The importance of supply chain management Essay

The importance of supply chain management - Essay Example Supply chain management has become an important topic of concern for many companies, who rely on getting a huge market for their highly competitive products. Supply chain management helps in the proper management of resources and a far more efficient way of distribution. Supply chain management is a fast and emerging concept in the distribution of goods in supermarkets. Huge international corporations such as Dell, Kodak, Gillette, Unilever and Wal-Mart have all introduced SCM. Therefore, I, as an SCM consultant have been asked to analyze the supply chain management of the fashion department of the Co-Op supermarket, and address and provide a few solutions to the concerns of the board of directors, which are quite valid. Fashion has an allure for many women in the United States. Therefore, the fashion department of the supermarket has done quite well. However, with the recent awareness of the problems of environment, many women have become largely concerned about the origination of these fashion products. Hence, supermarkets are faced with a dilemma. They have to remain competitive, offer low prices to customers and respond to certain other needs of customers, quite unrelated to the specification of the product, itself. The Supply Chain Management is an issue of such vital importance because the globalized world that we live in, has spurred off many benefits, as well as many problems. Market segmentation has occurred, where many consumers may become concerned with the environment. Co-op supermarket has an ethical policy, which takes many preferences of the consumers. Customer responsiveness is quite significant; therefore, consumer feedback has to be integrated into daily operations (Wisner, Tan & Le ong 2008, p. 26). The board of directors has become increasingly concerned over the channel of distribution of the fashion products, since they are manufactured in China, and are shipped across the globe to the United States. The concern is quite logical and merits consideration. According to Wisner, Tan and Leong, in their book â€Å"Principles of Supply Chain Management†, the greening of supply chains is important, because they suit the particular needs of the customers, especially in the case of Co-Op supermarket. Code of ethics is an important component of the workings of the Co-Op supermarket, the company prides in it. Therefore, ethical policy needs revision if the customer preferences have to be catered. The book mentions that the entire chain of distribution from storing, packaging, repackaging, transit and delivery have a significant threat to the environment. The threat to the environment comes in the form of air pollution, congestion, global warming and other forms of industrial pollution. In the case of shipment, whether by air or by sea, pollution is created, which inevitably leads to Global Warming. The fashion products can also be not manufactured in the United States, since the production can become highly expensive, because of expensive labor. However, products in China are manufactured quite cheaply. Therefore, even at the cost of ethical policy, the supermarket cannot forgo its competitiveness in the market. Moreover, the supermarket cannot only stock products from the native country, because this denies consumer the choice and variety of different products. Therefore, the supermarket is faced with a dilemma. If it is to maintain a market of the fashion products, it needs to address the concerns of many consumers who like to preserve the integrity of the

Violence in Nursing Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Violence in Nursing - Research Paper Example While this patient received a five-year sentence after successful prosecution in a court of law, many more such cases go unpunished, and there is continual mental and physical abuse of nurses by their patients each passing day in various medical facilities. In effect, nurses have put up with abusive behavior, and they continue to tolerate this issue on a daily basis. However, it is essential to avoid the current state of affairs to ensure that nurses played their roles and responsibilities in an enabling environment, which ensures their safety as they provide quality care. Conversely, the failure to ensure a safe environment for nurses will have adverse effects on the quality of care provided. Therefore, it is the responsibility of every stakeholder to ensure nurses' safety in the workplace. It is important to point out that there are ongoing actions to put in place measures meant to protect and punish violence in nursing. However, these measures prove not to be effective. Case in po int, a Maryland bill titled, HB 1099 - Second Degree Assault - Health Care Practitioner, sought to protect health care providers in their workplace during their line of duty. The bill, which healthcare providers were instrumental in its push, would apply to second-degree assault on a practitioner while asking for the raise in the penalty from a misdemeanor to an act of felony. Unfortunately, the judiciary committee in the house rejected the hearing of the bill. In effect, this calls for action to ensure a total protection of the nurses. Introduction The world considers health as the most important aspect that guides the development agenda in a nation. In effect, healthcare becomes the most important sector with governments of the world placing the highest priority in terms of resources and policies on healthcare. Based on the foregoing, the role of the nurse is a crucial one in the society and all over the world. In this regard, nurses play the crucial roles of educating their patie nts publicly and privately; advocacy roles essential for promoting health; rehabilitating patients, and most importantly playing the primary role of giving their patients’ the required care and support during treatment. However, it is crucial to ensure that the environment whereby the nurses operated was safe in order for them to provide quality care. Conversely, an environment that is not safe will have adverse effects on the quality of care nurses provided with the society suffering. Safety in healthcare, as in any other profession, is the most fundamental aspect in order to realize and meet the expected standards of care. In this regard, it is crucial to point out that the failure to have stiff penalties against violence impacts the role of nurses and effectively affects the quality of care. Nevertheless, aggressive and violent behavior from patients, their families, and their friends has become the norm rather than the exception on American hospitals and in the world. In effect, this underlines the importance of legislation and policies meant to penalize these incidents of violence against our nurses in hospital since they leave nurses in a state of negative psychological and emotional responses, which affect their productivity. In effect, this review of the literature seeks to investigate the effects of violence in nursing on the society.

