Construction Contract Administration and Law Essay

Construction Contract Administration and Law - Essay Example If time is made as an essence of contract, and if the contractor fails to complete the word within the timeframe stipulated in the contract, that itself is a breach of the terms of contract and is actionable. In JCT contract time is considered as a major component. (http://www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/qbs_code_of_practice_26.10.04.doc) The University, if it finds that the present contractor will not be able to fulfill his part of agreement as agreed within time can appoint another contractor after notice as to termination of contract and can seek legal proceedings for damages. The reliance on bad weather for non-completion of work within time is unsustainable and against law. Bad or Good weather conditions shall not and will not be a ground or excuse for going back from the terms of agreements or for seeking extension of time. If the situation complained is something, which a normal human person would expect to exist at the given time, the same cannot even be heard for a moment. Of course the contact and its clauses and its fulfillment can be affected due to acts of viz. major but weather condition cannot at any rate be considered as an input for extending time. The university is not at all bound to adhere to such a request as it is ill founded and unsustainable. As it transpires the subst... Bad or Good weather conditions shall not and will not be a ground or excuse for going back from the terms of agreements or for seeking extension of time. If the situation complained is something, which a normal human person would expect to exist at the given time, the same cannot even be heard for a moment. Of course the contact and its clauses and its fulfillment can be affected due to acts of viz. major but weather condition cannot at any rate be considered as an input for extending time. The university is not at all bound to adhere to such a request as it is ill founded and unsustainable. (Kim Franklin, Delay Claims, "Remember that Time is Money" http://www.crownofficechambers.com/downloads/114.pdf) As it transpires the substructure has just completed, and as per the agreement the it is high time to step into a later part of the construction. The same itself is a shortcoming from the part of contractor. He cannot seek the help of any ground problem so as to wriggle out from the liability and to say that it is a fit case for extension of time. Law does not permit to entertain such a feeble claim to be entertained, and deserves to be nipped down at the very instance of advancement of such an argument. (http://www.jctltd.co.uk/stylesheet.aspfile=20112006105255) The drawings of superstructure etc are an area over which the University is having no say at all. It is the bounden duty of the Contractor to see that he is armed with all the requisites to function smoothly. The University is only duty bound to disburse amounts as and when the agreement demands. The Contractor cannot escape from liability by resorting to such a lame excuse. It can also never be a good ground for

Price Determination in Market Forces of Demand and Supply

Price Determination in Market Forces of Demand and Supply Introduction It is inevitable that world prices of commodities are increasing substantially. The increase of commodity prices does not only affect producers and consumers, but also governments. Around the world, governments face renewed pressure to reform their budgeting processes, including Malaysia. Malaysia has a well-established infrastructure and is one of the most economically advanced countries in South Asia. This essay is opted to discuss the rational of price hikes and its impacts to the cost of living particularly in the Malaysian context as well as providing the blueprint for Malaysian government in bracing the price hikes. 2.0 Do Oil Price Increases Cause Higher Other Commodity Prices? Current commodity price hikes are not only affecting the Malaysian economy and society, but also affecting the whole world. According to OECD Economics Department Policy Notes, commodity prices have risen considerably since mid-2010. The rational of price hikes is due to the price hikes of world’s primary sources like crude oil, food, steel, wheat and such. Oil is one of the world’s basic necessities and the backbone of most countries, especially developing countries, as some developed countries do have renewable resources as alternatives in their productions of commodities. OECD Economics Department Policy Notes states that higher energy prices have contributed to rising food prices, because energy accounts for over one-third of the cost of grain production. 2.1 Scarcity of Oil as One of the Important Natural Resources This is further encouraged by the scarcity of natural resources and raw materials. It is expected that world supply and production of oil are falling into depletion. This problem is commonly referred to as â€Å"peak oil†, where the production of oil reaches a maximum and will subsequently begin to decline until full depletion is ultimately reached. According to Hassan (2010), it is expected that the world’s oil supply will be completely diminished by 2025. Prices are Set by Both International and Local Market Factors Commodity prices are largely determined by international market powers within regional basis at most of the time. This shows that commodity prices are in-part out of government’s control in most countries around the world including Malaysia. 3.1 Mixed Economy in Malaysia Malaysia is practicing a mixed economic system and not exempted by international price changes. The economic activities in Malaysia are carried out by entrepreneurs in the production activities of goods and services as well as by the government that provides public goods and services to Malaysian citizens in terms of education, transportation, health and others. Based on Price Control Act 1961, Malaysian government is controlling only seven types of goods—white refined sugar, petrol, diesel, liquid petroleum gas, flour, cooking oil, and facemask (as illustrated in table 1). According to Ministry of Domestic Trade, Co-operatives and Consumerism, Malaysian government previously controlled other five goods which are steel (price control was repealed on 12 May 2008), chicken (price control was repealed on 12 May 2008), cement (price control was repealed on 5 June 2008), sweetened condensed milk (price control was repealed on 1 April 2009) and white bread (price control was repeale d on 1 Jan 2010). Table 1: List of Controlled Goods Source: Ministry of Domestic Trade, Co-operatives and Consumerism (MDTCC) Commodity Price Increases in Malaysia According to Datuk Dr. Wee Ka Siong, Ayer Hitam MP and MCA Deputy President, 2014 is seen as a tough year for Malaysians as the prices hikes, including the impending ones that impacting the middle-income earners and below (Foong, 2014). The price hikes are assumed as one of the impacts of the Malaysian government’s rationalisation exercise of fuel subsidies and the electricity tariff in the effort of reducing the nation’s economic burden. 4.1 Reducing Nation’s Economic Burden The Malaysia’s federal government is in a bad state because it is spending more than it earns, causing a persistent budget deficit. Malaysia’s debt-to-GDP ratio is higher than officials would like. With the exception of India, that deficit burden is the highest among the Non-Japan Asian economies (KPMG, 2011). According to Deputy of Ministry of Finance Datuk Ahmad Maslan, at the end of June 2013, the federal government owed tax of RM 284.7 billion, which is 28.8% of Malaysian GDP (Bernama, 2013). Until September 30, 2013, the shortfall is funded by the federal government incurring more debt, which was in total of RM529.2 billion or 53.6% of GDP (Bernama, 2013). 4.2 Subsidy Removal According to Shanmugam, â€Å"In Malaysia, the electricity tariff, food prices and toll rates on urban highways are all going up in 2014 as the government cuts subsidies and reigns in its operating expenditure†. Scrapping energy subsidies has become a target for government austerity measures over the past years. In complying with the latest budget, Malaysia has recently cut its annual subsidy on petrol and electricity (The Economist, 2014). Malaysia slashed its petrol subsidies by 20 cents a litre and by 20 to 80 cents on diesel (BBC News, 2013). This is the first time in more than two years that Malaysia cuts fuel subsidies as it tries to reduce its budget deficit. On the other hand, the electricity tariff in Malaysia is increased by an average of about 14.89% for Peninsular Malaysia, and by about 17% for Sabah and Labuan starting January 1st, 2014 as shown in Table 2 (Shagar, 2013). This is in line with the Government’s effort towards gradually reducing energy subsidi es to industries through the Subsidy Rationalisation Program. Table 2: The table on implications of the revised rate on domestic users Impacts of price hikes to Malaysian cost of living It is pretty clear that the cost of living in Malaysia is going to rise substantially as we stepped into 2014. According to Alliance Financial Group Bhd. and Malaysian Rating Corp., the 14 percent increase in sugar cost starting in October 2013 and 11 percent increase of petrol in September 2014 as well as 15 percent increase of electricity in January 2014 could inhibit private consumption growth by 0.9 percentage point in 2014 (Chong, 2014). Chong (2014) anticipates that Malaysia’s middle class is harshly hit by the price increases with elevated household borrowings as slower pay increase than the lower-income earners. According to Wan Saiful Wan Jan, the chief officer at the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs, with as little as RM 3,000 salary per month, the middle-income earners or the ‘Sandwich Class’ is not benefitting as much as other higher and lower classes from the government income tax cuts (Chong, 2014). Despite the increase cost of living, the Malaysian Employers Federation estimates that there will be lower salary increases as well as bonuses in the private sector in 2014, where executives will get a 5.63 percent average increase in salaries and non-executives will get a 5.65 percent raise as the results of an MEF survey of 257 companies (Choong, 2014). The producers are the ones that expected to gain much of the price hikes, especially for those who take advantage by their hidden charges through overprice selling of goods on consumers. However, Ministry of Domestic Trade, Co-operatives and Consumerism Ministry is taking serious actions to protect consumers’ rights. Figure 1: Food Prices Comparison between 2013 and 2014 Source: Utusan Online—3 January 2014 How do Malaysian government brace such increases in commodity prices? In many ways, Malaysia has been an early adopter of important financial reform programs. According to Shanmugam, the opposition has claimed that corruption and wastage are the main reasons the government is not able to spend within its means, thus increasing its spending that leads to high debt. Nevertheless, the technocrats in the Cabinet, Dato’ Seri Idris Jala and Dato’ Seri Abdul Wahid Omar say that Dato’ Seri Najib Razak’s administration has spelt out clear measures to tackle leakages in government spending and end corrupt practices. 6.1 Long-Term Agreement One of the ways that is taken by the Malaysian government in bracing the price increases is by having agreement with the resources supplying countries. For example, the government is able to control sugar price because of its long-term agreement with Brazil in supplying raw sugar to Malaysia. Nevertheless, sugar is pressured by price hikes due to the usage of sugar canes as primary supplier of raw sugar in biofuel (Department of Information, 2008). This causes sugar canes for the use of biofuel having high demand in the world market. Outcome-Based Budgeting The government has also introduced the Outcome-Based Budgeting (OBB) which is also known as Performance-Based Budgeting in Budget 2014 as a way to allocate resources based on achieving agreed upon objectives, program goals and measured results. This will help in improving the implementation of efficiencies, reducing redundancy and systematically evaluate the performance of all ministries. Furthermore, according to Dato’ Seri Abdul Wahid, the government is now more focusing on public-private partnerships, where the private sector implements the projects and end-users pay for it. He said that â€Å"there will be less emphasis on private finance initiatives (FPI) where the government has to pay annual lease payments, which contribute to a growing operating budget† (Shanmugam, 2013). Goods and Services Tax Goods and Services Tax (GST) is a broad based consumption tax which will generally be applicable on all goods and services, where consumers pay only on what they consume. Any registered business that charges GST can offset the GST it pays against the tax it collects before forwarding the balance to the government, so that the tax is ensured to be imposed only once. This is called as an â€Å"input tax credit mechanism†, where businesses are able to operate without tax cost and the final 6% tax is borne by the end consumer (Kumaran and Simpson, 2013). However, basic goods such as unprocessed meat, cooking oil, and sugar as well as public services like education, healthcare, tolls, financial services and life insurance will be exempt from GST (Kumaran and Simpson, 2013). This will help Malaysians in curbing their expenses with the increasing living cost. Furthermore, under the Price Control and Anti-Profiteering Act 2010, it is illegal for businesses to increase prices by 4% across the board with the introduction of GST (Kumaran and Simpson, 2013). Pricing decisions by businesses are also obliged to be justifiable or else stringent penalties will be taken by domestic trade cooperatives and consumerism ministry. In brief, instead of making everything more expensive in addition to international price hikes, GST is going to help Malaysians by providing a more transparent, streamlined and fairer tax based on our consumption patterns (Kumaran and Simpson, 2013). Conclusion In conclusion, despite the drawbacks of price hike to the cost of living particularly in the Malaysian context, price hikes are seen as a good cause in reducing the government’s burden. The government does need to reduce its fiscal deficit for the long term economic wellbeing. Therefore, cuts in government subsidies executed by the Malaysian government are viewed as a rational approach. Based on the blueprint discussed in this essay, it shows that the government also has proposed some measures to curb the impacts of price hikes to consumers. The government and its people are supposed to be partners in their shared journey of development and progress, thus both parties have to play their parts in fiscal consolidation. References BBC News. (2013, September 3). BBC NEWS BUSINESS. Retrieved from BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23926411 Bernama. (2013, November 25). Hutang negara RM284.7b pada akhir Jun tahun ini, lapor Kementerian Kewangan. Retrieved from The Malaysian Insider: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/bahasa/article/hutang-negara-rm284.7b-pada-akhir-jun-tahun-ini-lapor-kementerian-kewangan Chong, P. K. (2014, January 7th). Malaysians Seen Curbing Spending as Living Costs Surge: Economy. Retrieved from Bloomberg News: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-07/malaysians-seen-curbing-spending-as-living-costs-surge-economy.html Choong, P. (2014, January 7). Malaysians Seen Curbing Spending as Living Costs Surge: Economy. Bloomberg News. Malaysia: Bloomberg L.P. Department of Information. (2008). Clarification on Subsidies and Price Increases of Goods and Services. Kuala Lumpur: Perkasa Nilam Sdn. Bhd. Foong, P. (2014, January 6). Malaysian Politics 2014: Tough explaining price hikes to people, says Dr Wee. Retrieved from The Star Online: http://www.thestar.com.my/News/Nation/2014/01/06/Malaysian-politics-2014-Wee-Ka-Siong-MCA-Barisan-Nasional/ Hassan, M. (2010, July 19). Bersediakah kita menuju negara hijau? Retrieved from Utusan Online: http://www.utusan.com.my/utusan/info.asp?y=2010dt=0719pub=Utusan_Malaysiasec=Rencanapg=re_06.htm KPDNKK. (2014, January 10). Price List of Controlled Items. Retrieved from Offical Portal of Ministry of Domestic Trade, Co-operatives and Consumerism: http://www.kpdnkk.gov.my/en/pengguna/penguatkuasaan/brg-kawalan/harga-brg-kawalan KPMG. (2011, September). Outcome-based Budgeting: A Six Nation Study. Making the Transition. KPMG International Cooperative. Kumaran, R., Simpson, T. (2013, October 21). Real impact of GST on cost of living. Retrieved from The Star Online: http://www.thestar.com.my/Business/Business-News/2013/10/21/Real-impact-of-GST-on-cost-of-living-It-helps-change-the-way-we-pay-tax-provides-more-transparent-s.aspx/ Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. (2011). The Effects of Oil Price Hikes on Economic Activity and Inflation. Economics Department Policy Note No. 4. OECD. Shagar, L. K. (2013, December 2). Electricity tariff up by average 15% from Jan 1. The Star. Malaysia: Star Publications (M) Bhd. Shanmugam, M. (2013, December 23). Shake-up in the economy. Malaysia: The Edge Malaysia Weekly. Star Publications (M) Bhd. (2014, January 21). Traders to pay for steep prices. Retrieved from The Star Online: http://www.thestar.com.my/News/Nation/2014/01/21/Traders-to-pay-for-steep-prices-Shop-owners-will-be-taken-to-court-if-they-violate-regulation/ Tenaga Nasional Berhad. (2014). Tariff Rates. Retrieved from Tenaga Nasional: http://www.tnb.com.my/residential/pricing-and-tariff/tariff-rates.html The Economist. (2014, Jan 11th). Fuelling controversy. The $9 Trillion Sale (Almost) Everything Must Go! The Economist Newspaper Limited. The copyright of Nur Nisrin Alina Abdul Aziz (MBA Services Management, UniRazak)Page 1

