Performance Management & Reward System

Performance Management â€Å"How I get my people to do what I want them to do, in the way I want them to do it! † Performance management (PM): Organisations that take performance management seriously, manage a range of different but inter-related topics: †¢Mission †¢Vision †¢Strategy †¢Business plans †¢Values (how people should and should not behave) †¢Culture in which improving performance is valued and developed †¢Monitoring of performance – at individual, unit and Team levels †¢Feedback of that monitoring to staff †¢Clear goals †¢A set of competencies Appraisal discussions †¢Personal development (training, coaching, reading, sittings etc) †¢Management development †¢Good job design †¢Team working (interaction and mutual responsibility) †¢Extrinsic reward and recognition (basic pay, performance pay, awards, saying ‘well done’)†¢Intrinsic rewards (the satisfaction from doing a w orthwhile job reasonably well) †¢Effective remedies for under performers. Performance management levels: †¢Organisation †¢Department †¢Unit †¢Team †¢Individual Data collection for PM: Data is collected at four levels: Inputs: Staff time, budget, data, consumables, energy, and equipment †¢Processes: Support, sales, teaching, research, paperwork, IT, purchasing etc. †¢Outputs: Customers served, bills paid, items sold, students helped, degrees awarded, research written up †¢Outcomes: Profit in a commercial enterprise or service delivery in a service organisation (usually assessed through customer satisfaction).Rules for monitoring performance: (a) Objective: †¢Introduce monitoring as one part of a bigger drive to improve customer experience. (b) Positive: †¢Seek information to improve the customer experience and not to blame people. c) Involvement: †¢Involve responsible people to work on the monitoring, as a part of their driv e to improve the customer experience. †¢If you choose items to monitor and impose those, staff will probably be de-motivated and performance will drop. †¢Treat your staff as professional, responsible and motivated (d) Outcomes: †¢Measure outcomes in preference to outputs. (Governments are obsessed with outputs – numbers of patients treated, lengths of waiting lists, numbers of students receiving degrees, numbers of children who can read and write etc). (e)Tough: Challenge those who like the fuzziness of not knowing how they are doing. (f) Choosy: †¢Pick only the most important factors to monitor as too many measures will be Counterproductive. (g) Numbers: †¢Measure performance numerically, by getting the customer to grade them on a scale 0 to 5. (h) Benchmark: †¢Use the results as your baseline or benchmark, from where you can improve. (i) Communicate: †¢Make sure the targets are known, understood and accepted. (j) Reliable Use reliable sour ces of data. HIGH PERFORMANCE WORKING High performance working (HPW): The four elements of HPW are: )Employee autonomy and involvement in decision making †¢Develop flexibility of skills †¢Team working to give variety and responsibility. 2)Support for employee performance †¢Appropriate selection and recruitment processes (finding staff at all levels who will support a high performance culture) †¢Comprehensive induction programmes †¢Sophisticated and wide training†¢Integrated and wide ranging performance management †¢Emphasis upon work-life balance. 3)Rewards for performance †¢Offer a career not just a job †¢Harmonised terms and conditions †¢Pay that is competitive with other employers Rewards linked to individual and team performance 4)Learning †¢Plenty of effective communication †¢Quality improvement teams †¢Lean systems (this can be expanded upon at the workshop) †¢Spending on training. Details will vary from org anisation to organisation. Why HPW: Because if you are not driving up performance: †¢Staff motivation will be lost †¢Quality, quantity and innovation will decline †¢Pressure to reduce your prices will grow or †¢Customers may simply stop buying your goods or services altogether or †¢Competitors may take your work. What does this mean in practice?Employee autonomy and involvement †¢Develop flexibility of skills †¢Team working to give variety and responsibility Support for employee performance †¢Appropriate selection and recruitment processes (finding staff at all levels who will support a high performance culture) †¢Comprehensive induction programmes †¢Sophisticated and wide training †¢Integrated and wide ranging performance management †¢Emphasis upon work-life balance Rewards for performance †¢Offer a career not just a job †¢Harmonised terms and conditions †¢Pay that is competitive with other employers Rewards linked to individual and team performance. Learning †¢Plenty of effective communication †¢Quality improvement teams †¢Lean systems (this can be expanded upon at the workshop) †¢Spending on training. According to 2004 research, by the Engineering Employers’ Federation and Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, effects of HPW are: †¢About 20% of increases in productivity and profit in manufacturing †¢Increased job satisfaction and commitment: quality, quantity and innovation †¢Employees more likely to say ‘a great place to work’ †¢Increased earnings potential for employeesImplementing high performance working Things that may need to be addressed are: †¢Getting top management’s commitment, particularly to resource, to communicate and to demonstrate the required behaviours. †¢Getting the resources HPW needs (both financial and risk taking e. g. new reward structures). †¢Carrying out team and in dividual appraisals that make a real difference. †¢Seeking and rewarding discretionary behaviour (Ability x Motivation x Opportunity = AMO). †¢Allowing employees to re-design jobs to maximise interest and challenge. †¢Changing existing strong cultures Increasing levels of trust between management and employees. †¢Getting staff to be understand about organisational performance †¢Involving employees in design and implementation of HPW. †¢Integrating initiatives, so they reinforce each other, therefore: ? Implementation is in bundles ?Staff understand it and show commitment ?Other organisations are used as benchmarks ?Continuous improvement is developed. THE CONTRASTING OBJECTIVES OF THE EMPLOYER AND THE EMPLOYEE †¢Ã¢â‚¬ËœThe employer wants as much productivity for as little cost as possible, whilst the employee wants as much money for as little effort as possible. †¢Life is more complex than this, but this is a useful start! This is the left win g pluralist approach. †¢The right wing unitarist approach is ‘Prosperous employers make prosperous employees. ’ What is the employer trying to get out of the employee?Principally, an employer wants three things from employees: †¢Quantity (productivity) †¢Quality (producing good work with low wastage) †¢Innovation (finding new and better ways to get the work done). But there are also management issues: †¢Cost †¢Control (of cost and of the employees) What do the elements of good performance look like? We now talk about ‘discretionary behaviour’ i. e. the voluntary effort people put in, over and above the bare minimum, below which they will get into trouble. †¢Employers seek discretionary behaviour and good organisations will establish performance management processes to generate it. It is normally expressed as: Discretionary behaviour = ability x motivation x opportunity †¢If the value of any component on the right is z ero there will be zero discretionary behaviour.†¢Ability is the assumption that people want to apply for jobs, have their attributes recognised and are willing to learn new skills. Motivation assumes that people can be motivated to use their ability in a productive manner. †¢Opportunity assumes people will perform well, engage in high-quality work and participate in wider activities, such as team initiatives or problem solving, if they are given the opportunity to do so. What are the employees’ objectives? This will vary from person to person. Work published by Guest and Conway (2001) on the psychological contract suggested the most common were: †¢A reasonably secure job †¢Fair pay for the work done†¢A career †¢Interesting work †¢Fair treatment by managers †¢Equality of treatment To be kept informed about changes affecting them †¢Involved and consulted about changes affecting them REWARD AND MOTIVATION †¢Motivation is concerne d with WHY people do or refrain from doing things. †¢A motive† is a need or a driving force within a person. The process of motivation involves choosing between alternative forms of action in order to achieve some desired end or goal. †¢As the following formula shows, goals can be tangible – such as higher earnings – or intangible – such as personal reputation or prestige. Motivation at work: We can divide motivation at work into internal and external motivation. a) Internal motivation†¢This is related to the work, where there is a close identity between the task itself and the human needs, e. g. where a cabinet-maker or motor-fitter derives satisfaction from a job well done. (b) External motivation †¢This is independent of the task i. e. the task is merely a means to an end; for instance, when a person works on an assembly line to get high wages. †¢Clashes of interest are resolved in the traditional manner by offering financial in centives and/or threatening the loss of employment – providing external motivation. This traditional â€Å"carrot and stick† idea still lingers – the carrot often being money and the stick, fear. Money: The â€Å"great motivator†. It is a fact that most people go to work because they get paid to do so. However, this basic need for money will only make a worker turn up and do the acceptable minimum. There are a range of other â€Å"carrots† – or positive incentives – offered as an incentive to work, or to particular types of performance, including welfare amenities, holidays, etc. Fear: The â€Å"big stick† theory is rather outdated now, but it is still occasionally appropriate to motivate people through fearIntrinsic and extrinsic motivators: †¢Intrinsic reinforcements of behaviour, which are â€Å"inside the individual† reward feelings, like finding work interesting, feeling appreciated, etc †¢Extrinsic reinfo rcements of behaviour, which are the outside influences and rewards such as money, extra holidays, company car, etc; Problems in work role: (a) Alienation: †¢Psychologists use this term to refer to the feelings of an individual when they are estranged from their situation at work. E. g. the salesperson forced to sell goods in which they have little belief or confidence. b) Anomie: (lack of the usual social or ethical standards) †¢The causes of anomie are to be found in the confusion that arises in large organisations. The individual may be faced with pressures and problems at work that they do not fully understand. (c) Status: †¢Social status refers to the amount of respect paid to an individual. A work role can confer prestige upon a person.Status may be perceived through the possession of symbols, e. g. salary, title of job, work surroundings, dress, company car, etc. †¢Many modern theorists are becoming convinced of the value of the Japanese approach of reduci ng status differences, e. g. veryone to wear the firm’s uniform; single canteen; parking and toilet facilities for all staff, etc. (d) Stress: †¢Psychologists define stress as strain experienced by an individual over a period of time, which impairs the ability of the individual to perform their role. †¢Stress can produce physical or mental symptoms and can be generated by pressures and problems in the work situation. Managers view of motivation: F W Taylor was an early proponent of the dictum that workers should share the same goals as those of the organisation, and the way to achieve this was through the application of scientific management principles.The basis of this approach lay in the following principles. †¢Planning †¢Time and motion study †¢Incentives †¢Working conditions †¢Training The essence of the practical application of the scientific approach is to try to reconcile the needs of the organisation and the needs of the individual. Individual and Organisational Needs: Factors that improve an employee’s level of job satisfaction are: †¢Responsibility †¢Challenge †¢Self-improvement and personal growth †¢Recognition †¢Sense of achievement NEED THEORIES OF MOTIVATION Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs:Hierarchy of Needs D C McClelland’s theory: D C McClelland is another theorist who, from the early 1960s, was concerned with the analysis of human needs. He concentrated on three key needs: i)Need for affiliation: The need of human beings for friendship and meaningful relationships. ii)Need for power: Some people seek power in their work situations; they wish to make a strong impression on people and events. iii) Need to achieve: To many people, the