Analysis governments involved in events and festival Essay - 1

Analysis governments involved in events and festival - Essay Example A few responsibilities however are common among all these levels of the government with the exception of others which are concerned with only a particular level of government. The basic function of every government is to provide protection and safety to the people. It is also the duty of the government to maintain order and peace in the country (Raj & Morpeth, 2007). It comes under the utmost responsibility of the government to make sure that no such events are taking place in the country that can result in disruption of the smooth running of the government and thereby affect stability of the country. It is also the responsibility of the concerned authorities to keep the economic conditions of the country up to a certain necessary mark and strive to make the country progress and increase economic stability. Providing the people and the citizens of the country with the basic necessities and provisions of life in order to help the people to live a satisfied and contended life is the ob ligation of the administration. Also governments have the primary responsibility to provide leisure activities for the people of their country so that they remain healthy and fit (Hall & Sharples, 2008). It is basically the duty of the local government to provide these leisure and entertainment facilities to the people. Entertainment facilities that government usually focus on include amusement parks, parks, walking tracks, gardens, theater, sports grounds, malls, museums, art galleries, exhibitions and different sites for tourist attractions. In order to make these entertainment facilities easily accessible it is necessary that the transport facilities like train, buses, etc. are easily available and these facilities are available at an affordable price so that they can be accessed by all the citizens of the country. Besides that roads and

Ford Pinto Ethics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Ford Pinto Ethics - Essay Example The other three survived only because special measures had been taken to prevent the rupture of the tank such as (a) plastic baffle between the axle housing and the gas tank (b) steel plate between the tank and the rear bumper and (c) a rubber lining in the gas tank. The results of the test therefore show clearly, that the fuel tank failed, yet the Company did not take any action to remedy the defect. Three of the cars fared better when some special measures were introduced, and the Company had this evidence on hand as well but this still did not factor as significant enough to merit some remedial work being carried out by the Company before getting the cars on to the market. Ford was therefore deficient in its duty of care, because when faced with such results, it should have taken greater care to ensure that the defect in the fuel tank was remedied. Secondly, there are ethical issues that need to be considered as well. The crash test results suggest that there was a danger posed to life and limb as a result of the defective fuel tanks. The question of ensuring safety of future consumers and users of the cars should have therefore been paramount in Ford’s decision as to whether to continue manufacturing the Pintos or not. However, in arriving at the decision on whether or not to market the Pintos despite the defect in the fuel tank which had been discovered, the Company had decided that in order to be competitive, the car should not cost more than $2000 and weigh more than 2000 pounds. This raises the issue of whether Ford considered its competitiveness more seriously or whether it valued the potential loss of life more seriously. Had the latter been the case, it would have taken steps to ensure that the fuel tank was replaced with a rupture proof fuel tank, which would have been somewhat more expensive. It would have als o rendered the Pinto less competitive because it would have used up

Tojo World War II

Tojo World War II Tojo World War II Project Throughout World War II many important individuals have played pivotal roles in the war. These individuals have included Adolf Hitler of Nazi Germany and Winston Churchill of Great Britain. But in the Pacific Theater of World War II, Hideki Tojo of Japan played a very important role in World War II as well. Tojo was important in World War II because he authorized many crucial events in the war, like the bombing of Pearl Harobr and the Battle of Midway. Hideki was born in Tokyo, Japan on December 30, 1884 and came from a family of samurai decent. His father was an accomplished general who enrolled Tojo in the Military Academy and the Army College. After Tojo graduated in 1924, he was able to achieve many accomplishments. His achievements included being a military attachà © in Switzerland and teaching at the Army Staff College. Within the military circle Tojo was known as the Razor; a reputation Tojo received for his ability to make quick and sharp decisions. But one of his biggest achievements before World War II was his arrest of the main conspirators of the February 26 incident. The February 26 incident was an attempted coup detat of the Japanese government. The reasoning behind this coup detat was that many of the younger officers in the Japanese military felt there was major corruption and poverty in the rural areas. And they believed the solution was to remove some of the officials in the government. Some of their targets included Keisuke Okada, who was the prime minister of Japan during the time of the incident. As well as Makino Nobuaki, who was in good relations with Emperor Hirohito. The conspirators of the February 26 incident believed by removing people like Nobuaki out of government, then the problems in Japan would be solved. However Tojo and other military members against the coup were able to arrest many of the conspirators and suppress the rebellion. As a result Tojo was promoted to a Chief of Staff Position and by 1929; Tojo had become commander of the illustrious First Infantry Regiment. Within Tojo, he had extreme right wing views and believed in an aggressive foreign policy. Thus it was natural for Tojo to support military actions such as the 1931 invasion of Manchuria and the Second Sino-Japanese War. The invasion of Manchuria consisted of Manchuria as well as Korea under Japanese control. Japan also instituted a puppet government in Manchuria called Manchuko, with Puyi as Manchukos regent. While the Second Sino Japanese War was a result of Japans imperialist policy to control China and obtain Chinas raw material and other resources. Although both wars displayed the military might of Japan, it also produced dire consequences. Many of the Chinese were killed and Japan was panned by the international community. Especially from the League of Nations, who condemned Japans military aggression, thus pushing Japan to leave the League of Nations. Tojo, like many of the Japanese people at the time, held great admiration for the dictators in Europe, such as Hitler and Mussolini. Tojo especially respected Hitler, whom Tojo admired for his passion and toughness. Japans respect toward the European dictators was exemplified when Japan signed the Tripartite Pact: a pact that created a mutual alliance between Italy, Germany, and Japan. However Japans respect toward the European dictators was not shared with the United States. Instead many Japanese people like Tojo perceived the Americans to be self indulgent, lazy and without morals. This was especially evidenced during Tojos trip to the United States as a military attachà ©. During the trip, Tojo perceived the Americans to be lacking the spiritual strength and dedication of the Japanese. Perhaps through this attitude toward the Americans and among other factors did it help persuade Tojo to authorize an attack on Pearl Harbor. When by Emperor Hirohito appointed Tojo to be the Prime Minister, Tojo believed that war with the United States was inevitable and Japan needed to be prepared for such a war. He thought this way because