Is equality for all a realistic and desirable aim within society? :: essays research papers

Equality exists in many contexts. It can exist in the political level; individuals have the same rights under the law. It can exist in a social level, between categories of people, for example gender, or race. It can even exist on an individual level, as to how each person is treated. Equality cannot be confined to simply equal opportunities for all; for an equal and fair process is still equality. An equal and fair result is also equality. At each of the different level, equality shifts from being realistic or being desirable, sometimes both, or sometimes neither. Modern societies often take for granted that social quality is desirable. Democratic values mean people from all backgrounds should be given an equal say to affect decisions in the country. All individuals should be given the equal right to education, and a chance at success in life. While this is amiable, one must consider if such a notion is in fact a realistic one. There is only so much that society can do to ensure equality. Taking a case of two boys, Tom and Jerry. Tom is from a respectable multibillion-dollar company owning family. Jerry on the other hand lives alone with his single mother along the streets. Assuming the every effort of equality, both Jerry and Tom are offered places in the same college. Upon entry to the college, Tom is instantly the popular guy with the hippest clothes and accessories, while Jerry is ostracized for his faded wear. The situation is simply not equitable. Tom comes from a ‘normal’ family and has potentially the love of both parents. Jerry has had to come to terms with only one parent. Hence in terms of psychological development, they are not equal. There are too many factors, too complicated to be realistically resolved within society’s reach. It is thus, unrealistic for society to aim to ensure equal chance at success for people. Society may also aim to provide equal opportunities for people. This could be done through education, hence the rich and the poor will both be admitted on grounds of meritocracy; if they do equally well they should have equal chances at the same job. However this is not always the case. Tom’s parents may have connections, which obviously Jerry’s mother would not have, giving him an edge in finding a job. His upbringing in a family business, may instil a keen eye for business in him, again giving him an edge over Jerry.

Reading for Pleasure Can Be Better Develped in Imagination and Language Sklls Than Watching Tv

Today, I will talk about an ancient city of China—Langzhong. My purpose in giving this presentation is to show you detailed geographic features of Langzhong, and recommend this famous place to you for travelling, so this presentation will have two parts, that is geography and tourism. Different from big modern cities, ancient cities can offer tourists an incredible variety of special sights and activities. This city is often referred to as a famous historical town. It’s one of the best preserved ancient towns in China. Langzhong city is a 2300-year-old city located in Nanchong, Sichuan Province.It is located in the north-east of the Sichuan basin and the middle reach of the Jialing River. The city is known as the wonderland of Sichuan. In terms of the geography of Langzhong, it is best to imagine the area as a main center surrounded by countless mountains and rivers with the northern part is higher than the southern part. Langzhong has plenty of natural resources such a s water resources, mineral resources and open space. Langzhong’s numerous rivers also ensure that our whole country has a major source of hydroelectric power. The government is also reclaiming these open spaces to improve agriculture.What’s more, Langzhong is rich in oil, gas, and gold. When people refer to Langzhong, they always talk about its long history. It was given the title of the best preserved ancient city around the world by the United Nations. As a travelling destination, Langzhong has something to offer almost every visitor. The first place that gives me a deep impression is Huaguang Tower. Huaguang Tower is also named Southern Tower or Zhenjiang Tower. It was first built in the Tang Dynasty, but it suffered several fires and was rebuilt repeatedly by past dynasties.The existing tower was renovated in the sixth year of the Tongzhi period of the Qing Dynasty. The base of the tower is 5 meters high and the total height is 25. 5 meters. With a three-layered ro of, the tower seems tall and straight as well as elegant and delicate. It has unique architectural features of the Tang Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty, winning the reputation of â€Å" the number one tower of Langyuan Garden†. In addition, few Langzhong sites are as impressive as the pavilion of Prince Teng, you can climb the pavilion to see the whole scenery of Langzhong City.The famous Chinese poet DuFu wrote an essay to praise this tower’s elegance and uniqueness highly–â€Å"The mountain is cloud-kissing, and people ascend it to enjoy a distant view. † If you want to know a lot about Chinese history and you are interested in the Han Dynasty, you can’t miss the chance to visit the Temple of Zhangfei. This temple has a history of 1700 years. It is well-known for its striking architecture, beautiful calligraphy, exhibition, and long history. Langzhong city is also famous for its examination hall.This hall was a special place for the imperial competi tive examination, which selected the most talented people and sent them to the emperor. Langzhong was called the town of number one scholars because it had so many geniuses who made great contribution to the entire world. What’s more, my favorites are the ancient streets and ancient houses. The preservation of the ancient city is a precious legacy for our whole world. Historians can learn a lot from this city. As for me, when I walked into the city, I simply wanted to spend a whole day strolling along the streets with my best friends.You can also take a boat to enjoy the scenery of Langzhong city along the Jialing River. This city is more peaceful than Lijing ancient city. Another thing the city has to offer is its excellent food. You can have a barbecue at night and drink specially-made plum wine or a beverage made of vinegar, both of which are delicious. The chafing dish has local features that are totally different from what I have ever eaten. That’s why I really wa nt to recommend it to you. There are some Langzhong’s tourist attractions, now, I want to talk about my trip to Langzhong. On that trip, I travelled with five friends.It was the first time that we took a trip without parents. We had to arrange everything in advance, but to be honest, it was hard to depend on ourselves completely. Nevertheless, I still enjoyed the trip and had great fun with my friends. We could visit any place we are interested in without a touring party. I think you can imagine how free we felt. In fact, I was not very close with two of those guys. Although we were classmates in middle school, we lost contact with each other after we graduated. After those five days, we had already become close friends and talked all the time.Yes, this trip was an valuable experience for me. Because of it, I understand it is difficult but important to be independent, I find it is so good to have such kind friends and I have fallen in love with this ancient city. It was just a five day long trip, but it becomes an precious part of my life. I know I will cherish it forever. That’s my speech. I hope everyone has learned something about Langzhong ancient city from it. If you want to experience the atmosphere of ancient China with your best friends, Langzhong is the place to do it! Thank you for your time.

