Sunday, September 15, 2019

How Sports Can Improve Team Relations

Team sports are a great fun way to instil strong teamwork values in staff that have to work effectively together off the field. Team Sport Spirit As a sports team functions in much a similar way to a workplace team – with members cooperating with one another to achieve a common goal, sport participation is a good way of further instilling the important principles of teamwork in a group. A lot of the same rules of the workplace team can be played out on the field or court. For example, if one person fails to pull their weight then the whole team performance will suffer. And conversely if one individual dominates then the performance of others will be adversely affected. Feeling undervalued and second best, their morale and motivation will droop. In both arenas the only way to achieve a victory is with a team working in harmony and on equal terms with one another. As with sport, a team may comprise of the most brilliant individual talents but if they don’t work well together then the team will be worthless. The Mechanics of a Good Team It’s easy to accept that the key lessons of team sport are the same as those in the workplace, but beyond that what can sport teach employees about teams that they can’t pick up in the workplace? For starters, the benefit of taking team relations out onto the field is in providing a more direct and boiled down display of how a team should function. On the field success is made or broken based on the effort – or lack of – of the competing players. If there are any weak links on the field, for example, then the upshot will be swift and decisive. It’s not so clear cut in the workplace where success and failure is not judged in super fast one hours bursts. Lazy individual members can generally drag the team down for a long time before the negative effects become apparent. Therefore by participating in sports, team members learn the effectiveness of ‘pulling together’ in achieving a goal and hopefully apply the same principles to their work. Team Bonding and Communication Team sports not only instil a belief in the power of effective teamwork but also they help improve team bonding and the relationships between team members, so that they can better achieve that goal. Encouraging staff to participate in team sports together on a regular basis is an excellent way to allow team members to get to know one another better and build up stronger and more productive relationships both on the field and in the workplace. Sport promotes a numbers of qualities that are valuable in the office, such as trust, respect, effective communication and good old fashioned comradeship. If team members find success together on the football field or badminton court, for example, then the bond they form with one another will hold strong in the workplace context. Often it doesn’t even matter whether certain people don’t get on in the workplace. On the sports field there is no room for frosty relations – for the sake of the team players must put their differences aside and cooperate. Hopefully success together can help people to put their petty differences aside off the field too.

Saturday, September 14, 2019

‘In Flanders Fields’, ‘Break of day in the trenches’ and ‘Dulce et decorum est’ Essay

In my opinion I think that the poems, ‘In Flanders Fields’, ‘Break of day in the trenches’ and ‘Dulce et decorum est’ do teach the modern reader a variety of different things, therefore to say: â€Å"the modern reader learns little from them† is an inaccurate conclusion to draw. I think the modern reader can learn a sufficient amount from the three poems because of the clear themes that run through them. In the poem; in Flanders fields written by John McRae, it is obvious to the reader that this poet was a patriot and that he felt that the duty of the living soldiers was to honour the deed by continuing to fight on it the Great War. This poem portrays the similar attitudes of many soldiers who fought as it reflects how important it was for them to give and sacrifice their lives for the victory of their country. As a reader, you can learn the significance of the poppy; the red colour symbolising blood and death, the natural world taking its course by allowing the poppies to grow on the dead to show its natural beauty and how death is part of a cycle and also how the natural world still exists in the chaos and destruction of war which can also be linked with the Rat in ‘break of day in the trenches’. The reader can also gain an insight into the a soldiers thoughts and feelings which can justify why they felt as if they had no option but to win and honour the dead who have already sacrificed their lives for the victory of their country. Break of day in the trenches is a great way for a 21st century reader to understand and remotely feel the suffering that took place daily for men during the First World War in the popularly talked about trenches. It teaches us the futileness of the war and the similarities and common humanities that were shared between the English and German soldiers. This is poignantly represented by a ‘queer sardonic rat’ in the poem written by Isaac Rosenberg. The rat that is mentioned highlights the importance of the freedom that these men lacked but the rat; an unwanted, diseased carrying animal that is most commonly seen as vermin had. He has the opportunity to walk around freely and do as he pleases whereas the man in a trench can only stay where he is positioned. Ironically, the rat can ‘cross the sleeping green between’ to have a better chance of survival than the men, who are ‘less chanced than you for life’. This idea is sharply perceptive. The reader can get a sense of the real trench life and how devastating the destruction was to their lives and the appalling conditions they had to bear with. The powerful line of ‘the darkness crumbles away’ suggests how close they were to the earth as it was as basic as a hole in the ground. Lastly, the poem ‘Dulce et Decorum est’ written by Wilfred Owen allows the modern reader to divulge into the world of a soldier who has to witness shocking and harrowing scenes of death and destruction day in day out. The poet gives the reader just a snippet of a typical gas attack and how they cope and deal with such a horrific situation. The reader can feel the pain and emotion that he is feeling as a poor soldier is caught in this form of attack. The lines; ‘Bent double, like old beggars under sacks†¦ coughing like hags’ shows the audience that men who are meant to be fit, healthy and able are in fact aged by the stresses and strains of these conditions and how their physical and mental states are deteriorating. The imagery and the descriptions of the gas attack in this poem are vivid which helps the reader to put in into context and can help them to visualize what is happening (‘I saw him drowning’) The speech that is used is effective because a reader can imagine the panic in their voices and how terrified they must be. Not only does the reader gain an insight into the troubles of the soldiers but the attitudes that many soldiers, poets, women and children had. The title translates as; it is a sweet and fitting thing to die for one’s country however this is very ironic as the poem suggests that it is a complete contrast. This line represents the attitudes of some people who expect the war to be a wonderful, romantic and honourable deed when in reality it causes pain. The reader can see that children were ‘ardent eyed for some desperate glory’ and they believed it was an honour to die in this way which is what the title suggests. Overall, the modern reader can learn a substantial amount from reading these poems as they all cover different aspects of the war but the most resourceful poem is ‘Dulce et Decorum est’ because the modern reader discovers the reality of life as a soldier and the ongoing difficulties that he has to face be it from staying clear from rats of escaping a gas attack. The stereotypical war idea has been removed and the reader can learn this through this poem.

