Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Wooden Bats versus Metal Bats in Baseball Essay

Wooden Bats versus Metal Bats in Baseball - Essay Example Wooden bats are heavier than metal bats because they are solid, and that is why they require more effort to sway than aluminum bats. They also have a smaller sweet spot due to which the hit remains within range, i.e., the hitting zone is small. In other words, the weight of wooden bats is concentrated far from hands, or in other words, the center of gravity lies in the barrel. Thus, the swing weight is higher, which keeps the ball within range and means that the ball will not go much farther. Metal bats are hollow from within. A metal bat is lighter because of a larger sweet spot (Zumerchik 52), and the weight is concentrated very close to the hands, which will make the hit swing much higher as the swing weight is lower. A ball thrown at a higher or faster pace will also go farther. Wooden bats are safer than metal bats because the exit speed of the ball is much slower in case of wooden bats. Thus, the ball comes off with slow speed, which is good as it reduces the danger of injury if the ball hits another player or pitcher. Also, there is no chance that the bat will get tossed away from the hands of the player. This is why major league baseball authorities endorse the use of wooden bats, considering the hit power of the professional players. Metal bats, as they are lighter, can easily get tossed away to injure another player. Also, the larger sweet spot in case of metal bats causes larger exit speed of the ball, i.e., the ball will jump off faster, which could injure anybody within the hitting zone very seriously. There have been many unfortunate events in the past, in which players or spectators got injured due to this issue, as the Associated Press states, â€Å"A New Jersey teenager left brain-damaged after being struck by a line drive while playing in a youth baseball game will receive $14.5 million to settle his lawsuit against the bat.

Monday, October 28, 2019

Should Women Be Allowed to Play Against Men in Sports Essay Example for Free

Should Women Be Allowed to Play Against Men in Sports Essay Every sports fan hates to admit the fact that sports are simply business, but it is undeniable that sports are one of the most lucrative businesses in the U. S. Right now the market for womens professional sports is growing rapidly. The best way for womens sporting organizations to promote and sell this market is to align with previously established organizations such as the NBA, NCAA and the USOIC. Although joining with mens organizations is a difficult process that involves compromise, merging with these organizations helps to land big television contracts, gives greater publicity, and brings in endorsements, advertisers and investors. The lack of these benefits was among the key factors in the failure of the ABL. Inversely, these are the reasons for the successes of the WNBA and womens sports in the Olympics. Throughout the history of female athletics merging with male sports organizations has not always been a pleasant experience. In 1982 the AIAW merged with the NCAA, despite the NCAA fighting tooth and nail to try and find ways out of Title IX, an act of Congress that required Universities to provide equal funding for womens athletics. The NCAA did everything they could to stop the equal funding but finally gave in during the 1990s. Right now the NCAA embraces its womens sports programs and has had many women represented on the executive committee roster and even has a committee on womens athletics. Also, the NCAA has worked out television contracts with ESPN, FOX sports and CBS. This has lead to not only coverage of womens sports but publicity. Womens games are talked about on Sports Center and College Hoops Tonight everyday during the season. The addition of the womens to the Olympics did a lot more to promote commercial secures and the advancement of womens The Womens Olympic Games went out of business shortly after the Olympics allowed women to participate. Women lost a lot with this merger at first due to the fact that women were prohibited from many Olympic events that they could have participated in as part of the Womens Olympics. These restrictions werent lifted until 1984. However in the long run co-ed Olympics are beneficial for womens sports. At the 2002 Olympics at Salt Lake City there was only two sports that USA women did not compete in, ski jumping and the Nordic combined. Female athletes were well represented even though there were a few more male athletes in some events and the television air time was almost equal for both sexes. The ABL never stood a chance against the WNBA. The ABL a independent womens league and the WNBA, a subsidiary of the NBA, played a big part in putting the ABL, a separate womens basketball league out of business. The WNBA could afford to pay players less because the players could receive a lot more publicity and endorsement playing in the WNBA. The ABL made huge mistakes right off the bat. First off there season was from October to March right and competing with the NBA and the college basketball season. Thus it was harder to land large television contracts. The could only get contracts on lower budget cable stations the Black Entertainment Television and some but not much regional coverage on the Sports Channel ( now Fox Sports). In their third and final year they did not renew the contact with BET and Fox Sports would show 16 games, a 61% decrease of games seen on TV . However they did work out a deal with CBS that would show two ABL playoff games. League went under before they could even finish the season. With the help of the NBA the WNBA was able to avoid costly mistakes while using the pervious existing structure of the NBA and its capital to increase the popularity of the WNBA and ensure some financial security. The WNBA had NBA marketers and promoters and big television contracts on NBC, Lifetime and ESPN. The WNBA just this season will be showing a lot more games the ever before. The LA Sparks will receive 22 of their 33 games televised nationally More importantly the WNBA had money behind it, commercial on NBC billboards all over there home cities and their marquee players such as Lisa Leslies were in shoe commercials. The market for womens sports is growing rapidly and a big part of this success is because of these mergers with established organization. These mergers of womens and mens sports can do a lot more for the promotion and the TV coverage then any newly formed league male or female, an example of the is the WNBA and the Olympics. Although the history of these mergers has had a shaky history in the past those days are over. There is a lot of money to be made on womens sports if promoted right and if leagues like the WNBA fail it would be a major set back for womens basketball so why not have the NBA and all its promoter TV contracts and executive expertise behind them.

Saturday, October 26, 2019

MARK TWAIN :: essays papers

MARK TWAIN Mark Twain also known as Samuel Clemens. He was born in Florida, Missouri on Nov 30,1835, the sixth child of John and Jane Clemens. Several years later, in 1839, the family moved to nearby Hannibal, where Clemens spent his boyhood years. Clemens boyhood dream was to become a steamboatman on the river. Clemens' newspaper career began while still a boy in Hannibal. In 1848, a year after his father death, he was apprentice to printer Joseph Ament, who published the Missouri Courier. Did tragedy make Samuel Clemens (Cox Clinton). Missouri Courier only last for a few weeks before he started working for his brother at Orion's Western Union, for which he wrote his first published sketches and worked as a printer. Over the next two years he continued at the Western Union, occasionally taking stints as editor in Orion's absence. In 1852, Sam published several sketches in Philadelphia's Saturday Evening Post. Clemens left Hannibal in 1853, at age 18, and worked as a printer in New York City and Philadelphia over the next year. During his trip east he published letters in the Hannibal Journal. Upon returning to the Midwest in 1854, Clemens lived in several cities on the Mississippi: the most prominent of these was Keokuk, Iowa where his brother Orion founded the Keokuk Journal. In April 1861 came the start of civil war river traffic on the Mississippi was suspended, and Clemens steamboat career came to an end. He joined a volunteer militia group called the Marion Rangers, which drilled for two weeks before disbanding. Sam accompanied Orion to the Nevada Territory by stagecoach: President Lincoln had appointed Orion as secretary of the new Territory, and Sam was to be his secretary. (Cox Clinton). During the 1880s and early 90s, Clemens became heavily involved with investing in the Paige Compositor, an automatic typesetting machine. He poured great amounts of money in the machine, and even founded a company in 1886 to manufacture and distribute it. The advent of the linotype machine, however, sent the Paige Compositor to its doom. After the second model of the machine failed a test run at the Chicago Herald in 1894 where 32 linotypes were running smoothly, the machine was scrapped. Clemens contributed to the bankruptcy of his publishing company when he shifted funds from that firm into the compositor.

