Strategy Implementation Barriers

Introduction Organisations identify their objectives and goals, which they seek to achieve through a course of action that they draft out. This course of action, the strategy, can only be achieved as intended if every participant acts as required in executing his or her roles (Clemens Bakstran, 2010, p. 393).Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Strategy Implementation Barriers specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More As Beer et al. (2005, p. 446) assert, organisations have to ‘fit’ themselves with the environment, including the strategies, leadership skills, as well as capabilities if they seek to achieve effective operations. This research carries out an extensive analysis of all possible barriers to strategy implementation and offers a remedy for each of the barriers. It borrows from theories and models suggested by scholars, including the silent killers of strategy implementation, organisational fitness, and critical questions that can help managers to address the barriers (Beer et al., 2005, p. 446). Literature Review Critical Questions to help in the Attainment of Objective Business Model Is the interaction within the organization effective? Within the organisation, the leadership plays a critical role in providing direction, offering protection, managing conflicts, as well as shaping norms and conducting orientation (Heifetz Laurie, 2001, p. 131). However, the most important role of leaders in an organisation should be to enhance adequate interaction through practicing strategic leadership to ensure that barriers to strategy implementation are overcome. As Beer et al. (2005, p. 450) point out, the organisational commitment, as well as purpose is lost when there is poor interaction within the organisation. Managers must promote dialogue with the rest of the organisation’s members to develop common purpose, which is needed for instilling the necessary commitment required to co nvert purpose into action. This should purposely be geared towards encouraging commitment from every participant in the organisation (Malewicki, 2005, p. 141).Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Effective strategic leadership that promotes interactivity should focus on five hierarchical levels. These levels include highly capable individuals who make their direct contributions through knowledge, talent, work habits, and high-level skills. The second level should comprise of contributing team members that target achieving the objectives of the group and working effectively within the group. The third level of the hierarchy should include competent managers (Kerr Werther, 2008, p. 112) whose main ability and contribution are in organising people and resources of the organisation, while the fourth level hierarchy should involve effective leadership. This mainly targets the adhere nce to the vision of the organisation, as well as the maintenance of the needed performance standards. The fifth and final strategy level involves the executive, with the specific quality being an endurance of greatness by way of professional will and personal humility (Watson Wooldridge, 2005, p. 147). The organisation’s leadership must have these characteristics as contained in the five hierarchies enumerated. Collectively, these qualities and values enable the management to develop a common purpose of communicating downwards to their subordinates, who are the actual executor of the strategic requirements (Allio, 2012, p. 24). The sufficient vertical communication provides the employees working in the department with the understanding about the actual organisational strategy and the directions that are needed concerning the daily decisions that are expected of them. It also enables them to understand about the exact priorities that will be needed by them as they collective ly work towards ensuring that the organisation achieves its objectives. Organisational Power Games and Politics: Are they Useful? All organisations have their unique internal politics and power games, which consequently affect the likelihood of the organisation to implementing its strategy as intended (Peng Litteljohn, 2001, p. 360). Managers are particularly responsible for this kind of barrier, mainly because their overriding personal interests and ineffective resource allocation on their part or respective departments. Adequate resource allocation is an important strategy implementation aspect because lack of resources eventually impedes successful strategy performance and activity (Brauer Schmidt, 2006, p. 205). Strategies are actually implemented by means of operational budgets and capital in general.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Strategy Implementation Barriers specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More However , internal politics threaten to derail this because it mainly involves a clash between the manager’s personal interest or that of his respective department, on the one hand and the interests of the organisation, on the other hand. The structural arrangement of the organisation plays a contributory role in fanning the internal organisational politics as departments or functions may begin to view themselves as exclusive entities that are in competition with the other departments or functions (Stuart, 1998, p. 469). It, thus, results in resistance, power struggles, and even a pursuance of non-fitting interests, which eventually affect the achievement of strategic objectives. The most critical question for managers in a bid to address the issue of politics and seeking to determine answers to the question is to establish whether there is a clear understanding when it comes to resource allocation. Apart from the allocation of monetary resources, managers must also be aware of the i mportant role of allocating physical resources, including equipment, plant, geographic location, as well as raw materials in general (‘Business Policy and Strategy Conference Paper Abstracts’, 2004, p. 1). Managers should constantly realise and appreciate the fact that the availability of resources is often scarce to effectively and fully cater for the entire needs of the organisation. Thus, self-interest should never contribute towards the allocation of resources. Managers must not commit themselves too quickly in allocating resources as they target projects and goals that deem to satisfy their own interests or personal performance (‘Business Policy and Strategy Conference Paper Abstracts’, 2004, p. 1). The decision-making role of managers concerning resource allocation must, therefore, be done in a way that purely seeks to front the organisation’s interest and agenda.