The Importance of the Study of Literature to the Christian Essay Example for Free

The Importance of the Study of Literature to the Christian Essay After listening and reading lessons about the importance of the study of literature to the Christian, I agree with the fact that electronic media, mainly television is not valuable to study literature and there are two reasons that can validate my opinion. First of all, electronic media makes the society gets lazier. It is due to the fact that Lesson 2 states when people watch television, everything is done for them. People only use the emotional side of their brain and they do not have to think logically. As a result, people are getting lazier because they just accept without thinking by their own will. Second, people today are becoming reliant upon over using electronics. When it comes to actually hands on learning, people need to think for themselves and form images and then they can totally comprehend. Unlike watching television goes to short-term memory, it goes to long-term memory. For instance, it has always been benefiical for me to learn from reading and mirroring practice. When I was a seventh grader, my history teacher let us watch a documentary about modern history. I was dozing off in the middle of class. Also, during watching the documentary, it was easy to be distracted and let my attention wander. Hence, I could not concentrate on my class material and the memory was lasting no longer. It shows that studying with electronic media is not effective. Consequently, studying through electronic media is not essential to learn literature because society is becoming lazier by the day using electronic media to study and reading allows people to do critical thinking. If people start to realize that they do have choices, people should not have to depend on electronic media, especially television to study. All in all, people can think logically with their own volition and make their own decisions.

The Importance of Stories in Borders by Thomas King Essay example --

In Thomas King's short story "Borders," a Blackfoot mother struggles with maintaining her cultural heritage under the pressure of two dominating nations. Storytelling is important, both for the mother and for the dominant White society. Stories are used to maintain and pass on cultural information and customs from one generation to another. Furthermore, stories can be used both positively and negatively. They can trap individuals into certain ways of thinking, but they can also act as catalysts that drive social change within society. Stories are a means of passing on information, acting as a medium to transport cultural heritage and customs forward into the future. In his essay titled "You'll Never Believe What Happened," King says that, "The truth about stories is that that's all we are† (King Essay 2). Contained within this statement is a powerful truth: without stories, a society transcending the limitations of time could not exist. Cultures might appear, but they would inevitably die away without a means of preservation. Subsequent generations would be tasked with creating language, customs, and moral laws, all from scratch. In a way, stories form the core of society's existence. Humans are the containers for stories, responsible for ensuring that many centuries worth of accumulated knowledge does not dissapear. However, the very fact that stories live on in humans can be problematic. If, for example, there are only five people in the world that knew English, and these people died without having taught anyone else the language, then English would dissapear with them; this is the dilemma the Blackfoot mother faces. Right before Laetitia leaves for Salt Lake City, she is talking with the mother. Although the mother is speak... ... perceptions their ancestors held centuries earlier. Stories are not set in stone, and this means that all stories - even the most powerful - can be altered. The Blackfoot mother refuses to accept the prevailing stories pushed onto her by society and, as a result, her access through the border is restricted. But in persisting for a third, viable alternative, the mother is able to shape the dominating assumptions of society. She tells her own counter-narratives, introducing an "alternative to the narratives of the nations [she] refuses to acknowledge" (Andrews and Walton 609). She presents a story that is capable of altering the metanarrative that governs that governs Canada and America; the mother succeeds in changing the fundamental beliefs held by both societies, and she is able to free the Canadians and Americans from the restrictive, dichotomous way of thinking.

Kants Moral Thoery Essay

(1) Explain Kant’s moral theory. Explain and critique Kant’s response to â€Å"The Nazis Objection. † Immanuel Kant is one of the most respected and studied philosopher of all time and is known for his basic yet in-depth moral theories and the belief that morality stems not from divine command or cultural conditioning but from reasoning and human freedom. His straight forward beliefs come from his very strict Lutheran upbringing which consisted of universal rights and universal wrongs with no exceptions He believed his moral laws to be universal and applied to every being including God, spirits and extraterrestrials. His ethics made him a leading figure in deontology which judges people on their actions, not the consequences of their actions, as morally significant. And actions are only as good as their intent to be morally permissible. Kant introduced two commandments of reason, called imperatives, from which all obligations and duties arise. The first imperative is called a hypothetical imperative which Kant describes as, â€Å"the practical necessity of a possible action as means to another end†(Kant, p. 327). This means if you want â€Å"A† then you must do â€Å"B†, such as if you want people to think you a thief, then you shouldn’t steal. This imperative is dependent upon our wants and goals which are ultimately rooted in self interest. The second imperative, which Kant bases the majority of his moral theory on, is called a categorical imperative which has no â€Å"if† in it and is a concrete universal law. Kant defines this imperative as â€Å"an action that is objectively necessary in itself without reference to any purpose†(Kant, p. 327). The categorical imperative of the example listed above would simply be â€Å"don’t steal†, because it against moral law. These imperatives rule out all self interest and are very blunt to what is right. Kant’s moral laws are laws that apply to everyone and everything without question. All things that should be done are required by moral law and all things that should not be done are forbidden by moral law. The method of determining these moral laws can be derived by what Kant describes as the only real categorical imperative in which