sense of â€Å"getting on†, progressing or being promoted, is very important. Frederick Herzberg’s Two-factor Theory: Frederick Herzberg, writing in the late 1950s and early 1960s, identified two distinct sets of needs in individuals working in organisations: the need to avoid pain and discomfort and the need to develop psychologically as a person.Herzberg proposes several ways in which a higher level of motivation might be promoted: †¢Good quality training: the more a person can do, the more that person can be motivated. †¢Focus on quality of communications, rather than quantity: communication should be direct whenever possible. †¢Job rotation: improving the variety of tasks and responsibilities. †¢Job enlargement: making a person capable of more. Job enrichment: creating meaningful, interesting work. Herzberg believes that it is difficult or impossible to achieve if the job is basically dull, repetitive or uninteresting Douglas McGregor developed a typology of two opposed views about employee behaviour, related to Maslow’s categories of need and considered their implications for management and motivation.The two views are known as Theory X and Theory Y. (a)Theory X â⠂¬ ¢This traditional approach of management, which accepts the worker as a lazy, grasping individual, who must be bribed or coerced into working, McGregor called Theory X. It rests on the following assumptions: The average human being dislikes work. †¢The average human being will avoid work whenever possible. †¢Not only is the average employee lazy but they also lack ambition and do not wish to take on responsibilities. †¢Because of the above characteristics, employees must be strictly controlled and directed. †¢Control of employees must be backed by coercion and threats, if the objectives of the organisation are to be achieved. †¢The average person prefers to be directed and not to have to think deeply for themselves in the work situation. (b)Theory Y McGregor then put forward the set of assumptions that modern managers should act upon.He calls this Theory Y. †¢The physical and mental effort people put into work is a natural human response; it is simil ar to the effort individuals make in games and sport. Hence, work can be enjoyable. †¢Employees do not have to be controlled or threatened; they have reserves of self control and self-motivation †¢Given the opportunities and training, employees will not only take, but also desire and seek, responsibilities. †¢Employees have reservoirs of imagination, creativity and ingenuity and given the right environment and encouragement, they will use these to help solve problems in the work situation. In some modern organisations the potential of employees is not fully utilised; not only is a waste of resources, but it also causes frustration among the workforce. Hence, when workers do not co-operate to achieve organisational goals, the fault may lie in the structure of the organisation rather than in the workers. Ouchi’s Theory Z †¢William Ouchi agreed with the basic ideas put forward by McGregor’s Theory Y and related these to certain of the ideas he detected in Japanese organisations. †¢Ouchi’s theory argues that participation is a crucial motivator.Employees will be motivated to higher levels of performance if they are involved in meaningful participation in decision making in their organisation. PROCESS THEORIES OF MOTIVATION Difference between a content theory and a process theory: †¢Content or need theories suggest that there are universal needs that all humans have for example security, socialisation, self respect etc. †¢Process theories do not look at the content of the motivational package but at the mental processes that we go through when faced with a situation. Process theories Expectancy Theory:Expectancy Theory is a cognitively based motivational theory, put forward by Victor Vroom. According to this theory the strength of a tendency to act in a certain way depends on the strength of our expectation that the act will be followed by a given outcome and on the attractiveness of that outcome to us. Attrac tiveness †¢This is the importance we place on the potential outcome or reward that can be achieved on the job. This will consider the unsatisfied needs of the individual. Performance-reward linkage †¢This is the degree to which we believe that performing at a particular level will lead to a desired outcome.Effort-performance linkage †¢The probability that we perceive that exerting a given amount of effort will lead to performance. The theory can be expressed by the formula: †¢Motivational force (F) = Valency (V) ? Expectancy (E) †¢Valency is the value of the outcome to the person; expectancy is the perceived likelihood of the outcome. Porter and Lawler †¢Porter and Lawler developed expectancy theory in the 1970s. They suggest that the amount of effort (motivation and energy exerted) put into work depends on: †¢The eventual reward †¢The amount of effort necessary to achieve that reward †¢How probable it is that the reward will be forthcomi ng.Attribution theory Kelley’s attribution theory examines the way in which people explain success or failure and the impact on subsequent motivations. Four variables are frequently used: †¢Ability †¢Effort †¢Task difficulty †¢Luck Handy’s motivational calculus Handy looks at motivation as though when a person takes a decision, they give attention to three sets of factors: (a) The individual’s personal needs (b) The desired outcome or results (c)The E factors: Effort, Energy, Excitement in attaining the desired outcome, Enthusiasm, Emotion, Expenditure. The motivation decision will depend on: i) The strength of the person’s needs. (ii) The expectation that by contributing one of the Es, the individual will achieve one of the desired results. (iii) The extent to which the result will contribute to satisfying the person’s needs. Connection with the psychological contract A psychological contract is the perceived relationship betwe en the individual and the organisation and involves the various factors that bind the individual to the enterprise. Three examples of psychological contracts are: †¢A coercive psychological contract exists when a person works because they are forced to do so.They may be tied into the job because the salary and fringe benefits prevent them from moving elsewhere. †¢A remunerative psychological contract exists when a person works for the money. The person may tolerate the job to attain the lifestyle it provides. This differs from the coercive contract as the remunerative contract may bind the person in the short term, only to be severed if a better deal is available elsewhere. †¢A collaborative psychological contract is one in which the worker is bound to the organisation by a belief that personal objectives can best be attained by enabling the organisation to fulfil its objectives.From an employer’s point of view, this is more likely to result in having a highly motivated workforce. The person’s desire to achieve can facilitate the company’s performance objectives. EXCELLENCE THEORY AND MOTIVATION †¢Excellence theories originate in the works of writers in the early 1980s, principally based on the work of Tom Peters and Robert Waterman. †¢The nature of these ideas is essentially one of observing successes and failures in actual business scenarios and attempting to draw universal lessons that can then be applied elsewhere. †¢Peters and Waterman did not set out to rite specifically on motivation, but their work comments much on the ability of successful companies to get a high level of commitment from their workers.Among their conclusions were: †¢Original ideas and ingenuity are grossly under-utilised. Drucker’s idea of the â€Å"entrepreneur† (the original thinker and innovator) was extended to suggest that if such persons are employed, their gifts should be harnessed for the benefit of the orga nisation. †¢To motivate workers, it is necessary to get close to the workers and understand the issues affecting them as well as their drives and motivations. They believe that workers respond more positively when they feel more in control of their destiny. †¢In one control group experiment, two teams were given the task of proofreading some text material against a noisy background of a tape containing foreign speech, loud music and other distractions. One group had a button to cut off the noise whilst the other did not. †¢The group with the button made far less errors than the other group. It was found, however, that no one had pressed the button!The fact that the workers felt in control made them work more effectively. Peters and Waterman record a direct application of this in a Ford Motor Company plant whereby any worker could (temporarily) stop the assembly line. This had stunning results in terms of increased productivity and reduced defect rates. PERFORMANCE BAS ED REWARDING IN NOKIA Nokia provides employees with market competitive rewards through a flexible global structure, which can address diverse and changing business and employment environments, as well as specific individual preferences.Our Total Compensation Package is tailored for each country and typically consists of elements such as annual base salary, incentives, bonuses, possible stock options or performance shares, flexible Work-Life balance solutions, and other local benefits. Nokia rewards employees for good performance, competence development, and for overall company success. This creates a positive and encouraging environment with opportunities for employees to optimize their potential and be rewarded fairly. Higher erformance and contribution will lead to higher rewards. The Nokia global market competitive rewards structure addresses the need for flexibility, personalization, empowerment and commitment. The basic salary is set to meet market conditions, the demands of th e job and individual competence and performance. The variable part may consist of incentives or bonuses and other compensation, such as overtime pay and call-out pay. Bonus System Employees should have the opportunity to share in the success of Nokia.Short-term incentive programs such as individual, team, project/program incentives and the Nokia Connecting People Bonus allow Nokia to offer immediate rewards for employee and team achievements. The Stock Option Plan is a long-term reward that may allow employees to share in sustained company success. Eligibility for an incentive, bonus or stock option plans is defined by the content and nature of each individual's job. Local Benefits Additional local rewards and benefits are also developed to complement the global programs and to ensure that the local market conditions are met.Annual Reviews Nokia has implemented a global process, where the change in the pay level for each employee is based on the results of the annual performance rev iew. Health Nokia cares for its employees right throughout the cycle of their working life: from induction and training, through development and advancement, and on to retirement. Nokia's Work-Life balance solutions mean that health benefits and possible local retirement benefits are tailored to individual needs according to factors such as tenure, contribution, performance, roles and responsibilities.The environment in which we do business is evolving continuously. To succeed, we must have the passion and courage to look for new ideas beyond existing products, services and ways of working. Only with truly innovative ideas will we be able to define the future development of our industry and profoundly shape the way in which people understand and use our products and services in their everyday lives. Rewarding performance Nokia rewards employees competitively through a global reward framework designed to recognize individual contribution and achievement.Levels of compensation are det ermined by local labour markets and take into account both individual and company performance. Their reward programs – including bonuses – recognize performance based on individual, team and company results. We introduced changes to their incentive plans in 2007 to make the plans simpler, more consistent and able to deliver equal or higher payouts if target performance or above is achieved. A wide number of employees are eligible to join their equity programs, based on rewarding performance and retaining top employees.Their broad-based equity compensation programs include stock options and performance shares. Both are linked to the company’s performance over a number of years. We communicate with employees about the effect of business results on their incentives after each quarterly announcement, through articles and video messages on our intranet news channel, the News Hub. We also communicate through quarterly letters, blogs, webcasts and face-to-face meetings . In addition, information is available on the Know Your Business section of our intranet.