tensions between Japan and the United States were already high. This was due to events such as Japans invasion of Manchuria in 1931 and their continuing expansion toward China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. In an attempt to stop Japans military aggression, the United placed an embargo on oil exports to Japan. The embargo implanted by the United States was proven to have a negative effect toward Japan because United States supplied many of Japans oil exports, and Japan needed vast amounts of oil to fuel their military expansion. And if Japan were to continue conquering further into Asia, Tojo and many military commanders were sure they would be in a war with the United States. As a way to prevent a war with the United States, an attack on Pearl Harbor seemed to be solution. After all Tojo and many Japanese commanders believed the Pearl Harbor plan would achieve three things. First of all through the plan, United States would lose many of its valuable ships, therefore preventing the U.S. from interfering with Japans naval interest. Second, the Pearl Harbor attack would give Japan time to strengthen its position and reinforce their navy. Lastly, the Pearl Harbor bombings would lower United States morale and give Japan the chance to dominate the Southeast Asia region. However after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, quite the contrary occurred. The United States congress immediately declared war on the empire of Japan and America began to mobilize its society toward an all out war. As it became evident that the United States would fight Japan in World War II, Tojo began to lead the empire of Japan toward many battles in the Pacific with the United States. At first it seemed Japan was victorious against their enemies as they were able to gain various territories in the Pacific. Territories that Japan conquered included Guam, the Wake Islands, Marianas, and many others. But their numerous victories were especially highlighted by the Battle of the Philippines. The Battle of the Philippines was an invasion conducted by the Japanese forces and its sole purpose was to gain raw materials in the nearby areas. The defending units of the Phillipines were a combined force of American and Filipino soldiers. Despite the defending troops having more men then Japan in the battle, they were otherwise at a disadvantage. Japan was using their best troops and equipment for the battle, while the American/Filipino soldiers were poorly trained and equipped. As a result the Philippin es became a part of Japan, and the Allied soldiers that did survive suffered harsh treatment from the Japanese. The Japanese punished the soldiers with atrocities such as the Bataan Death March. The Battaan Death March was a march of about 76,000 prisoners, marching from the Bataan peninsula to war prison camps. During the march the Japanese often beat the soldiers and nourishments like food were purposely kept away from the prisoners. Physical abuse such as rape, beheading, and bayonet piercing were common throughout the march. But despite the momentum Japan seemed to be reaching in the Pacific, they came to an abrupt halt during the Battle of Midway. The Battle of Midway was a decisive battle fought between the United States and Japan. In the battle Japan wanted to eliminate United States as a power in the Pacific theatre of World War II. Japan hoped a victory on Midway would convince the United States to end its operations in the Pacific and give the advantage Japan needed to dominate the other countries in East Asia. But during the Battle of Midway, the U.S. Navy were able to surprise the Japanese invasion fleet and score a resounding victory. The Navy was able to sink all four of Japans aircraft carriers while only three of their own carriers were sunk. After the Battle of Midway, Tojos reputation within Japan began to deteriorate as Japan began to suffer many defeats against the United States. These defeats have included battles such as the Battle of Iwo Jima. In the Battle of Iwo Jima, the United States planned to capture the island as a landing place for damaged bombers coming back from Japan. During the battle the U.S. marines suffered casualties around 20, 000 people. The Japanese that were left on the island died from the battle or by commit suicide. Many of the Japanese killed themselves because they thought the Americans were barbarous and would treat them terribly. In reality, the Americans treated the Japanese well and even offered them nourishments like water. Finally after the fall of Saipan in 1944, Tojo was dismissed as prime minister and maintained a low profile. But soon after Japans surrender in 1945, Tojos name began to reappear into the spotlight. It was because General Douglas Macarthur ordered the arrest of alleged war criminals which included Hideki Tojo. As a result many news reporters and photographers surrounded Tojos house, preventing Tojos chance to escape. Once the American forces finally arrived to Tojos house, Tojo shot himself in the chest as an attempt of suicide. Although Tojo intended to end his life by shooting his heart, he ended up shooting into his stomach and failed to kill himself. Tojo was then arrested and had an emergency surgery in a U.S. Army Hospital. Later on, Tojo would be tried by Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal for his war crimes during World War II. Tojo would be found guilty of crimes such as antagonizing war with the United States and the deaths of millions in the Eastern Asia region. As punishment Tojo would be sentenced to death. Tojo would finally be executed by hanging on December 2, 1948. Overall Tojo played a important role in World War II because he would lead many crucial events in the war. An example would be Tojos authorization of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. When the Japanese planes bombed Pearl Harbor, many of the ships that belonged to the United States were destroyed. Most of all battleships were heavily targeted because they were highly valued during this time period. The bombing of Pearl Harbor was a crucial event because it immediately switched the mindset of the American people at the time. Before the Pearl Harbor attacks, many Americans preferred an Isolationist policy of not being involved in the affairs of other countries. But because of the attack, the isolationist agenda was suddenly dropped and the United States suddenly joined forces with the Allies to fight the Japanese and the Axis Powers. Thus the authorization of the Pearl Harbor Bombing would be crucial to World War II because it would bring in one of the biggest players in the war: The United States of America. Another important event Tojo lead was the Battle of Midway. In this battle Japan wanted to eliminate United States as a power in the Pacific theatre of World War II. Japan hoped a victory on Midway would convince the United States to end its operations in the Pacific and give the advantage Japan needed to dominate the other countries in East Asia. The Battle of Midway was proven to be important because the battle proved itself to be a halt to the victories Japan held in the war. Before the Battle of Midway, the empire of Japan had a strung of victories in battles like the Battle of the Phillipines. But once the Americans defeated the Japanese in the Battle of Midway, Japan began to lose many battles afterwards. These battles have included historic events such as the Battle of Okinawa and Iwo Jima. Because of the continuing losses Japan began to suffer after the Battle of Midway, United States began to gain momentum and eventually end World War II in the Pacific. In conclusion Hideki Tojo has played a very important role in World War II, as it is evidenced through many of the crucial events that Tojo initiated. These events have included the Pearl Harbor attacks and the Battle of Midway. Although in Tojo is not as notorious as Hitler is in Europ, Tojo has an ominous presence within many countries in Asia. It was through the many crucial events Tojo authorized like The Battle of the Phillipipnes that made Tojo notorious there. Therefore through the many pivotal events Tojo conjured, Tojo proves himself to be a very important figure in World War II. Bibliography Browne, Courtney. Tojo, the last banzai. New York City: Penguin Books, 1998. Print. A detailed spectrum into the life of Tojo especially during his role in World War II Hideki Tojo. ABC CLIO. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 Mar. 2010. . Hideki Tojo. Spartacuz Educational. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Mar. 2010. . Hideki Tojos Biography History of World War II: Origins and Outbreak. N.p.: Marshall Cavendish, n.d. Print. Tojo was behind the Japanese Pearl Harbor Bombing Kamikazes. ABC CLIO. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Mar. 2010. . Kamikazes were encouraged by Tojo Pearl Harbor. ABC-CLIO:World History Modern Era. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Mar. 2010. . Pearl Harbor bombings