he tells people to â€Å"Act as if the maxim of your action were to become by your will, a universal law of nature(Kant, p. 328). This makes the reasoning of a moral obligation or action a very simple process. You must simply ask if your action can be made into a universal moral law and if it cannot then you must not do it. And if they answer is yes, then that means that the action can or should be performed by every being in the universe with no grey areas or exceptions to the rule. One example Kant uses is a man who is seriously depressed and debating with the thought of ending his own life. Kant describes his maxim as â€Å"from self-love I adopt it as a principle to shorten my life when its longer duration Is likely to spread more evil than satisfaction(Kant, p. 328). † Even though he may think he is doing a good thing for the world out of self-love, a universal law to destroy life could not exist. One major argument against Kant’s moral theory where a grey area is obviously present is whether or not it is okay to lie under the right circumstances. The main objection here is called the Nazi objection which asks that if you lived in Nazi Germany during the 1930’s and officers were at your door asking if you were harboring any Jews; would it then be morally permissible to lie because if you told the truth, the Jews would be killed? According to Kant’s moral theory you must tell the officers where you are hiding them, but after the Nazis go after the Jews, it then becomes your moral obligation to help the Jews from being killed which turns into a huge contradiction(Furman). If we listened to Kant in this situation, the owner of the house as well as the Jews would both be murdered and the moral right that you tried to accomplish would be wrong. Therefore, Kant’s theory is false and it is okay to lie as long as your reason is to preserve a higher duty such as the duty to preserve human life. While Kant’s moral theory does have a fantastic base for many ethical issues and moral issues, his theory runs into problems because of its absoluteness. Another example of this is the moral dilemma that would occur if you have made two separate commitments and are somehow only able to fulfill one of them because of unforeseen circumstances(Furman). Kant leaves no instruction on how to deal with this situation because you are breaking a promise when you fulfill one but not the other. The solution would be to use your intuition and reasoning and make a decision on the importance of each commitment. So although his theory does provide good rules to live by, it Is too restricted to become fully accepted.

Decision Making and Enron’s Control Essay

Introduction – Students, analysts and critics of modern business practice will always consider the colossal Enron collapse as an important text book case about how a lot of different things inside the company can trigger a nearly overnight downfall of a once prestigious company. If there was any Cinderella story in the world of blue chip trading and high portfolio business, Enron was the ultimate opposite, if not the witch herself who was killed by her own lethal potion. The Enron collapse resulted in the formulating of many different opinions pointing to the many different possible reasons why Enron – with all the promise and potential that it has a few years before it went south – made the nosedive that made it one of the worst disasters in the history of trade, commerce and business. There is no doubt that most of the opinions that surfaced explaining the reason why such an eventuality befell Enron placed the blame on the wrong things that the top management echelon did for the company; they are after all the one which is responsible for the present and the future of Enron. Critics looking at the Enron debacle scrutinized what happened leading to the collapse using many different perspectives and considering many different factors, both in the professional capability of the company’s leaders as well as the impact of the surrounding factors beyond Enron’s control. One of the most important facets in the debate regarding the fall of Enron is decision making. Evidently, a lot of wrong decisions were made, with one every wrong decision acting as a building block that eventually became an insurmountable wall of consequences all borne out of wrong or faulty decision making processes that yielded results that did the company more harm than good. Indeed, the decision making linchpins significant to the establishment of the case that the Enron collapse was due in some extent to the decision making aspect of the leadership strata of the company can be identified easily as it is scattered throughout the timeline of Enron’s very near and not so distant past leading to the eventual fall of the company that hid behind the faà §ade of the building the ugliness created by the qualities of its leaders that caused the chaos that burned down Enron down to meager, worthless ashes. This paper will pick the significant moments wherein the decision making capabilities and abilities of its top management leaders were at play and use these moments to establish the ethical and other considerations coming to play during the analysis of the decision making efforts of the leaders and why the outcome of such exercises led to the fall of Enron and not towards the company’s betterment, which is the main task of the company’s top executives. The paper will utilize these occasions to stress its argument regarding the role of effective, ethical and sound decision making of top executives leading to either the success or bankruptcy of companies, in this case that of Enron, and discuss key aspects of this line of thought. The paper will not criminalize the actions of the executives of Enron; rather, it will infuse inputs from other professionals regarding important aspects in the discussion of corporate decision making (ethics, result-orientation, etc). Background – Various angles have already been explored by many different individuals every time the topic of analysis is Enron and its collapse. Because of this, the paper is moving to focus on an aspect that is focused more on Kenneth Lay and the rest of his top executive clique’s personal characteristic that could have played an important role in the outcome of Enron’s operation. Decision making is both a personal characteristic as it is a professional credential, even an asset. Some people are being paid handsome amounts of money for their ability to transform decision making moments into an opportunity that provides a positive result and expected outcome for the company. Ehringer (1995) puts it simply: ‘The ability to make good decisions is the defining quality of our lives’ (Ehringer, 1995, p. 1). When Lay, Skilling, Fastow and other Enron bosses were placed in their respective positions, they were expected to exercise a high level of intuitiven