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Performance appraisal Essay

Introduction The  process  by which a  manager  or  consultant  (1)  examines  and evaluates an  employee’s  work  behavior  by comparing it with preset standards, (2)  documents  the  results  of the comparison, and (3)  uses  the results to  provide  feedback  to the employee to show where  improvements  are needed and why. Performance appraisals are  employed  to determine who  needs  what  training, and who will be promoted, demoted, retained, or fired. ‘PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL IS A FORMAL, STRUCTURED SYSTEM OF MEASURING AND EVALUATING AN EMPLOYEES JOB, RELATED BEHAVIORS AND OUTCOMES TO DISCOVER HOW AND WHY THE EMPLOYEE IS PRESENTLY PERFORMING ON THE JOB AND HOW THE EMPLOYEE CAN PERFORM MORE EFFECTIVELY IN THE FUTURE SO THAT THE EMPLOYEE, ORGANIZATION, AND SOCIETY ALL BENEFIT’. Performance appraisal is a process of summarizing, assessing and developing the work performance of an employee. In order to be effective and constructive, the performance manager should make every effort to obtain as much objective information about the employee’s performance as possible. Performance Appraisal is a review and discussion of an employee’s performance of assigned duties and responsibilities based on results obtained by the employee in their job, not on the employee’s personality characteristics. Personality should be considered only when it relates to performance of assigned duties and responsibilities. It is a structured formal interaction between a subordinate and supervisor, that usually takes the form of a periodic interview (annual or semi-annual), in which the work performance of the subordinate is examined and discussed, with a view to identifying weaknesses and strengths as well as opportunities for improvement and skills development. In many organizations – but not all – appraisal results are used, either directly or indirectly, to help determine reward outcomes. That is, the appraisal results are used to identify the better performing employees who should get the majority of available merit pay increases, bonuses, and promotions. By the same token, appraisal results are used to identify poorer performers, who may require some form of counseling, or in extreme cases, demotion, dismissal or decreases in pay. HISTORY OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL The history of performance appraisal is quite brief.  Its roots in the early 20th century can be traced to Taylor’s pioneering Time and Motion studies. But this is not very helpful, for the same may be said about almost everything in the field of modern human resources management. As a distinct and formal management procedure used in the evaluation of work performance, appraisal really dates from the time of the Second World War – not more than 60 years ago. Yet in a broader sense, the practice of appraisal is a very ancient art. In the scale of things historical, it might well lay claim to being the world’s second oldest profession! There is, says  Dulewicz (1989), â€Å"†¦ a basic human tendency to make judgements about those one is working with, as well as about oneself.† Appraisal, it seems, is both inevitable and universal. In the absence of a carefully structured system of appraisal, people will tend to judge the work performance of others, including subordinates, naturally, informally and arbitrarily. The human inclination to judge can create serious motivational, ethical and legal problems in the workplace. Without a structured appraisal system, there is little chance of ensuring that the judgements made will be lawful, fair, defensible and accurate. Performance appraisal systems began as simple methods of income justification. That is, appraisal was used to decide whether or not the salary or wage of an individual employee was justified. The process was firmly linked to material outcomes. If an employee’s performance was found to be less than ideal, a cut in pay would follow. On the other hand, if their performance was better than the supervisor expected, a pay rise was in  order. Little consideration, if any, was given to the developmental possibilities of appraisal. If was felt that a cut in pay, or a rise, should provide the only required impetus for an employee to either improve or continue to perform well.   Sometimes this basic system succeeded in getting the results that were intended; but more often than not, it failed. For example, early motivational researchers were aware that different people with roughly equal work abilities could be paid the same amount of money and yet have quite different levels of motivation and performance. These observations were confirmed in empirical studies. Pay rates were important, yes; but they were not the only element that had an impact on employee performance. It was found that other issues, such as morale and self-esteem, could also have a major influence. As a result, the traditional emphasis on reward outcomes was progressively rejected. In the 1950s in the United States, the potential usefulness of appraisal as tool for motivation and development was gradually recognized. The general model of performance appraisal, as it is known today, began from that time.   Modern Appraisal Performance appraisal may be defined as a structured formal interaction between a subordinate and supervisor, that usually takes the form of a periodic interview (annual or semi-annual), in which the work performance of the subordinate is examined and discussed, with a view to identifying weaknesses and strengths as well as opportunities for improvement and skills development. In many organizations – but not all – appraisal results are used, either directly or indirectly, to help determine reward outcomes. That is, the appraisal results are used to identify the better performing employees who should get the majority of available merit pay increases, bonuses, and promotions. By the same token, appraisal results are used to identify the poorer  performers who may require some form of counselling, or in extreme cases, demotion, dismissal or decreases in pay. (Organizations need to be aware of laws in their country that might restrict their capacity to dismiss employees or decrease pay.) Whether this is an appropriate use of performance appraisal – the assignment and justification of rewards and penalties – is a very uncertain and contentious matter. TRADITIONAL METHODS OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL 1.Rating Scales Method Rating Scales Method is commonly used method for assessing the performance of the employees and well-known traditional method of performance appraisal of employees. Many corporations and companies example in the country India, Telecommunications Company like airtel  and US IT companies like  Dell  Corporation  are using this method for evaluating the employees and subsequently take decisions on concerned employee. Depending upon the job of employee under this method of appraisal traits like attitude, performance, regularity, accountability and sincerity etc,are rated with scale from 1 to 10. 1 indicates negative feedback and 10 indicates positive feedback as shown below. Attitude of employee towards his superiors, colleagues and customers   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extremely                                                                                                                                                       Excellent poor Regularity in the job   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extremely                                                                                                                                                       outstanding poor Under this method of performance appraisal, employee may be assessed by his superiors, colleagues, subordinates or sometimes by his customers which all depends on nature of the company or job which is added where the employee. Appraiser is a person who appraises employee will give rating for every trait given by marking or choosing number basing on his observation and satisfaction. ultimately all numbers chosen or marked will be added to determine highest score gained by employee. Employee who scored more points will be treated as top performer following   descending scored employees will be treated as low performer and the least scored employee will be treated as non-performers. 2.  ESSAY APPRAISAL METHOD This traditional form of appraisal, also known as â€Å"Free Form method† involves a description of the performance of an employee by his superior. The description is an evaluation of the performance of any individual based on  the facts and often includes examples and evidences to support the information. A major drawback of the method is the inseparability of the bias of the evaluator. Under this method, the rater is asked to express the strong as well as weak points of the employee’s behavior. This technique is normally used with a combination of the graphic rating scale because the rater can elaborately present the scale by substantiating an explanation for his rating. While preparing the essay on the employee, the rater considers the following factors:   Job knowledge and potential of the employee; Employee’s understanding of the company’s programmes, policies, objectives, etc.; The employee’s relations with co-workers and superiors;  The employee’s general planning, organizing and controlling ability; The attitudes and perceptions of the employee, in general. Essay evaluation is a non-quantitative technique. This method is advantageous in at least one sense, i.e., the essay provides a good deal of information about the employee and also reveals more about the evaluator. The essay evaluation method however, suffers from the following limitations: It is highly subjective; the supervisor may write a biased essay. The employees who are sycophants will be evaluated more favorably then other employees. Some evaluators may be poor in writing essays on employee performance. Others may be superficial in explanation and use flowery language which may not reflect the actual performance of the employee. It is very difficult to find effective writers nowadays. The appraiser is required to find time to prepare the essay. A busy appraiser may write the essay hurriedly without properly assessing the actual performance of the worker. On the other hand, appraiser takes a long time, this becomes uneconomical from the view point of the firm, because the time of the evaluator (supervisor) is costly. 3.  RANKING METHOD How do we use the ranking method?  Under the ranking method, the manager com-pares an employee to other similar employees, rather than to a standard measurement. An offshoot of ranking is the forced distribution method, which  is similar to grading on a curve. Predetermined percentages of employees are placed in various performance categories, for example,  excellent, above average, average, below average, and poor,. The employees ranked in the top group usually get the rewards (raise, bonus, promotion), those not at the top tend to have the reward withheld, and those at the bottom sometimes get punished. In Self-Assessment and Skill Builder 8-1, you are asked to rank the performance of your peers. Why and when do we use the ranking method?  Managers have to make evaluative decisions, such as who is the employee of the month, who gets a raise or promotion, and who   gets laid off. So when we have to make evaluative decisions, we generally have to use ranking. However, our ranking can, and when possible should, be based on other methods and forms. Ranking can also be used for developmental purposes by letting employees know where they stand in comparison to their peers—they can be motivated to improve performance. For example, when one of the authors passes back exams, he places the grade distribution on the board. It does not in any way affect the current grades—but it lets students know where they stand, and he does it to motivate improvement. 4.  PAIRED COMPARISON A better technique of comparison than the straight ranking method, this method compares each employee with all others in the group, one at a time. After all the comparisons on the basis of the overall comparisons, the employees are given the final rankings. 5.  CRITICAL INCIDENTS METHODS This technique of performance appraisal was developed by  Flanagan and Burns. The manager prepares lists of statements of very effective and ineffective behaviour of an employee. These critical incidents or events represent the outstanding or poor behaviour of employees on the job. The manager maintains logs on each employee, whereby he periodically records critical incidents of the workers behaviour. At the  end of the rating period, these recorded  critical incidents are used in the evaluation of the workers’ performance. An example of a good critical incident of a sales assistant is the following: July 20 – The sales clerk patiently attended to the customer’s complaint. He is polite, prompt, and enthusiastic in solving the customers’ problem.   