Tuesday, August 6, 2019

How Does Child Labour Effect Society Young People Essay

How Does Child Labour Effect Society Young People Essay In order to overcome our daily living needs we need to work and earn according to individual capacities. In a healthy society individual perform their role according to their age, capabilities and health condition. In contradiction to this, many of the children are deprived of their basic right of freedom and education and they are compelled to start work in a very early age. They are paid very less so they start to work long hours in order to full fill their needs. This causes compromise in normal physiology. So it starts to affect every aspect of life from health, education and off course the socioeconomic status, thus automatically affecting the family and the whole society. According to Freedman (1998), Child labor is Work done by kids full-time under the age of 15. Work that prevents kids from attending school, such as unlimited or unrestricted domestic work. Work that is dangerous for kids and that is hazardous to their physical, mental or emotional health. There are number of children who are engaged in different kind of labours. According to International Labour Organization (2009), in Pakistan there are 40 million children age between 5- 14 years and among them 3.3 million children are engaged in labour. There are many serious social issues which are not yet addressed properly and not getting attention from the public, media and the government. Child labor is one of them. I would be highlighting few of the impact of child labour on the society with the help of a story of a boy who suffered from child labour at the age of 8 years. This story was told by one of my friend. I was born in a very low socioeconomic class. I am the only son to my parents and elder to my three sisters. My father was a laborer and worked for a company on a daily wages. Still we were spending prosperous life in our limited resources and I had the opportunity to get admission in a school. It seemed that education and comfort was there for my first eight year only as my father expired on road traffic accident. After this tragic movement my mother who at that time was expecting fourth child started working for the same company to overcome our financial needs, but she couldnt continue it for longer and has to quit it as she had end up with serious gynecological issue which I hardly remember. One my relative suggested my mother to send me to work as she thought that was healthier than my mother and can earn enough if worked with dedication so I was referred to a gentleman who had an automobile workshop near by my house. I had cross by this workshop multiple times but didnt ever think of the life there. So many MACHINES (which I call it at that time), three men wearing unique costumes busy in fixing things together, very strong smell of different nature which couldnt stop me to cover my nose for a while till one of them asked me to come to him in his autocratic voice. The sooner I get there he asked me wash an instrument and instruct me not to make it fall. That was so slippery but I did manage to wash it and get a smile from him. This helped me to believe that they are also human being. By the end of the day I get my first pay for the day which at that time my mother thought is enough for us and it was wise decision to quit mu school and get into job. Oh yes I did show my dedication towards my work and by the time I was ten years old I had started to do overtime twice a week to overcome my familys increasing need. I get very much used to the routines and was able to do stuff like cleaning, oil application and fixing very easily, so it was easy for me to work for longer hours without any complaints. I was able to handle scolds and verbal abuses from my seniors and was luckily safe from an accident in which I could have lost my right arm. Things never remain the same and I have entered in my late twenties no more dedication to work and family, I have chosen my own way which gives me pleasure and Im not alone as well, have my own group of deprived friends. We work for a person to transport opium to different places, he is happy with my work provide me all the drugs without witch I cant think of life. I have no regrets and I think I was born to get here. This issue has a great negative impact on individual and family life. It starts to effect health right from the beginning where the working environment comes. The environment plays a very crucial part in maintaining optimum health especially in early developmental age. In this age a child is very much susceptible to catch infections, acquire unhealthy behaviors and at a very much risk for physical and mental disability. Lawrence (2007), Healthy children grow into healthy adults. The health of our children is one of the most important investments that we can make and should be among our top priorities. In the above story the person is not playing its role as a healthy individual e.g. getting into drugs not only spoil his own health but also harmful to others. Not supporting the family can be cause of another social issue that his sisters may involve in other unhealthy practices for their survival. This becomes an unbreakable chain, unless it is addressed at family society and country level. There are many causes of child labour e.g. poverty, illiteracy and least concerned parents. But to me the most important cause of child labour is the economic instability of the country. In an economically stable country there would be no unemployment issues, people will get proper salary secured job, health and education benefits. There are certain situations in which accommodation and negotiation is difficult but not impossible, like the example of the child in the above mentioned story he was left with no other option except to get a work and to support the family. Serious action taken by the family and the country starting from base could help reduce in child labour. In need child can work but its his right that he should be provided particular hours and adequate salary by the employer so that there will be no need of overtime and he has the time to rest and prevent exhaustion. If these issues are not taken care it start to affect the economy of a country as a whole, and there wi ll be no contribution by the people to countrys economy. People will be living in hand to mouth condition and will be not able to identify countrys strength and hidden recourses causing economic recession and affecting whole society as well as globally. Least concerned parents, illiteracy and unawareness these are all directly linked to educational level of the society. Uneducated parents do not understand the value of education and have no priority for it. Without knowing the consequences they encourage their children to engage in labour and quit education which hinders the society growth by providing less educated people. Thus people become resistant to change and there is no advancement in the field which they are working. In this way the country is deprived of their human power. Parents education also counts when it comes to speak for their right and they can identify that if their child is being misused by the employer or the child is getting in to unhealthy habits. In Pakistan the Employment of Children Act 1991, describes almost all the condition in which a child can work and prohibition of work in certain hazardous environment and long working hour. According to Pakistan National Statics, more than two-third of child is working in the agricultural sector, 1.2 million Children are bonded in the carpet factories.   35 million soccer balls stitched in Pakistan, children produce one quarter of the balls, most of them as bonded servants. Child labour does affect the whole society in every aspect. Making the law is the not the solution is not the solution to overcome it. The law should be practical enough so that it can be practiced. It has to have a check and balance also, to make sure its applicability. Strict action should be taken against them who misuse child by providing very less incentives and unhealthy work place. They underlying cause should be identified first so that alternative arrangement could be done. E.g. what if the child is the only earning member of the family, if he is stop by doing work the remaining whole family suffer from it. Since it is not an overnight process it can be reduced by using the accommodation and negotiation according to situation. REFFERENCES: Freedman, Lewis. (1998). Kids At Work: Lewis Hine And The Crusade Against Child Labor. Retrieved from, http://www.nynetresources.org/Future%20Grant%20Projects/Projects/Child%20Labor/childlabor1.htm International Labour Organization. (1998). Retrieved from, http://www.oit.org/legacy/english/regions/asro/newdelhi/ipec/index.htm Lawrence, D., Deirdre, I. (2007). Environmental Injustice: Childrens Health. Pediatrics, 3, 5. Employment of Children Act, (1991). Retrieved from http://www.albarrtrust.com/Al%20Baar%20Web/SCAN%20RULES/Employment%20of%20Children%20Act,%201991.pdf Pakistan National Statistics. (1999). Retrieved from, http://www.globalmarch.org/worstformsreport/world/pakistan.html

