Friday, October 18, 2019
No topic Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words
No topic - Essay Example I also believe in the importance of family life. One needs a family to survive the daily contradictions that life throws at you. I keep on living this kind of life because I have a supportive, understanding and caring family. I am able to pursue my dreams by studying. I have a reliable set of friends. I have professors who are serious about my welfare. I have a whole new world which awaits my talent and serious work. It matters a lot if the world does not exist and everything becomes an illusion. It will be a very difficult place to live in a zone which has no reality to speak of. Living things and non-living things both constitute reality. The individual lives of man take on a reality in itself. Even self-doubt is a reality for most people. The movie "The Game" (1997) is related to Descartes problem in the sense that it tackled Von Horton's self-knowledge and self-realization. The movie is a claustrophobic thriller which features the addiction of Von Horton to the Consumer Recreation Services (CRS), a form of entertainment, given to him by his brother Conrad. Von Horton uses the CRS and it leads him to experience bad and weird things. Von Horton gained from his ignorance and confusion the insight that man can seek himself.
Thursday, October 17, 2019
Water Supply and Its Situation in Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Kansas, Ca Dissertation
Water Supply and Its Situation in Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Kansas, California, Nevada andMexico - Dissertation Example First, in the case of Texas that is experiencing about 40% of drought conditions as Hess & Frohlich write, the state needs to reverse the heavy use of water in the processing of natural gases in the fracking process (1). This will help save water and even save the agricultural sector. Oklahomaââ¬â¢s water problem may be solved by making agreements with other states on how it can save water even if it has to dig underground reservoirs for the same. Hess & Frohlich says that the same case would apply for Arizona since the state enjoys seasonal rains throughout the year (1). Through saving this water in underground reservoirs, the state can help deal with the severe drought conditions. Kansas, Nevada, and Mexico would greatly benefit from an institution of a water management plan that would even include the help of engineers to even construct underground pipes that will help store and transport water in the required places. For the case of California, investing in desalination water plants would prove useful since these plants as Hess & Frohlich explain would help save a lot of water that would have otherwise gone into waste (1). This water would also help in agricultural practices among the many farm workers in the state. From an analysis of the water supply conditions in these states, it is evident that there requires having stringent and timely measures to solve the water problems existing today. As seen in the compilation of Hess & Frohlich, fracking is a major contributor to drought in Texas (1). According to BBC, fracking is the process that involves drilling into the earth in the quest to release the gas underground (1). In this process, water of high pressure is directed at that underground rock so as to release the gas underneath. In the course of the fracking process, BBC writes that gas flares up from the ground either after the horizontal or a vertical process of hitting the rock layers.
International Political Economy of Oil and Gas Essay
International Political Economy of Oil and Gas - Essay Example The degree of dependence of the users on the oil and gas and their flexibility to adopt alternative sources of energy under the circumstances of rising oil prices determine the competitive advantage of the major oil exporting nation over the others and the degree of aggression of these economies over other countries due to the competitive advantage in the international economy (Bentley, 2002, p.199). The movement of gas prices in relation to the oil prices, the volume of used of gas and other forms of energy like electricity, solar energy, hydro-electricity used in the economies determine the impact of oil prices on the economies all over the world. In general circumstances, the rise in the oil prices leads to higher amount of national income for the oil exporting countries of the world. According to the recent report of OECD, the prices of oil are expected to soar up to 190 dollars till 2020 in terms of real value of money in todayââ¬â¢s economy. Due to the rise in the prices of oil, the net oil importing countries face situations of economic slowdown due to the rigidity in the structure of their economies (Sengupta, 2011, p.35). The minimum wages to be paid to the labours, the cost for importing the oil from the major oil exporters, the degree of economic investments are all affected by the rise of oil prices. The oil importing economies have to transfer more national income to the international oil exporters for importing the same volume of oil. Thus the volume of oil imports tends to decrease in a situation of rising international oil prices (Mankiw, 2011, p.82). This leads to slowdown of investments in the economy of the importing countries. The subsequent implications for the net oil importing countries are inflation in the economy as the supply of goods an d services are not able to meet the demand of the markets. Due to circular flow of money, the
Wednesday, October 16, 2019
Water Supply and Its Situation in Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Kansas, Ca Dissertation
Water Supply and Its Situation in Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Kansas, California, Nevada andMexico - Dissertation Example First, in the case of Texas that is experiencing about 40% of drought conditions as Hess & Frohlich write, the state needs to reverse the heavy use of water in the processing of natural gases in the fracking process (1). This will help save water and even save the agricultural sector. Oklahomaââ¬â¢s water problem may be solved by making agreements with other states on how it can save water even if it has to dig underground reservoirs for the same. Hess & Frohlich says that the same case would apply for Arizona since the state enjoys seasonal rains throughout the year (1). Through saving this water in underground reservoirs, the state can help deal with the severe drought conditions. Kansas, Nevada, and Mexico would greatly benefit from an institution of a water management plan that would even include the help of engineers to even construct underground pipes that will help store and transport water in the required places. For the case of California, investing in desalination water plants would prove useful since these plants as Hess & Frohlich explain would help save a lot of water that would have otherwise gone into waste (1). This water would also help in agricultural practices among the many farm workers in the state. From an analysis of the water supply conditions in these states, it is evident that there requires having stringent and timely measures to solve the water problems existing today. As seen in the compilation of Hess & Frohlich, fracking is a major contributor to drought in Texas (1). According to BBC, fracking is the process that involves drilling into the earth in the quest to release the gas underground (1). In this process, water of high pressure is directed at that underground rock so as to release the gas underneath. In the course of the fracking process, BBC writes that gas flares up from the ground either after the horizontal or a vertical process of hitting the rock layers.