Jungian Psychological Profiles in Glenngarry

Glengarry Glen Ross: A Jungian Perspective David Mamet wrote the play â€Å"Glengarry Glen Ross† as a look into the world of sales. As with most of his work, capitalism and its effect on the actors is a major theme. Stories as they are written have characters that have different roles based on their personalities and behaviors. This assignment of roles is something that has spanned the history of literary works. Carl Jung, Swiss  psychiatrist and the founder of  analytical psychology explained these roles people assume and their meaning.The term he used to refer to these character descriptions is called archetypes. All of the characters in the play have problems. Most of these are based in personality flaws and a lack of moral character. When looking at the characters of this play we see definite archetypes in their personalities. What is it that makes each character act the way they do, is there a common thread or archetype, and does Mamet speak to a greater problem by us ing Jungian archetypes? Is Mamet’s discourse on the effects of the sales office on people a discourse on the effects of capitalism on the society we live in now?There are 5 main characters in this play who work in the sales office; Shelly â€Å"the Machine† Levene, Ricky Roma, John Williamson, Dave Moss, and George Aaronow. Each of these characters has flaws in their character. Through careful examination of each character we can assign Jungian archetypes; to do this though we must understand archetypes. Archetypes are models or types of people, their personalities and their behaviors. But what is the definition of an archetype?Carl Jung said â€Å"The archetype is a symbolical formula, which always begins to function whenever there are no conscious ideas present, or when such as are present are impossible upon intrinsic or extrinsic grounds. The contents of the collective unconscious are represented in consciousness in the form of pronounced tendencies, or definite w ays of looking at things. (Jung 33)† These pronounced tendencies are the underlying motivation for each character in the play. We can see how each of these makes conscious and unconscious decisions that are reflective of each person’s assigned archetype.Looking at the characters we see the author has assigned them archetypes (consciously or unconsciously). In the opening act of the play we see Levene and Williamson sitting in a Chinese restaurant where Levene is begging for fresh leads. He lauds of past successes, and even tells Williamson to talk to Mitch and Murray (the owners of the office) about his mastery of sales. In this character we are beginning to see desperation. At the end of the month the two sales people with the lowest sales are going to get fired. He knows that if he does not sell he is doomed. He only gets old leads from Williamson.The new fresh leads will not be released to the salesmen until after the promotion. This is a classic vicious cycle. He ca nnot sell to the old leads because they are deadbeats and will not get the new ones; the ones who will buy, until he does. He is propositioned by another co-worker to break into the office to steal the new leads. He does this and tells the other co-worker he will keep quiet about the whole ordeal. In the end he cannot keep his mouth shut and cracks when he inadvertently discloses a brief fact that only the burglar would know to Williamson who picks up on this slip up immediately.Looking at Jungian archetypes with the Levene character we see three archetypes emerge: The Scapegoat, The Persona and The Shadow. Combined these play an intricate part in why Levene does what he does. The shadow archetype is best described as that â€Å"which personifies (sic) everything the subject does not wish to face in himself† (Jung 275) or the dark side of our nature. (Jung 85) In Levene we see a man who does not want to look at the darkness inside; the darkness that would have him trying to b ribe his boss for fresh leads, burglarize the office, or snitch on the co-worker who developed the plan in the first place.When he is found out as the burglar he panics. This is the animalistic part of the shadow; the resorting to primal instincts. He tries to bargain with Williamson. He offers a percentage of all future sales to him. When these do not work he resigns himself to the consequences. Coupled with the shadow we see Levene exemplify the persona. This archetype is described as a â€Å"symbol of the protective cover or mask. † (Jung 287) Levene acts in a manner while on the in the office with a co-workers client that is a full flight from reality. He acts like he is a vice president of American Express and travels the world.This is a ruse he jumps into with no preparation and pulls it off beautifully. This mask he uses whether to deceive his clients, himself, or others, is his persona. It is dishonest from its onset. This core dishonesty is how the shadow archetype i s manifesting in his psyche. Just like the vicious cycle with the leads here we see the cycle of his dishonesty in every aspect of his work life being transmitted into the shadow archetype, his subconscious now makes instinctual decisions from a negative jumping off place. The more he participates in this pattern the deeper the pathology sets in him.To round out this character we can apply the scapegoat archetype. The scapegoat archetype is defined as â€Å"the one who gets blamed for everything, regardless of whether he or she is actually at fault. † (Essortment) Sure he is to blame for the break in but he was not the first choice to do it. Aaronow was asked first but he decided he could not do it so Levene was asked. In the end Levene snitches on Moss for being the instigator. Levene was asked to do the burglary because if he was caught he would take the blame by himself. He was singled out for the archetype that fit him best.Every office needs a scapegoat and being the old est and least productive he subconsciously plays the role to a tee. Here where everything comes together, a desperate man, making base decisions from a negative subconscious, led by a persona steeped in dishonesty, who knows that he puts himself at risk of either getting fired for not selling or getting arrested for the break in, who is manipulated by the others in his workplace, and trying desperately hold on to an self-image long gone. Mamet is hinting that these factors are not something unique in a sales office or in capitalistic western society as a whole.This is why the character is so relatable. John Williamson is the office manager. He is not a salesman. He works for the owners and his job it to â€Å"marshal those leads. † (Mamet) He is a company man and his pay is not based on commission. He takes his orders from the owners. He has no sympathy for any of the salesmen in the office. He takes a constant barrage of crap from each of them every day. He does not have to sell in the field and that alienates him from the rest of the characters. In the opening scene we see Levene trying to get extra leads form him.When Levene offers money he is quick to say yes, but he wants all of the money right then. Levene says he will have the full sum the next day. Williamson reacts coldly, almost emotionless, to Levene’s pleas for leads. He is quick to betray his ethics for material gain. The first archetype for Williamson is the shadow. He is quick, almost instantly ready to betray his conscious to see the leads to Levene. He also has no compassion; that dark place that is the result of phenomenon in Williamson’s life that has jaded him. Understandably, in this office setting it would be hard to be compassionate seeing the way he is treated.But he should maintain his professionalism buy not entertaining the request from Levene. This is where the archetype of the scapegoat enters. Near the end of the play Williamson inadvertently blows one of Roma ’s deals thinking he is helping. He does not know the cardinal rule of a sales office; do not talk unless you know what is going on. As stated earlier, Williamson is blamed for all the problems in the office. Levene blames John for the lack of good leads; Roma blames him for blowing out his deal, so this makes him an easy target.Since he is not a salesman he is not considered one of the boys. He is an outsider. And anyone can relate to an outsider being a scapegoat. John also unknowingly reinforces Levene’s persona archetype buy feeding his superiority complex with simple rookie mistakes. It would seem that there is a contention between Levene and Williamson on who actually is the scapegoat. This would explain why in the end when Levene asked why he is turning him in he says â€Å"Because I don't like you. (Mamet)† His shadow archetype returns for justice. Mamet gives another nod to the problem with capitalism.That a person has to whatever it takes to be success ful in the business world. Whether it is betraying your own personal ethics, your relationships with other people, or obligations to employers, nothing can stand in the way of someone trying to make it in business. The next character is George Aaronow. He is in the same situation as Levene. He needs a sale before the end of the month or else he will be fired. Like Levene he has had a bad run when it comes to sales. Where Levene’s inflated ego is unwarranted, Aaronnow’s ego is deflated. He has practically given up on the world of sales.He listens to Moss’s rant on why the leads are garbage and agrees with everything he is saying. He desperately wants a reason other than himself for his problems. His character is not aggressive like the others. He has a meekness that is a liability in the office. He is metaphorically swimming in a shark tank and they see him as bait. He is originally propositioned to do the break in by Moss. Moss sees him as a perfect partner; a p erson who would not do something akin to a break in. He also has nothing real to say in the play. He constantly repeats whet others say as to agree.His lack of substance is deliberate. If he were more complex and aggressive he would not be in the situation he is in right now. This is the antithesis of the Levene character. He has no persona. No mask to hide behind. No sense of entitlement. He also has no courage as seen by his backing out of the plan to steal the leads. This explains why people see him as the perfect scapegoat. His shadow archetype is one based in resentment, and fear. He does not want to look at why he is failing. It is easy for him to jump on the bandwagon to blame Williamson.Aaronow is the perfect example of what is wrong with capitalism. He works hard for years only to have his spirit broken by an economic model that sees him as disposable. This lack of importance within the workplace or in his life as a whole is not seen as something to be investigated because it is a negative; in fact it is seen as the price of doing business. These are high prices for a man to pay in the premier years of his life. Dave Moss is very angry man. He has a level of anger that stays constant throughout the play. He is a predator in the shark tank.He knows nobody is going to help achieve anything in the office. He finds people who agree with his perception of why things are the way they are in the office. He uses his persona to manipulate people into doing things they normally would not do; things that betray their inner subconscious. He uses the skills that he learned on the streets selling to sell people around him on the idea that he is right about everything. They just have not become as angry about it as he has. He tries to use his skills to convince Aaronow that he should be just as angry as he is.His persona is based on resentment and frustration. This attitude keeps everyone at bay. It also shows him as a leader in the office. He probably will get the steak knives. He has several plans in his mind about his future and they are not with the firm. He knows that if he gets the leads and sells them to a rival office he will profit financially not just from the initial purchase of those leads, but he will have a job at the firm where he can schedule and close those leads. It is a win-win situation or him. He does not care about anyone but himself.His shadow is so deeply rooted in dishonesty he cannot even see it. This is his natural state. His consciousness has no compassion for anyone and it preys on the weak. His resentment filled subconscious feeds his conscious with self-hatred. Here we are again with the vicious cycle of a negative subconscious feeding an ego problem in turn cementing a negative subconscious. This has a poisoning effect on the people around him. His sarcasm is a telltale sign of his frustration. This is shown to be a hindrance to anyone trying to be successful and a precursor to further problems down the road. Ca labrese, 461) Moss is a prime example of what happens to misguided but motivated people within a capitalistic society. They revert to the animalistic shadow archetype at the expense of their own temperament. At what lengths exactly would Moss go to be successful? Manipulation, anger, frustration, deception, and theft are just some of the ways. These are the tools of the modern capitalist. A man must be willing to go to any lengths to reach his goal. Anything that gets in the way is collateral damage. Ricky Roma is the sales leader at the time of the promotion in the office.His arrogance shows in the way he talks to clients. It is reflective of someone successful on the backs of others. His interactions with the rest of the salespeople are distant and peppered with sarcasm. He has an inflated ego that is a direct result of his consistency in the sales room. He also berates Williamson for his inexperience in the field. He is the proverbial big shark in the tank. The rest of the salesm en resent him for his success. His shadow emerges when Lingk comes to the office to cancel his contract, the contract that put him on top of the sales contest.He instantly and instinctively creates an elaborate fraudulent ruse with the help of Levene to make Lingk think he made the right decision. Roma’s fears are now controlling his every move. Consciously he is trying to protect his prize, the Cadillac. Subconsciously he is maintaining his leadership role in the office. If he is seen as anything other than a producer he is weak. His shadow would never allow him to be weak. Therefore it is his persona that takes over. He puts out this larger than life attitude that he hopes will command respect.He hopes this mask will cover his fears. This flamboyant persona making base decisions out of subconscious fears only heighten his need to reinforce the persona. The vicious cycle returns. We see people like Roma all the time in capitalist societies. Whether it is Donald Trump, Mark C uban, or Sean Combs, we see a braggadocio that is consistent with a person with a superiority complex. These types of people are catapulted to the top of their chosen fields. These are the heads of companies, the decision makers, the capitalists as tableau.When looking at the people in the workplace we see a phenomenon that has occurred for millennia now; men acting out in social situations around other men to become dominant. In the caveman times the biggest and the strongest warriors who got the women, they ate better, and people venerated them with myths of the conquests. In modern times we this transition of men from being the warriors of the battlefield needing strength and battle skills to become the things legends are made of, to hyper intelligent men with business prowess and social savvy who wheel and deal, have trophy wives, and frolic in the â€Å"spoils of war†.But today we have more than just survival instincts motivating men; we have complex egos, varying degree s of psychological pathology, and a host of psychosocial problems arising from past phenomenon I their lives. â€Å"The collective unconscious, Jung claimed, contains primordial images and ideas that have emotions and symbolism â€Å"attached†. These images and ideas become manifest in fantasies, dreams, myths, and emotional responses to the world around us. † (Carr). This would explain why these men behave in the same way as the men of histories past.These actions are primordial in nature, as is the archetypes they personify. If all the characters had the same success that Roma had they would all be acting like king of the roost. Unfortunately in the play this is not the case, and would not make for much of a story either. All of these men participate in a behavior called repression. Each is stuffing down something about themselves they do not want to look at that is the breeding ground for their ego problems. â€Å"The repressed fear of the emotions becomes projecte d outward onto others.Emotional ties and bonds embedded in employee/work relationships are experienced as a loss of control and invitation toward chaos. The solution derived within such a system results in the imposition of more structure and control coupled with even more intensities of emotional denial. Dominance, individual obsessive control, and power form the overt behaviors of managers arising from the unconscious and are reflected and rationalized as the norms of organizational culture. † (Figler and Hanlon) Here we see why it is not uncommon to see these characters develop the way they do.This is the â€Å"norm† in business especially within a capitalistic society. There is an underlying common subconscious in men, one that has plagued them for centuries; their incessant need to be dominant within a social setting. This has evolved over time from a survival instinct into an economic paradigm. There have been several responses to this type of economic system, fro m communism to isolationism (forced and unforced). In this play David Mamet is exposing what capitalism really does to men. It puts them at odds with their own ethical beliefs, creates unwarranted ego complexes, and instills deep rooted psychological disorders.Mamet stated in the program notes that â€Å"American capitalism comes down to one thing [†¦ ] The operative axiom is ‘Hurrah for me and fuck you. Anything else is a lie. † (Boon) When we look at how this type of attitude early on affects people we see â€Å"this false self development, (sic) which is initially adaptive and maximizes gratifications, may become maladaptive by over-emphasis. If the early environment presents many adaptation failures, then deceptive strength will be given to the emerging false self, which then becomes the basis for later social relationships to the exclusion of the real self. (Hudson) All of these characters have problems due to over-emphasis of their subconscious shadow archet ype feeding a false persona which in turns deepens the pathology of the shadow archetype. As most people will tell you, these characters are commonplace in the workplace in western capitalistic models of business. Mamet shines a light onto this dark world that American business has evolved into. From seedy characters with dynamic psychological pathologies to a broad statement on capitalism as a whole Mamet only resents to the audience exactly what he sees in business; a vicious cycle of pain, frustration, and alienation. Works Cited Boon, Kevin Alexander. â€Å"Ethics and Capitalism in teh Screenplays of David Mamet. † Literature Film Quarterly 39. 3 (2011): 180. Web. Carr, Adrain. â€Å"Jung, Archetypes and Mirroring in Orginizational Change Management. † Journal of Orginizational Change Management 15. 5 (2002): 478. Web. 21 April 2012. Essortment. http://www. essortment. com/understanding-literary-archetypes-61301. html. n. d. Web. 24 April 2012. Figler, Robert and S usan Hanlon. Management Development and the Unconscious From an Analytical Psychology Framework. † Journal of Management Development (2008): 616. Web. 20 April 2012. Hudson, Wayne. â€Å"Persona and Defence Mechanisms. † Journal of Analytical Psychology (1978): 56. Web. 27 April 2012. Jung, Carl G. â€Å"Man and HIs Symbols. † Jung, Carl G. Man and His Symbols. New York City: Bantam Doubleday Dell, 1964. 85. Print. Mamet, David. â€Å"Glengarry Glen Ross. † The Norton Anthology of American Literature. New York City: W. W. Norton & Company Inc. , 2007. 3044. Print.