On the other hand the bad critical incident may appear as under: July 20 – The sales assistant stayed 45 minutes over on his break during the busiest part of the day. He failed to answer the store manager’s call thrice. He is lazy, negligent, stubborn and uninterested in work. This method provides an objective basis for conducting a thorough discussion of an employee’s performance. This method avoids recency bias (most recent incidents get too much emphasis). This method suffers however from the following limitations: Negative incidents may be more noticeable than positive incidents. The supervisors have a tendency to unload a series of complaints about incidents during an annual performance review session. It results in very close supervision which may not be liked by the employee. The recording of incidents may be a chore for the manager concerned, who may be too busy or forget to do it. 6. CONFIDENTIAL REPORT SYSTEM Confidential report system is well known method of performance appraisal system mostly being used by the Government organisations. In this method of  appraising  system, subordinate is observed by his superiors regarding his performance in the job and on his duties done. Thereafter  Superior  writes confidential report on his performance, mainly on his behaviour in the organisation and conduct and remarks if any. Confidential reports will be kept confidential and will not be revealed to anyone and finally confidential reports will be forwarded to the top management officials for taking decision against person on whom confidential report has made. Confidential reports are the main criteria for promoting or transferring  of any employee mainly in the government sector. All governmental organisations example judiciary, police Department and other government  departments in the India are using confidential reports method as a tool to know about the employee and to take any decision connecting to him. Procedure of confidential report system The superiors who appraise their subordinate’s performance, behaviour and other key issues will be kept in the form of writing on paper, which is called as confidential report.   Confidential report should not be sent openly on a paper, it must be kept in a sealed cover to send it to decision-making authorities. Only authorised persons are allowed to open the sealed covers which consists of confidential reports. Confidential reports shall not be handed over in loose sheets to the subordinates. Key factors assessed in  Confidential  Report writing Character and conduct of an employee Absenteeism of an employee Knowledge of an employee His nature and quality of work Punctuality of employee Unauthorised absenteeism or leave without permission Behaviour of an employee with colleagues, superiors and with public Ability of supervision and controlling His/her integrity and honesty If any complaints against employee 7.  CHECKLIST METHOD The rater is given a checklist of the descriptions of the behaviour of the employees on job. The checklist contains a list of statements on the basis of which the rater describes the on the job performance of the employees.   Ã‚  Another simple type of individual evaluation method is the checklist. A checklist represents, in its simplest form, a set of objectives or descriptive statements about the employee and his behavior. If the rater believes strongly that the employee possesses a particular listed trait, he checks the item; otherwise, he leaves the item blank. A more recent variation of the checklist method is the weighted list. Under this, the value of each question may be weighted equally or certain questions may be  weighted more heavily than others. The following are some of the sample questions in the checklist.   Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Is the employee really interested in the task assigned?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Yes/No   Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Is he respected by his colleagues (co-workers)  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Yes/No   Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Does he give respect to his superiors?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Yes/No  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Does he follow instructions properly?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Yes/No   Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Does he make mistakes frequently?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Yes/No 8. GRAPHIC RATING SCALE Example of Graphic Rating Scales Method Performance Trait Excellent Good Average Fair Poor Attitude 5 4 3 2 1 Knowledge of Work 5 4 3 2 1 Managerial Skills 5 4 3 2 1 Team Work 5 4 3 2 1 Honesty 5 4 3 2 1 Regularity 5 4 3 2 1 Accountability 5 4 3 2 1 Interpersonal relationships 5 4 3 2 1 Creativity 5 4 3 2   1 Discipline 5 4 3 2 1 This is the very popular, traditional method of performance appraisal. Under this method, core traits of employee pertaining to his job are   carefully  defined  like Attitude, Knowledge of Work, Managerial Skills, Team Work, Honesty, Regularity, Accountability, Interpersonal relationships, Creativity and Discipline etc. These traits are allotted with numerical scale to tabulate the scores gained by appraisee (employee) in  performance assessment  relating to his job by appraiser (employer) and sum-up to determine the best performer.   Appraiser ticks  rating of particular trait depending upon his endeavour in his job.  Score vary form employee to employee depending up on his performance levels and endeavour in his job. This method is popular because it is simple and does not require any writing ability. The method is easy to understand and use. Comparison among pairs is possible. This is necessary for decision on salary increases, promotion, etc. Companies like  DELL,  Maruti Suzuki India Ltd  and  airtel  are using this graphic rating scale method to appraise performance of their employees in there jobs and to take decisions regarding the matters concerned to employees 9.  FORCED DISTRIBUTION A rating system used by companies to evaluate their employees. The system requires the managers to evaluate each individual, and rank them typically into one of three categories (excellent, good, poor). The system is thought to be relatively widely-used, but remains somewhat controversial due to the competition it creates, and also the reality that not all employees will fit neatly into one of the categories and might end up in a category that does  not reflect their true performance. One of the first companies to use this system was General Electric, in the 1980s. ——–Businessdictionary.com Forced ranking is a method of performance appraisal to rank employee but in order of forced distribution. For example, the distribution requested with 10 or 20 percent in the top category, 70 or 80 percent in the middle, and 10 percent in the bottom. The top-ranked employees are considered â€Å"high-potential† employees and are often targeted for a more rapid career and leadership development programs. In contrast, those ranked at the bottom are denied bonuses and pay increases. They may be given a probationary period to improve their performance. 10.  Ã‚  Ã‚  BEHAVIOURLY ANCHORED RATING SCALES:  Statements of effective and ineffective behaviors determine the points. They are said to be behaviorally anchored. The rater is supposed to say, which behavior describes the employee performance. Advantages – helps overcome rating errors. Disadvantages – Suffers from distortions inherent in most rating techniques. 11.  Ã‚  FIELD REVIEW METHOD:  This is an appraisal done by someone outside employees’ own department usually from corporate or HR department. Advantages – Useful for managerial level promotions, when comparable information is needed, Disadvantages – Outsider is generally not familiar with employees work environment, Observation of actual behaviors not possible. 12.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  PERFORMANCE TESTS AND OBSERVATIONS:  This is based on the test of knowledge or skills. The tests may be written or an actual presentation of skills. Tests must be reliable and validated to be useful. Advantage – Tests may be apt to measure potential more than actual performance. Disadvantages – Tests may suffer if costs of test development or administration are high. Future Oriented Methods 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Management By Objectives:  It means management by objectives and the performance is rated against the achievement of objectives stated by the management. MBO process goes as under. Establish goals and desired outcomes for each subordinate Setting performance standards Comparison of actual goals with goals attained by the employee Establish new goals and new strategies for goals not achieved in previous year. Advantage – It is more useful for managerial positions. Disadvantages – Not applicable to all jobs, allocation of merit pay may result in setting short-term goals rather than important and long-term goals etc. 2.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Psychological Appraisals:  These appraisals are more directed to assess employees potential for future performance rather than the past one. It is done in the form of in-depth interviews, psychological tests, and discussion with supervisors and review of other evaluations. It is more focused on employees emotional, intellectual, and motivational and other personal characteristics affecting his performance. This approach is slow and costly and may be useful for bright young members who may have considerable potential. However quality of these appraisals largely depend upon the skills of psychologists who perform the evaluation. 3.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Assessment Centres:  This technique was first developed in USA and UK in 1943. An assessment centre is a central location where managers may come together to have their participation in job related exercises evaluated by trained observers. It is more focused on observation of behaviours across a series of select exercises or work samples. Assessees are requested to participate in in-basket exercises, work groups, computer simulations, role playing and other similar activities which require same attributes for successful performance in actual job. The characteristics assessed in assessment centre can be assertiveness, persuasive ability, communicating ability, planning and organizational ability, self confidence, resistance to  stress, energy level, decision making, sensitivity to feelings, administrative ability, creativity and mental alertness etc. Disadvantages – Costs of employees travelling and lodging, psychologists, ratings strongly influenced by assessee’s inter-personal skills. Solid performers may feel suffocated in simulated situations. Those who are not selected for this also may get affected. Advantages  Ã¢â‚¬â€œ well-conducted assessment centre can achieve better forecasts of future performance and progress than other methods of appraisals. Also reliability, content validity and predictive ability are said to be high in assessment centres. The tests also make sure that the wrong people are not hired or promoted. Finally it clearly defines the criteria for selection and promotion. 4.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  360-Degree Feedback:  It is a technique which is systematic collection of performance data on an individual group, derived from a number of stakeholders like immediate supervisors, team members, customers, peers and self. In fact anyone who has useful information on how an employee does a job may be one of the appraisers. This technique is highly useful in terms of broader perspective, greater self-development and multi-source feedback is useful. 360-degree appraisals are useful to measure inter-personal skills, customer satisfaction and team building skills. However on the negative side, receiving feedback from multiple sources can be intimidating, threatening etc. Multiple raters may be less adept at providing balanced and objective feedback. PROCESS OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL ESTABLISHING PERFORMANCE STANDARDS The first step in the  process of performance appraisal  is the setting up of the standards which will be used to as the base to compare the actual performance of the employees. This step requires setting the criteria to judge the performance of the employees as successful or unsuccessful and the degrees of their contribution to the organizational goals and objectives. The standards set should be clear, easily understandable and in measurable terms. In case the performance of the employee cannot be measured, great care should be taken to describe the standards. COMMUNICATING THE STANDARDS Once set, it is the responsibility of the management to communicate the standards to all the employees of the organization. The employees should be informed and the standards should be clearly explained to the. This will help them to understand their roles and to know what exactly is expected from them. The standards should also be communicated to the appraisers or the evaluators and if required, the standards can also be modified at this stage itself according to the relevant feedback from the employees or the evaluators. MEASURING THE ACTUAL PERFORMANCE The most difficult part of the  Performance appraisal  process is measuring the actual performance of the employees that is the work done by the employees during the specified period of time. It is a continuous process which involves monitoring the performance throughout the year. This stage requires the careful selection of the appropriate techniques of measurement, taking care that personal bias does not affect the outcome of the process and providing assistance rather than interfering in an employees work. COMPARING THE ACTUAL WITH THE DESIRED PERFORMANCE The actual performance is compared with the desired or the standard performance. The comparison tells the deviations in the performance of the employees from the standards set. The result can show the actual performance being more than the desired performance or, the actual performance being less than the desired performance depicting a negative deviation in the organizational performance. It includes recalling, evaluating and analysis of data related to the employees’ performance. DISCUSSING RESULTS The  result of the appraisal  is communicated and discussed with the employees on one-to-one basis. The focus of this discussion is on communication and listening. The results, the problems and the possible solutions are discussed with the aim of problem solving and reaching consensus. The feedback should be given with a positive attitude as this can have an effect on the employees’ future performance. The purpose of the meeting should be to solve the problems faced and motivate the employees to perform better. DECISION MAKING The last step of the process is to take decisions which can be taken either to improve the performance of the employees, take the required corrective actions, or the related HR decisions like rewards, promotions, demotions, transfers etc. THE 10 STEPS FOR CONDUCTING AN EMPLOYEE APPRAISAL EVALUATION For managers, there’s no single path to conducting highly successful employee-evaluation sessions. At the same time, when you’re leading these appraisal discussions, 10 steps will help make the meetings more interactive and productive: 1. Let your employee talk. Giving your employees the chance to discuss their actions, achievements, and competencies is rewarding to them because it further emphasizes your respect and trust, while also reinforcing your partnership with them. 2. Give an overview of the session. After you’ve heard your employee’s thoughts regarding her performance, your next step is to give her a brief overview of overall topics that you’ll be covering in the session. 