When Do Opportunity Costs Count Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

When Do Opportunity Costs Count - Article Example The author in this article initiated with defining opportunity costs and how the knowledge is gained to properly identify the opportunity costs in any working environment. The author illustrated this idea by considering two different groups of people. This was experimented by using management accounting students with management accounting professionals (having proper management accounting work exposure and experience). Thus, this experiment lead to the conclusion that professional management accountants were more capable at identifying the opportunity costs associated with any project. This better identification of the opportunity costs was declared as the procedural knowledge by the writer. Later, the writer explains that opportunity costs perform as a referee between the two issues of the opportunity cost vagueness and the project completion stage. Opportunity cost vagueness, as described by the writer, is the inability to derive a proper and exact value for the benefit forgone i.e . the opportunity cost. The writer further explains that management accountants usually use estimates of opportunity costs and then these estimates are included in the final appraisal of a project. The management accountants who had higher knowledge of the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles were deemed to consider opportunity costs lightly as compared to accountants who had lesser knowledge of these Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. According to the writer, at the project completion stage, individual tend to invest heavily in the project with a rush to  finish off the project even in circumstances when the project is profitable one.  

Virtues that pharmacists should possess 2 Literature review

Virtues that pharmacists should possess 2 - Literature review Example Many of the decisions that pharmacists make are life and death ones, and so we require a strong code of ethics from them. Like many other important professions they are respected but they are also held to high standards. According to Peterson (2004), virtues are core characteristics that are valued by philosophers and religious thinkers which add value to the character possessed by an individual to make them suited to perform in a task, vocation or leadership position. Peterson suggests that although the virtues of wisdom, justice, courage, humanity, temperance and transcendence may be in conflict in the psyche of an individual, these virtues add to the character of a person to make them suited to a position or a vocation. Peterson goes further to state that character strengths are the psychological ingredients that are represented in virtues. For example, wisdom depends on creativity, curiosity, love of learning, open mindedness and having a big picture of life. The nature of professional roles demands a virtue ethic, which emphasises doing good based on the nature and moral significance of such a role. A virtuous agent in a professional role must be able to act in a way that improves society (Oakley, 2003). Oakley argues that a ‘regulative ideal’ is desirable and actions in situations are right only if an agent with a virtuous character would do the same in the circumstances. Thus, according to Oakley, the virtue of benevolence is desirable in pharmacist, a doctor or a health worker because such a virtue results in a desire to save lives. Clearly, a practising pharmacist who deals with patients in need of drugs that can cure, but also kill due to dangerous side effects, needs to act in the best interest of a patient in a wise, benevolent and tempered manner. The Kantian Categorical Imperative presents standards of correct behaviour for professional agents. Indeed, under this scheme, only certain

Shared Truths Among Law and Religions Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Shared Truths Among Law and Religions - Essay Example On the basis of this perspective, ideas and considerations that Christians, Buddhists, and atheists might commonly accept include imposition of rules and regulations to deter discrimination on the basis of caste, gender, color, or origin; deterrence of fraud; deterrence of lies; deterrence of violence and bullying; deterrence of rape; and imposition of all such rules that are directed at the well-being of the society at large. Evidence of this can be witnessed in that all societies have a system of law and order that is directed at the promotion of justice and deterrence of injustice and violence, whether that is a predominantly Christian society like America, a predominantly Buddhist society like Burma, or a predominantly atheist society like Japan. People of all religions want legal freedom to pray in their religious ways; â€Å"Because the Establishment Clause does not apply to purely private speech, students enjoy the right to read their Bibles or other scriptures, say grace bef ore meals, pray before tests, and discuss religion with other willing student listeners† (â€Å"Joint Statement†). The laws and government supported by the shared ideas and considerations of Christians, Buddhists, and atheists are such that allows their respective followers to complete freedom to practice their religions without conflict. Such a governmental setup has to be democratic and considerate of the individualistic needs and desires of the people following different religions. â€Å"The word democracy means only that the people rule. Other than, perhaps, requiring freedom of speech and equal access to the ballot, indispensable requirements of self-rule, the notion of democracy sets no limits on what the people may do in their sovereign capacity† (Stern). Such a system of law and government cannot, in any way, be biased toward people of a certain religion.