ess, business acumen and professional foresight so that every decision making opportunity is met with the company’s best interest long term and short term in mind. They were where they were because those who placed them there believed that they can make decisions to which the company can benefit from. When Enron collapse, many people and organizations criticized the questioned the decision making capabilities of the top executives – was the collapse an effect of the result of the decision that they made? Was the decision made putting the benefit of the company and the employees first, or are the decisions shaped so that it benefited them first? How bad was the breach in the ethical considerations that a professional should take every time he or she makes a decision that puts the future of the company on the line? These are just some of the questions that may also be present in the minds of those who followed the Enron case. Sure there were varying degrees of deception and fraudulent acts from the part of many select individuals who sinned against Enron and its employees, but these cases would have been minimized or even averted altogether if the important decision making privileges was limited to a select few, or if the future-altering decision making capability is disseminated largely among a huge group of people that can provide a check and balance system for Enron. Roberts (2004) explained that ‘ if it is possible for others to make the decisions for a unit, then new options arise to design the decision-making process as well as the incentive schemes to get better performance on both dimensions. For example, the design might specify that a decision about a project arising in one unit that affects another would be implemented if and only if both units agree to it,† (Roberts, 2004, p.151). Enron is an energy trading firm which was performing well in the early part of its existence. By the s tart of the 21st century, the problems that the bosses were trying to hide from the public and from the employees started to stank. Soon, events unfolded like dominoes falling one after the other as a consequence of information spilling out into the public’s attention. Before 2004, the public already had a clear idea about how Enron bosses were supposedly the one responsible for the defrauding of the employees and their company shares and other benefits, as well as the one responsible for the bankruptcy of Enron. One by one, key company officials stepped out of the light and implicated a new name, which will in turn implicate a much bigger name, until the dragnet sent out to see who was accountable for the fraudulent acts in Enron caught its top bosses, including Lay, Skilling and Fastow. Many individuals faced criminal charges, and many more simply went home not just jobless but are robbed of lifetime investments which Enron bosses manipulated and soon lost because of the wrong decisions they made on how to run the company and make it prosper and grow. Examples of how Enron management made wrong decisions during decision making moments abound in the history of the company. Take for example what happened in 1987 – instead of declaring the $190 million loss the company experienced, they concealed it instead, leading to criminal charges. This habit of Enron for opting to conceal losses instead of declaring it became a dangerous vice; when Fastow was aboard Enron, the same outlook affected the decision making of Enron, leading to increase in pile of cases wherein Enron through its top management consciously made actions that defraud the employees and the public. There was also the case of poor public relations by Enron which fanned the flames of panic that removed any possible opportunity for Enron to remedy the financial situation without creating hysteria that saw many stockholders selling their stocks due to the continued falling of the stock value of Enron. Statement of Problem – The most important decision that Enron’s executives faced was not the decision on whether or not to publicly announce about the bankruptcy; in fact, there was no decision making factor during that instance since the predicament of the company has already been decided regardless of what the top executives might have opted for: they were flat out broke and the public needs to know about this, that was the situation. The true decision making moment for Enron’s bosses was the time when they were deciding what the best option to take is with regards to the financial aspect of the company, including taxes, earnings and financial loses. It was a matter of facing a decision making task that provided the Enron bosses with two options – to do the right thing, or to opt for something that is morally and ethically inappropriate. The decision reached in this particular decision making instance was laced with the hope that the option they took would be free from serious repercussions and give them enough time to fix it all up again. Unfortunately for Enron, things did not work out as planned, and the criminal liability of the Enron bosses stemmed from the fact that they decided to do something which they consciously knew was detrimental to the welfare of the Enron company and its employees. During that particular instance, Lay could have opted to do the right thing and faced the consequences – by coming clean, he may have a more sympathetic public to support him in whatever efforts he may wish to undertake to revive Enron, and not be faced with the collapsing stock value since those who can sell theirs sell it in a frantic phase to rid themselves of the stock of the company which is nearing imminent bankruptcy. This showed how the people do not give second chances to those who squander their decision making privileges by making decisions bereft of the consideration of the good of the greater many. Decision making – John Hintze (2006), in his discussion about making smart decisions during decision making, used the case of the Enron collapse to open his discussion and establish the fact that problems are something that is foreseen, something that happened nonetheless owing to bad decision making. Hintze wrote, ‘should we have seen 9/11 coming? What about the Enron collapse? The Signs were there; people pointed them out, but the appropriate steps were not taken by those in a position to do something. Why is this? Politics? Greed? Those certainly contributed, but there was something else at work here, too: A failure of common sense in decision making’ (Hintze, 2006, p. 123). Enron: Bad decision making – Nothing can prove more about how bad the decision making went inside Enron camp more convincingly than the fact the company transformed from prosperous to poor overnight. This was the general characteristic of Enron through the traits shown by its leaders that reflect the Enron personality. There were earlier discussions in the paper about