Monday, August 5, 2019

Skills Required in Phlebotomy

Skills Required in Phlebotomy Objectives To acquire the knowledge and skills to perform phlebotomy and finger prick. To learn the order of draw and its significance. To learn various devices and preparation techniques before phlebotomy. Introduction Phlebotomy is referred to the cutting of a vein. It is a procedure often involving invasion that invades the body through cutting or puncture normally carried out by professionals called phlebotomists. Among the major roles involving a phlebotomist is to obtain blood specimens for diagnostic testing. This can be done either by dermal puncture which is done by puncturing the skin or venepuncture which is done by puncturing the veins. Other than that, a phlebotomist is also responsible in redrawing blood from donors during blood transfusion of from any patients having polycythemia which is known for overproduction of blood cells. Phlebotomist are also responsible for collecting and properly packaging urine specimens, accepting incoming specimens (blood and body fluids, etc.), and routing specimens to the proper departments to be tested and analysed. In order for a phlebotomist to withdraw blood from a patient, he should make sure that the tubes are labelled and all the materials are pr epared before carrying out the procedure. The best sites for venipunture are normally the superficial veins of the upper limbs. The superficial vein most commonly used for venipuncture is the median Cubital Vein which lies over the cubital fossa and serves as an anastomosis between the basilica veins and the cephalic veins. The next most common vein is the cephalic vein where it can be followed proximally where it empties into the axillary vein. The basilic vein is also a location for venipunture as it divides to join the brachial vein. The usual sites for capillary puncture or finer prick in adults and children are the fingertip. In adults, the ring finger is often selected because it usually is not calloused. Capillary blood can be obtained from the great toe in infants and babies. In new-borns, the lateral or side portion of the end of the heel pas is used. The BD Discussion Among the inappropriate sites for venipuncture are the site affected by a mastectomy. This is because mastectomy causes lymphostasis which means stoppage of lymph flow where the bodys ability to fight infection is compromised if lymph nodes are removed therefore patients are more prone to infections. Edematous sites, an abnormal accumulation of fluid on the intracellular space of the tissue must also be avoided as it can cause difficulty in palpating the veins due to the excess fluid. The specimen can also be contaminated with the fluid. Venipuncture performed at sites of scars and burns are also inappropriate as it causes unusual pain for the patients. This is caused by the veins that are very difficult to palpate and also susceptible to infections as the protective barrier (epidermal layer) has been disrupted. Other than that, patients who have IV running in their arm should not be used for venepuncture as it may be a contaminant to the blood collected. Lastly, dermal punctures mus t never be performed on the fingers of a new-born or very young infant. This is because there is very little distance between the skin and the bone. Therefore, the bone could be easily pierced during the puncture, causing injury to the bone, infection, or gangrene. The order of draw is as follows, Blood Cultures Coagulation Tube (light blue top) Plain red AND/OR Serum Separator Tube (red gel/SST) Heparin Tube (green top) Plain Sodium Heparin Plain Lithium Heparin Lithium Heparin Gel EDTA Tube (purple and pink top) Fluoride/ Oxalate Tube (grey top) Miscellaneous tubes (these are drawn in no specific order) Heavy metal dark blue top (EDTA and plain red) b. ACD yellow top The purpose of the order of draw is to avoid possible test result error due to cross contamination from tube additives. Potassium results can be falsely elevated as EDTA is rich in potassium. Therefore test for potassium must be collected before tubes containing EDTA. Other than that, the microscopic appearance of the red blood cells on a WBC differential test will be distorted due to the additives in the Fluoride/ Oxalate tube as oxalate interferes the red blood cell membrane and fluoride alter its morphology. Moreover, coagulation tests such as Activated partial thromboplastic time (aPTT) and prothrombin (PT) can be affected with the presence of clot activators by shortened test results. Bacteria from non-sterile tube stoppers/shields can contaminate blood collected into bottles/tubes used for blood cultures, resulting in the growth of bacteria erroneously leading a physician to think his/her patient has a blood infection. A hematoma is a collection of blood beneath the skin. Hematomas are the most common adverse reaction to venipuncture. Precautions that can be taken to prevent hematoma in phlebotomy are by puncturing only the uppermost wall of the vein. Other than that, the phlebotomist can also remove the tourniquet before removing the needle. The needle should fully penetrate the upper-most wall of the vein as partial penetration may allow blood to leak into the tissue surrounding the vein. Lastly, adequate pressure should be applied to stop the bleeding once the phlebotomy is complete. Haemolysed blood specimens are not be acceptable for testing. Hemolysis occurs when the red cells rupture and haemoglobin and other intracellular components spill into the serum. Hemolyzed serum or plasma is pink or red, rather than the normal clear straw or pale yellow colour. Steps that can prevent haemolysis are by mixing tubes gently or about 5 – 10 times after collection. The tubes should not be shaken too vigorously and drawing blood should be performed on hematoma individuals. Other than that, when using a needle or syringe, avoid drawing back the plunger to forcefully. Moreover, if a blood transfer device is used to fill vacutainer tubes, always allow the vacuum to pull the blood into the tubes. Do not use he plunger or syringe to force the blood into the tubes quickly. References Akron Childrens Hospital, 2015, Lab Test Procedure : Performing A Venipuncture. [Online]. Available at : https://www.akronchildrens.org/cms/lab_procedures/9179c8cb8f877ee3/ [ Accessed 29/01/2015]. Johnson. L, 2013, National Center for Competency Testing : Phlebotomy order of draw, [Online]. Available at : https://www.ncctinc.com/documents/Phlebotomy%20Order%20of%20Draw.pdf [Accessed 29/01/2015]. MediaLab incorporated, 2015, Hematoma, [Online]. Available at : https://www.medialabinc.net/spg549505/hematoma.aspx, [ Accessed 29/01/2015]. Turgeon., M,. L, 2005, Clinical Hematology: Theory and Procedures, Volume 936, [Online], Available at : https://books.google.com.my/books?id=cHAjsUgegpQCpg=PA26lpg=PA26dq=edematous+site+venipuncturesource=blots=qxLCqzHsO2sig=OaKkj33lflGKFvorZweYFnb4RHUhl=ensa=Xei=n1bHVI-VM4yD8gW29IKoBgved=0CDIQ6AEwAw#v=onepageq=edematous%20site%20venipuncturef=false , [Accessed 29/01/2015]