Urban Legends Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Urban Legends - Essay Example It also evaluates how our lives change throughout adulthood when these legends disappear. †¦Modern folklore believed to be true by the people who preach about them†¦ [An urban legend is] an incredible story that may be true or false but gets exaggerated by the people who tell the story. As the story grows older, the more unbelievable the story becomes...Urban legends are a way for people to try and explain the unexplainable. Every culture has their own urban legends that people create. The stories carry their own traditions as they are passed down to later generations (Smith, Smith and Bobbitt, 2008, p. 93). Urban legends originate for a number of reasons. They may have been propagated as an explanation for unexplainable phenomena, as a fun addition to festivities, as a consolation for tragic events, as a way of inculcating certain morals and values, or merely as a creative release. Whatever the reason be, the fact is that these are lies. In most cases, those who propagate these stories know them for false. The questions that emerge here are – is it ethical to spread stories that we ourselves know are false? Is it right to lie to small children about the existence of characters such as Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy? Is it valid to justify those lies by believing that they serve a fun or moral purpose? These questions continue to be a matter of debate. In early childhood, we live a magical time. We grow up listening to fairy tales, tales of dragons and brave princes. Our festivities, especially Christmas time, are immersed with hoards of expectations from Santa Claus and fun with the Easter Bunny. We grow up idolizing the characters we hear stories of. As children, we do good and avoid bad because we know Santa Claus will get us what we want. Gifts appearing miraculously under the Christmas tree, stockings left overnight filled with candy from Santa,

Context and Discourse Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

Context and Discourse - Essay Example Such technicians proceed to use this information to create context-aware software. Close attention to these several definitions and explanations might, however, reveal a common ground upon which a universal concept of context might be built. Though context is often used and understood, it is such a broad and encompassing term that it can hardly be properly defined in a sentence or two. Though it deals with the surrounding condition of a situation, those conditions can take the form of several things, and perhaps that is why context shows up in so many disciplines. And, as it regards discourse analysis, it will be seen that reliance upon context is indispensable in gaining a complete and comprehensive understanding of the intricacies of any text, passage, speech, or other of the forms in which discourse presents itself. In education, especially reading, context is tangled up with prior knowledge and schema, and the study of it is in an effort to determine its use in the decoding of passages. Here, context is placed in relation to the written word, and it is defined by one as "the belief-revised integration of the reader's prior knowledge with the reader's internalized (co-)text" (Rappaport, 4). Here co-text refers to written text that surrounds the problematic word or phrase whose meaning the reader currently struggles to decode. In this discipline, experts often refer to "context clues," which direct the student to the passage being read, delineating it as the context. One researcher cites six kinds of context clues in what is known as contextual analysis. Students are expected to gain insight into the text using hints provided by the context, and those hints come in the form of definition clues, synonym or comparison clues, contrast clues, example clues, and explanation clues. In addition to thes e clues from the text, context (as mentioned before) is extended to include inferential clues, which come not from the text being read but from the prior experiences of the reader (Doyle). So that context according to this view has both an internal and external aspect. However, once the text becomes internalized, context may be considered to be in the domain of the mind. In engineering, some consider context a "filter" that determines the meaning to be applied to certain terms or actions in a given situation. In fact, according to Yaser Bishr who seeks to prepare a foundation on which to base a contextual theory of geospatial applications, any definition of context must include such measures as follow. Contexts should define what is common to any input in a given situation. It should be restrictive, in that it allows only certain meanings of any vocabulary involved to actually be admitted as meaning to be derived from the situation. The truth of any statement of fact should depend upon "a collection of assumption which implicitly define context" (Bishr, 2), and all "facts" are understood to be factual only when a context is defined. Therefore, though the statement "all birds can fly" is untrue in Antarctica, it is true in the context of Brazil, where no penguins exist. This view of context also asserts that thought and interpretation across contexts is allowable; however, "when several contexts occur in a discussion, there