3. Focus on objectives. This part of the discussion focuses on the agreed-upon objectives and the extent to which your employee met them. 4. Focus on performance results. The emphasis in this section is on the various additional performance-related outcomes that were the result of your employee’s actions and efforts, even if such outcomes were not directly attached to the overall objectives. 5. Focus on critical incidents. Your comments in this area are focused on the way in which your employee handled particularly noteworthy situations, whether positively or negatively. 6. Focus on competencies. This is where you discuss instances in which your employee applied his skills effectively to the job, shared his knowledge with others, or took specific steps to further build his competencies. 7. Focus on points of agreement. Whether based on your employee’s self-evaluations or on her opening comments regarding her performance, your focus at this point in the session is on the areas in which your employee agrees with your ratings. 8. Focus on points of disagreement. This is the time to discuss the areas in which you rated your employee lower than he rated himself, whether based on his self-evaluation or his opening comments. Your objective is to learn more about your employee’s rationale for giving himself ratings that are higher than yours and for him to understand the rationale behind the ratings that you gave. 9. Focus on the overall rating. At this point in the process, you and your employee have discussed all the key performance-related issues and concerns, and it’s now time to discuss the overall rating. Your comments should focus on the steps you took to determine this rating. 10. Focus on raises. There’s a good deal of debate among managers and management theorists as to where to place raises in the performance appraisal session. Some managers don’t even think that raises belong in the session at all. Here are your options: *  Bringing up raises in the beginning:  Letting them know at the outset is supposed to put an end to their wondering and allow them to pay attention to the feedback you’re providing. *  Bringing up raises toward the end:  After giving glowing reviews, you’re ideally able to provide a direct reward for the employees’ stellar behavior, demonstrating the clear link between better performance and better rewards. *  Eliminating raises from the discussion:  The idea behind this approach is that raises don’t belong in the performance appraisal session at all. Instead, these sessions should focus exclusively and extensively on the employees’ past performance, while issues such as raises and objectives should be discussed in separate sessions. Objectives of Performance Appraisal Performance Appraisal can be done with following objectives in mind: 1. To maintain records in order to determine compensation packages, wage structure, salaries raises, etc. 2. To identify the strengths and weaknesses of employees to place right men on right job. 3. To maintain and assess the potential present in a person for further growth and development. 4. To provide a feedback to employees regarding their performance and related status. 5. To provide a feedback to employees regarding their performance and related status. 6. It serves as a basis for influencing working habits of the employees. 7. To review and retain the promotional and other training programmes. Advantages of Performance Appraisal It is said that performance appraisal is an investment for the company which can be justified by following advantages: 1. Promotion:  Performance Appraisal helps the supervisors to chalk out the promotion programmes for efficient employees. In this regards, inefficient workers can be dismissed or demoted in case. 2. Compensation:  Performance Appraisal helps in chalking out compensation packages for employees. Merit rating is possible through performance appraisal. Performance Appraisal tries to give worth to a performance. Compensation packages which includes bonus, high salary rates, extra  benefits, allowances and pre-requisites are dependent on performance appraisal. The criteria should be merit rather than seniority. 3. Employees Development:  The systematic procedure of performance appraisal helps the supervisors to frame training policies and programmes. It helps to analyse strengths and weaknesses of employees so that new jobs can be designed for efficient employees. It also helps in framing future development programmes. 4. Selection Validation:  Performance Appraisal helps the supervisors to understand the validity and importance of the selection procedure. The supervisors come to know the validity and thereby the strengths and weaknesses of selection procedure. Future changes in selection methods can be made in this regard. 5. Communication:  For an organization, effective communication between employees and employers is very important. Through performance appraisal, communication can be sought for in the following ways: a. Through performance appraisal, the employers can understand and accept skills of subordinates. b. The subordinates can also understand and create a trust and confidence in superiors. c. It also helps in maintaining cordial and congenial labour management relationship. d. It develops the spirit of work and boosts the morale of employees. e. All the above factors ensure effective communication. 6. Motivation:  Performance appraisal serves as a motivation tool. Through evaluating performance of employees, a person’s efficiency can be determined if the targets are achieved. This very well motivates a person for better job and helps him to improve his performance in the future. LIMITATIONS OF PERFORMANCE APPAISAL 1.LACK OF CLARITY: The objective of performance appraisal is to evaluate and develop employees. An organization should avoid using one appraisal system to achieve both objectives. The particular system of the appraisal system should clarify before it is designed and should be discussed with all managers and  employees to gain their commitment. Any performance appraisal system, however good the design, is unlikely to succeed if the managers and employees are suspicious of its objectives. It is extremely difficult if not impossible to device a system that will be able to satisfy both performance and reward. It happens because employees are likely to resist negative feedback and tend to be defensive when weakness in current performance is identified. It is because of this type of overlap in purposes that the appraisal loses it’s practically and increases the conflict between the manager and the employees. 2. APPRAISAL ERRORS: These are as follows; Halo, Regency, Contrast effects: the Halo effect occurs when a manager rates an employee high or low on all teams, because of one characteristic. For instance; if an employee has few absences, his manager might give him high rates in all other area of work. The recency effect happens when a rater gives greater weight to recent occurrence when appraising an employee’s performance. This sort of effect is an understandable rater’s error. It may not be easy for the manager to remember all events that happened like for instance; six months ago. Contrast error occurs when employees are rated relatively to other employees rather than to performance standards. For example; if everyone else in a group is doing mediocre job, an employee performing somewhat better may be rated as excellent because of the contrast effect. Rater biases: this occurs when manager values distort the rating. Reasons for bias differ, for instance, religion, age, sex, appearance or other arbitrary classifications. If a manager strongly dislikes a certain ethnic group, this will be negatively reflected in appraisal if the appraisal scheme is not properly designed. 3. UNEQUAL PERFORMANCE STANDARDS People differ from each other in the way they perceive things. What is good for some may be bad for others. Therefore managers have different judgments in appraising their employees. Managers’ attitudes to their employees differ, so different managers will appraise the same people quite differently which could make appraisal system subjective and manipulative. 4.CULTURAL FACTORS Culture has profound impact on the appraisal system as it should be in consonance with the organizational culture. A system based on the employee participation and openness would be non-starter if the organizational culture is authoritarian and non-participative in its approach to other employee related policies. ‘Readymade’ performance review system imported from other organization rarely function satisfactorily. Their failure is partly due to culture differences. Thus culture is a vital factor to look after CASE STUDIES CASE STUDY 1 1) A sweet employee performance appraisal system for Jelly Belly Customer profile Candy making is a fun business, and so it’s no surprise that it’s fun to work at the Jelly Belly Candy Company of Fairfield, California. But at this family-owned company, there’s no fooling around when it comes to promoting employee performance and job satisfaction. So when Jelly Belly decided to overhaul and automate its antiquated employee performance and talent management process, it was looking for a serious solution to help give its employees across the United States fair, accurate performance appraisals. Herman Goelitz Candy was founded in 1869 by Albert and Gustav Goelitz, whose great-grandsons own and run Jelly Belly today. The Jelly Belly Candy Company makes Jelly Belly brand jelly beans in over 50 flavors, as well as candy corn and other treats. Introduced in 1976 and named by former U.S. president Ronald Reagan as his favorite candy, the company’s jelly beans are exported worldwide. Like almost every smart company, Jelly Belly recognizes that employees are more likely to stay with their employer when they feel connected and recognized for their efforts. Programs for managing and evaluating employee performance are critical to aligning corporate and employee values and priorities. Challenge Jelly Belly’s search for a new employee performance and talent management system began several years ago, when two branches of the family business were reunited into a single company. One branch was using an outdated  performance management software program. The other was doing its employee performance appraisals manually, using paper forms. Having a variety of jelly bean flavors is great — a variety of employee appraisal processes in a single company is not. The task of updating and consolidating the performance management process fell to Margie Poulos, HR Manager of Jelly Belly’s Midwest operations. She and a small team of Jelly Belly HR staff were charged with finding a single automated system that could be used for all of Jelly Belly’s 600 employees in three locations. The driving factor behind Jelly Belly’s performance management automation was the belief that thorough, accurate reviews help employees to better understand what’s expected of them,  so that they can set clear, measurable objectives. That translates into higher employee satisfaction, said Jeff Brown, Jelly Belly’s Director of Human Resources. â€Å"When employees feel they have gotten a thorough and accurate review, it boosts their morale,† Brown said. It also leads to improved talent management and  makes it easier to retain valuable employees, which management experts know is a key factor in corporate growth and market leadership. Solution To meet their strategic goals, Poulos and her team drew up a list of the criteria that a new system had to meet. Top on the list was ease of use. â€Å"We didn’t want to end up with a system that is so complicated that the managers wouldn’t use it,† Poulos said. A new system also had to save time. Because employees were in multiple locations, it needed to be web-based for accessibility. And it had to be flexible, easily incorporating core competencies into different forms. Jelly Belly’s selection committee looked at products from different software vendors. â€Å"We eliminated right away those that were geared to very large companies and those that were not web-based,† Poulos said. â€Å"We also eliminated those that offered too many options for customization. It’s one thing to offer options, but another thing when the product requires so much customization that it becomes overwhelming.† The committee selected Halogen eAppraisalâ„ ¢, a  web-based application for managing employee performance  from Halogen Software. â€Å"We liked the way it looked, and we really liked the user-friendliness of it. It’s easy for the managers to use and it’s customizable without overwhelming them,† Poulos said. After two days of training by Halogen staff, four members of Jelly Belly’s HR team set  out to train the company’s supervisors on the new system. About 50 managers received a crash course in using Halogen eAppraisal, and then used it to complete annual employee evaluations in May. Jelly Belly’s HR team is now customizing the software to include more relevant competencies and to respond to comments from managers and staff on the new system. â€Å"The feedback has been really positive, from both managers and employees as well. Some staff said this was the best appraisal they’ve had,† Poulos said, â€Å"They felt the evaluations were fair and realistic, and supervisors had the scope to provide more relevant and legitimate comments than they could before. Rather than just clicking on a bunch of canned comments, they were accurately reviewing the employee.