Sprite :: GCSE Business Marketing Coursework

Sprite â€Å"Image is Everything† â€Å"Thirst is Everything, Image is Nothing† we have all seen this slogan slapped on to every one of Sprite’s products for last couple of months. But what does it mean? Does it mean that someone at a Pepsi convention should order a Sprite, a Coke product, just cause they like the taste? Of course not, cause if they did they would get kicked out at the very least. Advertisers use this sort of slogan to catch your attention, and then they have you right where they want. In the most recent Sprite commercials that feature Grant Hill of the Detroit Pistons, they show us that the reason why we would have a Sprite is just for the taste of it. But if this was all they are trying to get across to us wouldn’t it be cheaper and wiser to use a 6 dollar per hour kid rather than a guy that won’t step foot in a place for less that a 100 grand. Why would they make a commercial that contradicts itself? The reason an advertisement would contradict itself like thi s is for one reason only, to try and fool our wants and desires into becoming our needs. Our needs are simply something that is a necessity for us to survive, such as food and water. We all know we couldn’t go long without these simple yet essential things. While our wants and desires for things such as five star restaurants and luxury cars. Which by no means are needed to survive, but just make living all the more fun. Advertisers are masters on how to exploit our desires, and to make us believe that they are our needs. And it is by no means is this easy or cheap for a commercial to be able to do. To be able to make us believe that our life would, in some way, be better with this product by our side. Sprite’s commercial that plays every time you blindly surf the television channels are all about image. The commercial that is shown the most, features Grant Hill drinking a Sprite. While they state in the back round and print on the screen, â€Å"Thirst Is Everything, Image Is Nothing†. When I first saw this I was thinking, â€Å"cool a great drink that anyone can have and not look out of place†.

Mercedes Benz Operations Management Essay

Executive Summary Daimler Mercedes-Benz is one of the most valuable companies around the world; it is ranked number ten out of 100 leading brands worldwide (Bestglobalbrands.com, 2014), Mercedes-Benz is part of Daimler AG which is one of the best leaders in automobiles brands. The Daimler AG brand aims to deliver services, value and premium quality to its customers. The company has 14 sub-companies that produce cars, vans, trucks, and financial services. It has more than 100 vehicle models in over 200 countries worldwide, offering high quality products is the company’s strategy and  goal. Daimler Mercedes-Benz cars have sold 1,565,563 million unit with revenues of over 64,307 million euros; with over 274,000 thousand employees in 2013, the company has also invested in plants and equipment worth over 3,751 billion euros (Daimler AG, 2013). This management report includes an in-depth study of the operations management inside the company, by covering the most important parts of the company such as manufacture, assembly line and warehouses management. The aim of this report is to study current issues as well as the status of the company and how changes in demand can be handled. At the end of this report, the conclusion and recommendations offer the company solutions to prevent any issues that they may face during the production life cycle. Part (A) A-I: Operations Management at Daimler Mercedes-Benz  Quality & Material Management Mercedes Benz’ manufacturers use a global quality management system to ensure that their automobile products meeting their standards, which in return increase customer loyalty to the brand. Producing high quality automobiles is the goal of Daimler- Mercedes’ strategy to meet the customer’s requirements, as well as opening a new road for new customers to experience Mercedes automobiles. Recently, the company has aimed to increase quality by adding extra environmentally friendly features to their products to help the global environment (Daimler AG, 2013). However, Mercedes Benz’ customer satisfaction can be damaged by quality worries. Alarms led the company to take the decision to recall over 250,000 cars from the year 2008 until late 2014 for mechanical and safety concerns at the assembly line. Mercedes recalled these vehicles to be serviced immediately for customer safety (Jensen, 2014). On the other hand, BMW had to recall fewer vehicles than Mercedes Benz, for immediate maintenance related to mechanical issues. Such issues could cause a crash due to a power fault in the engine (CBS Miami, 2014). Outsourcing outside Germany had increased this risk for Mercedes Benz, by decreasing the company quality and safety. The company recalled more than 55,000 vehicles that were produced in  China because of a faulty circuit made by the manufacturer (Wantchinatimes.com, 2014). These issues are related to the quality management of the company, and can decrease customer loyalty, which could lead them to consider changing to other brands. Quality and safety issues affect the company’s yearly ranking, which in return can increase or decrease their total revenues. Quality is one of the most important components for the company to keep ahead of the competition. Furthermore, according to (Miller and Lundegaard, 2002) Mercedes’ quality has to be bulletproof as the highest company priority, through closing any gaps that occurred through previous issues. The increasing numbers of sub-model cars can also affect the brand quality through increasing any risk issues once launched to the public. Furthermore, according to (Stephen, 2004) Mercedes customers have high expectations about the high quality promised by the company. In 2003, the company disappointed many customers when they sold over 2000 vehicles with an extra option for a navigation system, which were not ready to be delivered at the right time, also accompanied by other mechanical issues. On the other hand, the company made an announcement about its new high quality hydraulic breaking system, which increased its competitiveness in terms of safety and quality against other competitors in the industry. Our company should make sure that manufacturers deliver products with the highest design specification, in order to be order-winner quality conformance, by delivering products with no defects (Hill and Hill, 2012). Furthermore, improvements in quality lead to a decrease in cost for the company. According to (Evans, 1997) higher quality products lead to a decrease in costs for the company through higher productivity: ‘improvements in quality leads to lower cost because of less re-work, fewer mistakes, fewer delays and snags’ (Evans 1997, P.55). Speed According to (Hill and Hill, 2012), synchronising all supply chain activities through using the same data, and completing production at the scheduled time, coordinated between the manufacturer and suppliers, enables manufacturers to respond quickly to the demand changes. Therefore, synchronisation ensures that our