snippets on instances pointing to Enron’s penchant for making bad decision or for going to the resolving of a problem utilizing an option that is more questionable. Fox (2004) explained that ‘Enron believed that its expansion into international projects were positive initiatives simply because they put the company in more potential markets. In truth, Enron made bad business decisions that weren’t supported by the deal’s economics. The bad business decisions piled up, stretching from India to Brazil, pressuring the company to do something about its finances’ (Fox, 2004,p. 307). At least at this point, Fox is not pointing at the unethical aspect of the Enron decision making machinery, just the fact that they made decisions that were bad for the future of the company, but not to the extent of deliberately sabotaging the company or putting the company in danger with all known risk for personal gain. For Fox, it was a bad call plain and simple. But the matter of the fact is that not everyone sees it the way Fox does, and there are those who believe that there were ethical breaches in the decision making in Enron among its top bosses. The (absence of) Leaders in decision-making – Decision making in retrospective is one of the common line of thinking used when investigating events that led to growth or debacle. It is because decision making played an important part in shaping the future of the company; it is here where the foundation, or lack of it, was created via the decisions the bosses made or failed to make. To trace the problems or mark significant actions resulting from decision making which eventually resulted to either the success or failure of the company, it is not only the decision making events that are looked back to; the persons that made them were also put under the microscope, and among the qualities scrutinized is their decision making ability and their other characteristics that affect their decision making attitude and behavior. Professionals debate about the idea of a good decision, a bad decision, good intentions and bad intentions and how the good and bad effect that comes into play afterwards account for the overall accountability of a person wielding the power to make decisions that will have a tremendous impact on the future of the company, something which happened in Enron via Lay, Skilling, Fastow and the rest of the top figures of the company. Acuff (2004) explains that ‘if they make a decision that might not have been the decision I would have made, and the y come and talk to me about it, we look at it and discuss it. There are a lot of different ways to skin the horse. I don’t go saying my idea is the only one that will get you where you want to go. I hold people accountable for good decision-making. If a bad outcome results from a bad decision – that’s a problem. But if a bad outcome results from a reasonable decision, then that’s business, and it could happen to anyone† (Acuff, 2004, p. 187). This was the predicament of those who are trying to evaluate the decision making actions of Enron top executives – did they make decisions, even bad decisions – with the sake of the company in mind, and gambled with their careers because they know that if their plans and actions go well, it is extremely beneficial for the company, in a very Machiavellian approach towards getting things done regardless of the means by which they did it, or were they just plain guilty of fraudulent actions? People who are burdened by the decision that impacts a lot of people is not always amenable to taking the high and moral grounds, that is why the adage about the end justifying the means, about getting things done at what ever cost, about delivering against the odds became popular because of people like the Enron bosses who (probably) acted upon their decision making duties by risking what can be a popularly bad decision. Indeed, it may be easy or even convenient for most people adversely affected by the Enron collapse to attribute the colossal corporate debacle to the top management figures of the company by criticizing their decisions as well as their faculty for sound decision making. While it is true that Enron’s top executives are responsible for the collapse of the company, it is not that easy to measure the level of ethical decision making attributes of Enron’s top brass. Goethals et al (2004) pointed out that â€Å"the complexity associated with ethical decision making and behavior, especially as it applies to leadership and the workplace, makes the construct extremely difficult to research†, adding that â€Å"Measuring an individual’s level of ethical decision making is challenging, particularly because the measurement instruments that are available have problems with priming and social-desirability effects; that is, questionnaires or other similar modes of data collection cue respondents to give answers that they believe are socially acceptable rather than answers that truly reflect their own actions or opinions (Goethals et. al., 2004, p. 461).† Proof of which is the fact that all of these executives in question are career corporate leaders even before they joined Enron; their credentials played an important role regarding their selection for a corporate position as high as theirs. Because of this, as well as the factors that affect the credibility of the ability for identification of the real public pulse regarding the persons involved in the issue, ethical decision making levels of the persons involved is hard to ascertain, making claims for questionable ethical decision making consideration of the people lose important ground and stand on insufficient set of stable legs for proof and justification. Still, there are those who believe that the level of ethics that influences the decision making capabilities of the Enron bosses are without a doubt questionable, and this includes Mimi Swartz and Sherron Watkins who was quoted in the book edited by Kathy Fitzpatrick and Carolyn B. Bronstein. In the article, it mentions about how Swartz and Watkins â€Å"blame Ken Lay, former CEO of Enron, and other company executives for privileging greed and arrogance over ethical business decisions† (Fitzpatrick and Bronstein, 2006, p. 179), the gist of the published work co-authored by the two individuals. Nalebuff and Ayres (2006) wrote that ‘the problem often arises because people ignore the costs and benefits that their decisions have on other people. We call this approach â€Å"Why don’t you feel my pain?