Evidence Based Practice in Mental Health Nursing Essay

One of the most common and disabling psychological disorders encountered within mental health and general medical settings is that of an anxiety disorder (Dattilio & Kendall 2000). Research has indicated that people with learning disabilities are more prevalent to psychological disorders than the general population (Hassiotis et al 2000) consequently it could be hypothesised that prevalence rates of anxiety disorders are similar if not greater within the learning disabled population. Professional literature suggests that cognitive-behaviour therapy (CBT) has been an effective treatment against anxiety disorder (Beck 1995) however; this literature has predominately concentrated its focus to within the confines of mental health and general medical settings (Dattilio & Kendall 2000). The ability of people with learning disabilities to identify, evaluate and respond to their dysfunctional thoughts and beliefs, fundamentals of CBT (Beck 1995) have put into question the very use of this treatment programme for this particular client group (Kroese et al 1997). From a professional and personal perspective and through the utilisation of the Seedhouse (1998) ‘Ethical Grid’ responding to an anxiety disorder by way of CBT could be considered an ethically acceptable clinical intervention. Nationally and locally through government directives, ‘Valuing People’ (Department of Health 2001) and initiatives such as Health Action Plans (Department of Health 2002) services have recognised that they need to be more responsive to the mental health needs of people with learning disabilities. As a learning disability nurse wishing to ascertain the effectiveness of CBT as a practical intervention when presented with the dual-diagnosis of anxiety disorder and l earning disability, is through the use of ‘evidence-based practice’. When deciding on the best possible clinical intervention for an identified practice problem it seams logical to convert the issue into a single answerable question (Colyer & Kamath 1999). Several authors have identified that the use of frameworks to inform the development of the clinical question provide the practitioner with a systematic process of formulating an answerable question (Sackett et al 1997 Ridsdale1998). One such framework as described by Sackett et al (1997) is a four- stage process, known by the acronym PICO: Patient or Population Intervention or Indicator Comparison or Control Outcome The construction of an answerable question is the basis of evidence-based practice and should guide the practitioner to how to find an answer (Ridsdale 1998). It is important that each variable under the PICO framework is clearly defined, being as detailed and explicit as possible in order to extend clarification to the question. Working through PICO methodically the practitioner would instigate the process by defining the ‘Patient or Population’. Characteristics such age, gender and diagnosis would need to be deliberated and whilst the aforementioned were easily recognised in the practice area as adult male, identifying appropriate terminology for diagnosis can prove problematic. The term ‘Learning Disability’ is often used interchangeably in literature with terms such as, Mental Retardation and Intellectual Disabilities. ‘Learning Disability’ is a term with contemporary usage within the United Kingdom to describe a client group with significant development delays (Gates 1996). Whilst the idiom ‘Learning Disability’ is the preferred terminology for the question due to its contemporary usage it must be accepted that it’s a term not internationally recognised nor is it a term used for long in the United Kingdom (Gates 1996). Anxiety disorder comes in many facets and can be described as severe psychological disorders in which abnormal or chronic anxiety interferes with daily living (Adams & Bromley 1998). The client in the practice area had described psychological and physiological symptoms that were diagnosed as a social anxiety disorder through rating scales and self-report measures. It is crucial that the practitioner is aware that the term identified for the question as ‘social anxiety’ is often recognised by the synonyms, social phobia or panic disorder (Dattilio & Kendall 2000). The recognition of this inconsistent terminology will enable an evaluation to  take place between the relationships of the chosen term to symptoms displayed by the client. The identification of existing clinical interventions is a valuable part of the process of developing evidenced-based interventions (Meijel 2003). Literature suggests that CBT is an effective treatment for a number of psychological disorders (Embling 2002 Hatton 2002). Central to the model of CBT is that distorted or dysfunctional thinking is prevalent in all psychological disorders (Beck 1995). Analysis of accumulated experience of existing interventions and the aforementioned evidence of its validity led to the application of CBT as the ‘question intervention’. It is not imperative for the question to have a comparison intervention and this was the situation in the clinical problem described, therefore the conclusive element utilising the PICO framework was ‘outcome’. The outcome should be measurable (Sackett et al 1997) and after initially trivialising with the term ‘used’ it became evident that this would not develop into something that could be measured. Discussing whether or not an intervention is ‘effective’ however would provide the question with a measurable outcome. Revision of the terminology identified through the PICO framework would consequently translate the question as – Is cognitive-behaviour therapy an effective intervention for adult males with learning disabilities diagnosed as suffering from social anxiety? A well-formulated search strategy is an essential component in gathering appropriate evidence (Hewitt-Taylor 2002). Ridsdale (1998) discusses a four-stage search strategy that helps to translate the question into a meaningful search – a) Identify the subject elements of the question b) Define the relationship between the subject elements c) Convert the subject elements into search themes d) Decide on the scope of the search Assistance to define the subject elements can be found within the PICO framework – Patient – Learning Disability, Social Anxiety Intervention – CBT Outcome – Effectiveness Once identified an effective means of linking the subject elements of a question for the search process is through the use of ‘operators’. Operators such as: And – Or – Not, form a logical link between the elements of the question and can be used collectively or individually in any electronic database search (Ridsdale 1998). All of the subject elements of the question were required in order provide a conclusive answer therefore the operator required for the search strategy could be identified as ‘And’. The subject elements then require conversion into terms by which references can be retrieved (Ridsdale 1998). A keyword search would apply the terms identified as the subject elements, however making a list of the known synonyms of the subject elements such as Intellectual Disability and Mental Retardation, for inclusion, would substantially develop the search process. Finally the scope of the search decides what is wanted from the search. In order to identify the most appropriate type of evidence that is required for the practice problem the type of question asked must be identified (Sackett et al 1997). The question developed through the PICO framework can be readily identified as questioning, ‘the effectiveness of a therapy’. Sackett et al (1997) proposes that the best available evidence to answer this type of question is comparative / prospective studies and ideally random controlled trials (RCTs) which in turn determine the choice of database (Ridsdale 1998). Sackett et al (1997) provides a comprehensive catalogue of information resources such as databases, journals and web sites along with descriptions  of the type of evidence that can be found within these resources. It was established previously that the best type of evidence for the question would be RCTs and comparative / prospective studies. From the descriptions supplied by Sackett et al (1997) it could be identified that the Cochrane Library supplies the user with full text systematic reviews of effects of health-care interventions along with bibliographies of controlled trials. Further electronic databases identified through Salford University library information services were PsycINFO that contains citations and summaries of journal articles and books in the field of psychology chosen for its congruity with the clinical intervention. ‘Swetswise’ an electronic journal aggregator that provides access to full text publications from several major health care related academic publishers and ‘IngentaConnect’ which offers full text availability for all core Blackwell science and medical journals were chosen due to familiarity of use and extensive subject matter. Other databases considered were CINAHL, EMBASE and AMED however all were discounted due to their general nursing bias. Despite the recognition of Ridsdale’s (1998) four-stage search strategy and its systematic approach the initial search were completed exploiting familiar strategies through the IngentaConnect database. Preconceptions from previous endeavours searching for relevant evidence furnished the belief that a similar strategy would provide sufficient evidence to answer the question. A number of the subject elements were used through keyword searches whilst the operator ‘And’ was used to link each in turn (See Appendix). This easy to use search strategy produced a number of hits however none matched the criteria identified as being the most appropriate type of evidence to answer the question. The search revealed that almost all of the evidence found belonged in either mental health (Heimberg 2002) or general medical settings (Scholing & Emmelkamp 1999). Whenever the term learning disability or mental retardation was utilised they invariable appeared indiscriminately amidst the title or abstract of the article providing no specific relevance to the question. The frustration born out of this strategy led to further searches of electronic databases firstly through another familiar database, Swetswise. Ridsdale (1998) identifies that too many hits will be recovered if the subject element is to general  and this was evident in the first keyword search. The term learning disabilities produced 548 hits (See Appendix) far too many to feasibly scan. The subsequent four searches failed to produce a single hit a possibility also recognised by Ridsdale (1998) who suggests alternative synonyms are utilised in this circumstance. Due to the inability to find any relevant material of value towards answering the question Ridsdale’s (1998) four-stage strategy was then conscientiously adopted in conjunction with the knowledge acquired through lectures received at Salford University. A further search of Swetswise database was completed (See Appendix) which revealed significantly less hits than previously achieved but produced a literature review (Hatton 2002) specifically aimed at the use of CBT and people with learning disabilities. Whilst this evidence did not fulfil previous identified criteria it established that pursuing Ridsdale’s (1998) strategy could provide some success. A similar approach was undertaken while searching the Cochrane Library database which allows the user to restrict the search to the acquisition of systematic reviews and controlled trials whilst using a simple keyword option. Again the subject elements were utilised along with the recognised operator and despite new found co nfidence and knowledge the search strategy revealed no evidence of systematic reviews or RCTs with regards to the question (See Appendix). All systematic reviews or RCTs retrieved belonged within general and mental health settings. The final electronic database to be utilised was PsycINFO (via Ovid) where again Ridsdale’s (1998) four-stage strategy was conscientiously adopted. PsycINFO requires the user to have some prior knowledge of how to use electronic databases and their search strategies, which initially can prove bewildering to the novice. Once familiar with the database and its ability to combine search strategies either through keyword, journal or author the user should find it a practical resource (See Appendix). No systematic reviews or RCTs were found within the results however a further literature review (Feldman & Rivas-Vazquez 2003) aimed at psychosocial interventions and people with intellectual disabilities was unearthed along with evidence from child and adolescence services (Dadds & Spence 1997) and psychiatric services (Carmin & Albano 2003). Hatton (2002) suggests that research evidence on the effects of psychosocial interventions  for people with learning disabilities is sparse, whilst Kroese (1998) adds that therapists are reluctant to engage into therapy with this client group due to their dislike of having to relate to them. In an attempt to discover any type of evidence relating to people with learning disabilities and CBT the Salford University library catalogue was searched (See Appendix). A simple keyword search revealed one book (Kroese et al 1997) attaining the subject elements however again it did not produce the type of evidence recognised as the most appropriate to answer the question. Sackett et al (1997 p.2) defines evidence based practice as: â€Å"†¦the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients†. With this definition in mind it should be established as to what constitutes ‘current best evidence’ and its implications for the practitioner wishing to implement ‘evidence based practice’. Belsey & Snell (2001 p.2) states that, â€Å"†¦evidence is presented in many forms†¦ and the value of evidence can be ranked according to the following classification in descending order of credibility†: I. Strong evidence from at least one systematic review of multiple well-designed randomised controlled trials II. Strong evidence from at least one properly designed randomised controlled trial of appropriate size III. Evidence from well-designed trials such as non-randomised trials, cohort studies, time series or matched case-controlled studies IV. Evidence from well-designed non-experimental studies from more than one centre or research group V. Opinions of respected authorities, based on clinical evidence, descriptive studies or reports of expert committees In accepting this hierarchy of evidence practitioners should concede that the systematic review of multiple well-designed RCTs constitutes ‘best available evidence’ (Colyer & Kamath 1999). Sullivan (1998) adds weight to this argument when he states that RCTs constitute the strongest source of evidence and that the scientific community prefer the quantitative research technique that makes use of empirical data following a systematic process. Whilst a number of RCTs were found (Dadds & Spence 1997 Scholing & Emmelkamp 1999) whilst undertaking the search strategy none belonged within learning disability settings. The only evidence found specific to the original question were literature reviews and a specialist book (Kroese et al 1997) aimed at CBT and learning disabilities. The literature reviews (Hatton 2002 Kroese 1998) revealed that a number of case studies and a case series had demonstrated the potential feasibility of CBT reducing anxiety amongst people with learning disabilities. Whilst the specialist book (Kroese et al 1997) discussed conceptual and contextual issues of CBT and people with learning disabilities suffering anxiety disorders. This type of evidence appears in the lower reaches of the hierarchy of evidence and as such its subjectivity, reliability and validity can be disputed (Sullivan 1998). Whilst acknowledging the hierarchy of evidence and the proposal that comparative / prospective studies and ideally RCTs were the best forms of evidence to answer this type of question (Sackett et al 1997) it appears that in their absence the evidence revealed is the ‘best available’. RCTs are widely acknowledged as the gold standard of evidence-based practice (Rowland & Goss 2000) however it is suggested that they bear little resemblance to day-to-day reality (McInnes et al 2001). RCTs can be pragmatic or explanatory the former is concerned with the overall effectiveness of an intervention whilst the latter examines the impact of specific treatment elements on outcome (Parry 2000) however neither considers the perspectives and uniqueness of the respondents. The evidence recovered for the question (Hatton 2002 Kroese 1998) albeit in the lower reaches of the hierarchy acknowledges the feelings of the respondents due to its qualitative nature (patient centred, holistic and humanistic) therefore making it extremely suitable for the study of nursing phenomena (Parahoo  1997) along with its relevance as regards answering a therapy question (Parry 2000). Kroese (1997) offers a number of reasons why there is this lack of quantitative research evidence surrounding the subject elements in the question. He suggests that people with a learning disability are a devalued population, it is impossible to ensure that changes are due to clinical manipulations if individuals (learning disabled) do not have stable cognitions. Finally there is a conjecture that anxiety in people with learning disabilities is the same as in the general population consequently there is no need for specifically focused research. It emerges that learning disability services continue to adapt research evidence from general and mental health settings (Finlay & Lyons 2001) a similar approach with the RCTs recovered from the search strategy could make them a valued resource however it would take a skilled clinician to make this a feasible option. Reflection is a necessary component of Continuing Professional Development and is a legitimate method for questioning personal effectiveness and responsibility in all aspects of health care (Driscoll & Teh 2001). Through the process of reflection the practitioner recognised his own limitations in identifying appropriate evidence for his clinical problems, along with the often inconclusive, time consuming and frustrating strategies undertaken in the search of evidence in support of his clinical practice. The structured frameworks utilised throughout the process described earlier gave the practitioner a systematic approach to formulating a question, developing a search strategy and identifying appropriate evidence to answer his practice problem. The ability to systematically approach future clinical problems will enable the practitioner to offer his clients a holistic, client centred practice from the best external evidence available. Adams, B. Bromley, B. (1998) Psychology for Health Care Key Terms and Concepts, London, Macmillan Press Beck, J.S. (1995) Cognitive Therapy Basics and Beyond, London, Guildford Press. Belsey, J. Snell, T. (2001) What is Evidence-Based Medicine? [Internet] Available from www.jr2.ox.uk/bandolier (Accessed 7th December 2004) Carmin, C.N. Albano, A.M. (2003) Clinical Management of Anxiety Disorder in Psychiatric Settings: Psychology’s Impact on Evidence-Based Treatment of Children and Adults, Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, Vol. 34, No. 2 pp 170-176. Colyer, H. Kamath, P. (1999) Evidence-based practice A philosophical and political analysis: some matters for consideration by professional practitioners, Journal of Advanced Nursing, Vol. 29, No. 1, pp 188-193 Dadds, M.R. Spence, S.H. (1997) Prevention and Early Intervention for Anxiety Disorders: A Controlled Trial, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology Vol. 65, No. 4, pp 627-635. Dattilio, F.M. Kendall, P.C. (2000) Panic Disorder In: Dattilio, F.M. Freeman, A. Cognitive Behavioural Strategies in Crisis Interventions 2nd Edition, London, The Guildford Press. Driscoll, J. Teh, B. (2001) The potential of reflective practice to develop individual orthopaedic nurse practitioners and their practice, Journal of Orthopaedic Nursing, Vol. 5, pp 95-103 Embling, S. (2002) The effectiveness of cognitive behaviour therapy in depression, Nursing Standard, Vol. 17, Nos. 14-15, pp 33-41 Feldman, L.B. Rivas-Vazquez, R.A. (2003) Assessment and Treatment of Social Anxiety Disorder, Professional Psychology: Research and Practice Vol. 34, No. 4, pp 396-405. Gates, B. (1996) Learning Disability In: Kenworthy, N. Snowley, G. Gilling, C. (Eds) Common Foundations Studies in Nursing Second Edition, London, Churchill Livingston. Hassiotis, A. Barron, P. O’Hara, J. (2000) Mental Health Services for People with Learning Disabilities, British Medical Journal, Vol. 321, Issue 7261, pp 583-584 Hatton, C. (2002) Psychosocial interventions for adults with intellectual disabilities and mental health problems: A review, Journal of Mental Health, Vol. 11, No. 4, pp 357-373. Hewitt-Taylor, J. (2002) Evidence-based practice, Nursing Standard, Vol. 17, Nos. 14-15, pp 47-52. Department of Health (2001) Valuing People A New Strategy for Learning Disability for the 21st Century, A White Paper, London, HMSO. Department of Health (2002) Health Action Plans and Health Facilitation Good Practice Guidance for Learning Disability Partnership Boards, London, Department of Health. Heimberg, R.G. (2002) Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy for Social Anxiety Disorder: Current Status and Future Directions, Society of Biomedical Psychiatry, Vol. 51, pp 101-108. Kroese, B.S. Dagnan, D. Loumidis, K. (1997) (Eds) Cognitive-Behaviour Therapy for People with Learning Disabilities, London, Brunner-Routledge. Kroese, B.S. (1998) Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy for People with Learning Disabilities, Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy, Vol. 26, pp 315-322. McInnes, E. Harvey, G. Fennessy, G. Clark, E. (2001) Implementing evidence-based practice in clinical situations, Nursing Standard, Vol. 15, No. 41, pp 40-44. Meijel, van B. Game, C. Swieten-Duijfjes, van B. Grypdonck, M.H.F. (2003) The development of evidence-based nursing interventions: methodological considerations, Journal of Advance Nursing, Vol. 48, No. 1, pp 84-92. Parry, G. (2000) Evidence-based psychotherapy In: Rowland N. Goss S. (Eds) Evidence-Based Counselling and Psychological Therapies Research and Applications, London, Routledge. Ridsdale, L (1998) (Ed) Evidence-based Practice in Primary Care, London, Churchill Livingston. Rowland, N. Goss, S. (2000) (Eds) Evidence-Based Counselling and Psychological Therapies Research and Applications, London, Routledge. Sackett, D.L. Richardson, W.S. Rosenberg, W. Hayes, R.B. (1997) Evidence-based medicine: how to practice and teach EBM, London, Churchill Livingston. Scholing, A. Emmelkamp, P.M.G. (1999) Prediction of treatment outcomes in social phobia: a cross-validation, Behaviour Research and Therapy, Vol. 37, pp 659-670 Seedhouse, D. (1998) Ethics The Heart of Health Care 2nd Edition, Chichester, Wiley. Sullivan, P. (1998) Developing evidence-based care in mental health nursing, Nursing Standard, Vol. 12, No. 31, pp 35-38