Defining Marketing

Defining Marketing Free Online Research Papers In today’s business world, marketing is an effective tool in order for businesses to succeed in retail development for customers. To understand marketing, the perception of its definition is very important. People see marking from different points of view forgetting some of the most fundamental functions. Marketing is more than just buying or selling. Here are three marketing definitions from different prospective: As a personal definition, marketing is the heart of a business. Marketing is responsible to accommodate the customer needs by adjusting products or services. Some of these adjustments are such as prices, hours, product quality, product quantity, custom made product, or special service. A good example of marketing is taking place at Pacific Hospital of Long Beach. The marketing department is responsible for identifying the needs of the patients to increase the customer base and in turn boost net profit and repeat customers for services rendered from the facility. Some of the issues that were addressed by the marketing department that do satisfy the needs of the patients are: providing quality services at a competitive price, free transportation for surgeries at the facility, hotel accommodations when patients are from out of town for the family members, private rooms during the patients stay, a home like atmosphere in the patient rooms to make the patients more at ease, extra meals f or visitors, and financial aid. Providing these extra services gives the customer more options to choose from when determining which facility to use. By providing these extra services, the marketing department has increased the customer flow (daily census) to the hospital, and the hospital has achieved some of the companies stated business goals, specifically, an increase in profitability, and contributing to the business growth. Another marketing definition would be marketing is the developing and positioning an e-content product someone who will want to buy (Scott, 2004). In this definition, marketing will define a product in which customers will want to buy. Then the development of the product will take place. Here is a good example. Fast food restaurants need to compete with each other on pricing and new products. Marketing is responsible to create these new products. The marketing department of each firm will perform research for a product that customers will buy such as when McDonalds created a successful meal for children, the happy meal. The happy meal includes a toy with the meal and an attractive toy box that most of the children want to have. When the marketing research revealed that children from ages two to 10 years old were very interest in the toy more than a regular meal, the marketing department concentrated on the development of the happy meals brand creating new and very attractive toys on a season basis. This product or marketing tool increased sales for Mc Donald’s business. Here is the last definition of marketing. Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods, and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational goals (Kotler, 2001). This definition gives the understanding that marketing is not only about advertising, public relations, product placement, or promotions. Marketing focus more on the satisfaction and needs of a customer as this relates to business. The process brings together the four â€Å"P’s† and other factors using a well thought-out plan to achieve the companies marketing goals. These goals are to retain old customers and achieve new ones, and at the same time increase the business profitability. In conclusion, marketing is an important factor that will contribute to a businesses success. Marketing will assist any business or organization to succeed in the most cost-effective way. An effective marketing tool will reduce costs and can increase profitability for any business or organization. Marketing will assist businesses to achieve any business goal, and at the same time can increase customer satisfaction. When a customer is satisfied, customers will be loyal to that business, and this action will contribute to the businesses growth potential. Marketing is not only about buying and selling. Marketing is also about satisfying customers and the companies needs. References Kotler, P. (2001). Marketing Management, Millennium ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. Scott D. M. (2004, April). Buying and Selling. But what about marketing? Econtent, 27(4) 48. retrieved October 6, 2009 from: apollolibrary.com/Library/ERR/ElectronicReserveReadings.aspx Research Papers on Defining MarketingMarketing of Lifeboy Soap A Unilever ProductDefinition of Export QuotasThe Fifth HorsemanThe Project Managment Office SystemNever Been Kicked Out of a Place This NiceBionic Assembly System: A New Concept of SelfInfluences of Socio-Economic Status of Married MalesResearch Process Part OneOpen Architechture a white paperPETSTEL analysis of India

Writing SOL Prompt 3 Essay Essays - Attitude Change, Belief

Writing SOL Prompt 3 Essay Essays - Attitude Change, Belief PROMPT: actions speak louder than words agree or disagree? I support the phrase actions speak louder than words. Words carry a lot of weight, from what we say to how we say it, but it is through our actions that truly show the sincerity and bring things into being. In many cases, what people say dont necessarily line up with what they are really doing or planning on doing. Its easier to understand words than to interpret a persons actions. However, actions have a greater appeal than words because of the physical element involved in them For example, its easy to talk about our dreams and hopes for future, but it a lot more than energy to take the steps that lead to bringing our dreams to reality. It requires a lot of hard work and determination. If all we ever do is talk about it, we begin to lose faith in ourselves because nothing really changes. When a student says that theyll end up going to an Ivy League school and become a highly-acclaimed doctor, they cant just sit there and wait for it to happen. In order to meet up with what they said, they have to actually put their words into action and work for it. Things dont come easy and that student wont be able to convince themselves or others until theyve actually accomplished things. Another example is when a political leader runs for office; they often list a plethora of things they promise or plan on doing. They say that theyll help the poorest members of society, cease the tension in the Middle East, help gain easier entrance to colleges and universities, and much more. Of course their promises sound great, but actions show the reality. Words are easy to roll of the tongue, theyre easy to calculate, and come from the mind. But actions truly reveal the real situation and show you thats really going on. Political leaders make their promises as a way to gain support and a way to lure the citizens attention to them. For all we know, they could be deceiving the citizens just to win an election. We dont know if what they say is true until theyve put their words into actions. Although there are many examples were the phrase is supported, it is somewhat over-exaggerated and an inaccurate clich. It lowers the important of the power of words and their ability to leave everlasting effects on an individual and even an entire society. Even just a few words can influence an entire generation. The power of language is phenomenal. For example, before the Holocaust actually began, Hitler didnt gain his followers and supporters through physical acts of violence and persuasion. He used words to overcome an entire nation and killed millions of people with them. He spoke out to crowds and convinced the German people that the Jewish society was a minority and needed to be diminished and destroyed. Hitler didnt physically force his people to lash out towards the Jewish people and commit homicide, he did it through his power of words. However, even though this example argues against the phrase, the number of examples that do support it, overweight it. Overall, I think that the saying actions speak louder than words is very accurate. Someone can speak a promise to you, but until they actually do something, theyre just words.