manufacturers are able to deliver products faster and more flexibly to the customers. Furthermore, Daimler Mercedes-Benz understand what customers are looking for, therefore the company is expanding our dealers network to meet the customer requirements for vehicle availability. Our company’s relationship with the current suppliers is improving every day to minimise any risk of supplying defective vehicles (Automotivesupplychain.org, 2013). In addition, working closely with suppliers reflects positively on our brand’s customer service. In 2008, the company faced a problem with one of its suppliers, which caused a delay in one of our products models. The supplier was supposed to deliver special battery materials to the manufacturer’s warehouses (Ireson, 2008). However, the supplier refused to meet Mercedes-Benz’ requirements, which caused a delay in delivery and to use of low quality batteries which were defective. Our company is using the powerful application to manage our suppliers, this application is called SAP, it is making our supply chain management more efficient, flexible, and at the lowest cost. The SAP solves any gaps in the company’s capabilities by using the supply chain fingerprint system to scan all the parts and materials; these technologies is helping the company to reduce any extra cost (mSE Solutions, 2012). In addition, the SAP increases the flexibility of our manufacture as well as increasing the speed of delivery for the customers, through just in time (JIT). It does this by enabling many features for the dealer to calculate the vehicle price of the order during the order stage and at the same time getting an order-number to track the order. All these steps are integrated together into the supply chain management system, and are informed by each stage of the order (Infosys, 2005). This synchronises the information in real-time, reflecting on the company strategy to change with demand. Also, there are advantages in using the SAP application to manage our company warehouses where the company stores materials for vehicles. By sending orders for the warehouse to get ready to deliver an order to the assembly line, this can achieved by using the just in time (JIT) efficient method for manufacturing. In the meantime, this creates an extra space for new materials in the storage area at the  warehouse; the SAP system will already be sending a new order to fill and stack those storage areas for future orders from the system (Bayigen, 2012). All these measures combine to increase the speed, therefore reducing the cost of manufacture, and maintaining dependability in an efficient way. For our company dependability is an important factor of the company’s success, it reduces any ambiguity within the supply chain management (Slack et al., 2012). Dependability and Flexibility Our company had dependability issues in 2014. This dependability issue started after launching the new high quality CLA-Class model at an affordable price. Dealers of Mercedes-Benz could not deliver the new model on time, meaning customers had to wait at least two months until they are available in stock. Not keeping up with high demand could lead to loss of brand-loyal customers or interested buyers who are willing to trade in or paying cash immediately. This makes our company less flexible in terms of adapting to changes in customer demand (Flierl, 2014). Cost Our company differentiation strategy to produce high quality luxury cars is inspiring in itself, in terms of the creation of unique high quality vehicles that exceed our customers’ expectations. Our company charges a premium price for most of its models. This differentiation strategy helps the company to increase the brand image positively in our customers’ eyes, by including high-end technology and unique services (Tanwar, 2013). Also, our company provide different vehicles types with unique colours including high variety and volume to attract new costumers as well as reducing the unit cost from the supplier side. On the other hand, our company variation in demand is high due to the complexity of the production and the way that we keep in touch with the demand. A-II: Process Management at Daimler Mercedes-Benz Process management is a vital part of our company success. According to (Slack et al., 2012), operations and process management can break the whole business at any stage or place when they are managed in the wrong way. Furthermore, processes at Daimler Mercedes-Benz are internationally the same. Our processes include inputs, via a transformation stage, to create and deliver high quality outputs that meet the customer expectations and more. Customers’ orders are processed through the operations system as soon as they ask for a particular model. Types of Daimler Mercedes-Benz customers 1) Customers asking for a particular model through the dealer: Most of the time, Mercedes-Benz dealers have all the models in the showroom and ready to be sold. In the case of high demand for a model, dealers will have to order a new delivery from our company in order to manage the demand. 2) Customers asking for a particular model through the website: The company’s website gives customers details about car models. The website also allows customer to customise their desired car by adding extra features to the interior or exterior of the car model. Furthermore, when the customer is at the order-check out, it will automatically locate the nearest dealer to the customer to confirm the order. Once the dealer confirms the order, the order is entered into the SAP application and sent to the manufacturer. Where our company has already launched the new vehicle model, these models are produced using these processes: Advanced Design Process Daimler Mercedes-Benz’ models are designed by 440 designers from all over the world, from countries including the United States of America, Europe, and Asia. These designers are responsible for designing future cars using their creativity and imagination. Our company has invested millions of dollars into building high technology designing studios to meet the future of these  automobiles. Here, designers are involved in the development of each model through strategic management, to operation management of the vehicle design. Designers at Mercedes Benz control the design process as well as the model’s lifecycle, from the drawing stage to the stage where the interior and exterior meets the company’s quality standards. From here, the design is moved into a virtual digital design on computers, to add features and a superior look. The design process takes a long time, in some cases more than three years (Media.daimler.com, 2010). According to (Slack et al., 2012), designing process types depend on the complexity of the project. Mercedes-Benz vehicles tend to take too long to be designed, making their projects low volume as well as having a high variety of projects. The design process is sent to the board of management at our company with a planned schedule for the production life cycle. Approval is sought from the board of management: this stage of accepting or rejecting the new design impacts on the production process. The production process then involves the body shop and the assembly line. The Body and paint Shop (Raw Materials and Workers job commitment) High technology robots create the vehicle bodies including the metal shell. After the board of management have accepted the new vehicle design, the robots transform the design concept into reality by producing the body parts. Over 1200 robots are in daily operation at Mercedes Benz U.S. International, in order to increase the speed of production. These robots are used to guarantee quality and fast delivery. This means the workers can knows exactly when supplies are coming. This ensures that the line is not stacked with vehicle parts in order to make the process more flexible. Furthermore, the SAP application helps to reduce the chance of late delivery by ensuring that the parts are on time and by checking availability of the materials at the warehouses. Our company ensures that customer