Analysing The Challenges Facing Multilateral Organisations Today Politics Essay

Analysing The Challenges Facing Multilateral Organisations Today Politics Essay War is often the result of non negotiable problems/disputes. Since the end of the Second World War, liberal international theory advanced the establishment of international organizations such as the United Nations (UN) and its sub bodies, in the belief that such international forums were where state members have a chance to discuss and air their common issues and grievances and could prevent war and, widen the corporations between nation states. However, since its creation, the legitimacy as well as the effectiveness of these multilateral institutions has always been questioned. The end of the Cold War marked a new era of world politics where the United States (US) became the predominant power in the international system. In addition, the Iraq war of 2003, led by the US, but was not authorised by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) and the issue raised a question about the hegemonic position of the US over the United Nations. This is just one of the many challenges multilater al organizations like the UN are facing today. The terrorist attack on 9th November on the US and similar attacks elsewhere in the world, as well as the increasing threat of weapon of mass destruction (being used by either a rogue state such as Iran or a terrorist group) in the 21st Century is another major challenge for the United Nations and its administrative departments. Moreover, with the increasing involvement of non state actors and non governmental organizations nowadays, the value of formal institutions like the UN is clearly affected in adverse ways. To clarify if multilateralism is in crisis or not, it is essential to firstly look at the difficulties posed by these new dimensions to multilateralism, then evaluate its reaction and effectiveness at tackling them. In this essay, the focus will be on UN as this is often seen as the vanguard of multilateralism. Firstly, the essay will examine what multilateralism can be defined as and will name the current challenges which Mul tilateralism faces, it will then go on to give analysis of the sources of those troubles. Finally, it concludes that such multilateral institutions like the United Nations are under real challenge to the effectiveness of their multilateralism; however, it is not yet in a crisis situation. The leaders of these organizations can no long presume their exchanges to be â€Å"business as usual† but need to take into account these growing troubles and think more about â€Å"reform† if multilateralism is to continue to function in a stable way. Before discussing whether multilateralism is effective one needs to consider what exactly multilateralism is. For Paul Nielsson, UN Commissioner, multilateralism is about ‘all parties’ carrying out ‘concerted efforts’ to strengthen the international regulatory framework’ (Jorgensen, 2007, p.2) and involves states ‘pooling’ both resources and sovereignty. The problem for many participants in multilateral processes is that the processes themselves are ‘often slow and difficult, and rarely do their results satisfy every participant’ (ibid). Thus, multilateralism is by definition a process where participants cannot expect a zero-sum outcome, where they can clearly identify their gains or losses and say it was a success or failure. Multilateralism is a compromise between states where its greatest success is that everyone is a winner and everyone is a loser, because nobody gets everything they want.