† The more technical term for these effects is externalities. Decision makers who ignore externalities are bound to make bad decisions† (Nalebuff and Ayres, 2006, p. 67). This explanation greatly tarnishes the ethical value of the decision making ethics of Enron bosses because it shows that they are prone or inclined to make decisions even if the result of such decisions lead to negative effects that other people will experience. Niskanen (2005) believes that Lay, one of the top bosses of Enron, â€Å"should be judged on the basis of his personal actions, directions to subordinates, or the actions of subordinates that he implicitly condoned by knowing about it without attempting to correct – not on the basis of what he should have known† (Niskanen, 2005, p. 6). Lay’s condoning of actions is a result of a personal and professional decision that he made – or failed to make – and because of that, Niskanen believes that Lay is answerable for any criminal charges that would result from that particular action (or inaction). Watkins was thinking of the company and its employees and their future and hers as well, when she made the decision to let her superiors, particularly Lay, know about the possible accounting problems and the making public of the current and real financial and trade status of the company. This clearly illustrates the difference in ethics when it comes to decisio n making. Decision making, ethics and public perception – Decision making in business is not merely a power or a privilege that one can use at will without thinking of the consequences that might happen should the decision resulted into something that is considered as adversely negative and detrimental to the welfare of the employees, their jobs and the company they work for. Those who are provided with such amenity to go along with their job description should consider that it is also their responsibility to make sure that their employees and subordinates do not think that they are squandering away their decision making privilege and everything that goes along with it. This was the prevailing attitude or outlook of the Enron employees especially nearing the imminent collapse of the company. The absence of ethical consideration resulted to the losing of the credibility of the bosses of Enron because they were not careful with how they undertake their decision making tasks. While bankruptcy is something that is very difficult to accept and impacts greatly in the lives of the employees especially the rank and file blue collar workers, there is a sense of adding insult to injury during occasions wherein the employees are starting to realize that all of the unfortunate things that happen in the company and in their careers are all a result of the faulty, incompetent and unethical decision making of the top management echelon and not because the company was helpless in the onslaught of a devastating economic problem, like how companies closed down during the Great Depression despite the efforts of American businessmen to keep the different industries alive and breathing. During the collapse of Enron, the US is experiencing a very stable economy far from that which characterized US economy during the Great Depression, and is shielded securely from the impact of whatever it was that was happening in the global economic and business landscape, and so during the Enron collapse, the collective finger was pointing an accusing index digit to Enron bosses and majority of the cause of their indignation originates from the sloppy decision making capabilities of Enron bosses who lost their credibility the moment they lost Enron. Brazelton and Ammons (2002) wrote in the book they co-wrote: â€Å"The Ethics Resource Center conducted a survey in 2000 in which it learned that 43 percent of respondents believed that their supervisors are generally poor examples of honest managers, and the same number were pressured to compromise their own integrity or that of their organization during decision making. The survey also identified a strong connection between employees’ perceptions of their supervisors and their own ethical behavior (Brazelton and Ammons, 2002, p. 388).† Enron decision making: the two-pronged factors – It can be pointed out that one of the problems that happened to Enron is the ineffective of decision making among top executives – first, their top executives failed to make correct decisions when they are required to do so, and second, Enron was not fully complimented with a set of professionals which could have contributed to the decision making process, and in the process provided the possibility of infusing new or different ideas that could have altered the outcome of the decision making process. Fitzpatrick and Bronstein (2006) did not look exclusively on Enron’s bosses and the decisions they made in the management of Enron and the company’s money and asset, rather, the two editors focused on the absence of a key top managem ent personnel and took the presence of such a void as a sign that Enron is not even prioritizing the welfare of the company and its employees. The book Ethics in Public Relations: Responsible Advocacy, which includes the Enron case as one of the important case studies to point out the importance of the role of public relations, explains that â€Å"perhaps the governance of these companies was such that they did not care about their publics, and did not want the advice of senior-level public relations officer playing an active or dominant role in organizational decision making† (Fitzpatrick and Bronstein, 2006, pg 179). Conclusion – Niskanen (2005) summed up the Enron case on its characteristic of thriving in bad decisions made by its corporate leaders by saying in the book that ‘the most important lesson from the Enron collapse, however, is that Enron failed because of a combination of bad business decisions, not because its accounts were misleading’ adding that ‘the major business decisions that most contributed to its collapse were a series of bad investments, most of which were in the tra ditional asset-rich industries; the failure to reconcile two quite different business models; and the decision to focus management objectives on reported revenues and earning rather than on the present value of future cash flows’ (Niskanen, 2005, p. 6). Are they poor in decision making, or was the decision making adversely affected by other concerns and priorities outside of Enron that the results of the decision made for Enron looks like those who made the call did not even think about how this course of action will affect Enron? There are no sufficient proofs to point that the case was the latter; for a company that became seventh all in all in the Fortune 500 at least once, it is unthinkable how there will be conscious efforts to sink the company by making wrong decisions, deliberately or not. The point of the paper is not the assertion of the guild of Skilling, Lay or even Fastow, it’s the establishing of the point that decision making, when not handled properly, can turn even the most profitable company into a nose-diving wreck in a short period of time, that decision making plays an important role in how a person defines his or her life and how he or she leads a company and that because of these factors, no one