† Results The new automated employee performance appraisal system has completely formalized and organized Jelly Belly’s employee evaluation process. â€Å"It allows us to standardize competencies across job classifications, add signature and comment sections to make our process more interactive, and increase accessibility for remote managers,† Brown said. Under Jelly Belly’s old system, employees conducting reviews started from scratch once a year with new  performance journals. Halogen eAppraisal will let them log notes throughout the year and regularly update their on-line appraisals. Employees use one consistent employee evaluation form to add comments and to sign their appraisals. The web-based product helps remote and traveling managers maintain access to the forms and the data they need to evaluate their staff. â€Å"In our old system, a few folks in Chicago would have access to the system. But we have managers in California with Chicago subordinates. It’s important that they can share the same forms across the board. And we have folks who are on the road a lot or are working out of home offices, so having them be able to access this is a huge point for us,† Brown explained. Organizing and automating the appraisal process results in performance appraisals that are more accurate and fair, Brown noted. â€Å"This is important because, after all, an employee appraisal is a legal document,† he said. The new system is also helping Jelly Belly  track training requirements and development  in its staff, Poulos added. â€Å"We’ve always had a separate training manual. Now we can go in to the evaluations and more easily monitor employees’ skills development, see what training is needed by individuals and check the due dates for training and renewal. That makes it much easier for us to keep track,† Poulos noted. The new employee performance and talent management system has proven to be a big time-saver for Jelly Belly’s HR team. â€Å"Since this year was the first time using the new system, it took us a little longer than it will next year. But the process was a whole lot faster,† Poulos said. â€Å"It has already saved us a lot of time, and we got everybody’s appraisals done in one shot.† The new system is also helping Jelly Belly to better align employee goals with the company’s business objectives. And for one of America’s best-known candy companies, it doesn’t get any sweeter than that. CASE STUDY 2 2) Saving $20 million with a new appraisal system Most people enjoy having their performance appraised about as much as root canal treatment. Executives and HR professionals have a different view of these systems. Executives see Performance Management Systems (PMS) as a tool to help them  achieve their companies’  business objectives, whereas HR professionals see them as an opportunity to  assess and enhance performance of individuals. Let us examine the multi-million dollar opportunity that an HR professional found in his company’s performance management system. Yellow Freight System, one of the largest transport companies in the US, found itself competing with smaller companies on the basis of price and losing money for the first time in many years. The financial shock caused soul searching and strategy reformulation at the highest levels of the company. The top management concluded that only very large companies with the best talent would survive the newly introduced deregulation policy. This resulted in a programme of route expansion, employee reorientation and reorganisation into a hub-and-spoke transport system. Yellow Freight’s  Ã¢â‚¬Ëœs board of directors decided to train the entire workforce to take advantage of the realities of the deregulated environment. The head of HR was told to recruit a manager for Human Resource Development (HRD) who could provide employees state-of-the-art knowledge and development, which would help differentiate Yellow Freight from its competitors. The HRD manager’s first step was to define the  new department’s mission as â€Å"helping management manage and improve employee performance.†Ã‚  A needs analysis conducted suggested that branch managers, sales representatives and front-line supervisors needed to be trained. The HRD department conducted a performance audit  to identify the group, which had the  greatest potential to improve performance. A sample of employees from each of the three groups was identified based on functional considerations. Individuals were drawn from each major geographic region, from different size terminals, from every job function, all levels of management, and with high, average and low levels of job performance. This type of sample allowed each group in the company to feel that they had been represented. It also allowed the HRD department to observe exemplary and poor performers, and provided excellent information on why some employees performed better than others. Performance measures and standards were identified  for each of the three groups. Actual performance data was collected, where available, and the value of the average performer’s results was compared to the value of the exemplar’s performance. A performance improvement potential was defined as the gap between the performance of the exemplar and the average performance of the group. The largest gaps coupled with the largest number of performers pointed to the areas with the greatest potential return on investment. The HRD department also  searched for causes  for these performance gaps. Solutions that  seemed to close the gaps  were suggested to the performers. The main finding of the study was that while job responsibilities were not  consistent from location to location for any given job title, the work that had to get done was. Yellow Freight’s  new performance appraisal system  was designed as a performance management system. This meant that it was designed first as a tool for supervisors to use when managing employee performance, and second as a tool for evaluation and compensation. The performance management aspect of the programme focused on how to write accomplishment-based performance standards, design feedback systems, and troubleshoot performance problems and reward employees. To make sure the new programme would succeed,  Yellow Freight  provided additional training to improve interpersonal and communication skills. This case illustrates how a transport company responded to external deregulatory pressures and trained every manager and supervisor to manage more effectively and improve the performance of their employees. Results showed that an overwhelming percentage of the trainees felt the programme was useful; they met the learning objectives and were using the skills taught. Performance changes grossed   Ã‚   over $20 million in one year for  Yellow Freight! CASE STUDY 3 3) Case Study on the Performance Appraisal at Xerox In  the  mid-1980s  Xerox  Corporation  was  faced  with  a  problem—its  performance  appraisal system was not working. Rather than motivating the employees, its system was leaving them discouraged and disgruntled. Xerox recognized this problem and developed a new system to eliminate it. THE OLD SYSTEM The original system used by Xerox encompassed seven  main principles: 1. The appraisal occurred  once a  year. 2. It required employees to document their accomplishments. 3. The  manager  would  assess  these  accomplishments  in  writing  and   Assign  numerical ratings. 4. The appraisal included a summary written appraisal and a rating from 1 (unsatisfactory) to 5 (exceptional). 5. The ratings were on a forced distribution, controlled at the 3 level or below. 6. Merit increases were tied to the summary rating level. 7. Merit increase information and  performance appraisals occurred in one  session. This system resulted in inequitable ratings and was cited by employees as a major source of  dissatisfaction. In fact, in 1983, the Reprographic Business Group (RBG), Xerox’s main copier  division, reported that 95 percent of its employees received either a 3 or 4 on their appraisal. Merit raises for people in these two groups only varied by 1 to 2 percent. Essentially, across-the-  board raises were being given to  all employees, regardless of performance. THE NEW SYSTEM Rather than attempting to fix the old appraisal system, Xerox formed a task force to create a new system from scratch. The task force itself was made up of senior human resources executives; however, members of the task force also consulted with councils of employees and a council of  middle managers. Together they created a new system, which differed from the old one in many key respects: 1. The absence of a numerical rating system 2. The presence of a half-year feedback session. 3. The provision for development planning. 4. Prohibition in the appraisal guidelines of the use  of subjective assessments of  performance. The new system has three stages, as opposed to the one-step process of the old system. These stages are spread out over the course of the year. The first stage occurs at the beginning of the year when the manager meets with each employee. Together, they work out a written agreement on the employee’s goals, objectives, plans, and tasks for the year. Standards of satisfactory  performance are explicitly spelled out in measurable, attainable, and  specific terms. The second stage is a  mid-year, mandatory feedback and discussion session between the manager  and the employee. Progress toward objectives and performance strengths and weaknesses are discussed, as well as possible means for improving performance in the latter half of the year. Both the  manager  and the  employee  sign an  Ã¢â‚¬Å"objectives  sheet†Ã‚  indicating that the  meeting  took  place. The third stage in the appraisal process is the formal performance review, which takes place at year’s end. Both the manager and the employee prepare a written document, stating how well the employee met the preset performance targets. They then meet and discuss the performance of the employee,  resolving  any  discrepancies  between  the  perceptions  of  the  manager  and  theemployee. This meeting emphasizes feedback and improvement. Efforts are made to stress the  positive aspects of the employee’s performance as well as the  negative. This stage also includes a developmental planning session in which training, education, or development experiences that can help the employee are discussed. The merit increase discussion takes place in a separate meeting from the performance appraisal, usually a month or two later. The discussion usually centres on the specific reasons for the merit raise amount,  such as performance, relationship with  peers, and position in salary range. This allows the employee to better see the reasons behind the salary increase amount, as opposed to the  summary rank, which tells the employee very little. A follow-up survey was conducted the year after the implementation of the new appraisal system. Results were as follows: 81 percent better understood work group objectives  84 percent considered the new appraisal fair   72 percent said they understood how  their merit raise was determined 70 percent met their personal and work objectives  77 percent considered the system a step  in the right direction In conclusion, it can be clearly seen that the new system is a vast improvement over the previous one. Despite the fact that some of the philosophies, such as the use of self-appraisals, run counter  to conventional management practices, the  results speak for themselves. QUESTIONS 1. What type of performance appraisal is central to new system at Xerox? Which, if any, of  the criteria for a successful appraisal does this new system have? 2. Given the emphasis on employee development, what implications does this have for  hiring and promotions? 3.How  do  you  think,  management  feels  about the  new  performance  appraisal  system? Why? 4. Are there any potential negative aspects of the new performance appraisal system CONCLUSION Organisations need some means of ensuring performance standards are being achieved and objectives are being met. They also need to plan for the future by setting organisational objectives. These should be achieved through personal objectives agreed at the appraisal. This is vital for all employees in order to maintain a competitive position, and it is important that the method for doing this is successful. All the material in the ‘Skills of Appraisal and Performance Review’ resource is dedicated to that end. However, underlying the methods, practices and techniques there must be crucial managerial thoughts, attitudes and activities. BIBLIOGRAPHY BOOKS Organizational Behavior by Steve Robbins The Art of HRD, Reward Management, Volume 9  by Micheal Armstrongand Helen Murlis Performance Management, Concepts, Practices and Strategies for  Organisation success by S. K. Bhatia Human resource management by sunny fernandes WEBSITES https://www.google.co.in/search?newwindow=1&site=&source=hp&q=performance+appraisal&oq=performance+appri&gs_l=hp.3.0.0i10j0j0i10l8.1230.3930.0.5456.17.17.0.0.0.0.258.2039.6j10j1.17.0†¦.0†¦1c.1.28.hp..6.11.1167.T3ijeK0xX8s# https://www.google.co.in/search?newwindow=1&site=&source=hp&q=performance+appraisal&oq=performance+appri&gs_l=hp.3.0.0i10j0j0i10l8.1230.3930.0.5456.17.17.0.0.0.0.258.2039.6j10j1.17.0†¦.0†¦1c.1.28.hp..6.11.1167.T3ijeK0xX8s# https://www.google.co.in/search?newwindow=1&site=&source=hp&q=performance+appraisal&oq=performance+appri&gs_l=hp.3.0.0i10j0j0i10l8.1230.3930.0.5456.17.17.0.0.0.0.258.2039.6j10j1.17.0†¦.0†¦1c.1.28.hp..6.11.1167.T3ijeK0xX8s#

