company. It is not unfair to say that with a proper application upon the business and a great interaction in the marketing mix, Wal-Mart gets benefit from the classic theory. The application of the marketing mix could be seen as a key positive factor of the success of Wal-Mart. However, to improve the business performance of the giant retailer according to the paradigm, some soft factors such as the flexibility of distribution, PR and consumers emotion can be concerned by Wal-Mart.

The Shop :: English Literature Essays

The Shop The sound made Elizabeth jump. Yet again it had come from the shop next door. She frowned at the old, battered doors of the ancient antique store. It was as though the owner was renovating. The problem was, the shop did not have one. The owner had won the lottery and moved to Las Vegas a few months ago. Leaving his battered old shop and all the merchandise behind. Elizabeth had called the police three times but nobody was found. The police weren’t very pleased after the third time. Anyway, even if the store was unguarded Elizabeth doubted there would be any looters – most of the merchandise was dragged from the local dump. SMASH Elizabeth jumped again. The noise was replaced by the loud, sharp shriek of an electric drill gnawing at the wall. The ground seemed to shake at the loud, shrill noise. Elizabeth covered her ears. She was very annoyed now. The noise next door has been going night and day for the past three days, and because she lived at the back of her boutique she couldn’t get a wink of sleep. A truck pulled up next to the boutique, two extremely hairy and extremely tattooed men came out the back and began unloading boxes marked â€Å"summer drs† onto the footpath. After about ten boxes were stacked not–so–neatly next to Elizabeth’s feet the men got back in the truck and started the engines. â€Å"Wait a minute!† shouted Elizabeth. â€Å"You need to put these in my store!† â€Å"That’s your problem lady, not ours.† One of the men jeered, his friend laughed and slapped him on the back, and with that they were gone. Their outdated truck spewing out a line of thick, black exhaust. â€Å"You good–for–nothing bastards!† Elizabeth screamed at the truck as she picked up a stone and threw it. Miraculously it flew right through the driver’s window. The truck swerved, scattering a mass of boxes big and small on the road, and stopped. The driver came out with a bruise on the side of his head, his friend followed and shouted, â€Å"Hey lady! You stupid or something? We could’ve been killed! You gotta help us pick this mess up!† â€Å"That’s your problem!† Elizabeth called back as she hauled on of the boxes into her store. When she finally finished with the boxes, it was already midday. Elizabeth wiped her forehead with her sleeve and went inside to make herself a cup of cappuccino†¦

In Opposition of Eugenics and Human Embryo Research Essay -- Argumenta

In Opposition of Eugenics and Human Embryo Research There are a variety of views of eugenics and all that it entails. The definition of eugenics is "the science of improving the physical and mental qualities of human beings through control of the factors influencing heredity," ( Funk and Wagnall's, 1984). Others think eugenics is the social control of human genetic evolution, an ideology of racism and genocide, thought to improve society and halt disease while others think only of the Nazi Regime (Saetz, 1985 and McGee, 1997). Eugenics has a long and tumultous past but with the mapping of the human genome and research on human embryos, where will eugenics lead the wolrd in the near future? There are two main practices of eugenics: positive eugenics, increasing the procreation of those with "desireable" traits, including high IQ, physical attractiveness, resistance to disease, etc., and negative eugenics, halting the procreation of those with "undesirable" traits through sterilization, abortion, infanticide, birth control and couseling (Saetz, 1985 and Davis, 1981). Und...

Compare And Contrast Sociology Essay Essay

Sociology is based on two frameworks, namely structure-agency and conflict-consensus. These frameworks center around three founders of sociology, Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx and Max Weber. This essay will attempt to demonstrate which author explains sociology within which framework. The structure used for this essay will be a point-by-point structure. This essay will start off with structure, move on to agency and then to conflict and lastly conclude with consensus. Structure is the social patterns, which influence and may restrict the choices and opportunities of the individual. Durkheim is a structuralist and explains structure through social facts. Social facts are the structures, values and norms, which surpass the individual and may lead to social constraint. Durkheim believes that structure together with hierarchy is the most important aspect of maintaining a civilized society. Similarly, Marx is also a structuralist. However, he explains structure through dialectical materialism. Through this, he believes that history is not driven by ideas but rather by economic and class interests. Thus, structure is based on what the interests of the most influential class (in an economic context) are. In contrast, Weber is not a structuralist and focuses on agency more than structure (this will be explained further later on). However he does explain structure through bureaucracy and a rational-legal model. He defines bureaucracy as routine tasks that become jurisdictional areas and are ordered by rules and regulations. Thus, structure can only optimally function if bureaucracy follows the strict rules and regulations put in place without any corruption. On the other hand, agency is the ability of individuals to make their own decisions and act independently through free will. Durkheim does not believe that society is based on the individual but more on the social structures around the individual. He maintains that individuals will come and go from social institutions, but institutions have a life over and above the individual and therefore structure plays a more influential role than agency. Likewise, Marx also believes that structure is more important than agency but also emphasizes the fact that structure leads to the detriment of the majority of individuals. This means that the majority of individuals’ interests are not taken into consideration and are over powered by the role of structure. On the contrary, Weber starts his argument with agency and explains agency through â€Å"verstehen† and the theory of social action. Weber maintains that it is important to understand why the individual does a certain action (â€Å"verstehen†) and that there are three different types of social action that make up a civilized society: Traditional action (actions carried out due to tradition and because that’s they way things have always been done), affective action (actions carried out due to emotion to express personal feelings) and rational action (actions carried out using reason to achieve a certain goal). Weber also believes that legitimate authority is based on agency and the free choice of individuals. The conflict theory maintains that social, material and economic inequality are the forces of social change within a society. Durkheim is of the belief that conflict will not achieve social change, but rather consensus (will be explained further later on). He stresses the fact that conflict will only cause disorder and chaos within a society and a society will not be able to move forward if there is too much conflict. However, Marx emphasizes conflict over consensus and that inequality and class conflict furthers one side of society (the bourgeoisie) and not the other (the proletariat) due to the economic interest of the upper class. Weber is in the middle of Durkheim and Marx on both conflict and consensus. Weber is of the opinion that conflict is due to inequality within a society and the fact that there are certain people in power by force (are not chosen to be in power), which contributes even more to conflict. In contrast to conflict, consensus maintains that social and economic systems are fair and sustain social order in society. Durkheim believes that for there to be a normative basis for order within a society, there has to be moral and normative consensus. This means that everyone within a society needs to have the same values, and when everyone has the same values they become norms for a society to live and act by. Marx on the other hand, does not believe in consensus but rather in conflict. He focuses on the fact that a society can only progress if there is conflict, not shared values and norms. If there is no economic interest within a society or class, a society will remain stagnant and not move forward. As stated before, Weber stands in the middle of Durkheim and Marx on consensus and states that for there to be consensus within a society, legitimate authority needs to be achieved through the consent of the people in a society. This means that all people should decide together on who should be given authority to do what. However he also believes that for a society to progress forward, conflict and consensus need to occur simultaneously. In conclusion, the three different authors all have very different but equally important viewpoints on society. Durkheim emphasizes structure over agency and consensus over conflict. Marx also focuses on structure over agency but rather conflict over consensus. And Weber stresses agency over structure and that conflict and consensus are equally important. Therefore Durkheim, Marx and Weber have many differences and similarities within the structure-agency and conflict-consensus frameworks.