Friday, September 13, 2019

China, Asia and Globalization Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

China, Asia and Globalization - Essay Example However, the article goes on to highlight the flaws and indicators of why people should be skeptical of the present state. It gives a series of factors that are presently inflicting misery on a potential global leader and the ways that can be used to correct these flaws. This is accompanied by comparisons with other similar economies such as India, South Korea and Japan that are all from the same region. The writer takes the audience first through the present vices that are facing the country such as pollution, and the growing workforce (Ebenstein et al 10). This is culminated by the effects that these factors will have on the economy not only in the present but also in future terms. It is an analysis of the indicators and their influence to the economy as global trends that need to be critically examined if a country aims at making it in future (Bremmer 41). These arguments are assertive of the writer’s main theme that is to highlight a skeptic nature of economic trends that can only be compounded by being short-term and not in the long-term. However, the article ends by highlighting that although there may be problems relating with a strong China a weak China is even more catastrophic to the world (Bremmer 42). This is attributable to the level of control that the country currently holds. One of the arguments that the article highlights is the level of control and independent nature of Chinese interactions where they have managed to malign themselves from the West. Western countries have in the past.

Thursday, September 12, 2019

Construction assignment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Construction assignment - Essay Example It overlooks the Thames. It lies between the Houses of Parliament and St. Paul`s Cathedral. It is opposite to the Royal Courts of Justice. It is within five minutes walk of the Covent Garden, West End theatres and Trafalgar Square. The building is a 13 storied structure, and has 4 basement levels. The building is made of concrete and inflexible blockwork partitions. The floor to ceiling height is high. Roofs have valley gutters. Iron cramps have been inserted in masonry to bind the blocks together. Bonding timbers have been used in external brick and stone walls. The facade build-up includes glazed infill cladding. There are windows, and the flooring made of wood. The blockwork is inflexible, requiring extensive works. The facade are worn out. The facade are leaky allowing water ingress and air infiltration. VAV dual duct ventilation with open able windows caused high energy consumption. The environmental performance was poor. There are DDA and fire compliance issues. The top three floors were completely gutted. Access for fire escape and fire brigade was poor. Facade, building services and DDA access were not compliant. Major defects have been included in the table below. The occupants gave a negative feedback regarding the internal environment including noise and air pollution. Routine maintenance includes work that has to be carried out at intervals for keeping the building in appropriate condition. There may be requirements for replacement or repairing an item necessitated by natural deterioration of normal wear and tear. According to Chanter and Swallow (2000), routine maintenance is five yearly external decorations and servicing of boilers. According to the Audit Commission, details of maintenance cycles have to be set with a balance between planned and responsive maintenance. The initial focus must be on replacements that could be expected instead of those considered avoidable. The routine replacement items must be identified at the outset