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Leaving the decisions and behaviour of managers unchecked is detrimental to the organisation because while it may ensure that their personal objectives are met, the organisation may end up suffering in the process (‘Business Policy and Strategy Conference Paper Abstracts’, 2004, p. 11). Eliminating this barrier requires that the decision-making process be made a collective function such that managers from all the departments and functions of the organisation make their individual contributions. This way, the collective responsibility would put a check in their irregular decision-making even though individual managers may still have the urge to pursue their personal agenda (‘Business Policy and Strategy Conference Paper Abstracts’, 2004, p. 18). How important is Organisational Learning? Organisations must continually remain and promote learning as a way of sustaining new ideologies and methods. However, managers and employees might feel the urge to resist ch ange and new working procedures at some point. This often occurs as a result of the individuals feeling threatened. Employees, therefore, devise defensive mechanisms that they feel would comfortably protect their old practice of doing things. For organisational learning to occur, healthy communication in all directions must be encouraged and tolerated (Và ¤nttinen Pyhà ¤ltà ¶, 2009, p. 47). Managers must feel free to communicate among fellow managers and to the senior executive management concerning the overall running of the organisation. Downward and upward communication must also occur such that no one in the organisation feels left out in the strategy implementation plans (Và ¤nttinen Pyhà ¤ltà ¶, 2009, p. 47). Encouraged communication provides managers with the chance to notice challenges in strategy implementation and raise the matter early enough to help in finding solutions. Managers do not also feel threatened because they understand the fact that it is not their pe rsonal objective they are protecting, but that of the organisation (Forman Argenti, 2005, p. 245). Thus, they do not view their colleague managers as competitors, but as important partners whom they can learn from as they also are a valuable source of knowledge to their other colleagues. Employees, who are very important because of their role in implementing strategy, also participate actively in the organisational learning process if the organisation promotes and allows free communication (Olson, Slater, Hult, 2005, p. 47). They would be able to notice challenges within the system and quickly act by raising the issue with their immediate supervisors or managers, who would in turn act by providing a solution to the impediment or barrier. Where an organisation does not promote free and easy communication, the general learning process is also affected. People may not feel comfortable in pointing out at mistakes, especially where they believe or know that the mistake is contributed b y their superiors (Olson, Slater Hult, 2005, p. 47). For fear of being vilified, the employees would better maintain their silence and wish that their supervisor or manager discovers it on his or her own. Thus, an impediment to strategy implementation that would have otherwise been discovered and dealt with at an opportune time is allowed to continue wrecking damage to the entire organisation, thereby slowing its resolve to achieve its set objectives (Hendry, Huang Stevenson, 2013, p. 69). In addressing this aspect of organisational knowledge and learning, employees must be skilled and educated enough to enhance their ability of implementing strategy. It is not enough for information to be allowed to flow freely only, but that it should also flow freely to people who understand and realise how to put it into good use (Ramanigopal, 2012, p. 17). Without learning, it is not possible for change to be experienced or witnessed in the organisation. Increased knowledge through learning h elps the actors in their effort to engage successfully in the overall implementation process. Individual experience, though it is a critical aspect of goal achievement within the organisation, should not be confused with learning. Should Resistance to Change be encouraged? The external environment influences the way in which organisations operate in their quest to achieve their objectives. The environment acts as a barrier, particularly when the internal management of the organisation fails to realise some of the best strategies required to address the external environmental challenges. Decisions need to be made almost immediately to reflect on the changing external environment condition (Barton Ambrosini, 2013, p. 721). However, this is a challenging area because the changing environmental conditions can never be easily anticipated. Experienced management is required to determine the way forward on what steps the organisation should take. The major mistake that managers often