Tuesday, October 15, 2019
Personality Theory Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words
Personality Theory - Essay Example Nevertheless, as adults, the parents were responsible for their sonââ¬â¢s death. Parental Abuse Resulting in Child Suicide: The Personality of Both the Parents and Child which Results in Suicide The case of the child being abused by violent parents is not uncommon. It can happen anytime as long as there are children with suicidal tendencies and parents who are predisposed to behave in a way that they would hurt their children. Based on the details of the case, the child committed suicide because he must have been a typical case of Borderline Personality Disorder and his parents as well, and this must have unconsciously made them cause their own childââ¬â¢s death. Definition of the Case and Important Things to Consider The case study involving the child who killed himself and the parents who abused him must be investigated in such a way that the roles of the child and the parents in bringing about the act of suicide are defined. Moreover, one needs to consider the reasons why th e child could have decided to kill himself and why the parents themselves were abusive. Understanding the underlying cause of their actions and decisions would shed more light into why the suicide took place. The Possibility of Borderline Personality Disorder The child who killed himself may have been suffering from Borderline Personality Disorder, or BPD, because he displayed a similar set of symptoms as a typical case, and it was the parentsââ¬â¢ fault that the degree of their abuse towards him made him decide to kill himself. BPD is a psychological problem which is most commonly associated with ââ¬Å"self destructiveâ⬠behavior, which in turn is the most likely cause of the suicide (Paris, 2011). Moreover, someone with BPD is also most likely to be ââ¬Å"highly unstable emotionallyâ⬠and thus develops several mood swings especially as a rather automatic response to highly stressful events (Paris, 2011). These highly unstable emotions and unpredictable mood swings m ay have reached their peak at the time of suicide and thus may have triggered the act itself. Coupled with a preexisting self destructive behavior, the sudden surge of depressive or angry emotions in the child may have been directed towards himself. Parental abuse may have triggered the depression and anger in the child, but since the child may have felt powerless, he did not choose to retaliate and instead decided to kill himself in order to end the extremely uncomfortable feeling of abuse, loss of personal value and loss of self-esteem. Moreover, since BPD is characterized by ââ¬Å"repetitive suicide attempts,â⬠then it is obvious that the child was suffering from this or a similar disorder at the moment of suicide (Paris, 2011). The child may have therefore attempted suicide a number of times but perhaps during that time that he killed himself, there must have been too much anger in him that could not be contained anymore. There could also have been a lot of anger that had piled up and perhaps the last cruel thing his parents did to him somehow served as the last straw that eventually made him decide to end his life. Furthermore, there might not have been anyone else in the house who could have at least stopped the child from committing suicide, or perhaps there was but this person might have also been powerless and helpless against the childââ¬â¢
Monday, October 14, 2019
An Illustration of how Multinationals can fail Essay Example for Free
An Illustration of how Multinationals can fail Essay In an ever-globalizing world, which is turning the world into a global village, businesses have found tremendous opportunities to expand their operations, markets and resources worldwide. Globalization has led to opening of national borders, allowing freer trade and increased exploitation of the resources located in foreign countries giving rise to the phenomena of multinational corporations. These business enterprises own and control resources located in countries other than the country where these originate from or have their head-quarters based in. After the disintegration of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) and creation of an sovereign Russia in 1991, thus ending the Cold War, Russians and other former USSR republics began to consider opening their borders to freer trade, and also introduce some free-market economy initiatives. It was and is still perceived that the failure of state-run economy itself was the reason. During the early 80ââ¬â¢s the economy of Russia ceased to grow, making the government gradually deviate from communist ways of governing the economy. However this caused the USSR to break away. The reason why Russia had encouraged foreign investment on its soil is the potential for growth. Russia wishes to extract its natural resources for domestic use and export, which can help it sustain growth. Just upon creating, a number of free market reforms were introduced to improve the economy. Among those reforms, especially those that encourage foreign investment, Production Sharing Agreement was introduced in 1994 which was signed with the Sakhalin II project consortium. Sakhalin Sakhalin is an island located in the far east of Russia, close to Japan. It is now known for its oil and gas reserves. There have been two projects that include Sakhalin I and Sakhalin II. The area has grown in importance to Russia because it is has one of the unexploited oil reserves in the world. Sakhalin remained unexploited because USSR has other oil reserves in their central republics. It is estimated that the island and its surrounding have oil reserves amounting to 1. 8 billion tons of oil and gas reserves of about 2 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Such large amount of untapped resources have make Sakhalin an attraction for foreign oil companies. Sakhalin inhabitants have seen a general improvement is their life styles since the oil generation brought economic boom to their island. The inhabitants, who are traditional in outlook are becoming more modern, and now prefer to move to the central Russia, which is more developed. The Consortium The consortium consisted of Shell, Mitsui and Mitsubishi, which are multinational corporations, of which Shell had 55% of the shares. Royal Dutch Shell is a company which is jointly owned by the Dutch and Britain. Its core business is in oil and gas. It have make diversifications into many other areas of non-renewable and renewable energy generations. So it can be more appropriately defined to be in the energy sector. It was the majority shareholder of the project, which reflects the project core product. The remaining two minority shareholder, the Mitsui (25%) and Mitsubishi (20%) are corporations based in Japan and are conglomerates. Energy