Wednesday, September 11, 2019

Developing a conceptual framework is an impossible possibility Essay - 5

Developing a conceptual framework is an impossible possibility - Essay Example Further, it forms the basis for establishing which events should be accounted for and how the same should be released to the accountants (Macve 1987 p. 11). Despite the pertinence of the conceptual framework, there are challenges which are involved. This is so because it should and it is a concept that is developed to guide study and what is transpired or has transpired over a given period of time on certain things. Tentative theory explains a conceptual framework as a phenomenon which is subject of investigation. This theory enlighten the rest of your design, it helps in evaluating and also refining your targets, initiate realistic and important research issues. Further, it helps in selecting proper methods and recognizes probable validity perils to your conclusion. This theory also helps in proving your research. Conceptual framework can be described as the research problem. It therefore involves formulating research problem for purposes of initiation and designing of your study. The ideology behind this argument is that conceptual framework identifies something that is happening in the globe which is hard to analyse. As such therefore, the conceptual framework which you develop and deduce for consumption by the rest of the people should be justifiable so that people can be able to appreciate your work. This requires that the conceptual framework k should be backed with factual examples touching on the daily happenings in different institutions (Bhimani, 2005 p. 23). What we have discussed in the above statement does not mean that there exists clear and express report of the research problem. However, it is important that research structure should demonstrate impliedly or expressly some issue which are hypothetical in nature and also reveal which other information so required. To avoid misleading ideas on the issue of the conceptual framework, one

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Aston Martin's New Idea Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Aston Martin's New Idea - Essay Example The essay finally tells about the impact of the marketing plan on the sales of the company and the need for right strategy for developing the effective marketing plan. Table of Content Introduction 4 Marketing plan 5 Marketing objective 5 Target market and Segmentation 5 Marketing Strategies 6 Budget 7 8 Introduction Aston Martin, the iconic name in the world of cars, was founded in 1913 by Robert Bamford and Lionel Martin. The car company is headquartered at Gaydon, Warwickshire in England. Aston Martin is known for its luxury and style around the world. There are various models of the car in the market but some of the famous models include Aston Martin DB series, Lagonda Marque, Aston Martin One-77, etc (Aston Martin, 2012). The company has recently decided to change the style and theme of the car to make it more attractive and appealing to the young people in the age group of 20s. This idea of developing a new style and theme for Aston Martin cars can be both advantageous and disa dvantageous for the company. The whole idea of the company with its plan is to increase its market share and profit by targeting new markets which would mainly comprise people of today’s generation, especially in the age group of 20s. ... Marketing plan The marketing plan based on Aston Martin’s new approach to attract a new target market requires a planned marketing strategy which can be discussed as follows: Marketing objective Marketing objective is related to the company’s objective associated with Aston Martin. The objective of the company should deal with its long-term plans in establishing Aston Martin as a brand not only for luxury seeking people but for younger generations. Young people who prefer the sporty look with style and luxury but with different theme and design can be a great market opportunity for the company in terms of market share. Target market and Segmentation Segmentation is important for any company because of reasons such as process of segmentation of products according to their life cycle, and finding which product is to be segmented as per the consumers whom the company is targeting. The target market strategy for the company would begin with the analysis of market opportunit y which would allow the company to estimate the sales and size potential associated with the market segment (Lamb, Hair, & McDaniel, 2008, p. 49). Target market strategy implies the importance of segmentation of market for Aston Martin in order to achieve the marketing objective. Marketing Strategies Marketing strategy for the company should be based on market penetration, market development and promotional tools. Market penetration for the company decides it strategy based on the pricing strategy. It is often seen that companies reduce their product price to penetrate the market and attain a considerable market share before planning for market development. Aston Martin can penetrate the new

Monday, September 9, 2019

Financial Service Assignment 2 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Financial Service Assignment 2 - Essay Example vital contributor towards the steadiness with regard to the financial structure along with being a significant element in the course of operations associated with the existent economy (Department of Mathematics, 2008). The structure of derivatives market in the present times has been learnt to lure increased concentration next to the present environment related to fraud cases, financial crisis along with the collapse of few of the market participants. It was an evident fact that the recent financial catastrophe principally occurred because of the planned credit-linked securities which were not actually derivatives. This made the regulators and the policy developers think regarding intensification of the guidelines for boosting the lucidity and security for both the wide array of financial instruments as well as derivatives (Department of Mathematics, 2008). Derivatives are referred as financial contracts the worth of which is considered as a resultant of certain definite underlying assets. The underlying assets are believed to entail equity indices as well as equities, loans, exchange rates, commercial along with residential mortgages, bonds, interest rates, commodities and natural calamities like the hurricanes and the earthquakes. The derivative contracts appear or are available in numerous forms however, the most widespread forms entail forwards or futures, swaps and options (Acharya & et. al., 2009). A forward contract is referred to a certain contract in which the involved two parties comply to trade the definite â€Å"underlying asset† in the upcoming days at a specific point of time which has been ascertained earlier and at a preset price. Thus, the buyer complies today to purchase a definite form of asset in the upcoming days and the other party i.e. the seller complies to give delivery of that definite asset at the agreed and predetermined time. Futures are regarded as standardised form of forwards that are capable of being dealt in on the exchange