comm it while facing external environmental challenges is making decisions that rely on an old mental form. This mainly occurs where the management is also ill experienced to tackle and address such challenges. This is further worsened by the inexistence of honest feedback as well as discussion. This is itself an impediment when it comes to learning about similar models. Resistance to change particularly occurs where managers feel threatened by a certain phenomena and focus their attention on fighting it, instead of seeking for solutions (Barton Ambrosini, 2013, p. 723). Although experience is important in addressing such challenges that arise from external business environment, organisations must also work towards making themselves as centres of knowledge. In other words, solutions to external business challenges must be formulated from within the organisation itself to give it adequate ability to respond (‘Organization Development Change Conference Paper Abstracts’, 2005 , p. 1). The organisation is directly affected by the changing circumstances and it understands uniquely how best to react. Internal understanding and knowledge is promoted and sustained by allowing all participants in the organisation, including employees, to contribute towards providing suggestions on the way forward. The collective contribution by participants offers a wide range of alternatives from which the management can pick the best. This gives continuity to the organisation, especially in the face of new challenges that cannot be compared to past challenges. Because managers have a large pool from where they can obtain fresh ideas and suggestions, their unique solutions to challenges ensures that barriers to strategy implementation are effectively addressed. The quality of the ideas and management plans is also effective as it is provided by the actual implementers of the strategy, who understand all the challenges that they face in the process (‘Organization Develop ment Change Conference Paper Abstracts’, 2005, p. 6). Organisational Fitness and Silent Killers Beer and Eisenstat (2000, p. 29) have introduced a new phenomenon that seeks to empower managers even more as they participate in ensuring that their organisation fits with the strategy. The Strategic Fitness Process (SFP) comprises of high-potential managers that sit in a task force aimed at enhancing value-addition in the running of the organisation. The task force operates in coordination with the management of the organisation through issuance of feedback messages. In general, the SFP reveals up to six common barriers that hinder organisations from attaining their objectives and goals (Beer Eisenstat, 2000, p. 9). The barriers include unclear strategy that comprises of conflicting priorities, a top management team that is ineffective, a style of leadership that is too rigid in its top-down framework or one that is too laissez-faire, and lack of coordination across functions, geographic regions or businesses. Other common barriers identified include poor vertical communication and an inadequate leadership skill that also affects the nurturing of down-the-line leaders (Eisenstat Dixon, 2000, p. 52). What are the causes of unclear strategy? An unclear strategy implies a course of action that does not clearly identify an objective or one that identifies an objective, but fails to enumerate clearly the needed set of actions by the workers and management. Lack of clarity of a strategy may result from various causes, including a senior management team that is ineffective in its operations and a too disengaged or too controlling leader. While it is possible that the strategy of the organisation will be well designed and targeted towards achieving specific objectives, the leadership may lack a common focus towards attaining (Ketzenberger, 1998, p. 84). Communication is also paramount in this regard as it determines the quality of information flow. If the strate gy intent is constantly communicated, all the participants will realise what their role is and will work towards making it actual. On the other hand, poor flow of information denies the workers the ability to determine what their actual role and contribution should be (Ketzenberger, 1998, p. 84). Remedy for unclear strategy Addressing unclear strategy, therefore, requires that information flow within the entire organisation is improved to a greater extent. The senior teams must be able to issue relevant instructions to the lower level managers and subsequently to the employees who engage directly in executing the strategy (Ketzenberger, 1998, p. 84). Consequently, feedback information must also flow freely from the employees through the lower-ranked managers all the way to the top management. This way, all the participants are constantly reminded of the actual strategy that they are pursuing. It also empowers everybody to notice early enough and signal the senior management of any u nderlying barriers that could be working against the organisation and its resolve (Ketzenberger, 1998, p. 84). What are the influences of Ineffective Management? The management of an organisation is considered ineffective, particularly where it is unable to make quick and accurate decisions concerning the organisation. Additionally, ineffective management arises as a result of functional or departmental managers operating as though they were competing against each other. This leads to lack of cooperation between the managers, with vital information that would have otherwise helped the entire organisation to speed up its performance being kept away from individual managers (Majer Bell, 2011, p. 62). The top management of an organisation must get involved in all the decision-making processes and steps in order to develop fully and test the whole processes sufficiently. Because of the top