Role and Value of Information to Todays Marketing Managers Essay

Role and Value of Information to Todays Marketing Managers - Essay Example According to Holland and Naude, the effectiveness of a marketing campaign should be evaluated on the basis of the relationships formed (Holland & Naude, 2004, 167). However, a Kotler asserts that information is very important to a marketing campaign. Therefore, he criticizes that marketing campaign should be assessed based on the information driven approaches that are used in the campaign (Kotler, 2005, 25). Information helps managers to identify and be acquainted with the latest trends in the market. The world of today is very diverse and market trends keep on changing depending on the level of innovation in the market. Markets that have highly innovative businesses will tend to have vast changes in their ways of operation. Therefore, a business located in such a market will need to be equipped with data about the latest trends in the market (Randall, 1993, 5). Therefore, information is very important in helping marketing managers to recognize changes in the market prices, product d esigns and packaging methods. Impact of Information Information in the current days has greatly changed due to use of current technology. For instance, promotional methods have improved due to technological advancement. Therefore, the way in which goods and services are advertised in the market has greatly changed. Managers should be aware of these changes so that they can make the right decisions concerning their marketing procedures. This is because; all business activities are also becoming more information intensive and thus, this also makes it easier to solve physical problems in the business (Holland & Naude, 2004, 168). However, Holland & Naude have been criticized that they do not analyze the whole market when giving out this report because; it is not all business activities that are information intensive in the market. There are other business activities which require very little information (Georgia State University, 2002, 11). Information in marketing has also changed to an extent that it facilitates the marketing plan and control of the organization. Unlike with the old marketing methods, currently marketing managers are able to plan in advance concerning their marketing strategies due to availability of information. The business is able to analyze the whole market effectively since; it will have collected full market information from its competitors (Holland & Naude, 2004, 170). Therefore, the business can use this information to ensure effective

UAE stock market Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

UAE stock market - Essay Example The stock prices were fluctuating widely. Lack of sustainability produced the need of making a proper system with outlined regulations and laws. Government and other officials realized that the appropriate existence of market will be able to attract the investors in UAE in market. Hence, the Government decided to develop such a system where investors can rely and invest their money. After a great effort, the development of a proper stock exchange market took place in the year of 2000 in the presence of law number 4, and then in the year of 2000, Dubai Financial Market (DFM) and Abu Dhabi Securities Market (ADSM) were established. From 2000 the proper mechanism of stock exchange was started in UAE (GulfBase). STOCK AND COMMODITY EXCHANGE BOARD The development of stock and commodity exchange board presumes overall controlling responsibility in the stock and commodity exchange market in UAE. It practices the essential control and executive functions to discharge its allocates responsibi lities, and amenities investment of savings and other funds in the stock exchange market in the way that would give out the countrywide economy and make sure communication between the forces of supply and demand to decide fair-haired prices and guard investors, in addition to to promote investment knowledge in a way that would comprehend financial and economic consistency. Dubai Financial Market (DFM) The establishment of Dubai financial market took place on 26th March, 2000. It was registered as a public organization having self-governing authorized individuality. At the initial stage, the joint-stock companies use this market as secondary market for the buying and selling of stocks, In addition to the exchange of bonds that are issued by the UAE government, any of the local government bodies, institutions and public organizations within the government or investment units allocated from the local investment funds of a country or any other local or foreign financial instrument that are acceptable to the market of UAE (DFM). ABU DHABI SECURITIES MARKET (ADSM) The establishment of Abu Dhabi financial Market took place in the year of 2000. The establishment of market gives the stock exchange market as self-governing legal identity, managerial and financial independence, in addition to the essential control and decision-making authorities required by the market to release its functions. The official inauguration of the market took place on 15th November, 2000. It works for the security and protection of financial and economic constancy and the establishment and explanation of exchange procedures in such a way as to make sure the liquidity and stability of the market. After the development of stock exchange market the economy of UAE has been continuously growing and there are lots of investments from foreign companies are coming in the economy. The political stability and cultural diversity of UAE attracting the multinationals to make investments in UAE stock marke t. UAE is planning to serve as a financial hub in the Middle East region. The government is starting new projects to attract the investors. The most recent investment in the real state sector is an example. Now there are several companies listed on the stock exchanges of UAE that belongs to different regions of the world. The stock market of UAE is very prominent in Middle East region because it has a high growth rate. The government of UAE is continuously making plans for future projects and revealing it to

Corporate Goveranance Case Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Corporate Goveranance Case - Essay Example Please note that the case study did not indicate the number of hours the employees of Tasty meals Ltd is being forced to work. It is incredelous to compare the conditions of employees of Tasty meals with that of the other countries. The economic condition is not the same between two countries the cost of living is likewise not the same. The wage commission of the Philippine Government have taken these factors into consideration in determining the minimum wage in the Philippines. As far as the wage is concerned Tasty meals Ltd is in compliance and in fact exceed the requirements of the government. Question 2: Tasty meals Ltd, CANNOT be held responsible for the problems caused by unhealthy junk foods and high-calorie if the company is complying with the minimum requirement prescribed by the law of the Government of the Philippines. However, Tasty meals Ltd has the fiduciary responsibility if not a social responsibility to provide healthy foods to its loyal patrons. Fiduciary responsibi lity is not prosecutable by law if it is not met. Question 3: It is NOT reasonable to demand from Tasty meals Ltd to give up ‘cost effective’ and ‘convinient’. The use of cost effective and convenient disposable tableware and containers is not against the law within the Philippines. ... Question 5: Overall I consider Tasty meals Ltd to be compliant to the corporate governance principles with the exception of its dealings with corporation of questionable background. Tasty meals Ltd is NOT AN ethically and socially responsible corporation. A company is considered compliant to Corporate Governance principles if it complies with the maximum requirement of the law in the countries where it is operating from. A company is considered to be ethically and socially responsible if it complies with the requirements of international standards where it belongs to. Question 6: The following are my answers for each of the recommendation if it is appropriate the answer is Yes, if it’s not appropriate the answer is No. Recommendation 1 – No, the current salary is more than twice the government mandated minimum wage. Recommendation 2 – No, Tasty meals Ltd have its own market that might not be receptive to other products. Recommendation 3 – Yes, Reducing tra ns fat in its cooking process will help its global corporate image. Recommendation 4 and 5 – Yes, complying with the concern of international environment groups will enhance the image of the company. Recommendation 6 – Yes, sponsorship of charitable organizations will enhance the corporate image of the company. Recommendation 7 – Yes, this is a requirement to enhance the global image of the company Recommendation 8 – Yes, this will enhance the image of the company Recommendation 9 – Yes, this will enhance and also show the commitment of the company to self reflect and improve its operation to comply with the requirement of the law and other international standard. Question 7: YES, Adverse publicity often times affects the

Analysis of the Movie The Women Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Analysis of the Movie The Women - Essay Example The major technicalities that will be studied in the paper from the source of the Crystal Allen character are presentation and representation acting, personalization, emotional life of the character and importance of casting etc. Presentational and Representational Acting The role of Crystal Allen in the story can be presentational acting at the second interval of the film. The technicality of presentational and representational acting has a variance in its context. Representational acting is merely noted in plays where the actors have to play more than one role. This is associated with the simple background and context to the story. In the presentational acting, it is quiet evident that the actor plays a single role with a customized setting. As studied by the authors Hagen and Frankel, â€Å"Formalized, external (Representational) has a strong tendency to follow fashion. Internal acting presentation rejects fashion and consequently can become timeless as human experience itself (H agen and Frankel, 2nd Chapter). This clarifies the position of characterization of Crystal in the movie. It should be noted that the character of Crystal has shown vibrancy by appointing villainous role. The nature is practical in real life and, thus, it does not challenge the conscience of the audiences. The director projects a different view of the character by appointing her villainous side mentioning a setting which is real. The audiences of the movie are able to witness the reality of relationships which might miss out on trust. There is no representational acting done so far by Crystal as the role remains customary where she is depicted as a vamp of the story. The change or transition in the context of her character becomes obvious when the director presents Crystal to become consciously unfaithful to her husband despite knowing that he divorced her wife in order to marry her. This shows that the presentational acting is up to the mark and indicates the audiences about the rea l slot which they might have around them. This is how audiences relate their lives with the stories of film (Cukor). Emotional life The character of Crystal Allen is relatively strong in the movie because she has a dilemma of keeping sincerity with her partner. On the front, it can be observed that she is a bad woman in the story but it should be noted that the negativity of her character in the film is merely because of emotional imbalance in her life. As per analysis of the character, it can be said that she was nothing in terms of personalization as she has been depicted to be a perfume stall sales girl who cannot have a true relationship with a rich guy. Seemingly, it’s her emotionally imbalanced life that she gets involved with a man who is already married to someone. This imbalance of her emotional life continues to affect other characters of the story making it easy to notice that, being an emotionally imbalanced woman, she is not accepted by the audience (Cukor). Furt hermore, the emotional imbalance in her life is noted to become severe when she gets involved in a relationship with Buck after marrying Steven. This clarifies that she is not satisfied at all being married to Steven. She seems to be satisfied emotionally with the materialistic environment. Her desires and aspirations are greatly materialistic making it evident that the role of Crystal is of the typical women who want to have all the comforts