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

”The happiest days of your life” by Penelope Lively Essay

This is an analysis of the short story â€Å"The happiest days of your life†. The short story is written by Penelope Lively, who was sent away from her home to a boarding school in the rainy England. The short story is with an omniscient narrator, and takes place in the southern England – or more preciously in a area called Sussex. The story stretches over a day while a boy named Charles and his parents is going to visit an boarding school. The Sussex area is a part of the upper class, which indicates that the environment is rich. The boarding school (St. Edwards’s Preparatory School) is very big and luxurious. That can also be seen in the fact that the school is a big mansion with a swimming pool. It’s very formal inside the school, and the parents meets the maid who is all done up – which the mom approaches a lot (page 56, line 15). The school is very expensive, which tells that it’s not middle class area. In the end of the story the parents mentions that the school is a bit pricey, which indicates that they aren’t entirely upper class, but more upper middle class. Something that underlines, that they are upper middle class is that they uses a very formal language. There is no slang, and they are very correct in what they say and with their grammar. In page 56 they are talking about cricket, which is very upper class. They uses direct speech, but most of time the short story are in is past tense. Charles is the main character in the short story, and from the text I would say that he is an only child, since the parents want to send him to a expensive boarding school. Charles parents are both very self-centured. They think they care about Charles, and his feelings but without noticing they don’t see that Charles is not very happy or positive about the boarding school. Charles parents are very positive about the boarding school. The parents have a conversation, where Charles father says â€Å"Wilcox says quite a few City people send their boys here. One or two of the merchant bankers, those kind of people. It’s the sort of contact that would do no harm at all†. Those lines dedicates that Charles’s father is a businessman. The â€Å"City† is probably London, and thinks a lot about his career and to earn money. I think one of the main reasons the father sends his son away to that particular boarding school is to get contacts, because he know that the kids at that school has great families (page 56, line  25-30). He actually mentions that he could play cricket with them, which I already mentioned, is very upper class. The mother is kind of the same way. Also very self-centered, but she don’t have the same reason as Charles father. She is concerned about her son, but not as much as she is concerned about her own image and others opinion about her and their family. When the mother first entered the school she thought about her friend Sally, who bought an entirely new cream-linen-coat just for coming there, so now she has to be fine and live up to the standard. The mother corrects the headmasters wife, when she says â€Å"You live in Finchley, is that right?†. The mentions fast, that they don’t live in Finchley, but in Hampstead instead. Hampstead is for the upper class and rich and important people, when more normal families lives in Finchley. She don’t want the headmasters wife, to get an wrong impression about them. We don’t know much about the headmaster and the headmasters wife, but we know that they are fine people. The kids at the school probably likes the headmasters wife, because when she entered a room they became quiet and when she leaves they hold the door for her. Charles might be about 6-8 years because he is about to start at a preparatory school. Charles doesn’t like the situation and he is very uncomfortable. This can be seen in the beginning of the short story, when Charles sits in the back of the car with an unopened box of chocolate and a folded comic book. That isn’t a normal behavior for at child in that age, because usually they like sweets and comic books. Charles is very quiet, so he doesn’t say much at the boarding school. In the end when he sits in the car he hears the echo of the boy who said they shall mash him next term. The boys seems to appear nice, so maybe it was a joke but Charles really takes it to him and becomes afraid. That really indicates that he is insecure, because he even don’t want to tell his parents about that episode in the short story. The main conflict in the short story is that conflict between Charles and his insecure personality. He can’t say his opinion about the boarding school to his parents. Maybe he can feel that his parents are more interested in business contacts and their own reputation instead of him being happy, and that creates a misunderstood parent-child relationship who can serious consequences later in Charles life. The short story is called â€Å"The happiest days of your life† and that is something you usually says  about the time on a boarding school, but maybe in this case it could mean that those days are over. The time in the story changes, and all before the headmaster’s wife is taking Charles away is in past tense, but after that it goes to present but in this case it could mean that those days are over. The happiest days were until the time at the boarding school and now it is over. The time until the headmaster’s wife takes Charles away is in the past tense and that is what was and is no more. The boarding school is now and in present. The beginning of the boarding is the ending of his happiest days of his lives. Penelope Lively maybe had it at the same day, when she was forced to a boarding school and her life is an inspiration to this short story.

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Review of Indian Self-Government and Sovereignty in Canada essays

Review of Indian Self-Government and Sovereignty in Canada essays Ovide Mercredi, a Native rights advocate and an advisor for treaty and Aboriginal rights, taught Native studies at several universities such as McMaster University and University of Lethbridge. He was also the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations from 1991 to 1997. In his speech, Indian Self-Government and Sovereignty in Canada, Mercredi indicates that Canadas aboriginal people should have their own Self-Government and Sovereignty in order to conduct their own Indian affairs. Also, he gives several examples to distinguish between moral and political issues, and legal and constitutional issues, and makes suggestions on how Indian people can co-exist with the White community in Canada. Through the speech, Mercredi tries to persuade the audience that the laws and rules made by the provincial governments and the federal governments do not work for Indians. He believes this because of the different cultural background and historical issues. As he mentions, Canadas aboriginal people have been living in Canada for thousands of years. They had their own rules before European immigrants imposed their laws and regulations on Indians as the standard for human rights in Canada. Moreover, he points out that these double standards created by the government block the process of better co-existing between Indian community and major communities in Canada. Mercredi not only blames the rules made by Canadian government, but also tries to find solutions and gives suggestions for this moral and political issue. During his speech, Mercredi asks the audience to understand the needs of aboriginal people and to give them sovereignty to manage their own community not the delegated autho rity (270). One of the strengths of Mercredis speech is that he uses many historical and current issues to support his points. For instance, he mentions the recognition and protection of individual rights that the gover...

Monday, October 21, 2019

American Dreams essays

American Dreams essays Million of Immigrants settled in United States, its diversity of different culture during 1900 1930. California is one of the highest Mexican Immigrants settled in this state. Almost all worked as agricultural wage laborers. Mexican Americans ancestry became object of one of the largest removal operations ever authorized by the United States government. Immigration and repatriation were interrupting the lives of the Mexicans and American Mexicans, as well as the other ethnic culture in the United States. Mexicans immigrants believed with the ideas that living in United States will bring the social and economic prosperity that they never had. Mexicans brought their ideas, cultural practices, and experiences to established the image of America Dream. Mexicans believed that by working hard as a farmer it would bring prosperity in their social and economic way of life. United States as the land of opportunity and security gave immigrants the ideas of American Dream, freedom, and uniqueness. With these beliefs, Mexicans did not realize that there was a hidden division along class, gender, ethnic, and racial lines over who had access to economic security and freedom. Mexicans realized that there was differences between the expectation of the of a brown Mexican field worker to the white American farm owner. Freedom to Mexican farm workers, destined to reach their goals in economic and prosperity by working for wages, putting aside savings to sent back to their family in Mexico, opened a small business or going to school. These ideas of freedom was different from white farm owners, who alleged that they should allow to hire workers for a cheap labor wages that would allow them to a big profit, which they believed that their rights to be as Americans. During the twentieth century, there were two descriptions of who was allowed to the American Dream prevailed. The first description that could have an access, unre...