is not their core business. They have created small companies for some market share in the energy sector. Thus they exist in the Sakhalin II, sharing the revenues and reducing investment risk for Shell. Their exclusion from the project may not be of much concern to them because they have businesses in other products. However, for Shell, the exclusion will be a severe blow for Shell. This is because the Sakhalin II project is considered by investors and media alike as an ââ¬Ëimage buildingââ¬â¢ project. The Shell was planning to make further investments in the energy sector in the phase II of the project, which could have broken several records which are the largest investment of Shell itself, the largest foreign investment in Russian history and also creation of worldââ¬â¢s largest integrated oil and gas project. Such strides would have provided great potential for Shellââ¬â¢s growth. Exclusion means that Shell will lose their reputation by having to leave a project. The fourth partner emerged in the Sakhalin II project consortium is Gazprom which is Russia state owned energy corporation. It entered the consortium when it bought shares from all the three companies reducing them to exactly half of what it had been. Thus Gazprom became the majority share holder with 50% and one more share, giving it a majority position in the share. Gazpromââ¬â¢s entry into the consortium is rather controversial. It is known that the Russian government forced Shell to sell their shares. This caused a blow to the image of Shell. The circumstances under which Gazpromââ¬â¢s takeover took place also controversial. The Sakhalin Energy Investment Company is the operating company of which the shares are owned by the consortium. The creation of such a company is a legal requirement that is usually done two or more company want to do a joint venture. This arrangement helps the companies to organize their resources under a common company. For the Russian government, it helped ensure liquidity of the shareholdings, which means that any part of it can be traded with any company, and it is this feature that helped the Russian government make Gazprom a major shareholder. Production Sharing Agreement The consortium made explorations in the Sakhalin Island, and also succeeded in making export revenues. Soon, the Sakhalin II wan being considered as a most important project for Shell. The only challenge that Shell or the Russians faced for in bringing Shell was the Production Sharing Agreement. This agreement is a commercial contract which allows the member of the consortium to share the profits from the project. This agreement had many legal problems because it has many clauses which are not supported by other Russian Laws such as that of taxation. This has created a controversy which had been an obstacle to Shellââ¬â¢s presence right from the beginning. Production Sharing Agreement is supported by Russian Law but for non- Multinational corporations, which are state run companies in Russiaââ¬â¢s case, there is a different law. This create another issue of multi-nationals presence throughout the world; circumvention of local law. To encourage multinationals to remain in the country, new laws are created which are often are not available to local companies. (Abdelal, 2006) Production Sharing Agreement is designed to over-ride any local law. For example, in the energy sector of Russia the petroleum taxation for foreign oil companies is lesser than a local company. So, for example, they may stipulate a certain taxation rates on the profits of the foreign oil company that is party to the agreement, which is different from that of the general fiscal regime in the country as a whole. Production Sharing Agreement gives too much powers to the multinational corporations. First these contract cannot be changed without any mutual agreement. If the government want to change any clause, for example, place limits on productions or increase tax rate, it is not possible unless the multinational corporation agrees. If it implements any change without the multinational accepting, then the multinational has the right to bring international arbitrators to resolve the issue. Production Sharing Agreements remain in force for the full duration of the contract. The duration is usually a long period of time. This is favorable for the multinational because it gets the security for making any large capital investment. If would be quite risky for any foreign corporation to make a large investment without assurances. These assurances are not new to any country attracting foreign investment. However it also benefits the country because there is a limited time given to the multinationals to make explorations. If the explorations does not yield any reserves, then the multinational company cannot reclaim more than their original investment. Once the exploration succeeds, the company first covers it costs until what is left is the ââ¬Ëprofit oilââ¬â¢. As stated by the name of the agreement, the productionââ¬â¢s profit is shared between the state oil company and the foreign oil company according to an agreed ratio which is usually 40 percent allocated to the foreign oil company. In any case, the investment made by the multinational is usually a risked investment. Recently there has been an issue with such agreement as being ineffective. The Russian Natural Resources Ministry believes that the projects should be reviewed. The ministry reported that the production-sharing agreements are ineffective and are damaging Russiaââ¬â¢s national interests. If the agreements are taken for review and revision, this can potentially discourage the foreign investment in the future. (Buckley, 2006) Perhaps acting on national interests, the Russian government felt compelled to take over the Sakhalin II project. The project has a good estimate of ââ¬Ëprofit oilââ¬â¢ which have been realized to be of a strategic importance to the Russia. There were other issues which may have compelled the Russian government to take such a step which can potentially discourage foreign investment. Environmental Issues One issue that may have compelled the government to change the clauses of the agreement are environmental issues. The construction process has caused harm to the environment. The environmental issues is an important issue that weakened Shellââ¬â¢s position in Russian energy sector because it lost the financial support of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, a major financer of the project. There are numerous environmental violation that took place. The construction of oil tankers bay needed extraction of undersea mud and disposal on a site farther away in the sea. This had a damaging impact on marine life and ecosystem, which produces fish for local populationââ¬â¢s consumption. The island is seismic in nature, however there are no safeguard against