How to Respond to a Request for a Writing Critique

How to Respond to a Request for a Writing Critique How to Respond to a Request for a Writing Critique How to Respond to a Request for a Writing Critique By Mark Nichol You’ve been asked to critique another person’s writing. Perhaps you’re in a writing group. Maybe a colleague has a novel, or a short story, or a collection of their poems, they want to share with you. Or it may be a friend, or a family member, who requests your help. Easy, right? Not at all. Your response will be based on a variety of factors. First, who, exactly, is this person making this perfectly reasonable but deceptively simple-sounding request? How well do you know them, and how comfortable are you with critiquing their writing and they with receiving the criticism? And when they asked you for your assistance, how, precisely, did they pose their request? When someone asks you, in a context outside a professional working relationship, to look over something they wrote, your first response should be, â€Å"What, precisely, would you like me to do?† Their answer will depend, of course, on both their familiarity with the critiquing process and their self-awareness. If they respond that they just want assurance that their work is readable, that they’re headed in the right direction, that the concept and the narrative are potentially appealing to a wide readership, you have it relatively easy. You’ll simply be reading the piece of writing and spending a matter of minutes sharing, in writing or in conversation, your general impressions. But you’re still confronted with the possibility that your honest answer to their question â€Å"Is it any good?† will be no. I’ll get back to that in a moment. If they ask for a more substantial review, one involving notes and/or revisions, because they know you have writing and/or editing experience and can give them guidance, make sure you mention two things: One, they must know the distinction between substantive and mechanical editing. Two, they need to understand what they’ve asked of you. Substantive editing involves reviewing a piece of writing holistically, examining its structure, pacing, and overall impact, and determining whether it is well organized or would be improved with shuffling of sentences, paragraphs, or sections. (Rare is the early draft of a piece of writing that is not improved with at least some reorganization.) A substantive editor will also make occasional notes about phrasing or word choice. Mechanical editing, by contrast, is attention to grammar, syntax, style, spelling, punctuation, and other minutiae though a limited holistic appraisal is part of the process. Once you’re confident that the difference is understood, let the supplicant know that it’s best to manage these distinct tasks in two stages, and that at this point, during the draft stage, only the substantive review will be productive. I suggested earlier that you bring up two issues. The other thing you must do is manage expectations about your commitment of time and energy. Many beginning writers haven’t acquired a perspective about how long editing takes. Make it clear that for you to do anything more than read for general impressions, in order to give the piece of writing the attention it deserves, you would expect to be able to get through only a few pages per hour. For that reason, you would like them to select a chapter from the novel or a section of the short story or a reasonably small fraction of the collected poems for you to review, and to be patient about a response. Remember that part above about me getting back to you about something? That something is honest appraisal. I’ll go into detail in another post about how to appraise, but here is a brief caution: In agreeing to critique someone’s writing, whether superficially or in depth, you are agreeing to respond truthfully about someone’s success in communicating heartfelt expression about something that means a lot to them. As obvious as that may seem to you, I suggest that your response include something like this: â€Å"Understand that no matter how good a writer you are, there will be areas for improvement, and I want to be honest with you about them so that you can become even better. I’d expect no less from you if you looked over something I’ve written. So, unless you’ve done multiple drafts and had someone do substantive editing and someone else do mechanical editing, be prepared for the fact I’m going to find things in your writing that need work. Also, it’s possible that what you’ve written may appeal to others but not to me, but if that’s the case, I’ll still try to advise you about what you can do to make it even more appealing to others.† This statement may seem unduly frank and intimidating, but I think it’s important that you say it. By stating something like this up front, you’re not implying that the writer is a fragile narcissist who will crumble at the slightest hint of criticism; you’re preparing them to get what they asked for: a candid, productive evaluation of something they’ve put a lot of time and effort into but must be prepared to work on even more before it is ready for publication, if that is their goal. And if you must forthrightly state your opinion that the writer should abandon the idea (but not their desire to share other ideas), or that the presentation is awkward or ineffective (but has potential for success if they’re willing to put a lot more work into it), you’ve done your duty, and it is the other person’s responsibility to accept your conclusions with good grace. But be sure to preface the medicine with a spoonful of sugar: Find something positive to begin your report. I’ll go into more detail about that and other appraisal techniques in a later post. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Writing Basics category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:7 Types of Narrative Conflict50 Idioms About Fruits and Vegetables10 Terms for the Common People

DNA Fingerprinting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

DNA Fingerprinting - Essay Example These four bases pair with each other in a unique manner i.e. Adenine-Thymine and Guanine-Cytosine to form the unique DNA structure of every living thing. These bases are also attached to a sugar backbone that twists and turn in a double helix manner and give the molecule of its shape (Crocket 2001). Implications DNA fingerprinting, as the name implies is a technique used for the purpose of identification in many fields of science. Since fingerprints of not two individuals have been found to be similar, it has been proved that just like fingerprints, DNA sequence of every individual is also different and identity of a person in many cases can be found out by using this technique. Although many moral and ethical issues have been raised on the use of this technique but it has been found to be very helpful in the identifying individuals in many cases where it was almost impossible to attain hundred percent identity mainly because only remains of individuals were found or in mass disaste rs where the bodies were totally destroyed that obtaining fingerprints was almost impossible. For example in a mass disaster, the DNA samples of the relatives i.e. parents, siblings or offspring of the victims are taken and then the DNA sequence is matched with that of the victims and identities are generated on the basis of matching of base pairs. Also DNA fingerprints have been used in solving the cases of disputed paternity, identifying a rapist in cases of sexual assault and identifying the species in cases of fragmentary remains. Types and Techniques: The three main types of DNA Fingerprinting are: RFLP (Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism) VNTR (Variable Number Tandem Repeats) STR ( Short Tandem Repeats) RFLPs are the oldest type of DNA fingerprints. For this process, a sample from any part of the body is collected since all the nucleated cells of the body contain DNA. After the sample is collected, DNA is extracted from the sample by using restriction enzymes(Crocket 200 1). Restriction enzymes are highly specific enzymes for specific sequences of DNA and they act on and cleave only the sequences they are programmed for. After the DNA samples are properly extracted, specific band patterns are generated in agarose gel by using the process of Electrophoresis. This is a process in which electric current is applied to each side of the sheet containing the extracted DNA on a sheet and movement of particles is observed which creates a band pattern (Burke 1991).  Ã‚  

Analyzing a news article from a geographical perspective on Latin Research Paper

Analyzing a news article from a geographical perspective on Latin america using geography journals - Research Paper Example The politics of the location and the place are addressed in the political geography of the social movements. The widespread insensitivity to the push by the social movements in these nations and the outright downplaying of the quest for recognition and respect is also made mention of. This is an idea I am going to apply in analyzing a journalism article. The journalism article in focus is â€Å"The Racism and Racial Divides in Venezuela† by Gregory Wilpert. This article addresses issues of political geography in an evidently racist Venezuela. This paper analyses and reports on how the author of the political geography article would respond to the journalism article. In the journalism article, there are a great deal of issues on international order and the perceptions that are largely accepted and internalized by certain sections of the world’s population. Key among these and widely explored in the journal article is the concern for racism in the world in general and in Venezuela in particular. As reported in the journalism article, it is evident that the mindset of most of the Venezuelans, humans from different geographical locations of the world are and will never be equal. On the face of it, Venezuelans would say that there is no racism in the country, but the opposite proves true. They would say that it does not matter whether one is dark, brown or white since they all consider themselves to be â€Å"Mestizo† or â€Å"brown† (Wilpert 2). The journal article gives an account of how the opposite of this statement is proven during the visit by the Trans Africa Forum to the nation of Venezuela. This position of reality of racism in Venezuela was made clear by the very delegation in their final press conference in the country. The delegation mentioned the Venezuelan news commentators who referred to their trip as a ‘burned’ tour. This statement was

Is The World Flat Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Is The World Flat - Essay Example This essay stresses that in the Information Age, information becomes power. There is a transfer of information in the world, from Western locations, such as the United States of America and the European Union, to Asian ones like China and India. Most notably, China has been a much preferred place to outsource because of the low cost of labour. Because of this, the many countries are gaining power in the global market, but this does not necessarily create a level playing field. As mentioned in the previous paragraph, China is preferred because it has lower cost of labour. Thomas Friedman mentioned that â€Å"entrepreneurs and CEOs were responding to the flattening of the world.† However, by moving to China, it is not necessarily the flattening of the world that they are thinking about but simply practicality in the face of economic crisis. There must be some misunderstanding when people say the world is becoming flatter to mean that everyone has equal opportunity for work or in come. The previous illustration should have dispelled that mistaken notion. Companies will more often than not choose and develop three inexperienced but cheap labourers than pay more for one experienced person to do the same job. This paper makes a conclusion that health care and education should be improved. Health care ensures that employees can continue working and education ensures that people can find creative-type jobs in the future, if ever governments decide to ship grunt-type jobs out of the country.

Bakery Business Plan Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Bakery Business Plan - Essay Example ur is the most valuable ingredient that influences the entire processing response and determines the final quality of the finished bakery products because of the unique proteins in wheat that gives the products a characteristic highly expanded structure. In addition, wheat flour is generally present in a large proportion than any other ingredient used in baking industry. The baked products provide majority of the food supplements recommended for daily consumption. Such elements include carbohydrates, lipids (free fatty acids and simple glycerides), fiber, vitamins, and mineral salts (Matz, 1992). The production environment within the bakery involves all the entire processes from the onset of acquiring the raw materials for baking the products to when the baked product is ready for consumption, sale, and transportation of the finished products to other consumers. Purchasing of various ingredients including the required quantity of wheat flour, margarine, sweeteners and other required ingredients, mixing which is classified as a chemical engineering unit operation, entails putting plurality of materials originally existing separately in non-uniform combination. For example mixing flour with water and the required fluids including margarine and other fats into such an arrangement that each particle of one material lies nearly and adjacent to each particle of the other materials and make a thick semi solid mass of the mixture, which will be sliced in variable sizes according to the desired products. Such mixing is done using mixer machines (Matz, 1992). After the baking process the products are placed on storage containers awaiting for transportation and outsourcing to various distributors, wholesalers and consumers, this involves the incorporation of various transportation modes to ensure the delivery of fresh products to the market. The entire operation involves the use and coordination through human labor that control the machines during the baking process.