should have an excuse why decision making was taken lightly and without much thought or care. All the people can see is a group of people who made wrong decisions several times, the resulting web and how they got trapped in that web, that is assuming that there was no malice or hidden agenda that the bosses perpetrated in lieu of Enron’s collapse. In the end, only Lay (now deceased) and the elite circle of the Enron executive clique will be the ones who would really know about the truth regarding ethics and the decision making in Enron leading to th e collapse of the company. Many would ask, and some would presume, the reasons as well as the level of guilt of these leaders when it comes to breaching the ethical requirements needed when undertaking decision making for a company. Regardless, the decisions they made created far reaching ripples and altered the lives of many individuals who invested not just their time, strength and life’s savings into the company but as well as their but as well as their faith and trust, which are not in shattered pieces because of the bad decisions that Enron executives made. Crawford (2006) further elaborated on the pointed by explaining that ‘bad decisions by a major company, however, cause major disruptions for all of the company’s stakeholders’. He pointed at the case of Enron as one of his examples, saying that ‘the Enron disaster, as one example, certainly had devastating impacts on the lives of most of Enron employees (including the middle managers and professionals who invested in the company-sponsored Enron 401[K] plans) and also caused suffering for many individual investors who purchased Enron stock on the open market. Thousands of other Enron stakeholders, including Enron’s suppliers and customers, also suffered,’ (Crawford, 2006, p. 26). Indeed, Enron’s decision making had a hand in how the company turned out to be. References: Acuff, Jerry and Wood, Wally (March 2004). Relationship Edge in Business: Connecting with Customers and Colleagues when It Counts. Wiley, John & Sons, Incorporated. Brazelton, Julia K. and Ammons, Janice L. (September 2002). Enron and beyond: Technical Analysis of Accounting, Corporate Governance and Securities Issues. CCH, Incorporated. Crawford, Curtis J. J. (November 2006). Compliance and Conviction: The Evolution of Enlightened Corporate Governance. XCEO, Incorporated. Ehringer, Ann G. (June 1995). Make up Your Mind: Entrepreneurs Talk about Decision Making by Ann G. Graham. Silver Lake Publishing. Fitzpatrick, Kathy, Bronstein, Carolyn B. (May 2006). Ethics in Public Relations: Responsible Advocacy. SAGE Publications. Fox, Loren. (2004). Enron: The Rise and Fall. Retrieved May 12, 2008, from http://www.wiley.com. Fusaro, Peter C., Miller, Ross M. and James, Tom (2002). What Went Wrong at Enron: Everyone’s Guide to the Largest Bankruptcy in U.S History. John Wiley and Sons. Goethals, George R., Burns, James MacGregor and Sorenson, Georgia (March 2004). Encyclopedia of Leadership. SAGE Publications. Hintze, John. (May 2006). Making Smart Decisions. Harvard Business School Press. Nalebuff, Ian Ayres (November 2006). Why Not?: How to Use Everyday Ingenuity to Solve Problems Big and Small. Harvard Business School Press. Niskanen, William A. (June 2005). After Enron: Lessons for Public Policy. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Roberts, John. (May 2004). The Modern Firm: Organizational Design for Performance and Growth. Oxford University Press, USA.

Professionalism and Ethics

Professionalism and Ethics Introduction Professional ethics is a challenging field that demands professional concentration. Any profession demands organized and well developed career, enhanced by skills, knowledge and capacity to make sound decisions. This discussion explores professionalism and ethics attached to the field of engineering, with specific reface to mechanical engineering.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Professionalism and Ethics specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Personal conflict of interest In several occasions, humans are faced with a number of conflicts of interest or an ethical predicament in their day-to-day existence. The outcomes may lead to a precarious, partial and indiscriminating world owing to the un-examined existence. Thus, ethical dilemma should be resolved in order to make life worth living. The dilemma in moral thinking is contradicting. For instance, when thinking is left to the aforementioned reason, it leads to downright discrimination, unacquainted, incomplete, one-sided and prejudiced philosophy. The resolution to such dilemma requires effective review to apply personal ethics. Initially, finding resolutions to intricate complications through operational communication within an organization is more than essential. This assists in measuring and identifying the practical concerns, effects and suppositions brought out by the ethical dilemma. Moreover, testing the thought alongside ethics and pertinent criteria leads to well-reasoned resolutions and decisions. Operational analysis of the intellectual idea helps in evaluating and gathering the appropriate information. Ultimately, detailed and vibrant formulation of the raised up bottlenecks and vital demands helps in resolving the conflict of interest in life. At one time in my life, I faced one of the most testing moments at the work place. Having worked for my engineering company for seven months, I was included in a professional team ta sked with reviewing the worthiness of candidate contractors. With more than 20 applicants tabled before us, we had one week to go through each of them, determine their worthiness and either reject or accept them. In addition, we were expected to accept only four applications for the contract.Advertising Looking for essay on engineering? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More By the end of the third day, we had already accepted five applicants based on merit. The idea was to drop one application and accept the remaining four. However, I realized that the applicant with the fourth highest points was a company whose CEO was a close relative of my wife and such, my own relative. I had no previous information about this issue. My wife requested me to influence the team so that her relative’s company would get the deal. I was in a dilemma because I did not know whether it was right for me to accept her request before infor ming my colleagues. I was also aware that my wife was set to benefit from the deal. After thinking for two days, I realized that it was unethical to act in a manner that suggests I was favoring my relative’s company. I made my mind and informed the other members of the team. The issue was discussed at length. Finally, a decision was reached to reject the application from my relative’s company and accept the fifth best applicant. Professionalism