management’s usefulness in the entire process of making strategy, any ineffectiveness on t heir party is likely to result in unclear strategy, as well as priorities and affect the top-down relation or interaction within the organisation (McGuinness Morgan, 2005, p. 1306). This ends up curtailing the ability and possibility of the organisation to achieve its strategy effectively as desired. Quick and accurate decisions can only be achieved when a wider team or group of members within the organisation participates in providing solutions to challenges that affect the organisation (Majer Bell, 2011, p. 62). It improves the quality of decision making because all the areas in the organisation get equal representation in the decision-making process. Equally, all the managers feel as though they are a part of the organisation, especially when they witness their contributions being integrated by their employer. Remedy for ineffective management All the senior management team must get involved in the strategy process. They should participate in strategy development, perform organ isational diagnosis together, as well as conduct action planning and participate actively in communicating and monitoring the change. In other words, the top management team must combine efforts and work together as one in their quest to lead the organisation towards achieving objectives (Dervitsiotis, 2007 p. 21). There should be higher interactivity, close discussions among the managers, and high tolerance within the group. This kind of arrangement will help in speeding up the learning process in the organisation. Individual managers will get to understand how exactly they can stop from being an impediment to the rest of their organisation through the solitary decisions that they make (Dervitsiotis, 2007 p. 21). It will help in creating a good rapport among the managers, thus increasing the participation of each individual. Collective decision-making eliminates the need for rushed conclusions that individual leaders may fall prey to, particularly when their departments or function s fail short of performing as required and expected. Limited Top-Down/Laissez-Faire Style of Leadership: How does it affect strategy? Managers may have their own preferred management styles. The styles might be critical in impeding the organisation’s achievement of strategy and objectives. Limiting interaction to a top-down kind of flow only provides for managers to issue directions and instructions to the employees. It does not support a more interactive kind of interchange where the employees may also contribute towards strategy formulation and implementation (Skogstad et al. 2007, p. 80). In essence, a strict top-down interaction only emphasises the fact that employees are ignored by their managers and their contributions are not really considered as being worth. This affects the entire process because employees play a critical role in implementing strategy. Employees know the areas that are challenging to them when it comes to implementation and ignoring them means that t he manager may never get to realise what kind of remedy may be required. On the other hand, a laissez-faire style of management is not important in helping in the implementation of the strategy. Managers, while they should promote participative interaction with their employees, also need to be at the forefront leading. A lenient kind of leadership does not rein-in the followers or employees. Instead, the employees may feel as though they have a lot of freedom and get the temptation to indulge in other activities (Skogstad et al. 2007, p. 83). This is in, itself, a barrier to strategy because the organisation needs to have a common purpose in its focus on achieving strategy objectives. A limited top-down or laissez-faire leadership style creates an environment where conflict thrives between the departments or functions. The top divisional heads only concentrate on issuing orders and instructions that affect their areas of jurisdiction, but they fail to recognise the importance of ope rating as a unit with the rest of the functional heads. Managers must work towards forming partnership with their employees in order to address this impediment effectively. Managers must realise and appreciate the fact that employees are important players in the entire process, instead of considering the employees as being an impediment or barrier to strategy. Their contributions are important and should help the management in the decision-making process (Fredberg Norrgren, 2012, p. 34). Poor Functional Coordination: How is it a barrier? Organisations ought to integrate their activities effectively around the consumers, markets, and even products across the diverse functions of the organisation. However, lack of functional coordination is a recipe for competition within the organisation, where functions consider each other as competitors and not as contributors of the same cause. It is difficult for proper coordination across the functions to be realised unless the organisation set s up initiatives that cover the entire organisation and require the collective responsibility of all the managers. Responsibilities for the managers must also be defined properly and in clear terms to avoid clashes between the managers. Each manager must understand the contributory role that he or she must play in the organisation to create the much needed functional coordination. Another important aspect that must be taken into account when seeking to address the challenge of poor cross-functional coordination should be the question of hiring the right people. Managers with the right skills will find it easier and possible to work with each other, irrespective of their varying functions, and help in implementing the strategy. The organisation’s traditional structure and approach to