USA Cost Accounting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

USA Cost Accounting - Essay Example Though Obama promised change, Government spending has continued unabated and even the risk of default on debt obligations in the beginning of August 2010 did nothing to dampen the Government’s appetite for spending. Although there was an impasse between those who supported Obama and those who didn’t, in the end common sense meant that the debt ceiling had to be increased for America to avoid default. Notwithstanding the exhortations of the public to stop Government spending, to tighten the belts and purses of the Government agencies and politicians and to stop the war on terror that has resulted in overspending with little results, the inefficiencies, the bumbling and the ineptitude of the Government prevail. Obama-care has been opposed not because it is wrong, but because it would result in just more inefficiency. The government is butting into the realm of the private sector, the same mistake that was made by giving too much responsibility to Fannie Mae and Freddie Ma c, the controllers of the home mortgage industry and the housing sector. In such a scenario, cost allocations, revenue and expense targets and continued management reporting can make a world of difference in gauging the efficiencies of Government organizations and agencies. In this assignment, we are going to look at how cost is allocated in Government departments and private agencies and discuss the need and importance of the same. Discussion Let us start with the US Army Corp of Engineers. Even though they are a branch of the US Federal Government, yet they are concerned about cost allocation. The mission of this institution is to provide important and critical public engineering services and to strengthen the security of the USA in times of both war and peace, to energize and motivate the economy, and to reduce risks posed by and as a result of natural and man-made disasters. While we often think of the US Army Corps of Engineers to be a part of the US Army and therefore subject to Government funding, the truth is that it is funded by the taxpayers. No wonder it is worried about its funding and cost allocations. Even the Federal Government has rules and regulations for cost sharing and allocations, and the US Army Corps of Engineers has to abide by them. This means that the feasibility for all proposals and activities planned by the US Army Corps of Engineers has to be discussed and the need and cost of the projects debated before permission to proceed is granted. But the primary purpose of all cost allocations is to ensure their recovery or reimbursement by the powers that be, or to arrive at a basis for sharing of common costs between different arms and agencies of the Government. Both drawdown and flow augmentation methods are considered here (www.nww.usace.army.mil). The drawdown method presupposes that there would be a depletion of natural resources during the project, while the flow augmentation presupposes that there would be an apportionment of stor age among already identified purposes. It has been a policy of the US Army Corps of Engineers not to ask for a reallocation of costs unless a major change or overhaul of present facilities is planned to be implemented. Let us now move on to how the City Government plans its cost allocations and revenues. For instance, a perusal of accounting records for the City of Seattle Government Department lists a series of costs and associated cost drivers for allocating these costs. Most of these allocations have been made on the basis of common sense and practical wisdom- although I am sure some have been uniform throughout the history of modern Government. A further look at most of

Operations Management (OM) Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Operations Management (OM) - Essay Example Service System. Unlike product systems or manufacturing systems, service systems are unique in that they tend to be based more upon face-to-face customer interaction. In the bank, however, an effective service system will take advantage of the inherent nature of the business of banking. Banks do not manufacture money, but they do interact with individuals and companies to assist them with their financial needs. Accordingly, the branch manager can implement a service system that accommodates customer needs. Even though a banking-based service system will be somewhat intangible, the benefits of a well-designed one will be notable. For example, the branch manager may know that Friday afternoons are high volume time periods for the bank, as the local factory pays its employees on Fridays. Since no person want to stand around waiting on tellers to cash or deposit their checks, the branch manager could study the customer volume data for a month and then implement a service system that focu sed upon scheduling tellers and account managers around the times of highest volume. This OM technique would provide both efficiency in staffing as well as a happier client base. Job Design. Job Design. Job design is a relatively straightforward way of increasing operational efficiency in all organizations, but particularly in the banking industry. Like any other business, a bank has to maintain a productive workforce, and economic efficiencies are very important. Accordingly, our branch manager could spend a little research time on every segmented task within the bank. Looking for areas of overlap or opportunities for cross-training, the manager could design the job descriptions to maximize productivity without sacrificing customer service. For example, the job design of the teller would involve the standard activities of a bank teller; processing deposits, cashing checks, overseeing counter activities, etc. Similarly, the job design of an account manager is very easy to determine; be available to open new accounts for existing and new customers, perform customer service duties by telephone, solicit new accounts through various means, etc. If our branch man ager were to implement an effective job design, she might be able to construct a head teller or other hybrid position that could assist with teller operations during high volume times, and solicit accounts during times of low counter activity. This is an example of effective job design, and such an OM tool is very effective in this application. Quality Management. As we know, modern quality management is not so much about correcting mistakes after they occur, but preventing them from occurring at all. In a bank, customer service quality and the absence of numerical or clerical error is paramount to both the operations and reputation of the institution. The branch manager should place a high emphasis on attention to detail and quality job performance in both the technical (teller) and customer relations (account manager) departments. By utilizing such methods as regular staff meetings, on-going skill training, and written policy manuals, the branch manager can utilize the OM methodology of quality management

USA Cost Accounting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

USA Cost Accounting - Essay Example Though Obama promised change, Government spending has continued unabated and even the risk of default on debt obligations in the beginning of August 2010 did nothing to dampen the Government’s appetite for spending. Although there was an impasse between those who supported Obama and those who didn’t, in the end common sense meant that the debt ceiling had to be increased for America to avoid default. Notwithstanding the exhortations of the public to stop Government spending, to tighten the belts and purses of the Government agencies and politicians and to stop the war on terror that has resulted in overspending with little results, the inefficiencies, the bumbling and the ineptitude of the Government prevail. Obama-care has been opposed not because it is wrong, but because it would result in just more inefficiency. The government is butting into the realm of the private sector, the same mistake that was made by giving too much responsibility to Fannie Mae and Freddie Ma c, the controllers of the home mortgage industry and the housing sector. In such a scenario, cost allocations, revenue and expense targets and continued management reporting can make a world of difference in gauging the efficiencies of Government organizations and agencies. In this assignment, we are going to look at how cost is allocated in Government departments and private agencies and discuss the need and importance of the same. Discussion Let us start with the US Army Corp of Engineers. Even though they are a branch of the US Federal Government, yet they are concerned about cost allocation. The mission of this institution is to provide important and critical public engineering services and to strengthen the security of the USA in times of both war and peace, to energize and motivate the economy, and to reduce risks posed by and as a result of natural and man-made disasters. While we often think of the US Army Corps of Engineers to be a part of the US Army and therefore subject to Government funding, the truth is that it is funded by the taxpayers. No wonder it is worried about its funding and cost allocations. Even the Federal Government has rules and regulations for cost sharing and allocations, and the US Army Corps of Engineers has to abide by them. This means that the feasibility for all proposals and activities planned by the US Army Corps of Engineers has to be discussed and the need and cost of the projects debated before permission to proceed is granted. But the primary purpose of all cost allocations is to ensure their recovery or reimbursement by the powers that be, or to arrive at a basis for sharing of common costs between different arms and agencies of the Government. Both drawdown and flow augmentation methods are considered here (www.nww.usace.army.mil). The drawdown method presupposes that there would be a depletion of natural resources during the project, while the flow augmentation presupposes that there would be an apportionment of stor age among already identified purposes. It has been a policy of the US Army Corps of Engineers not to ask for a reallocation of costs unless a major change or overhaul of present facilities is planned to be implemented. Let us now move on to how the City Government plans its cost allocations and revenues. For instance, a perusal of accounting records for the City of Seattle Government Department lists a series of costs and associated cost drivers for allocating these costs. Most of these allocations have been made on the basis of common sense and practical wisdom- although I am sure some have been uniform throughout the history of modern Government. A further look at most of

Interpreting a Factor Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Interpreting a Factor Analysis - Essay Example This low education affects their ability to either secure any or a well-paying job (Vijayakumar, 2013). Furthermore, the younger generations have lower job skills and work experience compared to the older persons. Due to their limited access to work/ well paying work, young people are more prone to poverty and, consequently, higher financial dependency (Gupta, 2007). These two studies successfully demonstrate that there is a relationship between age and dependency – the higher the age, the lower the level of dependency. Based on these findings, I seek to investigate whether this hypothetical relationship between age and financial dependency is valid for the data at hand. The following hypothesis is investigated: That implies that, for this study, higher levels of dependency are expected to correspond to lower ages. A bivariate correlation analysis was run in the SPSS using the computed value for â€Å"dependency† and age. The test was run at the 5% level of significance. The findings are contained in the following section. The average ages of the 1146 participants is 32.4 years (Std. dev. = 11.25), while the average dependency score is 14.25 (Std. dev. = 4.56). The correlation between the ages of participants and dependency is -0.107 (p The findings of this study fall in line with the findings of both Gupta (2007) and Vijavakumar (2013) which established the existence of significant correlations between the ages and dependency levels of participants. This confirms validity of the â€Å"dependency† scale. Since the relationship between age and dependency is inverse (negative correlation coefficient), and having confirmed the validity of the dependency scale, we conclude that the older generations have relatively lower levels of financial dependency, while the younger individuals have relatively higher levels of financial