any major earthquake. The pipelines are not made up of an appropriate material and are vulnerable to breakdown in case of any such natural calamity. This can cause oil spill and thus are a risk to the environment. Also during the construction of some pipelines, it was found that large amount of earth was left in the open alongside the pipelines which caused the temporary revocation of the construction licenses and the contruction process had to be stopped. Such hindrances in the construction process increases the overall cost of construction and also endangers the environment. The consortium had to pay US $ 110,000 in advance to the Russian Federation for all the potential damage that can be caused to fish off-shore in the Sea of Japan, although there has not been any oil spill till date. There have been reconstruction of some pipelines and also the re-routing of pipelines to prevent any potential damage in the future. Lessons from Shell in Sakhalin It has been found that since the publication of the case, Shell came under pressure from the environmental issues as well as the economic opportunities for Russia that compelled Gazprom to take over half of the Sakhalin II. With Shell under pressure, it became increasingly possible for Russia to come under a ââ¬Ëmutualââ¬â¢ agreement with Shell to change some clauses of the Production Sharing Agreement. Thus the intent of Russia was not to deal with the environmental issue but rather to gain control of the world gas industry as the project produces over 8 % of worldââ¬â¢s gas and that too in the most transportable form, LPG. The goal might be to create a cartel in the future that can control the gas prices in the future. (Miriam, 2008) One lesson learnt is that in today globalizing world, multinational corporations face challenging situations where they have to know the interests of the country they are operating in. No matter what assurances have been made, it is important to consider the changing underlying economic interests behind such assurances. As we see in the case, the apparent reason for assurances made by Russia was to exploit its resources, however as it realized the economic potential of such vast reserves, they looked for an appropriate time to start the takeover program. The other lessons learnt is the multinationals should look at the social interests of the country where they have their operations. Environmental issues as we have seen in the Shellââ¬â¢s case were alarming social issues that went unheeded in the beginning. It is a habit of multinationals not to look after the social issues. Their motive is to exploit the market and maximize their profits in the process. In the type of industry which Shell belongs to is rather short term. After exploiting non-renewable resource until these have been exhausted, there will be no reason to stay in the country. Thus is this industry where short term interests exist, multinationals do not wish to make social investments. Another lesson that has been learnt is the approach to issues. As we have seen, Shell did not have a proactive approach let alone an interactive approach. We have seen that Shell took corrective steps towards environment only if it was prompted by the Russian government and international environmental activists. Moreover, such steps seemed to be taken in haste, without much thought to the fact that such steps are also causing pollution. Such an approach is a reactive approach and it is now being discouraged in business circles. If an interactive approach had been taken, the conditions would have been much better, showing the world that the corporation is socially responsible and knows the interests of the countries where they operate. Russian Conditions for Foreign Direct Investment If we are to rely on the case study, we can infer that Russia has been making attempts to place itself as a destination for Foreign Direct Investment in the early 90ââ¬â¢s. That time was much different from what it is today. That time, Russians believed that free market economies can produce better results. For that reason they introduced new regulations that encourage investment by multinational corporations. However today, the government is once again centralizing its control of economy. This can change the way the Russian economy is managed. Such a step, which is unexpected and has not been favored by the multinationals, has stemmed from the local pressures. The public opposition of programs that favor the multinationals has increased. However, this has come at a time, when several opportunities are being realized. By coincidence or by intention, as we see in the case, the step was taken when the economic opportunities were on the maximum. It has been found that although Russia has become a favoured destination for FDI, other large developing countries are becoming more popular in the recent years. WTO and multinationals are urging the Russians to right against corruption, red-tapes and bureaucracy, which are known causes why foreign investment does not enter Russia. Thus it has been realized that most investors enter Russia because of its largely untapped resources and markets. This has meant that investors still give low mark on Russiaââ¬â¢s promotional efforts. (The School of Russian and Asian Studies, 2006) Due to the reluctance of Russia to open up as investors expect it to, has caused China and India become more favored destinations for FDI, although their growth in FDI is not as high. This is because these countries have already been allowing FDI much more openly even before Russia did. China opened up in1979 while India did in 1991. However in the current global financial crisis, it has been found that FDI will fall in all these economies. So is difficult to predict which economy will get least affected by this crisis. It can be said that Russia may be least affected because its economy which is not as open as India or China, can prevent the shocks from reaching their economy. This goes with those who believe that there is a ââ¬Å"firewallâ⬠that protects some Asian economies. References Abdelal, Rawi (2006) Journey to Sakhalin: Royal Dutch/Shell in Russia, Harvard Business School Publishing Buckley, Neil, Thomas Catan, Carola Hoyos and Arkady Osrovsky, (2006) ââ¬Å"Russia Calls for Review of Two Foreign Oil Projects: Sakhalin Island,â⬠The Financial Times. 26 May 2006 p. 6. Miriam Elder (2008-12-2007). Russia look to control worlds gas prices, Telegraph. Retrieved on 27 December 2008 The School of Russian and Asian Studies (2006)RUSSIA: INVESTMENT DESTINATION II, Retrieved Decemer 28, 2008, from RUSSIA: INVESTMENT DESTINATION II, http://www. sras. org/news2. phtml? m=648
Sunday, October 13, 2019
Organization Structure Impact On Its Performance Commerce Essay