Sunday, August 4, 2019

Betrayed By God :: essays research papers

Betrayed By God   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  To tell you the truth I have never really felt betrayed by God. It's most likely due to the fact that I haven't had many significant life experiences come up. Also when something goes wrong I don't look at God as a scapegoat. I feel you should blame whoever or whatever caused the tragedy. Blaming God is just the easy way out or just a quick answer to your problems. All this aside and even though I've never felt betrayed, I know others who have.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I work at a deli in my town and it recently burnt down. If I were the owner, I would have felt betrayed or denied. I mean, it's his life. It's the way he supports his family. One day he woke up and it was gone. Even worse is the time of year it happened, Christmas. This is the time when you need every penny but the only thing he's getting now is lost-wages paid by his insurance company. It doesn't even close to what he would be making if the deli were still up and running. But it's better than nothing, I guess.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  His business has been through a lot of hardships over the last 16 years. Another difficulty was the building of the Blue Route near his business. The construction blocked almost everyone from entering the building. I don't know if you could blame God for that sort of problem or maybe it was just fate. But with these dilemmas and problems, he didn't question why God allowed these things to happen. He looked insstead to the way he benefited from the experiences.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  One benefit was it made him stronger mentally aand spiritually. To keep a business going for three years with minimal customers is hard. It takes dedication and will to show up every morning and basically prepare for nothing, but he did . He was much more grateful when people came in and developed a better business. Perhaps God knew what He was doing.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Even the fire was a blessing in disguise. Some of the equipment was getting old and things just weren't all in top condition. So now he will have new equipment, walls, ceiling and so on. He wouldn't have had the pocket money to do this alone. Now you might be thinking it was just an insurance scam, but he had many inspectors come in and checked the cause . It was faulty wiring.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  God might have seen that things weren't exactly great and things needed to be done to help out in the future. Betrayed By God :: essays research papers Betrayed By God   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  To tell you the truth I have never really felt betrayed by God. It's most likely due to the fact that I haven't had many significant life experiences come up. Also when something goes wrong I don't look at God as a scapegoat. I feel you should blame whoever or whatever caused the tragedy. Blaming God is just the easy way out or just a quick answer to your problems. All this aside and even though I've never felt betrayed, I know others who have.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I work at a deli in my town and it recently burnt down. If I were the owner, I would have felt betrayed or denied. I mean, it's his life. It's the way he supports his family. One day he woke up and it was gone. Even worse is the time of year it happened, Christmas. This is the time when you need every penny but the only thing he's getting now is lost-wages paid by his insurance company. It doesn't even close to what he would be making if the deli were still up and running. But it's better than nothing, I guess.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  His business has been through a lot of hardships over the last 16 years. Another difficulty was the building of the Blue Route near his business. The construction blocked almost everyone from entering the building. I don't know if you could blame God for that sort of problem or maybe it was just fate. But with these dilemmas and problems, he didn't question why God allowed these things to happen. He looked insstead to the way he benefited from the experiences.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  One benefit was it made him stronger mentally aand spiritually. To keep a business going for three years with minimal customers is hard. It takes dedication and will to show up every morning and basically prepare for nothing, but he did . He was much more grateful when people came in and developed a better business. Perhaps God knew what He was doing.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Even the fire was a blessing in disguise. Some of the equipment was getting old and things just weren't all in top condition. So now he will have new equipment, walls, ceiling and so on. He wouldn't have had the pocket money to do this alone. Now you might be thinking it was just an insurance scam, but he had many inspectors come in and checked the cause . It was faulty wiring.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  God might have seen that things weren't exactly great and things needed to be done to help out in the future.

Saturday, August 3, 2019

where is all of my money going? Essay -- essays research papers

While searching through various newspapers and newspaper web sites online, I realized that the biggest social problem of all is the how misinformed and uneducated the public is. In search of articles on important social problems, the most prominent topics I found were things such as â€Å"Halliburton is awarded $72 Million in Bonuses,† â€Å"Putin blows of steam over baltics at EU Summit,† â€Å"Egypt Presidential Vote may not be very open,† â€Å"China is unwilling to impose sanctions on North Koreans.† Although these are fairly important â€Å"world† issues, they aren’t as important as things such as global structural inequality, racial and ethnic problems, gender inequality and male superiority, over consumption and starvation, and globalization and technology. It seems that people are so caught up in the smaller issues that we forget that some countries are wasting too much of the world’s resources, while other countries are starv ing to death, and ultimately we’re destroying the Earth at a rate faster than even imaginable. But that’s not what we hear on the news because we’re so caught up with the â€Å"runaway bride,† and the naughty priests.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I did, however, find an article that somewhat relates to the issue of overspending and misplacing our funds while we’re at it. The article is from the Los Angeles Times and is entitled â€Å"$82 Billion Okd in Emergency Spending.† I’ve never managed national budgets, but with that kind of money we could build countries and feed billion...