Sunday, October 20, 2019

The Crimes of Florida Death Row Inmate Tiffany Cole

The Crimes of Florida Death Row Inmate Tiffany Cole Tiffany Cole, along with three co-defendants, was convicted of the kidnapping and first-degree murder of a Florida couple, Carol and Reggie Sumner.   A Trusted Friend Tiffany Cole knew the Summers. They were a frail couple that had been her neighbors in South Carolina. She had also bought a car from them and had visited them in their home in Florida. It was during one of those visits that she learned that they had sold their South Carolina home and made a $99,000 profit. From that point on, Cole, Michael Jackson, Bruce Nixon, Jr., and Alan Wade  began plotting a way to rob the couple. They knew that gaining access to their home would be easy since the Summers knew and trusted Cole. The Robbery On July 8, 2005, Cole, Jackson, Nixon, Jr., and Alan Wade went to the Summers home with the intention of robbing and killing the couple. Once inside the home, the Summers were bound with duct tape while Nixon, Wade, and Jackson searched the home for valuables. They then forced the couple to their garage and into the trunk of their Lincoln Town Car Buried Alive Nixon and Wade drove the Lincoln Town Car, followed by Cole and Jackson who were in a Mazda that Cole had rented for the trip. They were headed to a spot located right across the Florida line in Georgia. They had already picked out the spot and prepared it by digging a large hole two days earlier.   When they arrived Jackson and Wade led the couple into the hole and buried them alive. At some point, Jackson had forced the couple to tell him their personal identification number for their ATM card. The group then abandoned the Lincoln and found a hotel room to stay in for the night. The next day they returned to the Summers home, wiped it down with Clorox, stole jewelry and a computer which Cole later pawned. Over the next few days, the group celebrated their crime by spending several thousand dollars that they got from the Summers ATM account. The Investigation On July 10, 2005, Mrs. Summers daughter, Rhonda Alford, called authorities and reported that her parents were missing.   Investigators went to the Summers home and discovered a bank statement which showed a large sum of money in it. The bank was contacted and it was learned that an excessive amount of money had been withdrawn from the account over the past few days. On July 12, Jackson and Cole, posing as the Summers, made a call to the Jacksonville Sheriffs Office. They told the detective that responded to the call that they had left town quickly due to a family emergency and they were having problems accessing their account. They were hoping that he could help. Suspecting that they were not really the Summers, the detective contacted the bank and asked them not to block any withdraws from the account so that he could continue his investigation. He was then able to track the cellular telephone that the callers used. It belonged to Michael Jackson and records showed the phone had been used near the Summers home at the time that they disappeared. There were also several calls made to a car rental company who was able to provide the detective with a description of the Mazda that Cole had rented and which was now overdue. By using the global tracking system in the car, it was determined that the Mazda had been within blocks of the Summers home on the night that they went missing. Busted On July 14, the entire group, with the exception of Cole, was caught at a Best Western Hotel in Charlestown, South Carolina. Police searched the two hotel rooms that were rented under Coles name and found personal property belonging to the Summers. They also found the Summers ATM card in Jacksons back pocket. Cole was caught at her home near Charlestown after police got here address through the car rental agency where she rented the Mazda. Confession Bruce Nixon was the first co-defendant that confessed to murdering the Summers. He provided the police with the details of the crimes that were committed, how the robbery and abduction were planned and the location of where the couple was buried. Dr. Anthony J. Clark, Medical Examiner for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation performed autopsies on the Summers and testified that they both died after being buried alive and their airways passages became blocked with dirt.   Cole Pleads Her Case Cole took the stand during her trial. She testified that she thought that the crime would be a simple theft and that she did not knowingly participate in the robberies, kidnappings, or murders. She also said that she was at first unaware that the Summers were in the trunk of their Lincoln and that they were being taken to the pre-dug gravesite. She then said the holes were dug in order to scare the Summers into giving up their ATM PIN numbers. Conviction and Sentencing On October 19, 2007, the jury deliberated for 90 minutes before finding Cole guilty of two counts of first-degree murder, on both premeditation and felony-murder theories, two counts of kidnapping, and two counts of robbery.Cole was sentenced to death for each murder, life imprisonment for each kidnapping, and fifteen years for each robbery.  She is currently on death row at the  Lowell Correctional Institution Annex Co-Defendants Wade and Jackson were also convicted and sentenced to two death sentences.  Nixon pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 45 years in prison.

Saturday, October 19, 2019

Show Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Show - Essay Example how is to isolate the contestants and then observe their behavior and interactions with all the other participants as they are completely cut off from the outside world. The eligibility criteria is simple, the individual must be 21 years of age and must be willing to travel at his or her own expense. US citizenship is mandatory and the individual should be fit mentally and physically. The layout of the show requires complete informed consent from the contestants that allows the producers to conduct a full background check. These are some of the eligibility requirements that are set by the CBS Entertainment Corporation. If the requirements are fulfilled then the individual needs to fill out an application form and send in an introductory video, upon receipt of these materials subsequent interviews decides whether or not they get to appear on the show. Their survival in the house under heavy scrutiny takes them a step closer to the cash prize and turns them into a celebrity

The Tai Yang Syndrome and The Tao He Cheng Qi Tang of Clause Essay

The Tai Yang Syndrome and The Tao He Cheng Qi Tang of Clause - Essay Example The "Shang Han Lun" also incorporates medicial therapy into theory and patterns of diseases. Zhang Zhong Jin used short and simple sentences yet the words were layered with different meanings, and lets readers provide their own interpretation (Fan, n.d.). Thus, it is easy and very useful for doctors in various fields to apply in their own practices. In addition to this, discussion is focused on the more difficult and complicated cases because Zhang Zhong Jin expected that doctors already know the treatment and cure for common medical scenarios (Fan, n.d.). Again, this makes his theoretical discussions more interesting and useful to the practice of medicine. The "Shang Han Lun" establishes that diseases can be diagnosed through syndrome differentiation according to the 6 channels: the tai yang, yang min, shao yang, tai yin, shao yin, and jue yin. This method of diagnosis and differentiation examines the pathological changes over the route of an exogenous disease or disease due to an external factor, especially for cold induced diseases known as the "Shang Han" (Shen Nong Ltd., 2006). Based on the differentiation of diseases, syndromes are divided between the yang meridian, which focuses itself on external factors, and the yin meridian, which is about internal factors. The yang meridian is further classified into three: the tai yang, the yang ming, and the shao yang. The yin meridian is the classified into the tai yin, shao yin, and jue yin. The usual pathway of the progression of a disease through the six channels is illustrated below. Table 1. a diagram of the progression of diseases from Shen Nong Limited. Tai Yang: The greater Yang Syndrome The location of the three yang meridians are on the exterior parts of the body and as an evil develops the disease's symptoms will worsen along the more internal yin meridians (Shen Nong Ltd., 2006). The tai yang or the greater yang, refers to cold damage in general. It is also known as the exterior syndrome (Shen Nong Ltd., 2006). It focuses itself on externally contracted diseases that is caused by evils that enter the body from the outside (Greater yang disease: Pulses and signs; treatment). It refers to the original attack of an external cold evil through the pores and interstices of the skin ("TCM diagnosis," 2007). The tai yang is the first to be affected because this is the greater channel that rules the exterior of the body, such as the skin, the muscles, and the hair. This stage is broad in scope yet milder in its manifestations of symptoms, being external in essence. There are three major forms of the greater yang syndrome: (1) wind strike, (2) cold damage, and (3) warm disease. These three basic forms reflect Zhang Zhong Jin's understanding that exogenous diseases are due to the wind, the cold, or the warmth. However, less attention is given to the warm disease, and is rendered less

Friday, October 18, 2019

LEAN Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

LEAN - Essay Example In this case, waste should be avoided by the organization since it specifically targets poverty stricken areas. The broad aim of the organization is to alleviate poverty among the less privileged societies hence the need for it to remain focused through the removal of waste. The next step that can be carried is to map the value stream of the customers. This is a very important part since it helps the organization to deliver value once it familiarises itself with the needs of the customers. The organization can use this principle in order to deliver value to the people. The other important principle of lean thinking is to create flow by eliminating waste. In a service organization, steps ought to be taken in order to ensure that waste is eliminated so that its goals can be achieved without any interruption. It is also important for Care international to ensure that it responds to customer pull and demand. If the organization is in a position to establish the needs of the targeted customers, then it is in a better position to satisfy their needs. The last principle is related to pursuant of perfection. The organization can achieve success through perfecting its operations so that the targeted customers get the value of the service offered. In undertaking its activities, Care International can implement the seven wastes of lean namely: transportation, inventory, motion, waiting, overproduction, over processing and defects (Quality Assurance Solutions, ND). . It is important for the organization to ensure that it is capable of transporting the goods to the targeted people so that loses that can result wastes are not recorded. The other important element is to ensure that inventory does not become a waste by storing excessive quantities of goods that are not required by the customers. Excessive motion can also result in wastes since high costs can be

The Corporate Culture of Google and the Core Principles That Drive Essay

The Corporate Culture of Google and the Core Principles That Drive Them - Essay Example From its few employees, Google has now leapt to a gargantuan organization of 20,000 plus employees (Google). The company however strove to avoid the culture of being big and always actively maintain that â€Å"small feel company†. Google as a company always strove to ward-off conservatism that can be seen as companies mature. â€Å"We are actively trying to prevent middle-agedom,† explains Eric Schmidt, Google’s current chief executive (The Economist). And this youthfulness which had brought in innovative products such as Google Maps is best reflected in its corporate culture to reinforce the mindset that made it what it is today. Google’s distinct, perhaps unorthodox culture can be readily observed in its headquarters in Mountain View, California which Google calls its campus as Googleplex-a combination of the words â€Å"Google† and â€Å"complex† (Google). It actively creates an environment of interaction among its employees where it offer s its employees to eat free in its coffee stations to have conversations. It also creates diversity just like its products and services with its game rooms that has pool tables, video games and ping-pong, and yes, it even has a baby piano. It also promotes a culture of openness with very few solo offices where Googlers shares cubes, yurts and huddle rooms (Google). Dogs, massage chairs and large inflatable balls are also okay. The list on how distinct its offices maintain a youthful ambience can go on and on. Google’s youthfulness and innovative culture is not only limited on how its offices are set up. What appears to be play is in fact a continuous search for perfection beginning in its hiring process where it favors ability more than experience. Moreso when hired, because Googlers, a Google employee is often called, is not strapped with a single repetitive function but wears several hats. This actually grows with how things are set up with Google offices and those free caf es have their purpose. It provides an avenue for cultivating ideas that may become the next big innovative product. This is further reinforced with the openness of its leadership which it also actively promotes a cultivating environment. In a Google environment, â€Å"no one, no one hesitates to pose questions directly to Larry or Sergey in our weekly all-hands (â€Å"TGIF†) meetings – or spike a volleyball across the net at a corporate officer â€Å" (Google). Perhaps to better understand its seemingly age proof and unorthodox corporate culture, it would be insightful to examine closely its core values that drives its action and the company’s culture. Google’s core principles that drives it corporate culture can be summed up as follows (Google); 1. Focus on the user and all else will follow – before doing anything, Googlers think about the end users welfare first. 2. It’s best to do one thing really, really well – even as it embark s on other products such as Gmail and Google Maps, Google knows what it does best – to search. And knows how to do it well and better. 3. Fast is better than slow – perhaps the best representational product of this core value is its internet browser Chrome. Chrome beat all its competitors for its speed and is the preferred internet browser of almost everyone due to its speed. This core value is always considered every time a new product is being developed. 4.