Tomkins PLC Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Tomkins PLC - Essay Example The declaration of dividend is often almost solely dependent on the internal condition of a company. Accordingly, a company is only able to declare a cash dividend if its operation in the fiscal year had been profitable and if it has enough cash. Capital gains on the other hand, are determined by various factors internal and external to the company. Operating performance, investor financial ratios, revenues and profits are often determines the price level of stocks. Other external factors such as interest rates, competitors, and other company issues are irrefutably integrated in the investors' perception of the intrinsic value of a stock. Thus, the creation of wealth for shareholders is often reflected at the dividend pay-outs and the appreciation of its stock price. This report will look at the shareholder value creation of Tomkins PLC for the past ten years. The next section will give a brief background on the company. The paper will then present how the company maximized shareholder value through dividends and capital gains. Relevant investor ratios will also be examined. Lastly, the report will conclude on how the company can further develop its wealth creation record. Tomkins PLC is player in the international engineering industry listed in both London (LSE) and New York Stock Exchanges (NYSE). Generally, the company is subdivided into two business segments namely, industrial and automotive, and building products. The company expressed that "Our primary business objective is to achieve a long term sustainable growth in the economic value of Tomkins through strategic development of our businesses." Tomkins PLC was recognized by the Euromonitor as one of the top companies in the world in terms of Ownership Transparency and Rights, Financial Transparency & Process, Board Structure, Stakeholder Relations and Alignment of Managerial Interest. The company garnered a high score as it ranked number two in developing countries and the best of four British companies in the top ten (Tomkins top for Corporate Governance 2003). This just reflects the company's commitment in enhancing transparency for investors on the real value of their stocks. Tomkins Chairman David Newlands expressed, "We are very pleased with this accolade from Euromoney, which acknowledges the enormous amount of work that we have put into Corporate Governance. At Tomkins we have made corporate governance and delivering shareholder value our top priorities and this survey is recognition of how far we have come. We continue to concentrate on maintaining the highest standards of transparency and delivering value to our s hareholders." Dividends As stated above, dividend is an indicator of shareholder value creation. Through dividends, each stockholder is compensated for holding the company's stock. It is

Economic Development in East Asia Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Economic Development in East Asia - Essay Example Many countries started the modern economic growth post Second World War while some other countries chose to start them according to their preference. The biggest developer Japan decided to use the modern economy from 1985, where as china implemented it from 1980s. It followed the economy policy and preferred market economies over central economy. From then it has been a growing stage for each country as well as the East Asia as a whole. Globalization created so much impact on all the countries and only some could withstand the era of Globalization. East Asian countries did not face this problem. They were strong enough to accept and change towards globalization, and from then there has been a continuous growth in all the countries. As politics played a major role in the development of a country, many countries could not improve their economic standard immediately. They had to cooperate with the government and abide by their rules and regulations. The growth and development was seen in starting up new industries and inventing new things.(Nabende 2003). Import and Export underwent a transformation. Countries like Japan and China started to manufacture their own products instead of importing them from other foreign countries. This in turn resulted in exporting goods manufactured by them to the other countries. Manufacturing companies started to produce textiles, technological products and other industrial and home appliances. The shares of each country were based on their development and some of them had a tough time due to the massive improvement of China and Japan. (Sycip 1996).There was also a growth on the education and employment, which gradually improved the economy. After some years, the government started providing monetary support to the countries, which made the development easier. The trade and its market started to improve; import and export decided a countries role to develop other nations. Though East Asian countries were experiencing growth, in the 1980s there was a setback which the countries found it difficult to cope up with. Some of them reported zero growth and import and export were affected. This condition improved after years of struggle and fight. Japan was leading in the development stage and it faced a severe competition with the improvement of United States. The value of dollar and Yen kept in fluctuating. There was a tough competition between them. Financial Crisis Financial crisis disturbed and turned down the improvement of almost all the countries in the world. East Asian countries were the worst hit by the financial crisis. There was a drop in their currency value too. (Greenwood 2005).The U.S dollar continued to dominate and countries like Japan and China had their currencies floating. The recovery from this crisis took some time and improvement seemed to be tough. Due to this crisis, trading operations totally came to a halt. Countries with good economies could manage, where as smaller countries started to suffer. Investment went down and they found it difficult to tide over the situation. But then after sometime the countries started to recover and the recovery was rather a shock to the other countries. With the help of the government, countries gained financial support and their trading, import, export and investment seemed to improve. Trade assignments between the East Asian countr

EARLY MOTIVATIONAL THEORIES Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

EARLY MOTIVATIONAL THEORIES - Essay Example However, the theory that comes closest in understanding the motivation in human being in every sense is Abraham Maslow’s theory of ‘Hierarchy of Needs’. Unlike the ‘reward-punishment’ and ‘fair-unfair’ approach of motivation theories like ‘reinforcement theory’ by B.F. Skinner and ‘equity theory’ by John Adams respectively, the theory of ‘hierarchy of needs’ takes a ‘humanistic approach’ towards the motivation factor in human beings. It considers human beings as ‘humans’ and not ‘machines’ or ‘trainable’ beings who can be made to behave in certain way by giving them certain rewards in return. ‘Hierarchy of needs’ is the most developed and ‘human’ theory of motivation because it not only values the physical and psychological needs of human being, but also values the spiritual needs of human beings and hence, demonstrate that every human being has a spiritual dimension hidden in him which can be attained when his basic needs are fulfilled. The idea of ‘whole’ being Abraham Maslow was a revolutionary psychologist. He was instrumental in bringing a totally different kind of thinking, known as ‘the third force’, in the field of psychology. Maslow believed that religious aspects of human beings, like morality and spirituality, are as much a part of human nature as science is (Goble 32). He believed that if one is to truly understand the nature of human being, then one should study not only the ‘scientific’ aspects of his nature but also the spiritual and moral aspects (Goble 32). This belief led Abraham Maslow to develop the theory of motivation called as the ‘hierarchy of needs’. Maslow’s theory of human motivation is based on an understanding that human being is an integrated and organized ‘whole’ being and hence, when he is motivated to do something, then his ‘whole’ being gets involved in fulfilling the motivated act and not just a part of him (Goble 50). Hence, the desires and the needs that motivate human beings are related to each other and do not function independently from each other. The more complex the need and desire is, the higher are the chances of interrelation with other needs and desires (Goble 50). Hence, human beings cannot be motivated to perform by rewarding (ends) their individual needs (means) (Goble 50). An individual cannot be motivated to act unless all his interrelated needs are fulfilled. Hence, Maslow based his theory of motivation on the basis of the understanding that human being gets highly motivated only when he realizes that the needs of his ‘whole’ being are getting fulfilled. Hierarchy of needs Maslow has classified human needs into following five categories: 1. Physiological Needs According to Maslow, the physiological needs of food, liquid, shelter, sex, sleep and oxygen are the most powerful needs of human being as his physical survival depends on these needs (Goble 50). Once these needs are sufficiently satisfied, then the next category of needs emerge in the nature of the human beings. 2. The Safety Needs The safety needs of human beings are fulfilled when they experience security, consistency, fairness and routine at home and at school/work (Goble 54). When a person is denied of safety needs, he becomes neurotic and his need for order and control becomes a matter of life and death (Goble 54). This leads him to develop compulsive and neurotic attitude towards safety needs. When the safety needs are unfulfilled, then people get

The Creolization of Old Calabar Essay Example for Free

The Creolization of Old Calabar Essay The business and social interactions of the African and English slave traders created a very different Old Calabar. As the slave trade grew the society quickly started to reflect not only the traditions and values of the Africans but of the English as well. Old Calabar became a New Creolized Calabar†. Was this the direct result of the slave trading? The evidence says yes? The creolization of the African Society of Calabar can clearly be associated with the slave trade by analyzing their language changes, life style changes and political changes as the slave trading became more competitive and economically beneficial. Creolization usually brings to mind the decedents in Louisiana born to the Spanish, French and Haitians before the Civil War. Randy Sparks introduces the idea of creolization as being a way to explain what happened in Old Calabar, but interestingly, he poses the thought that it had little to do with the origin or birth of those involved. Sparks instead introduces historian Ira Berlins idea of the Robin Johns being a kind of Atlantic Creole not because of blood lines but by experiences. Ira Berlins quote is as follows: Familiar with the commerce of the Atlantic, fluent in its new languages, and intimate with its trade and cultures, they were cosmopolitan in the fullest sense. (pg. 4) The Robin Johns were not only fluent in the English language but also in trade language alluded to by Ira Berlin. These various languages developed in areas from Gambia to Cameron and developed as a result of the constant exposure of slave traders to each others languages. The variations spread around the Atlantic Ocean to areas where slave trade was popular from Africa to the Americas to Europe. Sparks describes the languages as a combination of mostly English words having African Grammatical structures. The African leaders in Old Calabar were responsible for the cosmopolitan† like essence of the Robin Robins. The leaders knew that by being more European understanding the European customs and practicing the lifestyle. It gave them the competitive edge over the other African competitors who did not. Joining with the Europeans in the lucrative slave business was an economic gold mine. So, the smart African transformed himself into an image of what they believed made them more appealing to the Europeans. An example of this would be that they ordered and used extravagant products such as English razors, pewter piss pots and mirrors six feet tall. The degree of their creolization is very apparent on pages 11 and 12 of the first chapter. Sparks description of Grandy King George, who was originally known as Ephraim, is filled with the pageantry of both Royal English and African fused together. Sparks describes Grandy King George as he boards the Royal Canoe the day before The Massacre of 1767. Sparks indicates that Grandy King George wore a multicolored robe and red coat trimmed in gold lace, a silk sash thrown over his shoulders. He carried a gold skull headed cane in one hand and a fine ceremonial sword in the other. Under one arm he carried a gold trimmed cocked hat and the ensigns that, as Sparks describes them, blew in the wind, engraved with Grandy King Georges name written in English letters. The Kings name being written in English letters emphasizes the point that the African Slave traders not only spoke the English language, but also had the ability to read and write it. The unique combination of The Kings attire and accessories powerfully displayed his desire to indicate his appreciation for both cultures. The red coat trimmed in gold clearly reflected his admiration of the English Royals, while the skull headed cane, on the other hand, indicated his pride in his African heritage. Sparks seems to save his last description of the King and his surroundings that day as the most obvious fusion of the two cultures. He describes that behind the King, in the center of the canoe, there was a small house painted in bright colors, and on top of the house there were two men loudly playing the drums. There was a canon in the bow of the canoe, and in front of the canon was a man who shook a large bundle of reeds to symbolically ward off obstacles. Again, one could say that the mixing of cultures is self-evident. The canon would have been something purchased from the English, while the spirit man and the men beating the drums would have reflected his African faith. African Politics in the area of Efiks experienced significant change after the slave trade with the English escalated. The economy had been predominantly based on agricultural trade and there was no strong centralized government. Small groups of population approximately 1200 were divided up into Wards and Houses lead by town council Elders and House Elders. As the economy grew, the criteria for qualification as head of house changed from lineage to wealth. Houses became larger, Wards and Towns as well. A stronger governing system was created. The â€Å"Grand Council† was introduced to govern the â€Å"Council of Elders†. The â€Å"Ekpe Society† was created to set standards and create laws for the entire system. Entry into the system was open to all men even slaves as long as the entry fees were paid. The Society had many levels of membership determined by the wealth of the man. The Ekpe Society controlled all trading regulations both slave and agricultural. In addition they controlled the economy. They set prices for goods, enforced debt collection, payment submissions and kept track of inventory. The Ekpe Society even controlled who was responsible for sweeping the streets. The crealization is seen in the change of the African Society governing style from a lineage system to a system influenced more by wealth and requiring strong central government. In conclusion it is clear that the relationship with the English and the huge amounts of capital to be made created a creolized African Society. It changed how they thought about status. They wanted English clothes, razors, mirrors and pewter piss pots. The government became more about money than lineage and last but not least their language changed. An entire language was created around the slave trade.