Friday, August 2, 2019

How Does The Writer Create Atmosphere In The Novel The Woman In Black E

How Does The Writer Create Atmosphere In The Novel The Woman In Black and the Short Story The Signalman? "The Woman In Black" and "The Signalman" are both of the same genre horror/ghost stories. This genre is ideal to create a distinct atmosphere for the reader to be drawn into. The atmosphere the author creates for the reader is done so by mainly 2 things. Firstly, the characters, descriptions of supernatural presence, disbelief of the character or narrator and their uncertainty or confusion of conflict. Secondly, the setting, the type of setting chosen is very important and the way in which the author describes it also. When we pick up either of these stories we come to expect certain features from this genre. Both ghost stories have a derelict and isolated setting, very common in a ghost story. Also, many points are set in dark and enclosed spaces, where there is an inability to see clearly. Descriptions are used a lot, especially descriptions of darkness, strangeness and coldness. In both stories, there is a "supernatural presence" that is for the most part unexplained, but is something the narrator can both see and hear. There may be a sense of evil, or the manifestation us one of unrest. It is up to the reader to work out the story surrounding the unnatural presence-sometimes at the same time as the narrator if things are withheld from us. An atmosphere of unrest, either from the supernatural presence, or the discomfort from main characters, the narrator and even the reader is created. The setting creates an atmosphere of isolation and coldness. The emphasis on darkness and enclosure creates an atmosphere of unrest and confusion for the reader as well as the narrator. The atmosphere of ghostlin... ...k" and the short story "The Signalman", as well as both being of the same genre, they also have other similarities. They both include a spectre within the story and this is what the stories are based around. "The Signalman" introduces not only ghostliness but also death and mourning, this is similar to "The Woman In Black" when the child dies and Arthur Kipps hears horrifying cries. They both have terrible reactions when a death is involved. The Signalman feels he is in some way drawn into the main event, as does Arthur Kipps in the novel. The Signalman has to experience a death, which is torturous to him, but he cannot stop it, as does Arthur in "The Woman In Black". As for the atmosphere in both these stories, the emphasis on the descriptions of darkness, of the setting and of the characters emotions and this helps the reader to feel what is going on.