Organization Structure Impact On Its Performance Commerce Essay Different organization structures have different impact on organization performance. Organization structure or organization design is a mean to achieve the organizational objectives through coordination, supervision and allocation of tasks. Three main elements that are organization structure considers are decision making, selection of members and leadership. Companies have to make a tradeoff between different sets of benefits when selecting a particular organization structure. Moreover structure is also important to organization performance because firstly it describes daily routine and operating procedures and secondly it points out that who would be involved in decision making process. Organization structure assists the organization: in maintaining order, resolving issues between different departments and within each department and binds the organization members together. The advantages of strong organization structure include stable hierarchy, smooth flow of communication and a well defined cohesive company message. Organization structure might also entails problems like internal conflicts, high employee turnover, less productivity and delayed decision making. So, its important to identify organization structure issues and to resolve them as they occur to ensure effective and efficient organization performance. Background of Organization Structure For any growing organization its structure is important to guide human resource issues. The history of organization structure dates back to tribal organizations which involved clerical organizational structure and now it has evolved to post industrial structures. Previously organizations histories are ruled by centralization and control which was prevalent after industrial revolution in 19th and early 20th century. After World War II decentralized structures gain sway over organizations. So in post industrial economy smaller organization having decentralized structure more rapidly react to changes as compared to larger organization which have more centralized structures. Importance of the study with respect to the world: The major aim of this study is to find out that how the design of an organization affects its overall performance. This question has been clarified under the context of one company operating in Pakistan. By looking at the problems faced by the company that aroused because of hierarchical issues like communication gap, incentive system, attitude towards change, participation in decision making etc would help other organization identify similar problems and resolve them to improve their performance level. This study would help organizations to consider factors like: is clear channels of communication encourage whistle blowing internally; affect of training, information distortion, team structure and turnover on organization performance; centralized versus decentralized decision making and how employees react when new innovative ideas or strategies are being implemented by an organization. Importance of study with respect to Organization Research Question How organization design impacts the organization performance? Chapter 2 Literature Review DeCanio et al (2000) conducted research on Importance of Organizational Structure for the Adoption of Innovation. The objective of the paper is to study the relationship between organizational structure and its performance. The focus is on economic measures of performance mainly on measures of income inequalities which are result of alternative compensation rules. The model of the research is based on the example of how fitness of the firm gained by the interaction of structure and environmental factors. Now the fitness depends on members adopting the profitable innovation. While the adoption speed and cost depends on firm internal structure and parameters like fixed cost of internal communication, value of innovation and interest rate. The methodology includes representing structures as digraph G. agents representing organization are on vertices and channels of communication are represented of directed edges. The equation formed was à â⠬ = f(x, G) where à â⠬ is fitness and x is representing one of the parameters. Then it was assumed that because of changing environmental factors there is a change in x which in turn leads to changing organizational structure. The paper concluded that structure of organization is very important for adoption of innovation and if the impact of organization structure on its performance is not recognized than it would lead to biases in cost estimation and loss of benefits due to change in external circumstances. King (1999) conducted research on The Implications of an Organizations Structure on Whistle blowing. The core theme of this paper is that organizational structure is being affected by whistle blowing. The main objective is to examine that how structure of organization affects the decision of employees in reporting the wrong doings of other employees. Whistle blowing has been defined as the disclosure by organization members (former or current) of illegal, immoral or illegitimate practices under the control of their employers, to persons or organizations that may be able to effect action (Near and Miceli, 1985, p. 4).whistle blowing is also defined as when the illegal act of organization are leaked to third parties. So, whistle blowing can be internal or external. Paper discusses two propositions that are P1: Whistleblowers use of internal disclosure channels may be affected by the structure of an organization and P2: Attributes of various organizational structures may influence inter nal disclosure of perceived wrongdoings. It has been mentioned that design of organization that is span of control, number of managerial levels, number of subordinates etc affect the behavior of employees. First paper talks about centralized structure which is very close to bureaucratic structure. Information flows from CEO to the upper management and from the management to the subordinates. The prominent features of this system are high levels of control, standardized procedures, uniform policies, specific titles, ranked positions, a high level of bureaucracy, and highly structured communication. As a result the negative views are suppressed and whistle blowing is not reported internally. The second structure that has been discussed is matrix structure. This design has two divisions that are functional and project. Employees report to projects head and also to function department head. So in matrix structure whistle blowing externally would be unlikely if clear and proper structure s are available. Thirdly horizontal structure in which information flows between and among same organizational level is discussed. Wrongdoings would be reported externally only if communication channels are unclear and ambiguous. Fourthly divisional structure is discussed which is configured based on the product