The Culture Of Cambodia Cultural Studies Essay

The Culture Of Cambodia Cultural Studies Essay There is a different work hours between government and private offices. For government offices, the routine work hours is on Monday- Saturday since 7.30am until 4.30pm with breaking for the lunch time while private offices normally have no break by use working on ones shift instead to keep longer hours for example; shops, supermarket, etc. Cambodian have customs and tradition to have long and suitable relationships in any business. They trust having proper behavior is more important than work performance for example; if you are honest, responsible for your tasks, polite and respect to the superiors or the higher powers, etc. The higher power will concern and give some rewards to the good employees such as money or power. To give and opinion, Cambodian employees prefer to follow the superiors opinion than against them. Cambodians prefer to improve their English skills to enhance themselves to the internationally therefore, the English books, magazines or language tapes are popular to be the gifts for any business. Shoes and socks are unsuitable for the gifts because cultures they believe that the foot is the lowest of their body according to Buddhist cultures. Cambodia has a long history of culture and civilization which mainly influenced by Indian country. Notice from the Cambodians life involve with the religions of Buddhism and also Hinduism. Cambodia population around 95 percent is Theravada Buddhist according to relies on reasonableness, personal experience, and critical analysis. This is the main Buddhist in Southeast Asia including Cambodia which affected Cambodians culture and etiquette in nowadays and the other are Islam, atheism, or animism respectively. For example; the conceptual ideas about karma, collectivism, and saving face plays and important roles in the daily life of Cambodians. For karma, this idea involves with the rationality and law of action. If you do something, something will be happened follow things that you did. For collectivism, Cambodians prefer give priority to family, group, and society rather than the individual. This idea also concerns about saving face which tries to avoid losing someones face in any transactions. Losing face can be occurred when someone is criticized or is given compliments in the public. Therefore, if you want to do business with Cambodia, you should be aware of this action to assure that you are not misunderstanding this concept. The followings are the tips for saving Face; Normally the monks in Cambodia always highly respect in the society because they are faithful and admirable. They have similar ways to Thailand for example; they dressed in the color robes, women must avoid touching or handing to the monks even though she is a monks mother. To have a conversation with the monks, you should press the hands together at the chest  level for showing respect to the monks. For the daily routine of monks, they are allowed to eat only to times per days which are in the morning and lunch. Normally, when the Cambodians greet, they usually bow their head to show respect with press the hands together at chest level which is quite similar to Thailand. This gesture is known as Som Pas. However, when they greet with the foreigners, they usually adapt the greeting of western style by shaking hands. Typically, it is improper for the men to shake hands with Khmer women and to hug, kiss, or touch the body of a Khmer woman are not allowed and unsuitable in this society. To address the name of Cambodians, they use Lok instead of Mr. for the man and Lok Srey instead of Ms. or Mrs. for the woman before the first name and surname. Proper dress is an important for Cambodians for both men and women. It can show their position in the society for example, shorts are considered as the proper dress only for school children and it is not proper for both men and women if they want to go inside the official places or temples. Doing business in Cambodia also consider about the proper dress. Generally, to do business or working in Cambodia men wear collared shirts and long pants. For women, they wear dress or blouse instead short skirts and should not show their shoulders. It is a typically in Cambodian society to bring the gift for the host if you are invited to have lunch or dinner at someones home. Normally they give flowers, fruit, cookies, etc. Knives or sharp things are not popular to be the gifts. Moreover, gifts are preferred to wrap with colorful paper rather than the white because it means the sadness or mourning. Moreover, when you want to give the gifts, you should use both hands for showing care and gifts are not opened when you received. Cambodians emphasis on the formal dress when they are doing business for both domestic and international transactions, contact with the government sectors or enter to the official places. Moreover, having proper and formal dress show the respect to the people who are doing business with or the places that you will go there. Normally, both men and women wear a lightweight tropical suit in formal situations. Shorts and skirts are not suitable in the public. For less formal occasions, it is enough to wear casual shirts and blouses with collars. Cambodians culture in communication is very indirect and non-verbal behavior therefore, the person who want to do business in Cambodia should understand about this culture and be aware of it for example; they prefer silent when they disagree instead of complain in front of others, smiling in Cambodia has many meanings not only in the positive ways but also in the negative ways, etc. Time is also important in doing business here. If you arrive late, it means you ignore and do not respect to the person who you are doing business with. Business Cards Presenting the card in doing business is general in Cambodia and it should be exchanged at the beginning of introduction. For the business card, it is better if one side is translated into Khmer. When you present your card or receive the card, remember to use the right hand or both hands. Meeting and Greeting The followings are some guides for meeting and greeting in Cambodia; For Group meeting you should introduce people in order to rank. Handshakes are general however you should be careful not to be too tight which can be considered as aggressive. It is the tradition that if the man is doing business with the woman, they should keep distance to avoid misinterpret from the others because Cambodians has a strongly traditional in sexuality for example eye contact should be kept to a minimum. Cambodians address them with the title Lok for a man and Lok Srey for a woman with the first name only or both the first and the last name. CULTURAL DIMENSIONS Nowadays the world is separated in different countries and culture and many people still dont know much about their international business partners and how to deal with them in the right way. Therefore business people should need to know how they can cope with the foreign partners. This part is emphasized on the cultural dimensions and communication in South East Asia including Lao and Cambodia. It is an important to know about the fundamental facts of these countries if you want to do successful business in SE Asia. Cultural Dimensions from Hofstede High power distance Societies have significant gaps between the higher power and the weak. There is related distinguished to unfairness between the rich and the poor. High level of uncertainty avoidance The cultures in SE Asia tend to reduce risk and ensure financial securities, many written rules, less risk taking by managers, lower labor turnover and less ambitious employees. Collectivism People are very interested in long lasting relationships and give priority to a group, family or society. They care each other in change for loyalty and tend to show less individual. High feminity (low masculinity index) Care each other and quality of life for both men and women. Managers give their employees more credit if they have high responsibility for their tasks and allow them more freedom.