Thursday, August 1, 2019

How Organizations Can Learn from Failure Essay

Even though there is a no precise definition for failure in organizations, there is a general agreement to what failure means and could lead to. Failure is broadly defined as a condition of not meeting the intended objective or end. Failure could result in the depletion of finance, shrinking market, exit from the market, loss of market share, project failure and loss of legitimacy. We can assume that failure has negative consequences even though the final outcome may be positive, with firms learning from failure. Understanding the need for learning from failure is unquestionable; however it is tough for organizations to put this into practice. It is crucial that organizations understand failure and think about it in the right way before they can go about implementing procedures to prevent such failures from happening in the future. Learning from failure involves understanding that failure is not always bad and that learning from failure is no straightforward task. An organization cannot simply reflect on what they did wrong and expect to not make the same mistakes again. Organizations have to understand about the different degrees of failure which occur on a scale ranging from blameworthy to praiseworthy. They fall into three broad categories which are 1, failures which occur in predictable operations which could be prevented. 2, unavoidable failures which occur in complex organizations which can be managed to prevent snowballing. 3, unwanted outcomes†¦. To learn from failure, we require different strategies for each setting. It is key to detect them early, analyze failures with depth, develop hypothesis, experiments and projects to product them. In order to minimize failure employees first have to feel safe to report these failures. In the article titled strategies for learning from failure the author Amy C. Edmondson talks about http://hbr. org/2011/04/strategies-for-learning-from-failure/ar/1 First the organization has to go about understanding failure in the right way as well as all the possible side†¦ Important for managers to think about failure in the right way. Failure is not always bad. It is sometimes bad and sometimes inevitable and sometimes good. Learning from failure is not a straightforward task. The attitudes and activities required to effectively detect and analyze failures are in short supply in most companies and the need for context-specific learning strategies is underappreciated.? Organizations need new and better ways to go beyond lessons which are superficial( procedures which weren’t followed) or self serving ( The market just wasn’t ready for our great new product) That means jettisoning old cultural beliefs and stereotypical notions. The blame game? A spectrum of reasons for failure? http://www. uk. sagepub. com/upm-data/10989_Chapter_9. pdf Failing to learn from failure reasons? -Simply experiencing a negative event is not sufficient for learning. – Learning can be a complicated process, the acquisition of knowledge and the shifts in behavior must occur at all levels of a highly complex system. â€Å"Bazerman and Watkins (2004) contend that, when organizations fail to learn failures, they become susceptible to predictable surprises. What is the difference between predictable and unpredictable surprises? Predictable surprises occur when an organization leadership ignores or fails to understand clear evidence that a potentially devastating problem to occur. There are different sort of failures and not all failures are created equally. Bazerman and Watkins( 2004) identify four ways in which organizations fail to learn from failures that occur around them: Scanning Failures: failure to pay close attention to potential problems both inside and outside the organization; this failure could be due to arrogance, a lack of resources, or simple inattentions? Intergration failures: failure to understand how pieces of potentially complicated information fit together to provide lessons of how to avoid crises. 3. Incentive Failures: failure to provide sufficient rewards to people who report problems and take actions to avoid possible crises 4. Learning Failures: failure to draw important lessons from crises and preserve their memory in the organization Organizations who face these failures potentially could damage their organizational integrity. Eg Mitroff and Anagnos 2001, Managing Crises before they happen: what every manager needs to know about crisis management. 1982, Johnson and Johnson could respond to an external crisis with their product being linked to cyanide poisoning and thus the company responded quickly by pulling their stock of capsules from the shelves and having great PR work. J and J knew how to handle their PR well and their product managed to get back to the top seller. J and J however became a victim of its previous succ ess and had not done well with ‘Predictable surprises’ where crises occurred within the company. J and J had failed to do proper product scanning and had been a different sort of failure. failure of a different type? Failure of Success. Problem 1 and 4. Learning from failure: Sitkin 1996- Mittelstaedt (2005) – Failure is an essential part of learning for many organizations. Failures, should not be hidden or avoided. Making mistakes is essential to success, a company which appears to be free from disruption may be