management could be the main reason hindering the cross-functional coordination within the organisation. In such an instance, the best remedy for the challenge should involve restructuring the org anisation to promote coordination. It is important that the management should transform its existing internal structures and model because the external business environment keeps changing, thus continually offering new challenges to the organisation. This transformation is necessary in order to fit properly with the existing environmental challenges. This would, in turn, result in the alignment of different organisational parts, thus providing an accurate mechanism for promoting effectiveness in the running of the organisation. What is the role of leadership skills? Organisations have varying management levels that are expected to work together towards making objective achievement easier and less demanding. While the top leadership of the organisation is directly responsible for formulating and determining strategy, the subsequent management levels play a critical role in enforcing and ensuring that the strategy is achieved as intended. However, organisations must have adequate lead ership skills to ensure that this objective is attained. New opportunities need to be continually created, especially by the top-level management, to offer a learning opportunity for the low-level managers. This will provide a practical experience from where the lower-level managers can build upon their skills. Apart from availing practical experiences, the organisation should arrange for just-in-time coaching, training sessions, as well as targeted recruitment. The idea is to continually help the managers to attain the appropriate knowledge and skills to enhance their contribution in strategy formulation and implementation. Although the top-level managers may formulate the best fitting strategy for the organisation, the lower level managers who participate in the direct implementation may turn out to be the actual strategy barrier. Their lack of knowledge and skills may end up hindering the organisation from attaining its goals and objectives. Having determined how important the co ntribution of the lower-level managers is, it is important that the organisation only acquires individuals who are capable of performing the role. Where a middle-level manager is not able to measure to the challenge, the organisation should move with speed and replace them with other qualified and able candidates. Appraisals can be conducted on a more regular basis to measure and ascertain how effective each of the middle-level managers are in performing their roles. Relevant Theories and Models Organisational Fit and Fitness: Integrated Analytical Framework The SFP identifies an effective diagnostic framework that allows managers to link their respective organisational business strategy together with the competitive environment with the capabilities of the organisation. As Beer (2002) notes, organisations must ensure that their strategies fit within the competitive environment in which they exist. Three basic areas define the organisational fitness model, which include the organisa tional levers, organisational capabilities, and the goals. An organisation must carefully align the three important aspects with specific consideration to the external competitive environment before seeking to implement it. Organisational levers The organisational levers mainly involve the internal systems that the organisation adopts in its effort to ensure that it functions effectively. They include the leadership team, which comprises of the senior executive management, and other managers within the organisation, including functional and departmental heads, as well as line managers (Dervitsiotis, 2008, p. 709). Leadership is a critical aspect because it determines, through the shaping of policies and opinions, the actual decision that the organisation will follow. Work systems consist of the actual methodologies that the organisation applies as it executes its roles and functions. Management processes, on the other hand, have a direct influence on the performance of the organisat ion because they determine the decisions and the course of action to be applied by the organisation. The quality of an organisation’s overall leadership and management depends on its management processes because it identifies the roles and participation of individual managers in making decisions (Kostopoulos, Spanos Prastacos, 2013, p. 1430). The human resource system identifies the quality of employees that the organisation acquires in terms of their skills, experience, and knowledge. It also determines the skill development path for the workers by integrating external business environment components within the training framework. The organisational principles and culture affect the entire operations of the organisation. It affects the way interactions within and outside the organisation take place. These organisational levers must be aligned such that they result in organisational capabilities that would enhance goal achievement. Capabilities Organisational capabilities co mprise of the ‘7Cs’, which include coordination, competence, commitment, and communication. Others include conflict management capabilities, creativity, as well as capacity management. Coordination results in effective cooperation between different individuals and functions or departments of the organisation, which need to combine efforts towards implementing goal realisation (Hanna, Crittenden Crittenden, 2013, p. 18). Competence focuses on developing and utilising the appropriate skills. This leads to the achievement of desired objectives and goals. Quality leadership entails competence as it requires individuals to understand how to relate and integrate with colleagues (Heide, Grà ¸nhaug, Johannessen, 2002, p. 217). As the organisation targets to achieve its set out objective using the available resources and within the stipulated period, it has to ensure that both the management and the employees are committed fully to realise the objective. The individual contri bution of each employee is critical in building and enhancing the commitment. Failure or lack of commitment, on the other hand, results in employees directing their efforts toward different directions. This makes it difficult for the strategy to be followed and the objective be attained. Communication is needed for relaying information, thereby improving the quality of interaction within the organisation. Managers must communicate with their employees, but they also need to communicate with their peers in the other departments (Heide, Grà ¸nhaug, Johannessen, 2002, p. 217). This improves coordination within the organisation, while also promoting learning. On the other hand, upward communication must also be encouraged to enable employees give their feedback details to the management for appropriate action to be taken. The focus of the management should be to devise appropriate ways of addressing conflicts because conflicts are inevitable in any society (Heide, Grà ¸nhaug, Johann essen, 2002, p. 217). Competition between individuals and their personal interests should be put in check as this is a major source of politics within the organisation. However, individual creativity should never be curtailed as a result. The competitive environment where the organisation operates demands the identification of unique ideologies that can attract the market and create a competitive edge against the rivals. The effective alignment of the organisational levers eventually results in the achievement of the capabilities (Heide, Grà ¸nhaug, Johannessen, 2002, p. 217). The organisation can direct its efforts towards goal achievement once the appropriate capabilities are achieved. The framework forms an important learning loop, which is a continuous cycle that can revert to the organisational levers or capabilities in case the objectives fail to be met. Summary and Recommendations The success of any organisation’s operations depends on how effective its strategy has been formulated and how efficient the implementation is executed. The organisational setup exists in a complex business environment. This requires that the fitness of the strategy is maintained all through to enhance the achievement of the objectives. However, several factors within the organisation act as barriers in the execution of strategy and they need to be addressed to enhance overall organisational performance. These factors include unhealthy internal power struggles and politics. These could see managers pursue their own personal interests at the expense of the organisation’s interests. They could also see managers allocate resources in an ineffective way, where the basis of their actions would be on their own interests and goals. Lack of organisational purpose also forms a barrier to strategy implementation, where the organisation lacks an effective communication system. The rest of the participants may lack the necessary commitment to push through the objective. Re sistance to change also occurs within the organisation, where managers resort to formulating defensive routines, while the employees in departments opt to remain silent even where they notice difficulties. Another barrier to strategy implementation involves the prevention of organisational learning by the managers. 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B 2005, ‘Business unit manager influence on corporate-level strategy formulation’, Journal of Managerial Issues, vol. 17, no. 2, pp. 147-161 This essay on Strategy Implementation Barriers was written and submitted by user Qu1nt1n to help you with your own studies. 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buy custom Adoption of Community Outreach Health Policy Plan essay This report will be directed to the public relations manager McDonalds Corporation, seeking to explain and recommend a community outreach health program aimed at proposing change in the companys outreach policy to accommodate rising health issues specifically the rising case of overweight and obese people. Topic: community health outreach policy program review The program will recommend a get back to the people program that will facilitate healthy living among the people many of whom are potential as well as existing customers. The health policy of the company ensures that the foods promote healthy living for example through low calorie foods. Even with these standards, it has emerged in the recent past that there is increasing number of overweight and obese people because of individual unhealthy practices regarding eating habits and choice of foods. Since the community forms an integral part of the McDonalds Corporation, the public relations manager should adopt this community outreach review program in the companys outreach policies(CDC, 2010). Purpose of the report The purpose of the report is to give a recommendation on the best way to deal with obesity and related overweight problem in the community. According to the Natioal Health and Nutrition Survey, one in every three Americans is obese. Obesity has resulting complications like diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, heart diseases, stroke and even high cholesterol. The rate is more alarming too in children and therefore as part of giving to the community, this recommendation will add to other existing outreach programs and will therefore will assist in trying to get a permanent solution to the problem(CDC, 2010). Resources required To implement this future community health program recommendation, resources will be required to