Approaches to Child Protection Issues

Approaches to Child Protection Issues What we need in child protection is for workers to take a lighter touch approach, more supportive and less intrusive. Discuss and evaluate this proposition. Introduction Where it has been estimated that a child may be at risk then a social worker has a duty of care under the 1989 Children’s Act. Furthermore, he or she is also bound by a requirement to act within a framework that is informed by the Human Rights Act of 1998. This means that the social worker, and any other agencies who may be involved, while having a duty to protect that child, should, nevertheless, also bear in mind the rights of the family. History tends to suggest that these rights are often ignored. How can workers be expected to take a less intrusive approach to child protection issues when the history of Government policy making actually places the onus on them to take more of an interventionist approach? Arguably, the question is almost impossible to answer when social workers are hidebound by the increasingly intrusive policy making that has been the legacy of successive political parties. This paper will look at what is needed in child protection, is for workers to approach cases with a lighter touch. It will begin by looking at the changing concept of childhood and then at successive Governments’ policies since the beginning of the Welfare State. The paper will also look at some research studies which argue that there is a need for intervention and support and how the concept of needs has been substituted for a concept of risk, particularly since the introduction of market principles into social care. Finally the study will argue that while workers should apply a lighter, less intrusive approach to child protection issues, social workers are prevented from doing so as a result of changing market forces and Government policy making. Changing Views of Childhood In pre-industrial societies there was little distinction between youth and adulthood and children were not subjected to codes of behaviour that were different to those of adults. With the rise of the factories and the shift from rural to urban life this began to change and by the 18th century parents were deemed to have responsibility for their offspring and to see that they had a safe and disciplined upbringing. The idea of childhood was a novel one, particularly among the poor where everyone was expected to be economically active, how childhood was understood, therefore depended largely upon class. While ideas were changing children were generally regarded as their parents’ legal property and child cruelty did not become an offence until 1889. Increasingly childhood and adolescence have become problematic concepts and young people are perceived as different and more difficult, than their forbears, thus the perceived need for a different approach to policy making. Young people are often in situations where they are deemed to be ‘at risk.’ Giddens (1998) has argued that the modern world is characterised by manufactured risks, .practices, and policies that are meant to reduce risk or minimise harm but often have unintended consequences. As Giddens maintains with regard to warnings about risk: We just cannot know beforehand when we are actually ‘scaremongering’ and when we are not (Giddens, 1998:30). Need and Risk More recently Kemshall (2002) has raised the question of whether government and social services’ focus have changed from a concept of need to a concept of risk. Recent, further extensions to the concept of childhood have meant that children are viewed as a vulnerable group in need of care and protection. Corby (1993) maintains that historical evidence suggests that while notions of what proper parenting might be said to be, has varied over time there has always been a concern over child abuse. However, Corby argues that despite this concern, childcare and child protection policies over the hundred years leading up to the 1989 Children’s Act were largely ambivalent. Hemshall (2002) argues that rather than late twentieth century policy making remaining ambivalent, an interventionist approach to child protection began to appear from the time of the inception of the welfare state. The interventionist approach, it might be argued, was also a class based system whereby certain types of families (most often the very poor) were identified as problem families. This resulted in new categories pertaining to child abuse and what was meant by the term ‘at risk’. With the emergence of these discourses state powers with regard to family life were increased. This resulted in the Children and Young Person’s Act of 1952. This Act gave greater powers to children’s departments to identify families who were deemed to be ‘in need’ and to oversee their protection. Problem families were associated with ‘cycles of deprivation’, and child abuse was medicalised as the ‘battered baby syndrome’ (Kempe et al, 1962 and Okell and Butcher, 1969, in Kemshall, 2002:71). Over the next fifteen to twenty years both the concept of abuse and the areas where children were considered to be at risk, were extended to include such things as a failure to thrive. The case of Maria Colwell in the late 1960s was given extensive media coverage. This was a new aspect to the debates about children at risk and had the effect of raising public awareness and concern over what was seen as a failure to protect on the part of social service agencies. Subsequently the profession was increasingly held to account for its failure to identify risk and to intervene. Cochrane (1993)[1] maintains that the continuing number of enquiries that took place between the early 1970s and the 1980s resulted in social work being practised in what he describes as a beleagured context for the profession (Cochrane, 1993:82). Scaremongering about perceived risk raises public disquiet and leads to unforeseen outcomes. Nowhere was this more evident than the mistakes made in Cleveland in the late 1980s when widespread child abuse was believed to have taken place and numbers of children were removed from family homes on flimsy evidence. Serious mistakes were made in an attempt to prevent harm. The accusations were later proved unfounded, but some parents had to go to the European Courts in order to get their children returned. Kemshall et al (1997) are of the opinion that while this was the case, rather than recommending a lighter touch, Government policies tended towards even greater intervention. This altered the whole concept of what social services had originally been about, that of helping people in need. The Market Economy, Needs and Risks In the market based economy that Britain had become under Thatcher, needs were to be met by the community in an effort at cutting welfare costs. These developments meant that by 1989 the context had changed from families in need to children at risk. †¦the notion of the ‘child in need’ and the ‘child at risk’ is constructed through the dominant discourse of modernity’s welfarist normalisation of families. This locates children in a bounded space within which certain behaviours, activities and attitudes are seen as normal or deviant (Kemshall, 2002:73 citing Moss et al, 2000). As Kemshall (2002) maintains we have become defensive about risk and see it in terms of harm to be avoided this negative view of risk can lead, as Douglas, (1992) contends to a culture of blame. The (system we are in now is almost ready to treat every death as chargeable to someone’s account, every accident as cuased by someone’s criminal negligence, every sickness a threatened prosecution. Whose fault? Is the first question (Douglas, 1992:15-16).[2] Agencies, both statutory and non-statutory, have a duty with respect to safeguarding children. This was highlighted in research evidence and further documented in the Department of Health 1999 Report Working together to safeguard children. While it might be argued that this view can lead to mistakes such as those made in Cleveland, and there are still many cases where perfectly innocent parents have had their children removed from the family home, social workers try to do their best in very difficult circumstances. This means that there are times when they are over zealous and intervene in cases where a child was never at risk, and at other times they miss the warning signs and make mistakes. The public tends to remember the mistakes rather than applauding the good work that is done. This is because when mistakes are made they can lead to horrifying consequences as the case of Victoria Climbie demonstrates. Since that time guidance on when and how to act has tended to be clearer and more precise. Most of this has been in response to the recommendations of Lord Laming after his work on the Victoria Climbie enquiry (Laming, 2003). A whole series of measures have since been put in place aimed at those families and situations where a child could legitimately be deemed to be at risk.. The Joint Chief Inspector’s Report, Safeguarding children (2002) defines safeguarding children and their families in the following way: All agencies working with children, young people and their families take all reasonable measures to ensure that the risks of harm to children’s welfare are minimized, and where there are concerns about children and young people’s welfare, all agencies take all appropriate action to address those concerns, working to agreed local policies and procedures in full partnership with other local agencies. Class still appears to be a problem when it comes to identifying children who are at risk and the authorities are more likely to suspect abuse when dealing with children from poorer homes than they are with those from middle-class homes. This raises the question of whether Becker’s (1967) labeling theory was correct in the assumption that when you treat people in a certain way they tend to act out those assumptions. It is unfortunately the case that there have been a number of research studies which tend to suggest that factors such as poverty and unemployment do sometimes lead to child safety issues. One study of parents who had children on the At Risk Register, found that children in homes where there was unemployment and financial problems ran a greater risk of being abused than children who did not live in that situation. The research argues that the findings suggest a clear link between social and economic deprivation and the risk of child neglect and/or abuse (Sidebotham et al, 2002). Some studies also suggest that in homes where the parents have alcohol or other substance abuse issues, children are more likely to be at risk. Harwin and Forester (2002) found that in cases where the parents misused drugs or alcohol, the children often came to the attention of Social Services as a result of concern for their safety and well being. In a study of more than 290 cases across four London Boroughs, a third of those children who needed long term intervention lived with one or more parents who had some form of substance abuse issues. Research such as this raises concern in a number of areas, particularly in homes where there are children under the age of six. This did not mean that these children were necessarily victims of their parent’s cruelty, rather it was the case that the family needed some support to help with these problems. The terms of Section 17 of the 1989 Children’s Act mean that families in crisis should be offered some service provision in order to ease problematic situations. The idea being that such support will result in better prospects for their children’s emotional, physical and social development. Gardner (2002) in a study undertaken for the NSPCC found that support services could be of significant help under these circumstances and that 58% of children who were considered to be at risk, and who had access to support services, showed significant improvement in their  development after these measures were put in place. In 2001 the Government commissioned the Children in Need Census[3] which attempted to establish why children accessed children in need services, what type of provision they accessed and the costs associated with that provision. Moore (2002) maintains that guidelines, policies and procedures relating to child safety issues are constantly under review. Since the 1990 NHS Care and Community Act there has been an increasing stress on inter-agency co-operation and working together in all areas, not just child protection issues. However there is an increasing need for greater co-operation between agencies when it comes to suspicions that a child may be at risk. With regard to cases of outright physical or sexual abuse health workers and social workers are not always clear on who has the responsibility in this area. While the 1970 Act placed that responsibility solely in the hands of social services departments, the stress on inter-agency working has muddied the waters somewhat in this area . Under the terms of the 1990 Act there is a stipulation that health and social workers should work and plan together to assess and meet service users needs. However, past history tends to reveal clear lines of professional delineation and a failure to agree on what is best and who should be responsible such an arrangement means that working together can often result in conflict. This makes agencies wary of taking a decision with regard to the responsibility of care (Parrott, 2002). Clearly, where the NHS and social services fail to co-operate in assessing need and delivering care then service users suffer and are failed by the system. The more recent Health and Social Care Bill of 2001 gives Government powers to ensure that health agencies and local authorities, whose services are failing to pool their resources comply with this legislation. However, there is nothing in place to delineate how this might be done and without a clear working agreement on who is responsible for what services will continue to fail. This means that those members of society who are least able to help themselves will lose out, and will not have their needs met. Each area now has an Area Child Protection Committee which is comprised of health representatives, social workers, teachers, probation services and the police. Each of these committees is required to produce a set of guidelines for all of those people who work with children, either in schools, in hospitals or in residential acco mmodation. The guidelines do make suggestions as to courses of action when any kind of child abuse is suspected, but there is still no clear cut ruling as to how this might be carried out. Yet another of the Committee’s duties is to oversee the child protection register. This is a list of children whose circumstances may have raised concern among professionals and it is held by every social services department in the country. To protect their welfare such children have specific inter-agency plans set up for their protection. One aspect of this is that every child on the register must have a key worker and a child protection care plan. These are generally social workers who will work with the family and help to draw up and monitor the care plan. These child protection systems are continually monitored and reviewed (Moore, 2002). One problem with the child protection register is that once a child is on it they may remain on it for a very long time, long after the problems may h ave abated. It is also the case that in many departments children who come to the notice of social services for any reason may have their names put on the register – even if it is simply that the family have asked for help during a time of crisis, such as when the mother has to go into hospital. These children are not assigned a worker but there names are on a register that has negative associations for both the wider community and those working in social services departments. Conclusion This assignment has looked at the question of whether social workers should take a lighter approach when dealing with child protection issues. It has done this within the wider context of Government policy making and has found that successive Governments have taken an increasingly interventionist approach when dealing with child protection issues since the beginnings of the Welfare State. While it has to be said that there did need to be some guidelines and provisions in place for children in need or who were deemed to be at risk, it would also seem that policy making has made it almost impossible for social workers to apply a lighter touch in these matters. Social workers are there to help assess and satisfy needs that may arise in families and in the wider community, yet increasingly there has been a shift in emphasis from need to risk. It is arguably the case that this shift is due in part to the marketisation of social care because meeting needs implies a cost to local authoritie s and the whole idea is to shift that cost from off the shoulders of the government and onto the community. Child protection is a sensitive area and children have a right to be protected. However, interventionist policy making blur the lines for social workers so that it is almost impossible to decide when a light and non-invasive approach should be used, and when other measures are called for. Bibliography Aries, P. 1962 Centuries of Childhood London, Cape. Corby, B. 1993. Child Abuse: Towards a Knowledge Base. Buckingham, Open University Press Department of Health (1999) Working Together to Safeguard Children: A guide to inter-agency working to safeguard and promote the welfare of children HMSO. Department of Health (2000) Assessing Children in Need and their Families The Stationary Office Department of Health (2000)Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families The Stationary office. Gardner, R. 2002 Supporting Families:L Child Protection in the Community Chichester Valley Giddens, A. 1998. â€Å" Risk society, the context of British politics, in Franklin, J ed. The Politics of Risk Society Oxford, Polity Press. Griffiths Report (1988) Community Care; An Agenda for Action, London: HMSO Harwin J. and Forester, D. 2002 Parental Substance Misuse and Child Welfare: A study of social work with families in which parents misuse drugs or alcohol Department of Health Hendrick, 1997. â€Å"Constructions and reconstructions of British childhood: an interpretative survey, 1800 to the present† in James, A. and Proat, A. (eds) Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood. Oxford, Clarendon Kemshall, H. 2002. Risk, Social Policy and Welfare Buckingham, Open University Press Lord Lamley â€Å"The Victoria Climbie Enquiry† http://www.victoria-climbie-inquiry.org.uk/finreport/finreport.htm Moore, S. Scourfield, P. Sinclair, S. Burch, S. and Wendon, B. 3rd ed. 2002 Social Welfare Alive Cheltenham, Nelson Thornes. Parrott, L 2002 Social Work and Social Care London, Routledge. Postle, F. (2000) The social work side is disappearing. I guess it started with us being called care managers, Practice, 13(2), pp. 13-27. Sidebotham, P. et al â€Å"Children at Risk of maltreatment in Children of the Nineties: deprivation, class and social networks in a UK sample† Child Abuse 26 (12) pp 1243-1259 1 Footnotes [1] Cited in Hemshall 2002 [2] Quoted in Hemshall, 2002::9 [3] http://www.dfes.gov.uk/publications/childrenactreport/docs/DfES-Childrens Act.pdf