operating unrealistically and from a uniformed perspective. â€Å"learning to identify mistakes analytically and timely is the difference between failure and success. † Too often employees and managers are unwilling to admit small failures for fear of reprisal. The unwillingness to recognize and embrace failure is also a failure to recognize and respond to potential crises. The longer these small crises build up the higher likelihood it could escalate into a major crisis. In successful organizations, failure creates recognition of risk and a motivation for change that would not exist otherwise. Describes this recognition as a â€Å"learning readiness† without failure, very difficult to produce in most organizations. Sitkin cautions that not all failures are equally effective in fostering good risk management. Organizations learn best from intelligent failures, which have these characteristics, result from planned actions, uncertain outcomes, modest in scale, and take place in domains that are familiar enough to permit effective learning. Organizations need to recognize risks by accepting and acting on failures. Learn the best when failure results from competent actions, not major crises. Still within the comfort zone and employees are eager and experienced enough to respond. These opportunities arise: Vicarious Learning – learning that occurs as a function of observing, retaining and replicating behavior observed in others. Organizations need not fail as an entity in order to learn. Successful organizations engage in vicarious learning in order to recognize risk, organizational leaders observe the failures or crises experienced by similar organizations and take action to avoid making the same mistakes. Examples of Vicarious Learning- Give!!! Organizational memory: Without learning from their own and other’s mistakes organizations stagnate and fail to respond to potential threats in an ever-changing world. Learning has no use if the knowledge is not retained. An example of failure in organizational memory is the Union carbide plant in Bhopal, India in 1984. Early in December morning, the plant leaked a deadly cloud of gas that settled over part of the sleeping city of a million residents. Within two hours 2000 of them were dead with thousands left injured? Part of the reason for the disaster was a loss in organizational memory. The plant had been slated for closure and many experienced staff had been transferred out, leaving minimal crew with little work experience, with the training for remaining crew at a minimum. The crisis was traced to staff reductions and oversight failures. Much of the blame for the tragedy rests with a rapid reduction in experienced staff that took with them a large share of organizational memory. Organizational memory comprises of, a) Acquiring knowledge, done by recognizing failures within the organization and by observing failures of similar organizations. b) Distributing knowledge is the key to organizational memory. Highly experienced employees will leave the organization and these people should be given an opportunity to share their knowledge around or those departing personnel will go along with their experience. ) Acting upon knowledge, is important for organizational memory to serve an organization. New employees need to learn from those departing ones.! New employees cannot do things their own way or else it will lead to repeat failures†¦.!!!! Employees have many opportunities to discard the hard-earned knowledge. Because organizational memory depends on exchanging information from one person to another perception change , mistreatment and stubbornness to learn can disrupt preserving organizational memory. Organizations need to learn and build from previous experiences. Unlearning: Effective organizational learning depends on an organizations ability to unlearn practices and policies that have become outdated by environmental changes. Example of Unlearning 1. Expanding Options: When organizations are unwilling to forego routine procedures during crisis or potential crisis situations, they lose the capacity to react to unique circumstances. Unlearning enables the organization to expand its options. 2. Contracting Options: In some cases, organizations may respond to a crisis with a strategy that has worked well in the past. In the current situation, however, the strategy from the past may actually make matters worse. In such cases, organizations must be willing to reject some strategies in favor of others. 3. Grafting: In the previous section, we discussed the need for organizations to hand down existing knowledge to new employees. If the socialization of new employees is so intense that they cannot bring new knowledge to the organization, however, the organization is doing itself a disservice. Although organizational memory is essential, some degree of unlearning Opportunity 1: Organizations should treat failure as an opportunity to recognize a potential crisis or to prevent a similar crisis in the future. Opportunity 2: Organizations can avoid crises by learning from the failures and crises of other organizations. Opportunity 3: Organizational training and planning should emphasize the preservation of previous learning in order to make organizational memory a priority. Opportunity 4: Organizations must be willing to unlearn outdated or ineffective procedures if they are to learn better crisis management strategies Bazerman, M. H. & Watkins, M. D. (2004). Predictable surprises: The disasters you should have seen coming and how to prevent them. Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Huber, G. P. (1996). Organizational learning: The contributing processes and the literatures. In M. D. Cohen & L. S. Sproull (Eds. ), Organizational learning (pp. 124-162). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Mitroff, I. I. , & Anagnos, G. (2001). Managing crises before they happen: What every executive and manager needs to know about crisis management. New York: AMACOM. Mittelstaedt, R. E. (2005). Will your next mistake be fatal? Avoiding the chain of mistakes that can destroy. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Wharton. Sitkin, S. B. (1996). Learning through failure: The strategy of small losses. In M. D. Cohen & L. S. Sproull (Eds. ), Organizational learning (pp. 541-578). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Tompkins, P. K. (2005). Apollo, Challenger, Columbia: The decline of the space program. Los Angeles: Roxbury. Organizations who face these failures potentially could damage their organizational integrity. It is important for an organization to identify these failures and act on them while the company is still in operation. Having a crisis management team to prepare, respond and recover from a crisis is paramount in ensuring that the organization recovers and continues. Preparation must happen before a crisis occurs. In times of crisis, organizations need to systematically analyze its errors, acknowledge the errors and limits of the organization as well as address the issue with a level of sophistication. When an organization continually fails to differentiate and neglect crisis and failures it could lead to detrimental problems for the organization. Failure/ Crisis Management Case Study 1 A hypothetical example would be the Deepwater Horizon oil spill (BP oil spill) that occurred in the Gulf of Mexico from 20 April 2010 to 15 July 2010. The estimated 185 million barrels of oil first made landfall in Louisiana. By June 2010, the tar balls and oil mousse had reached the shores of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. By August, it had smeared tourist beaches, washed onto the shorelines of sleepy coastal communities, oozed into the marshy bays that fishermen have worked for generations as well as killed millions of wildlife in the process. Instead of dealing with the failure in a professional way, BP inadvertently created a PR situation synonymous with herding cats. It’s had to fight to clear up two quagmires – its oil mess and its tarnished image. (Please Refer to Appendix- New York Times, Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill) In times of crisis or failure, it is important for an organization to understand the need for a comprehensive risk analysis. Should the failure be environmentally or socially threatening, impressions demonstrations of empathy and competence are vital. BP was not prepared to successfully deal with such a catastrophe. To minimize the damage, BP should have immediately accomplished five tasks: 1. Issue regular, frequent progress reports 2. Control the pictures (even some on the Web site appeared to be canned or generic) 3. Transparency 4. Display empathy as a concerned corporate entity comprised of authentic people diligently making a good-faith effort to solve the problem Failure/ Crisis Management Case Study 2 Failure, if properly attended to and rectified is a great plus. It gives the much needed confidence to the public, client or stakeholders in the product and organization. Furthermore, with proper management, the organization will be able to assess its capacity to deal with the systemic and circumstantial deficiencies leading to failures and work out a way forward. A great example would be the Johnson and Johnson Tylenol poisoning crisis in 1982. When the Tylenol scare occurred, Johnson and Johnson responded immediately and positively, taking the analgesic off the shelves, keeping the public apprised of the investigation, and their instituting new tamper-proof seals to make their product more secure. An organization needs to be upfront and out front with their communication about the situation and what they are doing to correct it and protect the public. The organization has to keep the public’s best interests at heart when communicating the issue effectively, clearly, accurately, and promptly upon discovering the problem. Having a crisis management plan in place before a crisis occurs puts an organization in a solid position to handle it more effectively and responsibly. Detecting failure, analyising failure, promoting experiementation? Deviance Inattention Lack of Ability Process Inadequacy Task Challenge Process Complexity Uncertainty Hypothesis Testing Exploratory Testing Blameworthy Praiseworthy Violating a prescribed practice or process by choice Straying away from specifications Does not possess the necessary qualifications or skills for the task Adhering to a prescribed but faulty or incomplete task Task too difficult to be executed reliably each time Process comprises of element breaks when encountering interactions Lack of clarity causes actions which seem reasonable but produces undesired results An experiment to prove and idea, fails Experiment to increase knowledge and understand possibilities leads to an unwanted result