line. Managers are in control of their departments. So wrongdoings are reported internally because of decentralized decision making. Lastly hybrid structure has been discussed. Decision making is decentralized as operational units and as a result wrongdoings would be reported internally a because of open channel of communication between business unit and upper management. So the organizations with clear channels of communication encourages whistle blowing internally and organization with various levels would result in external whistle blowing. Harris and Raviv (2002) conducted research on Organization Design. Three organizational structure are discussed which are functional, divisional and matrix structure. The paper emphasized on the topics that have been ignored in economic literature that are which structure organization adopts and how many managerial levels are involved in it. The main purpose of study is to explore the issues that arise because of selecting a particular design. In order to reap the benefits from interaction of different activities an expert manager is required. Middle managers have the capability to coordinate a pair of interaction but companywide interaction can only be managed by CEO. Company would follow flat structure when cost of hiring middle manager is very high. When salaries of middle managers are low matrix structure would be followed. The methodology includes a hypothetical firm operating four projects named as A, B, C and D. interactions between the two projects have been denoted as AB, CD , AC and BD. Project manager, middle manager and CEO are involved while project manager refers interactions to CEO or middle manager. The paper concludes on the note that new firms have flatter structure with more involvement of CEO and with the passage of time organizational structure will evolve as: highly decentralized structure, matrix structure to decentralized structure or centralized structure followed by decentralized flat structure or matrix structure. Rivkin and Siggelkow (2003) conducted research to stumble on Interdependencies among Elements of Organizational Design. The focus of study was to identify major elements of organizational structure that leads firm to broad search and ultimately to stability. The interdependencies among vertical hierarchy, incentive system and decomposition were studied. The other two contextual factors considered were underlying pattern of interaction among firms decisions and limits imposed on ability of managers to process information. The method used to conduct the research is agent based simulation which involves defining pattern of interaction among decisions. The next step is generation of set of decision problems and lastly firms handle these computer based decision problem. Paper concluded that the reason for Interdependencies arise is because design elements influence how broadly a firm searches its environment to discover good sets of coordinated choices and whether the firm is able to stab ilize around those sets once they are discovered. The stage for organizational configurations is set by Interdependencies among design elements, which also results in the interplay among competing firms. Gehrig (2004) studied Organizational Form and Information Acquisition. The Sah and Stiglitz frame work is used to address issue of research incentive. This frame work states that in order to implement innovative projects bureaucratic systems needs consensus while liberal polyarchial systems implement too many projects. The paper discusses that individual incentives to invest in information generation is affected by organizational forms. The analysis concluded that private incentives of employees to produce information depend on organization form. External research monopolies dominate independent research in terms of incentives of information production, hierarchical or polyarchical research. Joint ventures may dominate research cartels under plausible economic conditions, especially when independent signals provide additional independent information. Dean et al (1992) conducted research on Advanced Manufacturing Technology and Organization Structure: Empowerment or Subordination? The paper talks about advance manufacturing technologies (AMT) which includes computer-aided design (CAD), engineering (CAE), process planning (CAPP), and manufacturing (CAM), manufacturing resource planning (MRP), and computer-integrated manufacturing (CIM) systems. The argument is that AMT is in association with organization structure. The research question is What is the nature of AMTs impact on structure? The methodology adopted is field survey. Factories of the metal-working industries in US were the target population. Upper management like vice presidents of manufacturing and plant managers were addressed by questionnaires and response rate was of 38.3%. Nine functional areas like accounting, purchasing, human resources etc were identified and respondents were requested to indicate extent of computer usage for these areas to measure computerized su pport functions. 11 manufacturing processes were identified to measure computerization of technical core. Similarly integration of support functions and integration between support functions and core functions were studied using 4 point scale. Integration sophistication was also measured. Control variable includes size and environmental factors. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed to check validity and reliability if variables. LISREL analysis was used to test the dependence between organization design and ATM constructs. Technology Marxist view is subject to subordination and it predicts centralization. Idealistic view is linked to empowerment of employees and it predicts decentralization. The research concluded on the note that AMTs integration capacity allows information to be gathered at lower levels and ATMs flexibility allows departments to adapt to decisions of other departments easily that results in lower centralize organization decisions. Formalization is adopted fo r efficient use of technology. So, formalization is described as a mechanism for decentralization. Keck (1997) conducted research on Top Management Team Structure: Differential Effects by Environmental Context. The core argument of paper is that under different environmental factors team structure affects organization performance differently. Organizational performance is financial performance in this study. The sample for this research includes top management teams from 56 cement and 18 minicomputer firms. The firms with four years of financial data were selected in order to analyze the two year ROA growth and lags. The independent variable was the number of team structure. In service offerings innovativeness is increased as a result of functional heterogeneity. More fluctuation in team tenure results in