quality and safety standards are met by increasing the welding parts to more than 5000 welds on each vehicle. When the process is done, engineers have to check the quality of the vehicle as well as following the ‘just in time’ method in sending them on to the next process. Workers at the body shop are well  trained to meet standards such as safety and cleanliness of the work place (Mbusi.com, 2012). The Assembly Line Implementing innovation in the Mercedes-Benz assembly line is one of its drivers to success. An example of this is our assembly line at Mercedes Benz U.S. International which contains four lines. When parts are finished at the paint shop, our assembly line and its workers are ready to build up the final vehicle shape. Our strategy makes the assembly line moves while the workers are working, which decreases waste in terms of time. Suppliers respond to our strategy to be environmentally friendly by using re-usable plastic packages. At the end of the assembly line stage, there is a new stage of quality checks, including a rattle test, wheel alignment test, roll test, and shower test. These all ensure that the quality meets the company standards. After the quality check results are confirmed (Mbusi.com, 2012), the vehicles are made ready for worldwide shipping by transporting them to the marshalling yard, containing the transportation areas. Customer Service Strategy At Daimler Mercedes-Benz, customer service plays a big role in the brand image. It helps the company to ensure that customers are satisfied and their expectations are met. To satisfy customers, their perception of the product needs to match the delivered product (Johnston et al, 2012). Our company had created a new service called customer service assistant system CSA in order to provide customers with a broad range of services in each country. This customer service assistant system is available 24/7in order to assist owners of the vehicles, so they can be in contact with any issues that may occur. Furthermore, the company is also investing in research for future customer needs. Staff can speak many languages, making the service more efficient and more flexible. The CSA allows customers to complain about any issues relating to their vehicle. The CSA system studies and checks each issue, while also sending the customer to their nearest Mercedes-Benz dealer to resolve the issue as soon as possible. This strategy helps our company to  ensure that the functionality of the customer services meets and exceeds customers’ expectations (sustainability.daimler.com, 2012). The company’s current customer services include: Safe-Driving courses for the safety of the owners Rescue services booklet 24/7 emergency breakdown assistance Financial services After-sales services According to (Hill and Hill, 2012), quality is determined by how well a company’s services meet their customers’ requirements and expectations. Our company CSA system is meeting the customers’ expectations by contacting them after their purchase to ensure that they are happy with the service. Including customers by ask for recommendations. This strategy provides our company with extra information about areas that we should cover in the future, which increases the company sales revenue; and decreases vehicle defects, which saves time. Furthermore, accepting customers’ complaints helps our company to look again at how the manufacturer produces car models in the future. This ensures that our customers are satisfied by the services provided. The after-sales services should be prepared for any mistake in the manufacture, by informing customers one-by-one once any issues have been discovered. Inventory Management At Daimler Mercedes-Benz, each region has its own warehouse where the company stores all the parts of the car models. Each region has its own geographic areas where temperatures can range from below zero degrees to over 35 degrees. These parts are either sent to the manufacture or to the after-sales services. Furthermore, our company is the owner of the most warehouses across the world. Our company uses SAP to control these parts in each region. However, the company failed to ensure that the warehouses were ready to send vehicles for its new CLA model. This is an alarm for the company, warning it to look into the system in order to catch up with high demand. It also shows that there was a time-waste issue between delivering  the materials to the manufacturers and new orders for new materials to be stocked in the warehouses. This may cause issues in the future when it comes to high demand orders. There may be an increased risk of unavailable parts. Furthermore, when the inventory management fails to catch up with demand by putting customers in queues, this can make these customers unhappy, which can affect the company’s revenue in other ways (Slack et al., 2012). Purchasing and Supply Chain Management Our company is facing material shortages from the suppliers. These shortages notified our managers to focus more on research from around the world, in order to implement new ideas by finding solutions. At Mercedes-Benz’ our suppliers are local suppliers in each country, working under specific conditions and requirements. The aim in commissioning local suppliers is to reduce time, so materials can be delivered to the ware house ‘just in time’, further decreasing extra costs for the company (BayIgen, 2012). One of the issues that faced our company when a certain supplier was not able to deliver batteries on time was the resulting delay in the production process. This delay affected customer demand, causing customers to look at other products. Therefore, the company is now using the SAP application to manage their suppliers. The Process Chart A-III: Lean Management at Mercedes Benz At Mercedes-Benz, lean management has been in place for more than 15 years; lean management is a vital part of our operation management. This is achieved through using the Mercedes-Benz production system (MPS), which refers to: layout, standards, tools of the production, and the methods for operating our company plants worldwide. Furthermore, MPS is divided into two systems: one for training and the other for support. The MPS training centre ensures that our trained experts are working hard and are well motivated on the production line as well. It also ensures that improvements are made by managers, meeting the minimum company requirements and standards. The  process of training employees and managers at Mercedes-Benz takes more than six months. This involves the employees in the operation processes, in order to deliver the quality of services that our customer expects. MPS trainees receive one type of training that covers the theories and four types of training that put what they have learnt into practice. MPS aims to enhance communications between the plants, leading our company to ensure that lean synchronisation processes are well constructed, in order to eliminate waste. A significant approach to eliminating waste of time is used by our company. When the our workforce understands exactly how important high quality is to the company, each employee has the experience and is well enough equipped with the minimum tools to do the given job role. Then the employee can find the car set up, with the tools next to him and ready to be used (Daimler AG, 2012). A new strategy has been developed by the company to take a closer look at customer demand. This strategy is based on launching our products in public. At the same time the plant has started production of a new model to test and catch up with demand in each country, by applying the lean and just in time principles to reduce overproduction as well as producing what our customer needs at a given time, and delivering a high quality car model (Azok, 2014). This new strategy strengthens our company view on demand as well as producing high quality car models as soon as possible, meeting our customers’ expectations. Other plants around the world are, one by one, each month, preparing to start production. It is clear that the company is doing