Thursday, October 17, 2019

B) The Electoral College was designed at a time when the framers of Essay

B) The Electoral College was designed at a time when the framers of the Constitution decided not to trust the common man in sele - Essay Example It is only used in presidential elections and appears to be used simply to increase the perceived margin of victory from the actual popular vote. Election reform supporters want to either eradicate the Electoral College system entirely and replace it with the direct popular vote or repair perceived defects in the present system. However, the Electoral College was put in place for a reason by the same minds who founded the nation. Maybe we should try to better understand their motives before scrapping the system. States with smaller populations argue that if the electoral system were eliminated candidates for president would have no motivation to advertise or campaign there. â€Å"Why visit a small state with a media market that reaches, say, 100,000 people, when a visit to a large state can put the candidate in touch with millions?† (Gregg, 2001). Those opposed to the Electoral College want a direct national election, contending that it would better represent the diversity of the country. A direct election system would create incentives for campaigns to spend time and money in small states. Candidates would collect votes for their effort even if they lost the state as a whole. Even more importantly, â€Å"the financial calculus of election campaigns in a direct-election system might help level the playing field between large and small states.

Tesco Personal Finance Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words - 1

Tesco Personal Finance - Case Study Example News Release, (2008), â€Å"Tesco takes full ownership of TPF and targets  £1 billion from retailing services†, Tesco plc, retrieved online, 4th April, 2009, from: http://www.tescoplc.com/plc/storage/intannounce.pdf 21 Stern, M., (2008), â€Å"Interview: Tescos FD, Andrew Higginson†, Financial Director retrieved online, 4th April, 2009, from: http://www.financialdirector.co.uk/financial-director/features/2229174/shelf-confidence-4297859 21 Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC: RBS Preferred Series "T" and RBS Preferred Series "Q", (No Date), Stanford Law School Securities Class Action Clearing House, retrieved online, 17 April 2008, from: http://securities.stanford.edu/1042/RBST_01/ 22 Tesco Personal Finance that was set up in 1997, as a joint venture between Tesco and the RBS. From a strategic perspective the TPF was established to draw on the Royal Bank of Scotland’s financial expertise while using the Group’s stores and online resources as a medium to recruit and cater financial services to the customers at low-cost. However, after a decade, the joint venture came to its termination with the Tesco gaining the full ownership of Tesco Personal Finance. On July 28, 2008, Tesco, the supermarket retail giant announced that it had come to an agreement with the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) to buy its 50% stake in the Tesco Personal Finance for a sum of  £950 million (News Release, 2008). This acquisition of Tesco over the 50% stake of RBS coming as a direct challenge for the high street financial institutions which currently are on the stormy side of the economic recession tide and presently are in-waiting for the bank charges decision by the High Court. The acquisition will help Tesco to make its expansion from financial services that revolved around an assortment of popular financial services and products to full-fledged retail banking

Wednesday, October 16, 2019

B) The Electoral College was designed at a time when the framers of Essay

B) The Electoral College was designed at a time when the framers of the Constitution decided not to trust the common man in sele - Essay Example It is only used in presidential elections and appears to be used simply to increase the perceived margin of victory from the actual popular vote. Election reform supporters want to either eradicate the Electoral College system entirely and replace it with the direct popular vote or repair perceived defects in the present system. However, the Electoral College was put in place for a reason by the same minds who founded the nation. Maybe we should try to better understand their motives before scrapping the system. States with smaller populations argue that if the electoral system were eliminated candidates for president would have no motivation to advertise or campaign there. â€Å"Why visit a small state with a media market that reaches, say, 100,000 people, when a visit to a large state can put the candidate in touch with millions?† (Gregg, 2001). Those opposed to the Electoral College want a direct national election, contending that it would better represent the diversity of the country. A direct election system would create incentives for campaigns to spend time and money in small states. Candidates would collect votes for their effort even if they lost the state as a whole. Even more importantly, â€Å"the financial calculus of election campaigns in a direct-election system might help level the playing field between large and small states.

Tuesday, October 15, 2019

Gamestop Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Gamestop - Essay Example (Gamestop) The updated information lists its store network at 6,683 stores, all owned by the company, located in four key regions, namely Canada, Australia, Europe and the US. Its range of products extend to software, hardware, personal computer software, accessories, and related merchandise. It has a market capitalization of 2.85 billion dollars, a third of its peak market capitalization achieved in 2007. Share prices at present are comparable to levels in 2006 and have been at those levels since 2009, suggesting that prices are stable and that market prospects are stable as well (Google). It is clear from the business overview that its business strategy centers on excellence in distribution, and diversification to include all key segments of the gaming industry,, across different hardware and software platforms, and including online. It is a business strategy centered partly on achieving scale economies, and akin to the business model for Amazon and Walmart, catering to the targeted market of gaming (Google; Gamestop). A PEST analysis reveals that out of these four external environment factors, the stable political environment in the markets where the company operates means that political factors are not as important as technological factors, owing to the rapid changes in the gaming industry, and in the technology and information technologies industries in general (Google; Gamestop) Gamestops competitive position is ok, given its stable prospects as reflected in its share price, but not particularly invulnerable, given large shifts in the gaming industry from new developments in technologies, so that share prices are stagnant even as the company tries to expand its footprint as well as its sales (Google; Gamestop) Its key strengths include its large store network and online network, its significant gaming properties and its continued drive to expand, which all translate to significant scale economies and

Monday, October 14, 2019

Rules About School Essay Example for Free

Rules About School Essay Students tend to break the rules once in awhile that that is because of peer pressure or rebellion against or with someone else. Teenagers explore and do things others wouldn’t do to look â€Å"cool† or to prove something that they could do something with their life, or to look â€Å"superior† to someone else. Imagine a smart and decent student could do inappropriate behavior just to prove they are fit in that society and to not be called names like â€Å"nerd† or â€Å"loser†, that’s how rules are made in school. But I think that we have a little too much of that. Imagine having fewer rules it would be knowledgeable only if it could help students and help the school, having a lot of rules tend to put stress on students that they want to break out of it and just do whatever they want. With less school rules, student would be in school more often, they have the chance to freely do things they could do, less stress for the students and for the teachers, meaning teachers would have an easier job because bad students wouldn’t be so bad anymore because they have less stress on their mind and now they could pay attention and pass grades. Rules that are forced by the securities and faculty staff are sometimes straining and stressing the students involved in such activities. These activities affect the student’s mentality and social behavior because of aggression and rebellion that has been formed on a student’s mind. An example of an activity is sport. When someone is a student athlete they tend to stay after school and hang out for awhile before a game or a practice start, but some securities have a rule that you can’t stay after school that long and you would have to go home right away, for a student athlete to go home would be a waste of energy and stressing that causes aggression towards the school and the school securities which could resolve to conflict. Another School Rule that students are against is â€Å"contraband† this includes Cell phones, iPods, and dress codes. This rule shouldn’t be forced highly and shouldn’t be taken that seriously by the staff of the school. Technology has been a part of this generation and without them a student could be devastated and again could cause aggression towards a staff. I know that it is rude for a student to use such things during class, but if they do they face a consequence of failing in class due to inattentiveness and no participation, they have the choice to do it or not. And even during recess or lunch securities tend to take peoples and  iPods away, they take it too seriously, iPods should not be that bad it’s called â€Å"Break Time† for students and now music is part of our lives so shouldn’t that become an exemption? Then we have our Tardy/Late rule that students break a lot. This rule is good for some parts and bad for some part. The good part of this rule is to teach students to have discipline and be prompt most of the time. But the bad part of this rule is the consequence or the punishment of it, the punishment is â€Å"calf duty† or ISS(In School Suspension). Which most of the students dislike, if Radford really wants its student to be successful academically it wouldn’t be fair to have rules like these: ISS is a punishment that makes students to rake leaves, clean the gym, wipe tables on the cafà ©, throw the thrash, and clean the baseball field on a SUNNY day for one whole class or more. I personally do not think that this punishment is fair because students need to go to class and learn, not to learn how to rake and clean, that is why we have custodians that does that for us. Not only that but again this things causes hate and aggression towards the school and with that, a student will not be able to focus on studies and they would cause an outrage or break more rules, It doesn’t help the student It makes it worst for them. â€Å"Cafà © duty† is not so bad because they provide free lunch for student, but some other classes HAVE to do it without doing anything bad, and that causes the class to be pulled back academically, again the custodians could do their job and serve the food to the students. It’s a learning environment not a job orientation. Consequences for students are a little bit too much, if the staff thinks that by making these type of consequences would stop the student s to break the rules, I don’t think it will because it causes a student to be rebellious and would want to hate the school for making him/her do all the stuff that REGULAR student does not do. School rules are good but it matters on how staff pushes them and how strict they could be. Deviance has its own punishment and it could be being unsuccessful in life or being a pariah in our school society. A person has a choice to do bad things or good, but there are always consequences for our actions.