lower level of communication and commitment. So in heterogeneous measures functional heterogeneity and variation in team tenures are used. Fluctuations were measured by number of executives coming in and existing each year. The stratification includes chairman, corporate presiden t, cement or minicomputer president, executive vice presidents and executive committee members, senior vice presidents, and vice presidents. Dependent Variable was the financial performance. The controls included were firm age, firm size and industry performance. For analysis autoregressive-heteroscedastic model was used. The results of analysis indicated that good financial performance under turbulent contexts includes more heterogeneity in tenure, more fluctuations, lower stratification and shorter team tenure. Better performance in stable context can be achieved by lower fluctuations and heterogeneity, higher stratifications and longer team tenure. Radner (1993) conducted research on The Organization of Decentralized Information Processing. The main theme of paper that in decentralizing the activities of information processing hierarchical structures is also remarkably effective. This paper considers decentralization of information-processing for decision-making, and considers three applications that are linear decision rules, project selection and pattern-matching. Model of parallel processing has been used to describe the decentralized computation of organizational decision. Paper concluded that Organizations make many different decisions. In principle, different trees might be used to compute different decisions, or different classes of decisions. Even if there is only one tree of authority, many-or most-of the information flows do not follow it. Podolny and Page (1998) conducted research on Network Forms of Organization. Paper discuses increase in sociological interest in network forms of organization. Sociologists argued that network forms of organization represent a unique alternative possessing its own logic and it could not be considered hybrids of markets or hierarchies. Second, they argued that the network form of organization have significant efficiency advantages that are not possessed by pure markets or pure hierarchies. Podolny and Page defines a network form of organization as any collection of actors (N> 2) that pursue repeated, enduring exchange relations with one another and, at the same time, lack a legitimate organizational authority to arbitrate and resolve disputes that may arise during the exchange. Paper emphasizes on the fact that the network form does not represents one of two forms rather it represent one of three alternative forms of governance. A pair wise comparison was made in past like between aut onomy of the network form and hierarchy. The system which presents the greater advantage can be assessed by considering strengths and weaknesses of three forms simultaneously. Hsu and Hannan (2005) conducted research work on Identities, Genres, and Organizational Forms. The paper discusses organizational ecology and argues that many new organizations have emerged and also many have undergone structural change recently. OEs strategy examines full histories and collects history data from population, examines type of entry and exists and it uses event history method to examine the impact of population, environment and characteristics of organization on hazards of entry and exist. Social rules that organization are expected to follow are called organizational identities. Specific kinds of collective identities represent organizational forms. Two basic issues are addressed when measuring the organizational identities: (1) whose point of view should be considered when measuring identity? (2) How can the social embodied in this point of view be measured? The study concluded that organizational forms are described in term of social identities. Forms or sociologica l real categories are defined as for which membership matters. To invite consideration of systematic ways in which in order to specify and differentiate forms in terms of identities properties such as simplicity, specificity, sharpness, resonance, and authenticity and their potential impact on key organizational dynamics have been considered. Mintzberg (1980) conducted research on Structure in 5s: A Synthesis of the Research on Organization Design. The main purpose of paper is that organizational structuring can better be understood through configurations. Organization consists of five parts that are operating core, strategic apex, middle line, techno structure and support staff. Coordination of organizational tasks is effected by direct supervision, standardization of work processes, standardization of work output, standardization of skills and mutual adjustment. Five different types of decentralization mentioned in paper are vertical and horizontal centralization, limited horizontal decentralization, limited vertical decentralization, horizontal and vertical decentralization and selective decentralization. In simple structure there is no techno structure, few support staffers, a loose division of labor, a small middle line hierarchy, communication flow and decision making is informal. The classic example of this structu re is entrepreneurial firm. Machine bureaucracy is highly specialized, routine operating tasks, much formalized procedures and large-sized units in the operating core, little use made of training and of the liaison devices, relatively centralized power for decision making with some use of action planning systems, and an elaborate administrative structure with a sharp distinction between line and staff. Professional Bureaucracy is found in school systems, social work agencies, accounting firms, and craft manufacturing firms. They hire highly trained specialists in its operating core, and then give them considerable autonomy in their work. The techno structure is minimal and support staff is highly elaborated. The divisionalized form is described as a market-based one having large number of divisions which reports to the one central headquarters. The fifth structure is Adhocracy. This configuration consists of organic structure with little formalization of behavior; extensive horizont al job specialization based on formal training; a tendency to group the professional specialists in functional units for housekeeping purposes but to deploy them in small market-based teams to do their project work. These five configurations represent typology that would help to determine how structures emerge, how and why they change over time, why certain pathologies plague organizational. Yoo et al (2006) conducted research on From Organization Design to Organization Designing. The paper is based on the argument that managers should move beyond selecting an organization and should create new organizational forms. Four projects of Gehrys Partners over the period of past 15 years have been selected. These projects were build with unique challenges and needs in different environment. 