its best to forecast customer demand. Furthermore, according to (Slack et al., 2012), implementing lean synchronisation in a company operations means that they can produce at the lowest possible cost and the highest quality. This is achieved through delivering exactly what the customers expect from the company. Also, applying this method our plants in other countries, to produce cars at different times, enables our company to handle any mistakes or errors that may occur at the first plant by compensating and changing at other plants. Thus, it will decrease quality issues, since information can be shared between our plants ‘just in time’. In return, this will ensure that efficiency and improvement principles are in place, reducing costs as well as eliminating unnecessary steps. The ‘just in time’ (JIT) concept of Mercedes-Benz is similar to Toyota’s concept. The assembly line at Mercedes-Benz can handle producing new models, reducing the time needed to build a new assembly line and to commission new plants. This represents a cost incentive for the company. Since the assembly lines at our company are able to handle new models, this will decrease the setup time, which in return will reduce waste of resources. According to (Evans, 1997), setup time reduction will increase the flexibility of the production line by decreasing the production time as well as decreasing the inventory; furthermore, it increases company productivity. The similarities between Mercedes-Benz’ production system (MPS) and Toyota’s production system lie in their JIT, pull production and kanban systems. These enable both companies to produce any quantity of vehicles depending on demand. They help the company to use available materials depending on the demand level. At this point, our company is going to replace containers of used materials with new containers by asking our long-term suppliers to send a new order. This uses a high technology card that can be removed from the container and scanned using the MPS system. It then sends the new order to our supplier. In this way, MPS minimises the inventory as well as using minimum inputs to produce the highest outputs (Clarke, 2006). Our company has already received many awards for its lean production as well as for reducing the production of many models from 43 to 30 hours in 2015. This is enabled by our lean production system, which has reduced waste in terms of time (Hamprecht, 2012). Part (B) Capacity Management at Mercedes Benz Daimler Mercedes-Benz’ capacity management failed to chase the demand for our new CLA model. According to (Hill and Hill, 2012), capacity means serving customers by delivering products through matching the organisation’s resources to current demand. Our company could not cope with the high volume of requests for this model due to an inaccurate estimation of demand. The management team needs to be more efficient in chasing demand by tweaking the  output to match the current demand of this model. This would start with hiring more labour and asking workers if they are able to take overtime shifts in order to fulfil the high volume production. This could then decrease the number of customers who were dissatisfied by the delay, waiting for more than three months in the queue. Also, since that our company already has a long-term strategy for achieving high demand, the company should consider asking the nearest plants outside the country whether they have products ready to be dispatched directly. Weak cooperation between those countries could cause delays. The complexity of the operation process affected the delivery of the CLA model. The management team could have waited longer before launching the model to the public, by checking all the available resources. Nevertheless, our company manufacturers were not ready to deliver ready products on time to the customers. This led to a hard decision for managers to decide what is best for both the company and customers. The decision to make customers wait in queues for three months until this model is available is, in the customers’ eyes, harming our company’s image. Furthermore, the warning signs of being out of stock were not checked properly; from this it is clear that our staff should be more skilled. Also, asking for recalls for defective models due to manufacturing issues, affects the quality of the production inside the manufacturer as well as our customers will be unhappy. Quality is a high priority problem, which negatively affects our company relationship with the customers, leading to queues, as with the shortage of CLA models. Lack of dependability and flexibility can decrease our company sales revenue as well as increasing in costs, which in return reduces our lean synchronisation. The company was aware of these risks yet our company decided to launch the new CLA model. Our company is already scheduling our future growth by investing in expanding our capacity. This will lead our company being more flexible in the future, as well as better able to serve high customer demand. Our company has realised that there is a lack of space for expansions in many places, therefore our company is looking to find more locations to build up new assembly lines to enhance our production (Daimler.com, 2013). It is  important that the company should always attempt to catch up with demand to ensure that our customers are satisfied, as well as to increase our sales revenues. An automobile manufacturer should always match the existing material flow with production, and also ensure that the company record the capacity planning in order to get more details about our actual capacity. This will enable our company to control the demand properly. Also, when our company could not control the demand, this led the company to face many challenges relating to our supply chain management. When a company cannot meet customer demand, this makes it more difficult for the company to manage their capacity. This complexity is called the ‘bullwhip effect’, suppliers should expand their current capacity in order to be more flexible to catch up with the high demand on the materials (University Alliance, 2015). Capacity management has many levels. In the case of our company, the capacity level depends on demand, especially as most of the services that Mercedes-Benz offer are related to physical materials such as vehicles and service parts. This is considered to be a mixed long-term capacity which depends on demand. The demand forecast in our company is different from one year to another. Accurately forecasting the demand means that our company has the ability to evaluate uncertain risks that may occur. Also there is a value in operational terms, in knowing our company’s limits: knowing what we can and cannot do. On the other hand, our company already has experts who control our capacity. Controlling capacity means planning at an advanced level for companies to be well-prepared in terms of: responding to uncertain changes in terms of demand; and controlling the inventory and warehouses so that inputs are ready to be transformed into outputs. This will benefit companies and manufacturers in terms of increasing revenues, and through establishing an organisation where high demand places pressure on the parties inside the company (Slack et al., 2012). Part (C) Conclusion and Recommendations Dependability is an important factor that can help the supply chain to deal  with high demand. According to (Slack et al., 2012), focusing on dependability at an earlier point may reduce uncertainty about any risks that the manufacturer may face. This is especially important when it comes to dealing with quantities; our manufactures should focus more on delivering products on time. Dealers should be prepared for such an event and could be warned by the manufacture of high demand in order to be prepared to be flexible at an earlier stage in the order. Covering a high demand of orders from customers is important. In order to satisfy them, our company should be more flexible to reduce the impact of any events that may occur. The company should address quality