Building Maintenance | Literature Review

Building Maintenance | Literature Review Building defects are common phenomena especially for those old residential apartments. Lack of maintenance management is one of the factors which lead to poor building condition. Despite the authorities in charge of building maintenance, the residents are also a factor contributing to poor maintenance on building. Misusing the facilities, poor management team, insufficiency of fund for maintenance, the use of poor quality material by the maintenance department, improper maintenance strategy often cause maintenance to achieve a result less than expected. Poor maintenance management will reduce the building lifespan and accelerate the deterioration process of building. Besides that, poor maintenance also will effects the condition of the building, it is also a threats to the residents, making the residents feel unsafe, cause inconvenience and bring a lot of trouble to the resident and others. Thus, this research aim is to identify the flaw of building maintenance in residential apartments, give recommendations and provide the suitable of maintenance strategy to improve the quality and conditions of the apartments. The center question in this study is to identify a suitable maintenance strategy to improve the condition of residential apartments. Along the way of research, following question will also be identified. What is the flaw of building maintenance in residential apartments? What is the reason to affect the maintenance cost? 1.3 Aim The aim of this research project is to study the building maintenance strategy in residential apartments. 1.4 Objectives In achieving the aim, four objectives have been outlined. There are: To determine the suitable of maintenance strategy to improve the quality of residential apartments. To compare the type of building maintenance strategy. To review the factor that affect maintenance cost. 1.5 Hypothesis Proper maintenance strategy can reduce the building defects, increase the monetary value of apartment and prolong the lifespan of residential apartment. 1.6 Background of the Study Building maintenance is an important activity to keep the building in good condition. Even though the buildings are seemed like wonderful or in perfect condition, there are a lot of maintenance work needed to be done in order to maintain at such condition. To preserve and prolong the life of building, maintenance is necessary to be carried out. Chudley (1981, p.1) define the maintenance as: maintenance is the act of maintaining. The Committee on Building Maintenance in British defined maintenance as: Building Maintenance is the work undertaken in order to keep, restore or improve every facility, i.e every part of a building, its services and surrounds to a currently acceptable standard, and to sustain the utility and value of the building (Wood, 2009, p.3) In this research project, researcher is tending to identify the flaw of building maintenance in residential apartments and proposed the suitable maintenance strategy. The motivation to carry out this research project is a lot of tenants or residents have neglected the importance of maintenance work. Also, maintenance will affect the built environment, building lifespan, quality, safety and condition of apartments. Proper maintenance strategy plays an important role for a building. The proper maintenance strategy is able to affect the performance of maintenance. Good and poor maintenance also depends on the maintenance strategy using. The poor maintenance also caused by using the improper maintenance strategy. The poor maintenance of the residential apartment will lead to depreciation of property value, affects the condition of the building, result as a threats to the residents, making the residents feel unsafe, caused inconvenience to the residents, building efficiency drop and eventually cause the building to deteriorate rapidly than others. 1.7 Scope of the Study In order to carry out the research project, the researcher specified in residential buildings at Setapak. The nature of the building to be focus in apartment and the building will be reviewed in this research are those which were built between 1990s and early 2000s. The building maintenance of the residential apartments is to be reveal through this research project. This research focuses on the maintenance strategy of the residential apartment thus understand on the building maintenance strategies and knowledge on flaw of building maintenance are important in this case. The key words like building maintenance strategy and residential apartments will be defined at first so that the person who reads can easily understand point of the research project or dissertation. To carry out the research, it is necessary to identify flaw of building maintenance of residential apartments and proposed the suitable or proper maintenance strategy to rectify the flaw of building maintenance or improve the quality of the buildings. In addition, in this dissertation identifies the factors that affect the maintenance cost. 1.8 Research Methodology 1.8.1 Literature review To carry out a research, literature review is the most important of the research. Before carry out a research, it has to well understand of the research title and literature review. The effective information can be obtained through the books in the library, journals, internet, newspaper and others those will provide us ideas to start doing dissertation or easily to do the dissertation with refer to the books, journals and others. 1.8.2 Questionnaire One of the research methodology using in this dissertation, questionnaire will be carried out in order to get some important information from respondents. The questionnaires form will be contribute to the respondents by hands or mail. The targeted respondents are those who stay in the apartment at Setapak. The questionnaire forms can include respondents detail, satisfaction of the building facilities and efficiency, knowledge on the building defect and others. All the data collected get from respondents, it have to analyze it and discussed together with recommendations to improve the building defects or quality of the building. 1.8.3 Interview Besides that, interview also will be carry out in the research. The targeted interviewees are resident of the apartment at Setapak and the repair specialist also will be interview. For this dissertation, the informal interview will be carry out in order to finalize the conclusion and the respond of interviewee are more accurate than the questionnaire and face to face discuss the problem of the resident facing. 1.9 Chapter Outline 1.9.1 Chapter 1-Introduction Chapter 1 is introducing about research background and this chapter is including aims and objectives, problem statement, research methodology, chapter outline and others. 1.9.2 Chapter 2-Literature Review Chapter 2 is review the definition of maintenance and the importance of building maintenance. This chapter also will identify the factors of affecting building maintenance cost and let the reader understanding different types of maintenance strategies. 1.9.3 Chapter 3-Research Methodology Chapter 3 is aim to review the details of research methodology. The Literature review, questionnaire, interview is the method of carry out in this research project. In this chapter, it has to review the way of get the feedback from the respondent and what is the result. 1.9.4 Chapter 4-Data Analysis Chapter 4 is need to analyzing the data which is obtained from questionnaire. It needs to analyses the problem of maintenance management in residential apartments. 1.9.5 Chapter 5-Conclusion and Recommendations Chapter 5 is to provide the conclusion of the whole research project and recommend the importance of building maintenance in residential apartments. Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 Title 1.2 Problem Statement 1.3 Aims and objectives 1.4 Background 1.5 Scope of Study 1.6 Research Methodology 1.7 Chapter Outline Chapter 2: Literature Review 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Definition 2.3 Importance of building maintenance 2.4 Factor affect the building maintenance cost 2.5 Types of building maintenance strategies 2.6 The comparison of maintenance strategies 2.7 Selection of maintenance strategy 2.8 Maintenance management decision diagram Table 0 Plan and actual schedule Based to the table above, I was late to confirm the research title that is because I was confusing on the various tiles that I have found. To get back the progress that I was planning, I was tried to confirm the tile on Week 4. After that, there is also late to done the work in Chapter One. Within that delay period, I have a presentation and a lot of assignment need to submit. Also, I was having twice time amendment on Chapter One. During Week 9, I was realized that was very late to start the work in Chapter Two. To resolve this problem, I was try to spending more time to do the research and I was try to finished the introduction, definition and importance of building maintenance and factor affect the building maintenance cost. During Week 9 to Week 12, I was try my best to match back the planned schedule and I was get help who is my supervisor in doing the work in Chapter 2. He is giving a lot recommendation to give me a direction to done the proposal and final draft. Finally, I was done my work on Week 12 and I was submitting my final draft on Week 13. Chapter 2.0 Literature review 2.1 Introduction This chapter reviews the types of building maintenance strategy. The definition and the importance of maintenance also will be identified in this chapter. Besides that, this chapter will identify the factor affecting the building maintenance cost and maintenance management decision diagram. 2.2 Definition of Building Maintenance The maintenance term was comes from the French verb maintenir, which means to hold, retain, prolong or preserve the building or structure to an acceptable standard. Chudley (1981, p.1) defines the maintenance is the act of maintaining, many people are misunderstanding the maintenance is equal with repair. In the act of maintaining repairs or replacement may well be necessary but the main objectives of all maintenance procedures is to prevent as far as practicable the need to repair or replace the structure, furnishings, services, equipment or fittings which collectively make up the total environment of any building (Chudley, 1981, p.1). According to BS 3811: 1964 defines maintenance as a combination of any actions carried out to retain an item in, or restore it, to an acceptable condition (Lee, 1981, p.9). Wood (2009, p.4) defines maintenance as keeping an item at a certain level or of restoring it that position of acceptability, although it does not identify who it is that determines the acceptability condition. Besides that, the Building Maintenance Committee in British recommended the following definition: Work undertaken in order to keep, restore or improve every facility, i.e every part of a building, its services and surrounds, to a currently accepted standard and to sustain the utility and value of the facility (Lee, 1981, p.10). In conclusion, the main objectives of building maintenance is to keep the building in perfect condition and ensure that the condition of the buildings meets all statutory requirements by regularly checking or repairing it when failure occurs so that the building can be continued perform in term of acceptable standard. 2.3 The importance of Building Maintenance Most people are unlikely to carry out maintenance work and they have neglected the importance of maintenance work. There are many good reasons for carry out the maintenance work. For example, maintenance can be preserving our building, prolong the buildings life, reducing the deterioration process of the building, provide a safe environment and maintaining buildings appearance. In the economic sense, maintenance can reduce the major repair projects. Under some circumstances, repairs works can be costly than maintenance work in terms of finances. Thus, it is better to carry out the maintenance work than extending the period of repairs work. For an example, the routine cleaning of the gutter and drains is cheaper and less convenient than having to cope with a serious outbreak of dry rot in timber roof trusses which is neglect for many years. The appropriate routine management and maintenance will minimize the need for larger repairs or it is the most economical way of sustaining an ass et (Beehive, 2010). Besides that, maintenance will also ensure the safety of the building or to person (Jeff, 2008). For instance, maintenance of building fire safety installations. Fire safety installations must be capable performing in standard level to ensure the safety of the building and building users or occupants. Fire safety installations are including fire extinguisher, fire doors, fire hydrants, fire hose reels, emergency lighting and smoke detectors (Queensland Government, n.d). In addition, maintenance also can provide opportunities for employment. Some of the maintenance works are required repair specialist or maintenance professionals to carry out the maintenance or repair works. For example, cleaning high-level gutters may require specially trained personnel or equipment to carry out the work or some of the maintenance or repair work need a lot of repair specialist to carry out the work therefore it provide a opportunities to earn a living (Beehive, 2010). 