Study Guide Mis 691 Chapter 2

Study Guide MIS 691 Midterm Chapter 2 2. 2 Entity: One theme or topic; something of importance to a user that needs to be represented in a database. In the entity-relationship model, entities are restricted to things that can be represented by a single table. An example of this is in the EMPLOYEE table; data about the entity (the employee) is in the table rows and data about the entity’s attributes are in the rows. 2. List the characteristics a table must have to be a relation: * Each row of the table holds data that pertain to some entity or a portion of some entity * Each column contains data of the attributes of the entity * The cells must hold a single value; no repeating elements * All of the entries in any column must be the same kind * Each column must have a unique name and the column order is unimportant * The order of the rows in unimportant * No two rows in the table may hold identical data values 2. 0 Define the term unique key and give an example: A key that defin es a unique row. An example of a unique key in the EMPLOYEE table is EmployeeNumber; the query of any EmployeeNumber (223 for example) will only produce a single row and data for one employee. 2. 11 Non-unique key: A key that potentially identifies more than one row. In the EMPLOYEE table from our book, Department is a non-unique key because it identifies several rows. 2. 12 Give an example of a relation with a unique composite key: A composite key contains two or more attributes.An example of a unique composite key in the EMPLOYEE table is if we combined LastName, FirstName, and Department as a key; these three attributes combined would insure that we would identify only one row. 2. 13 Explain the difference between a primary key and a candidate key: Candidate keys are keys that uniquely identify each row in a relation. They can be single or composite. The primary key is the candidate key that is chosen as the key that the DBMS will use to uniquely identify each row. 2. 5 What is a surrogate key and under what circumstances would you use one? A surrogate key is a column with a unique, DBMS-assigned identifier that has been added to a table to be the primary key. You would use a surrogate key when the primary key in the table is not ideal. You add a surrogate because it is short, numeric, and will never change – it is an ideal primary key. 2. 20 Define the term referential integrity restraint and give an example: A relationship constraint on foreign key values.A referential integrity constraint specifies that the values of a foreign key must be a proper subset of the values of the primary key to which it refers. In the EMPLOYEE table: the value of Department should match a value of DepartmentName in the DEPARTMENT table. 2. 21 Explain the three possible interpretations of a null value: 1. It could mean that no value is appropriate 2. It might mean that the value is known to be blank (intentionally left blank) 3. It may mean that the value is unknown 2. 4 Name the functional dependency and identify the determinants of: Area = Length x Width Area is functionally dependent upon Length and Width or that the composite of Length and Width are determinants of Area 2. 31 Describe the nature and purpose of the normalization process: Normalization is breaking up tables with more than one theme into sets of tables that have one theme each. You have to do this so that there isn’t repeat information in a table and so there are no modification or deletion issues.Normalization: Normalization is the process of breaking a table with one or more theme into a set of tables such that each only has one theme. You need to create a well-formed relation: 1. Every determinant must be a candidate key 2. Any relation that is not well-formed should be broken into two or more relations that are well-formed The Normalization Process: 1. Indentify all of the candidate keys 2. Indentify all of the functional dependencies 3. Examine the dereminants of the functional dependencies.If any determinant is not a candidate key, the relation is not well-formed. In this case: a. Place the columns of the functional dependency in a new relation of their own b. Make the determinant of the functional dependacy the primary key of the new relation c. Leave a copy of the determinat as a foreign key in the original relation d. Create a referential integrity constraint between the orginal and the new relation. 4. Repeat step 3 until every key is a candidate key