It is worth arguing that college professors are professionals. Indeed, they possess a number of critical attributes that render them professionals. The attributes owned by college professors are all integrated in the dimension of critical thinking. This entails thinking that is own-corrective, own-monitored, own-disciplined and own-directed. As professionals, they enjoy careful knowledge in what they practice as well as rigorous principles of brilliance. These professors seek to overcome the native socio-centrism and egocentrism through their skills in problem solving and actual communication (Harris, Pritchard and Rabins 121). In order to improve the scholarly traits, they habitually enforce the knowledgeable principles to the cognitive module. On the other hand, the professors apply the several elements and aspire to develop the lives of different individuals. The elements applied by the professors include suppositions, inferences, notions, and extrapolations. In addition, they apply effective information, opinion, enquiries and purpose to instill growth in persons of diverse professions. The above elements develop several intellectual traits that college professors put into effect as professionals. Such intellectual traits are bravery, honesty, sovereignty and self-effacement. As well, they enforce the application of other traits similar to fair-mindedness, understanding and persistence. The above dimensions apply to the critical attributes that brand college professors as professionals.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Professionalism and Ethics specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The difference between code of ethics and law Law and code of ethics may perhaps differ in a number of ways. In fact, law is something that one person has to do as it is obligatory. On the other hand, code of ethics denotes something that one ought to do. The code of ethics most likely applies to professionals, for instance, the police, lawyers, medics and engineers or personalities of limited factions. Nonetheless, law is applied in a similar manner to any person as it appears as a loose word hypothetically. The government or state is in control of setting up the law. The state or government that sets the law is the one that oversees its enforcement, given that it should be applied a similar manner to every individual. Rendering the primeval laws has a hostage to fortune in regards to the marginalized groups. In contrast, codes of conduct are enforced and only spread over to certain groups of professionals. In this case, the peers of a medic, an engineer, or a lawyer are the ones who impose and charge their fellows who breach the code of conduct. The contemporary world concentrates on the moral matters, given that ethics are not much different from these morals. Social Responsibility An organization is socially responsible for the things and operations it organizes. In the modern world, companies yield an overwhelming economic influence on society. In the eyes of the law, companies are legal entities, which means that they enjoy the rights and protections of an individual citizen. Thus, corporations can make moral or immoral decisions. The process of corporate moral decision is developed and determined through corporate internal decisions. Although this framework is composed of individuals, it operates like a system or machine. Companies are socially responsible for their actions. They must ensure that they work with in the legal, moral and social requirements. In the Lockheed example, it was expected that the individuals involved were financially endowed for the favors that were involved. The Tristar Jet Company was awarded the right to supply the Chinese travellers to Africa and America with visa to travel without restrictions. Lockheed is popular for guaranteeing the populace in which it operates and takes social responsibility to account for the challenges that the community faces.Advertising Looking for essay on engineering? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More In looking for an attachment with Lockheed, it was difficult to settle an appointment with the human resources manager. Allegedly, shop stewards at the company demand bribes from prospective employees. Conclusion Work ethics is an influential field that demands the influence of the individual expert. Thus, it is the right of professionals to conduct their roles within the limits of their academic qualifications. It determines the way a professional handles the issues that are to be engaged with learners and the employees. Harris, Charles, Michael Pritchard and Michael Rabins. Engineering Ethics: Concepts Case. London: Cengage Learning, 2004. Print.

By Looking Closely At Language Content Style

By Looking Closely At Language, Content, Style Show How? Fat? Can Be Considered A Typical Carve Sto Essay, Research Paper ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? When replying this inquiry one must first see what a typical Raymond Carve narrative is. After reading several of his other short narratives you can see a pattern development. His minimalist manner creates a sense of withdrawal from the narrative and its characters, nevertheless at the same clip he is still able to take you through a scope of emotions. A typical Carver narrative surely involves conversational and easy to understand linguistic communication. However at the base and beneath this are really intricate and elaborate narrative lines that frequently hold implicit in concealed messages, these messages are the readers occupation to bring out. The simpleness of Raymond Carver # 8217 ; s characters makes them complex. Though this is an dry statement as sarcasm is portion of Raymond Carver? s authorship. The individualities of his characters are simple and ordinary, but the sarcasm of the narratives makes them unusual. Most of Carver # 8217 ; s characters are similar: alone personalities without the ability to show themselves, fighting with the troubles of the day-to-day life and traveling from occupation to occupation. There is a bound to what they can bear, and even an undistinguished event can oppress their lives. Their ordinary lives all of a sudden seam non so ordinary ; they become strange. The scenes are semi-industrial American towns that make the reader depressed and dying. The secret plans of his narratives are besides comparable: the action begins with ordinary lives, which somehow prostration into darkness, depression and terror. The universe portrayed by the writer is without faith, political relations, civilization or society. The reader is left with assorted feelings: desperation and gratefulness. Our lives may be bad, but compared to those described in his narratives they seem heavenly. ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? If you compare? Fat? to this analogy so one can surely see similarities. Language wise, this narrative is simple with no complex metaphors etc, Carver does non necessitate these to make the image he wants. His simple authorship manner still can convey you through a scope of emotions. At the beginning of the narrative I found it humourous, ? This adult male is the fattest individual I have of all time seen. ? This description of the adult male can be interpreted as entertaining. However as the narrative develops, this facet of temper shortly alterations into a more serious affair as one begins to feel understanding for the adult male. The elaborate description of what he eats, how he chows an vitamin D people? s comments to his weight filled me with great compassion, ? He? s truly a fatty. ? The linguistic communication used by the characters to depict the adult male can be harsh and cruel reenforcing your understanding for him. In footings of manner the usage of the first individual narrative in this narrative allows Carver to step back and have less of an interpretative influence. A first individual narrative does non let Carver to hold such control over the characters. The gives a greater sense of pragmatism. Many of George washington carvers narratives are focused on one character depicting events. In? Fat? it is based around this adult females giving her perceptual experience of proceedings, ? I say and a feeling comes over me? The adult females does non depict what this feeling is merely that she has one. This adds a turn to the narrative as the adult females is non merely concerned by this mans weight but by something else. It is our occupation as the reader to dissect this. Besides at the beginning of the narrative it is a really laid back and relaxed manner, nevertheless as the narrative progresses your emotions start to come up and you are seeking to calculate out what is truly traveling on. This is Carver? manner being able to subletely toss the whole narrative over conveying up many surprises along the manner. As with many other of his short narratives, Carver will describe something so far and merely at the point where everything is about to be exposed he stops, go forthing the remainder to our imaginativeness. At the terminal of a Carver narrative you feel baffled as such a simple event can be turned around into something life altering for a character. If one looks at the general content of the narrative so you see several analogues emerging with his other narratives. ? Fat? starts off with an ordinary individual, with an ordinary occupation in a ordinary state of affairs. However Carver? s glare is how he converts these apparently dull state of affairss into a life altering experience for the character. If one looks at? Fat? so the stoping is a complete bewilderment for the reader, ? My life is traveling to alter. I feel it. ? In? Fat? there is no existent narrative line as with his other narratives, but its stoping exemplifies Carver? s minimalist manner, maintaining everything simple on the surface, but underneath you can see that something else is traveling on. In decision? Fat? has adult male similarities with a typical Carver narrative. With its minimalist manner and dull ordinary people populating their lives, nevertheless these lives can be changed dramatically by one individual or one event. As a consequence the lives can travel into depression or make the antonym and flourish.

HRM Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

HRM - Essay Example Moreover the staffs feel a greater sense of insecurity for the people of the upper management fail to pay a pleasant ear to their problems. Thus the company in the current juncture is largely facing the threat of rise in attrition levels of the staffs. Older staffs of the company have started developing a feeling that they are being rendered the same importance as given to the newcomers for which they are reflecting less attachment to the task ordered (Fuller, n.d.). Thus the management needs to devise plan of action to let the staff feel secured and motivated so as to reduce the attrition rate. Human Resource Audit-Significance In review of the above problems occurring in GS Plumbing the case for conducting a Human Resource Audit is widely suggested. The Human Resource Audit conducted would help the management to understand the potential and significance of the different Human Resource policies in properly monitoring the activities of the people through the satisfactory compliance o f legal and legislative standards. Human Resource Auditing Process earns due importance for it rests on the activity of conducting interviews on the staffs and employees of the concern pertaining to different levels. Subjects of the interviews mainly aim at highlighting the conditions of employment being offered by the company and the amount of job satisfaction reflected by the large number of interviewees amongst the employees. The Human Resource Audit activities are conducted both by internal and external people. However audit team generated from the external environment is considered more dependable than the internal audit team. The scope of Human Resource Audit is emphasized for it helps in the identification of obsolete policies being practiced by the company and renders fruitful suggestions in changing such for better efficiency. Further Human Resource Audit also helps in enhancing the training dimension of the company to better enhance the working standards of its employees. This practice also helps to focus on the areas, which are deprived of policy regulations and thereby provide efficient mechanisms, which would help in the sorting of problems pertaining to such. Thus the Human Resource Auditing Activity, which in itself is a quite expensive operation, encourages the indulgence of both the management and staff levels. It is because the set of policy recommendations suggested to develop the performances of the organization must be welcomed and reviewed by all. Through such the system of Human Resource Audit earns its due expertise (Gross, 2011). Unplanned Absence of Employees The employees at GS Plumbing were found taking sudden leaves which failed to be administered by the upper management owing to their unplanned nature. Unplanned leaves taken by employees constituted of absences regarding breakdown of their personal health or of the family members. Again the category of unplanned leaves also comprised of employee leaves, which happened due to occur rences of serious accidents in the workplace, and other leaves, which were payless in nature. To address the problem of the growing number of unplanned absences the managers both at the strategic and tactical level are required to conduct a useful process. Firstly the managers and the supervisory team must work to augment to make others aware of the frequencies and consequences of such leaves. Thereby a set of close monitoring actions also needs