issues at an earlier stage. The company already conducts high quality checks on each process and stage. It is highly recommended to report any concerns that may appear during the product life cycle. Reporting these at an earlier stage will give our company extra time to find proper solutions. In the case of covering the inventory management, our company failed with the new CLA model. The company should consider looking again at the whole warehouse system. It is recommended that the operations manager should focus on increasing the physical quantity stored in warehouses inside the company, in order to anticipate future demand as well as increasing the company’s value to its customers. Also, since that our company is the owner of most of the warehouses, it is a competitive advantage to never be out of stock, even when the demand is increasing. Furthermore, the warehouses at Daimler Mercedes-Benz should become more efficient through using the SAP application. The company should consider giving more opportunities for the employees to gain more skills and experiences. Since our company is investing in capacity, it is also a competitive advantage for us to always be ahead of demand; this will ensure that the company increases levels of customer satisfaction, whereby products meet customer demand. Being able to forecast the demand on a daily basis will help the company to decide whether they should invest more in capacity or reduce the number of suppliers. Mercedes-Benz should focus more on suppliers’ entry requirements and how a long-term or short-term arrangement can be an advantage or disadvantage for the company. Managing suppliers in an effective way will reduce any extra cost as well as making sure that our suppliers realise the company requirements in terms of JIT. In addition, our company should enhance its relationships with all suppliers. This will ensure that the suppliers are happy when they are dealing with our company and are not likely to provide the company with defective products. Reference List Automotivesupplychain.org (2013) Mercedes by any other name. [Online] Available from:http://www.automotivesupplychain.org/features/216/62/Mercedes-by-any-other-name/> Azok, D. (2014) Mercedes-Benz: Alabama production of the C-Class will cut U.S. wait times for the model [Online] Available at: Bayigen, M. (2012) How Mercedes-Benz turned research into reality – Global – CSCMP’s Supply Chain Quarterly [Online] Supplychainquarterly.com Available at: Bestglobalbrands.com, (2014) Mercedes-Benz – Best Global Brands – Interbrand [Online] Available at: Clarke, C. (2006) Automotive Production Systems and Standardisation: From Ford to the Case of Mercedes-Benz. In: Springer Science & Business Media pp.169-172 Daimler AG (2012) AMG behind the scenes [Online] Available at: Daimler AG, (2013) Annual report 2013 [Online] Available at: Daimler.com, (2013) Daimler plans expansion of Mercedes-Benz Cars production network [Online] Available at: Evans, J (1997) Product ion/operations management Minneapolis/St. Paul: West Pub. Co. Evans, J. (1997) Productions/operations management. Quality, Performance, and value 5th ed. New York: West Publishing Company, p.44-57 Flierl G, D. (2014) If you want a new 2014 Mercedes-Benz CLA-Class

Race and intelligence

Essay 1 An individual’s work achievement can be best predicted by measuring their intelligence. Discuss. In modern life, the motive to success in career has been researched in order to benefit both individual and organization. The term â€Å"intelligence† has been acknowledged over the world as a common way to compare between individual people. Majority believe that succeed of every people can be best measured in that way. However, after many year of using that, some people argue intelligence is not the best way to show how good in work people are.They figure out other ways of measuring success of worker. So does intelligence measurement method make the best prediction for work achievement? This essay is going to discuss about methods for determining an individual’s work outcome for every body clear about that. Before discussing about career success and measurement, there is some knowledge that people should know. As everyone knows ‘intelligence’ is used all over the world but in fact, what intelligence is?As it was mentioned in Principle of Organisation Behaviour (2005), â€Å"intelligence† can be classified as: Pure speed which is the speed of process for simple information, choice speed which is an ability to make a choice, speed of lexical access is the time taken for retrieving information from long-term memory, speed of reasoning processes is speed at higher order information processing. Career is a general course of action or conduct in life, or in a particular part or calling in life, or in some special undertaking; usually applied to course or conduct which is of a public character (1913 Webster).Success is the accomplishment of an aim or purpose. The other meaning of that is the attainment of fame, wealth, or social status (Oxford dictionary 1998). So, career success could be defined as achieving the goal of work. For an individual, goal of works are difference for example some people want to do their normal jo bs, some want to do better than others in order to be premoted. In general, the work achievement that managers want to define can be understood as how good the work could be done.The measurement of intelligence is the way they get score to compare between people. Nevertheless, how they calculate the score of one thing that cannot be seen. Charles Spearman explores the â€Å"G† number which is the score related to intelligent. Many psychologists broke out the â€Å"G† into many parts such as Schmidt and Hunter (1998), Sir Cyril Burt and Thurstone (1938). These primary factors were identified which we would nowadays known as: Spatial ability, verbal reasoning, perceptual speed, numerical ability, memory, verbal fluency, inductive reasoning.The basis education in the UK during 1944 to 1971, the found that school education could be determined at the age of 11 by seeing intelligence test score. Actually, it is usually argued that intelligence is the best single predictor of scholastic achievement (Gottfredson, 2002; Kuncel, Hezlett, & Ones, 2004). Commonly, many organizations believe an ability of individual can be forecasted from an intelligence test score. Moreover, occupational status that is foundation form of achievement can be predicted by individual’s intelligence. Individuals are different.The same work might have difference result due to difference of method. As being describe in definition, intelligence has been known as the speed of dealing with problem. People who work faster and more efficiency can be more successful at work so that intelligence is an important part of working-achieve judgement. Beside that, intelligent people have more advantage of learning new thing than others. For example, they can find the new way of getting thing done rather than work under supervisor’s order. Intelligence has impacts on education, job performance and income.Because the more intelligences people have, the better they can achieve in edu cation. That also gives them a chance to have better reference to support their job and income. Jensen (1980) summarizes several causes underlying the later fact. Taking samples with high educational levels attenuate the correlation with intelligence scores (producing values between . 30 and . 40), whereas samples from elementary and high school produce the largest correlations (from . 50 to . 