facilitate it. The McDonalds Corporation will have to review its budgetary allocations to the community outreach programs since this will an additional program with its own unique financial requirements. The adoption of the program will need public education and awareness programs as well as assisting those already affected. Public awareness can be through advertisements or specific area to area training. The company can also get involved in getting other corporate bodies to get involved including influencing insurance companies to offer remuneration to affected people by covering in their insurance policies. All these require financial input from the MacDonald Corporation dedicated to each activity(Egeland, 2010). Information gathering techniques For the justification report recommending this new health outreach program, information will be gathered to give data and details for the proposed change. Some of the ways of collecting this information include direct observation, for example for the case of observing an affected groups of people with associated problems since obesity results in other problems like diabetes. A one-on-one interview with the person affected is yet another method. The internet has proven to an important research tool and this will help in reviewing the outreach policy. Facilitated sessions can also help collect information because they involve bringing a larger group of people with weight problems together with an aim of getting information faster (Egeland, 2010). Information evaluation criteria Some of the factors to consider in the evaluation criteria include the direct effect of the program to the community. These include checking the healthy living of the people who might have gone through weight loss programs, the measure of reduced obese cases and even the reduced obesity related complications and deaths. Another evaluation criterion is motivational concept of the consumer or customer reaction. This includes the direct effect of the program on the McDonald Corporation in terms of sales as well as the community reaction to the program(Egeland, 2010). Buy custom Adoption of Community Outreach Health Policy Plan essay

Case Study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 2

Case Study - Essay Example It shows the use of technology in organizational communication. Communication is a very important tool in any set up. It is even more important in the business world. For a business organization to be successful, the manager has to use very effective communication strategies. This is in relation to every person in the organization. The business environment calls for a high level of effectiveness in the communication. 1 When communication is rightly used in an organization it can motivate the employees. However when it is wrongly used it will always demoralize the workers. This is the internal communication. Organizations also need to communicate to the public. This is referred to external communication. Through this it can create a positive or a negative public image. When this case study is evaluated, there was some effective communication to the public. This is shown when the plant was open to the media. Analysis shows that the quality assurance manager was also available to the press. What Madeira did in this case was very effective. The public affairs department that was appointed was very effective. This is because in this department there were specialists who responded to the media inquiries. They provided regular updates of facts and developments that were going on. There was effective communication through video news releases because they educated the public. The use of audiotapes and press releases was very effective in this case. Customers could easily access information by use of charts, and the diagrams provided by the Pepsi public affairs department. The photos that were internally and externally distributed were effective in giving the visual aid of the production process. Very effective communication was done through the use of the 24-hour toll hotlines. Through this the public questions were answered. This really helped in getting the public’s comment on the issue. Through this the monitoring of the public

Week 8 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 6

Week 8 - Essay Example In such instances, the management of multinational enterprises is always forced to the extra mile, in order to strike an ideal balance without compromising their core values, an approach that takes additional resources. Widespread public ownership and extensive government intervention somewhat presents a mixed bag for businesses. This perception is fundamentally because in as much as a section of business administrators have overtime reaffirmed that implementing some of the policies put forward by the government such as antitrust laws is a waste of both time and resources, government input has come in handy in some situations. This includes providing the businesses with information that can give them an edge over their competitors and financial loans during harsh economic conditions. Similarly, it is believed that government interventions always safeguard consumers and ensure that businesses protect the environment, hence ensuring that the businesses are in good books with the market. The relationship between democracy and economic growth has often brought up conflicting ideas, for some economic analysts hold the perception that in some instances autocratic leaderships can act as a basis for growth, as was the case during the tenure of Lee Kwan Yew of Singapore (www.wsj.com). Nonetheless, it is important to note that a democratic political system is essential for sustained economic progress. This is because democracy, when properly practiced naturally leads to a prosperous and stable economy. This is because most of the rich nations that have sustained rapid economic growth overtime are stable democracies, while most of the poor countries are either brutal dictatorships or dysfunctional