2.4 The factors that affecting building maintenance cost This research project is to identify the factors that affecting building maintenance cost because the issue of continuous increasing in building maintenance cost is often discussed. In order to solve the problem of increasing in building maintenance cost, building management team should adapt some strategies by reduce or minimizing the number of maintenance activities (Azlan Shah Ali, 2010). Besides that, building maintenance costs increase and decrease will be affected due to the various factors. For examples, designer is fails to comply with the specifications and standard also is a factors that influence the building maintenance cost. (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003) 2.4.1 Design The complexity of the building design will increase the difficulty in maintenance work. Regular cleaning and minor repair work can be carried out easily to avoid major replacement of building component. For example, some of the maintenance requires some tools to be performed. If the designer fails to allow enough space for the tools to execute maintenance work, it will cause minor problem become major problem (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). The building design also including the building height, area and size. The high rise building is need the additional costs for the equipment and tools used to carry out the maintenance works. For instance, when carry out the maintenance works at high rise buildings such as window cleaning, painting work, repairs work and other external works is need scaffolding (Azlan Shah Ali, 2010). Besides that, some of the building defects are caused by improper structural design such as designer is neglected the spacing for contraction and expansion which movement will cause joint of the wall cracking (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.2 Poor Quality Control Quality control program is essential and important during the maintenance and construction stages. That program is used to control, check and test of activities due to the contract requirement and construction procedures. An effective quality control program will reduce the occurrence of building defects therefore maintenance work will be reduce accordingly. During the maintenance stages, the quality control program is essential to ensure that which component is required to maintain or might not need to maintain (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.3 Lack knowledge of maintenance strategy Improper maintenance strategy is caused by the designer or maintenance management team lack in knowledge of maintenance strategy. Improper using maintenance strategy might not be increase the cost of the particular work but it might be affected on the long-term durability of the building and the cost of maintenance (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.4 Unfamiliarity with local and site condition The designer should know the building location, type of plants, environment condition and insects existing around of the building. For example, if the designers realized that surround of the building have many plants and those plants might have termite or white-ants, it can be provide a suitable maintenance strategy to avoid termite attack. In addition, designer also should be familiar with buildings site condition such as soil condition. For example, poor soil condition might affect the building shrinking and causes the structural elements start cracking (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.5 Improper diagnosis The maintenance management team is failure to identify the main and true causes of the defect and it will affect the decision on decide the maintenance strategy. Besides that, improper diagnosis will affect the maintenance cost. This is because improper diagnosis will worsen the condition of the building therefore it is require a lot of maintenance or repair works to repair it (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.6 Life Cycle Cost (LCC) Life cycle cost (LCC) is the total relevant costs over the life of a system including cost of operation, maintenance, acquisition, disposal and modification for the purpose of making decision (Shear, 1993). LCC takes into account firstly and other costs (total cost of operation and maintenance of a system) over a buildings life. During the buildings life period, it helps in the determination of how the owners money distributed. Moreover, it was to determine of meeting a need of space with the most economic way. Besides that, it was also assisting in developing the most economic plan shape, structural form and internal layout. The greater saving and lowering the committed cost if LCC is applied earlier. LCC is used to identify which have the lowest total cost of design feature, components and finishing. And, it also identifies high cost areas and evaluates changes that will reduce these costs (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.7 Labour Unskilled labours such as foreign labour will failure to carry out the maintenance work and it is also will increasing the maintenance cost if they have not performing well in maintenance work. It is because they are lack in experience, knowledge and skills to perform well of the maintenance work. Therefore, employ a skilled labour is better than employ unskilled labour. Skilled labour will help to minimizing maintenance cost and improve the quality of work (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.8 Material selection Material selection in the early design stage also is the one of the factors will be influence the maintenance cost. Once the selection of materials is failure or select wrong materials it is required high maintenance cost to repair or replace the existing building components (Azlan Shah Ali, 2010). The selection of poor or bad quality of materials will cause failure of the materials and deterioration occurred in the building components, which will require replacement or more maintenance tasks in the future. To minimize future expenses during maintenance stage, selection of materials should be according to the performance specification requirements of the building (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.9 Misusing materials The misconception of using cheap materials will minimize or reduce the maintenance cost. Those cheap and bad quality materials will cause building deterioration, which will require more maintenance or repairs work to be carry out. It will be more costly to carry out the repair, replacement and maintenance work (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.10 Fluctuation of Material Prices The most common of factors that affecting the maintenance cost is fluctuation of material prices such as cement, steel bar and etc. it might be increasing the material prices and also decreasing the material prices but usually is increasing (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.11 Climate change Some of the building material will have chemical reaction when the climate was change. For example, acid rain wills accelerate the deterioration process of some building materials. Thus, there are some maintenance or remedial action need to be carry out (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.12 Unqualified Maintenance Contractor To ensure the maintenance work can be performing effectively, the well-experiences maintenance contractors are very important. A good maintenance contractor should be good in analyzing the maintenance cost and analyze which maintenance strategy is most economical way to carry out the maintenance work or which is the most suitable maintenance strategy can be using (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003).. Besides that, those of the unqualified maintenance contractor or operator are lack of training which could cause to poor operating and maintenance practices (Azlan Shah Ali, 2010). 2.4.13 Age of the building According to Skinner (1982), Slater (1982) and ONeill (1974), the age of the building or property also could be influencing the maintenance cost. When the age of a building increase, the maintenance cost also will increase accordingly. Some of the maintenance works such as replacement of new roof tiles, painting work, and other works are required to carry out because these maintenance works is to ensure the sustainability of building while the building age is increasing (Azlan Shah Ali, 2010). Besides that, the building components have their expected life, if the building components life is over than the expected life, it is better to demolish it or replace it. This is because the maintenance cost might be higher than the cost spending on demolished or replacement (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003).. 2.4.14 Poor management A good maintenance management can be an effective tool or equipment for achieving a high standard of maintenance work and it can reduce the maintenance works and costs. According to Horner et al. (1997), the maintenance management is required to reduce or minimize the repair works on building defect (Azlan-Shah Ali, 2010). Without maintenance management, it will lead to failure maintenance work, time consuming and cumbersome. Therefore, maintenance management is requiring formulating long term strategic plan to meet those needs. 2.4.15 Poor financial management The building owners are require to preparing the annual budgets which budgets is enough financial support for maintenance work. Without financial support for maintenance work required, maintenance works require to carry out will not be perform properly and building will not maintained properly (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.16 User neglected importance of maintenance work Building users are often misunderstanding that there is not their responsibility to keeping the building in good condition and facility therefore they are taking no action or neglected the maintenance work. As time passes, it will lead to the buildings start to deteriorate. Therefore, they require additional maintenance cost to carry out large repair or maintenance work to cope the deterioration of the building. Therefore, it is better that they are intention to carry out the maintenance work before the building is deteriorated (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.17 Misuse of building after construction is complete Some of building users or owners is misusing the buildings and its components in proper way after the building construction is completed. There are causing the building components are needs to repair and it is also would be costly for those repairs work (Jalal, 2003). In order to minimized this problem, the introducing of property operating manuals and regulation, and educating occupants and users are need to be carry out (Azlan-Shah Ali, 2010) 2.4.18 Behavior and attitude of users The bad attitudes of building users are often misusing the facility and services of the building and vandalism by building user will cause to damage and defects on building components. It would be costly to repair for those damages (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.4.19 Improper Maintenance Strategy Improper maintenance strategy also will be affected the cost of maintenance. For example, a building elements are require to using the preventive maintenance strategy but they are using corrective maintenance strategy therefore it is more costly to carry out the maintenance (Jalal A. Al-Khatam, 2003). 2.5 The types of Buildings Maintenance Strategies According to Chudley (1980, p.110), defines maintenance as any work undertaken in order to keep or restore every part of a building to an acceptable standard. The types of maintenance activities which are require achieving this objective. It can be categorized as planned and unplanned maintenance. Those of the maintenance strategies are provide options to decide which maintenance strategy will be decide to use, it should be make sure that those alternative decisions are available to management in maintaining a building. Besides that, it is also need to depend on the failure elements condition then decide a maintenance strategy to repair or replace it. During making decision to select maintenance strategy, it must be consider which maintenance strategy is more efficiency (Chudley, 1981). Figure 0 Types of Maintenance Source: (Abdul-Mohsen Al- Hammad, n.d) 2.5.1 Planned Maintenance is defined the planned maintenance is the maintenance work have been planned, organized and execute with forethought, control and the use of records to a predetermined plan (Abdul-Mohsen Al- Hammad, n.d). Besides that, planned maintenance can be used to overcome the disadvantages of corrective maintenance and emergency maintenance. It is commonly referred to the schedule system which is require consider time, cost and quality. Planned maintenance is including preventive maintenance. 2.5.1.1 Preventive Maintenance (PM) In this maintenance strategy, the building components, elements, facilities and services are subjected to a regular schedule of maintenance tasks, such as cleaning, inspections, adjustments, inspections, and others. The maintenance tasks are carried out at fixed intervals to reduce building deteriorated or to ensure the building is in good condition (RDH Building Enginerring Ltd, n.d). Besides that, the disadvantages of corrective maintenance can be overcome by preventive maintenance. Preventive maintenance also will reduce the probability of occurrence of failure or defects and avoiding sudden failure. This maintenance strategy is referred to as time-based maintenance, planned maintenance or cyclic maintenance. Preventive maintenance tasks are performed in accordance with a predetermined plan at regular, fixed intervals, which may be based for example on operating time (IMSS Security Services, 2011). Preventive maintenance has various advantages over the corrective maintenance. The preventive maintenance tasks are providing several advantages, those are shown as below (Au Wai Hoe, 2008): The equipment will perform more efficiently. Preserve and prolong the life of the building. Reduce and avoid the occurrence of failure. Save potential energy and prevent energy will go to waste. The preventive maintenance cost is more economical than the corrective maintenance cost. The following are the disadvantages of preventive maintenance. Unnecessary task will be carried out even thought the building components are in good condition. The elements which are required remained in a safe and acceptable condition for long time; it will be carried out a large amount of unnecessary tasks. Very demanding in terms of spare parts and labour. Although the preventive maintenance work is carried out, failures are still likely to occur because it was human error during the implementation of the maintenance works. In addition, there are some of the advantages of preventive over corrective maintenance as shown as below: It will not make the building users inconvenient while execute maintenance work because maintenance can be planned ahead and performed when it is convenient to the users. Avoiding the cost of consequential damage can be reduced the maintenance cost. It can be minimized the downtime which is the time that an element of the building or whole of the building is out of services, so that the habitability of the building can be increased. Improved health and safety of the building users. 2.5.1.1.1 Condition-based maintenance This maintenance strategy work is performing in response to an acceptable deterioration in a unit as indicated by a change monitored parameter of the units condition or performance. The reason for carrying out the maintenance work is the condition of building elements has been change or deterioration, and the optimal time to execute maintenance works is determined by monitoring the actual state of the system, its performance or other condition parameters. Its concept recognizes that the main reason for carrying out maintenance is due to change in condition or performance of an item. Before a major failure occurs, to identify the element or equipments requires maintenance which is condition-based maintenance tasks. This maintenance tasks is planned by good monitoring to the buildings elements and service equipment. To make this strategy perform or works effectively, it is need to monitoring the condition of the building components or item. Those monitoring works is to identify whether there is any evidence of change from a normal to abnormal condition. This maintenance can be carried out by selecting the factor which can be best described the item and monitoring changes using suitable condition monitoring tools. Condition measurement can be change from a simple inspection or visual check to more advanced assessment by using variety of condition monitoring tools and techniques (IMSS Security Services, 2011). 2.5.2 Unplanned maintenance Unplanned maintenance works is executed without predetermined planning. In this strategy, the maintenance work is carried out after a failure has occurred (Abdul-Mohsen Al-Hammad n.d). The repair works of the unplanned maintenance is the restoration of an item to an acceptable state or level through replacing, renewing and mending damaged parts. Unplanned maintenance cost is more costly than planned maintenance cost. Besides that, unplanned maintenance includes corrective and emergency maintenance. 2.5.2.1 Corrective maintenance Corrective maintenance is the simplest types of maintenance strategy, where a building element is used until it cannot perform or breaks down. It covers all activities, including replacement, repair and renew of a building element that has failed to a point at which it cannot perform its required function or cannot carry out the services. This maintenance strategy is carried out the work after a failure or defects has occurred and intended to restore an item to an acceptable state to perform its required func