70) because of the greater restriction in range of ability at higher educational levels.The greater intelligent people can have the better capable abilities they have to achieve higher level of education. With higher IQ results, people can be success in studying at school by faster processing information, solving problem and so on. That way, those people get more information and better understanding about their work. Consequently, they can achieve better grade than the others do. Hence, the effects of intelligent continue with job performance such as people with higher IQ score can do work mor e accelerative because can process information faster.They have high pure speed for processing simple information combining with choice speed for retrieving information from long-term memory. Speed of reasoning processes is speed at higher order information processing can makes the work rapidly. Moreover, those people also have the backup from all information, knowledge they gain from work, training and education. They can connect the information that they received and knowledge that they gain for an outcome. Intelligence seems to do a set of barrier to entry into higher-status of occupation for people with low score.Vvariety of research found that the median scores of accountants was 128 with a range between 94 and 154 while the median for labourers was 88 with range from 94 to 145 (Harrell and Harrell, 1945). That caused by intellectual work require people working more rapidly and accurately with information. That gives people with high faculty of understanding, intellect (the abi lities of knowing and reasoning), quickness or superiority of understanding, sagacity, the action or fact of understanding something, knowledge, comprehension better job performance.Furthermore, higher IQ score more likely be seen as higher education so that those people have better reference, education and training than others do. â€Å"The proper aim of higher education in a democratic is to prepare the individual to make wise decision†. (Principle of Organisational Behaviour) As the measurement of intelligence, intelligence can be broken down to many parts. Spatial reasoning is the imagine abilities from perspectives. That copes with flat two dimension diagrams. That is necessary abilities for working as engineering, designer and so on.Verbal reasoning is the abilities to figure out the relationship. That helps people with job roles where prompt and accurate understanding of written material is important. Perceptual speed shows the speed of decision making. Numerical abili ty is the abilities of dealing with numbers. That has an effects on job performance because, higher intelligence mean they can have better abilities to deal with special parts of work. According to the results, high scorers are capable of contributing effectively in management and Besides that, Lynn, R. , & Vanhanen, T. 2002) research show that the estimated of national IQ. The results of comparison between GDP and national IQ score, Lynn and Vanhanen coincluded that there was a sthrong relation between intelligence and national wealth. They further argued that the relation was causal, and that it reflected essentially intractable differences in mental competence across countries. On the other hand, in The Mismeasure of Man (1981), Professor Stephen Jay Gcould argues that intelligence tests are based on faulty assumptions and shows their history of being used as the basis for scientific racism.Although, intelligence measurement is a good method to expect work successive but not all, it does not actually figure out the true value of workers, it misses out many important part that effect to measuring successful. There are many type of intelligences has been identified through history of biology. They are ‘linguistic, logical mathematical, musical, bodily, spatial, interpersonal, intrapersonal and naturalistic’. As can be seen, many kinds of intelligence are not easy to measure such as intelligent of art. Furthermore, as Halsey (Halsey et al. 1980) said the relationship between intelligence and occupational status occurs as indirect relation and subtly. This is caused by some of the impact of intelligence comes from the powerful shared cultural assumptions. That problem was figure out as being smart is more importance than having experience and understanding the market place. That is not true; because people cannot invest money on the market, they do not know and understand. In addition, some of the affect of intelligence on work exist indirectly bec ause of education, culture, environment, personality, emotion, communication, oopportunity and so on.For instant, the company cannot judge who is better just by seeing employees’ intelligences between people has IQ 180, diploma and 5 years of experience and the other with the same IQ score has degree and 1-year experience. Education gives people more power from reference, information, knowledge and training. From these points, people can develop further their knowledge, skills better than the others can who do not have as much education as them. Their personality such as hard working is important. In fact, to compare two people with the same range of intelligence their work hardworking must be taken in account.Because the more he or she does, the more experience he or she get from that. More over, when people practise their skills also improve further and they get more chance of promotion than other does. Besides that, even if people work hard and intelligent, they still have mistake. As long as, they ignore the mistake they made, the errors might increase and their works become worst. Self-monitoring is the ability and willingness to identify the problem and develop self-presentation and the sensitivity to expressive behaviors of others (Hamid, 1994; Lennox and Wolfe, 1984).Moreover, locus of work can makes the difference at work. People with high level of focusing at work they can reduce their errors that lead to an increasing in working process and performance (Andrisani and Nestel, 1976; Rotter, 1966; Ryckman, 1997). Those people can achieve high performance in disadvantage environment. Communication is also necessary for everyone at work or study because people can gain their knowledge simply by communicate with others. Information, experiences and skills can be transferred from one to another.That skill not only gives people whom good at a chance to improve ability to adjust to any situation but also helps them to reduce stress level. People need to be extraversion, open to experience in communication because they can have more contacts and oopportunity to learn from others with these personalities. Although good environment can makes people develop better, without suitable personalities and skills they might face difficulties. Emotion cannot be excluded, because every person has different character, emotion so that his or her work might not be measure correctly at one particular period.A principal emotion is self-esteem refers to how favourably individuals evaluate themselves (Brockner, 1988; Turban and Dougherty, 1994). High level of self-esteem mearns they feel more positive and believe they are more capable to cope with different situations and tasks (Brockner, 1988; Turban and Dougherty, 1994). Those people also have high self-confidence level at work that gives them more capable to do their work successful. With high confident people can have more power to control their work and increase higher chance of work premote.N evertheless, optimism also is an importance factor of negative affeactivity. It is a relatively stable dimension of individual differences characterised by a tendency to experience positive emotional states (Levin and Stokes, 1989; Turban and Dougherty, 1994; Watson and Clark, 1984). Moreover, the situation in life might change their successful such as people in poor family cannot have enough condition to pay up the tuition fee. In consequence, they lose their chance to get into higher education lead to an unsuccessful career.In addition, their work might achieve better or worst due to a difference of support received at work. Besides that, there are many factors effect the success of individual’s career such as family background, gender, marital status, number of children and so on. That is an implication of several major factor effects on individual’s career success. As far as this essay concern, it can be seen that intelligence is a good way to predict the advantage for education, meanwhile using intelligence term only to measure work achievement might be bias and lead to an incorrect results.