83 interviews were conducted with architects, designers, and engineers working at Gehry Partners, contractors and subcontractors, a surveyor, structural engineering consultants, owner representatives, a building fire inspector, a city building code inspector, lawyers involved in contract negotiations, and several construction crews who worked at the sites. Similarities and differences were identified to study Gehrys Project gestalt of organizational designing. The design embraces three inter dependent elements that are architectural vision, use of representational technologies, and a collabo rative network for design and construction. The paper concluded that building a successful project results in organization design. Designing products and designing organization should flow from the common set of capabilities called as design gestalt (virtual capability that combines ideas, values, resources, tools, and people into ensembles that can create and project remark able artifacts). Westerman et al (2006) conducted research on Organization Design and Effectiveness over the Innovation Life Cycle. The Paper examines that in different eras of the innovations life cycle, how firms adapt to differing strategic contingencies. The research questions are: How do firms organize to adopt innovations at different eras of the innovation life cycle? How can managers address conditions of misfit? How do organization designs change over time? The paired case study has been selected with theoretical sampling to choose pairs of industry leaders who use different designs and competed head to head. For example for retail pharmacy, we compared the number of unique visitors to the company websites each month. The paper concluded on the note that firms use one of three adaptation modes that are separated early, integrated early and wait then transform. None of these adaptation modes are fully autonomous nor fully integrated, and they change over time. Each mode optimizes for one cont ingency while sub optimally attempting to address the other. Ouchi (1997) conducted research on The Relationship between Organizational Structure and Organizational Control. The paper is based on the argument that organization control and structure are not clearly distinguished in organization literature. Control and structure are two different things where control means evaluation process based on monitoring of behavior or output. The research methodology includes the data collected from 78 full-line, non-discount, and retail department store companies located in the Northeastern one-fourth of the United States. The study concluded that structure is related to control. Large organizations have many managerial levels and departments and increased supervisory efficiency of managers. Size is related to danger of control loss which in turn brings measures which minimize the control loss. Carley and Lin (1997) conducted research on A Theoretical Study of Organizational Performance under Information Distortion. The addresses the question that how should organizations of intelligent agents be designed so that they exhibit high performance despite information distortion? For this purpose stylized radar detection task has been used. The interrelationship between information distortion, organizational design and task environment has been considered. The results of study showed that training improves performance, the greater the number of information distortions the lower the performance, turnover degrades performance, misinformation leads to lower performance than communication breakdowns, and teams outperform hierarchies. Teams outperform hierarchies when the task environment is unbiased decomposable. Before settling on a particular organizational design or expending effort to minimize information distortions organization should first consider what task environment it is likely to face. After doing the literature review, it is concluded that different organizational forms have significant impact on organization performance. Different methodologies have been used in research paper to prove the assumptions made. Organization design is strongly linked with information acquisition, innovation, whistle blowing, financial performance, information distortion, organization control and empowerment or subordination of employees. Chapter 3 Methodology Research Type Qualitative and quantitative both research tools would be used to conduct this research. Qualitative research would be used to explore the problem within the organization and to gather rich information on hierarchical issues being faced through in-depth interviews with upper management as well as with lower management. Quantitative research would be used to find out the relationship between the dependent variable and the independent variable. Data Type and Research Period The data for this study would be mostly primary in nature. It would be gathered through questionnaires and face to face interviews. In order to measure impact on performance secondary resources would be used like official documents and financial statements for last four years that is from 2009 to 2012. Time frame for the primary data is from November 2012 to April 2013. The sample size for collection data is 100 and questionnaires would be distributed to the employees of different branches of the same bank. Sources of Data In order to gather data internal sources within the organization would be used. These sources include accounting resources (financial statement), internals experts (head of departments), lower level employees and operational reports from HR department. Population, Working population and Planned sample The population is all organizations working in Pakistan. Working Population. Planned sample for the research is 100 employees from different branches of bank in Lahore. Research Hypothesis Techniques After gathering the data from primary and secondary resources the regression analysis would be conducted. Regression will be conducted to check the relationship between the variable over the years. Data analysis The SPSS software that stands for Statistical Product and Service Solutions would be used to analyze the data. This software is used for statistical analysis and includes programs like ANOVA, linear regression, t-test and correlation. Regression will be conducted to check the relationship between the variable over the years. Graphs and tables would be used to represent the results. Data interpretation The results generated from the statistical software would be compiled and graphs, tables and regression results would be used to interpret the results. Theoretical Framework
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