What is a source of nursing research Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

What is a source of nursing research - Essay Example All nursing research are fuelled by an identified gap in practical field that must be addressed to better nursing care, often this is regarded as the research problem (Winsett & Cashion, 2007). Nursing research can be identified by a wide search on different topics in current journals on health. Most journals give current information on trends in health, life style disease and health practices in various groups of people in the population. Analyzing these journals with an interest of identifying areas that have inadequate information or problems that stand unsolved will often avail chances of coming up with research problems (Winsett & Cashion, 2007). For instance a journal containing information about the menace of drug resistance among a certain population may provoke several questions which will ultimately lead to fining a research problem. Drug resistance is broad however a narrower research topic can be coined out to help better the understanding why drug resistance is a menace to the public health. Using drug resistance as the broader topic, a research topic such as; assessing the knowledge and awareness of a certain population on the dangers of noncompliance to an tibiotic therapy. This is a potential research study meant to reveal why the population is having a problem of drug

Mmap Creation of New Mapping

Mmap Creation of New Mapping The goal of this experiment is too understand how mmap creates a new mapping on a process virtual memory address space. Figure 1 The outcome of the program is shown (figure 1). The page size of this architecture is equal to 4096 bytes, which is the default page size for most modern operating systems. The program threw a segmentation core dump error the first time it was ran but after editing the C program it ran as expected. The code altered is shown below, this code had to be changed as the program wouldnt have the permissions to write memory which renders this program useless Code before: Array = mmap (Null, alloc_size, PROT_READ, MAP_PRIVATE, fd, 0) Code After: Array = mmap (Null, alloc_size, PROT_READ | PROT WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE, fd, 0) This segment of code(Figure 2) writes to the first page of the allocated area at the position of zero, if this was changed to something larger than the size of page size (4096 bytes) then the program would return a segmentation fault. Tutorial 1 Exercise 2 The concept in this experiment has shown how to create a mapped memory region then use the fork() process to create a child process in which shares the same memory region as its parent. The fork() process creates a new process by duplicating the calling process. (Manual, 2016) Above (Figure 3) is a segment of code from the program used to show how to create a memory mapped area between shared processes. In this segment the child process increments the shared integer (*addr) twice, meaning when the integers value is printed again in the parent process it will be equal to three (Figure 4). The program waits for the child process until it prints to the user the value of the parent and unmmaps. The wait() system call suspends execution of the calling process until one of its children terminates, on success returns the process ID of the terminated child (Manual, wait(), 2016); Tutorial 1 -Exercise 3 The goal of this exercise to understand memory management through a program that uses the device memory(/dev/mem). /dev/mem is character device file that is an image of the main memory of the computer. Depending on the users permission level, the program must be run as root otherwise the program cannot access the main memory (Figure 5). When the program is run as root user (Figure 6) a list of memory addresses is printed to the user. These addresses in /dev/mem are interpreted as physical memory addresses. References to nonexistent locations can cause errors. (Manual, MEM(4), 2015) Tutorial 1 Exercise 4 The concept of the experiment is reducing memory footprint through the dynamical access of executables and memory addressing. Linux incorporates the use of shared libraries within its operating systems, a lot of Linux programs use the same standard functions such as screen support or file access, for a programmer to include these functions in every program it would cause program files to be unnecessarily large. The advantage of having these libraries is that a library only needs to be loaded once for several programs to use it; resulting in saving RAM and hard disk space. (Kofler, 1998) Tutorial 2 Exercise 1 The concept of the experiment is to understand how mmap uses a file as part of the address space. The program used in this experiment is an emulation of how the Operating system extends RAM to a file. The program being used in this experiment uses a file called test.txt as RAM, the file itself is equivalent to one page size of the given architecture. The program then writes to the page with a char at the array position of zero to four(Figure 9). This is an example of how a memory mapped file is taken from disk and placed into memory explicitly for reading/writing and will stay there until the user unmaps it. This experiment shows that when writing to ram youre writing to a file. Tutorial 2 -Exercise 2 The goal of this experiment is too understand that Mprotect can change permissions of mapped areas. After using the Mmap function within the program (FIGURE 10(Gedit)) the permissions set are read only, meaning that the program wouldnt be able to write to the array. After memory has been mapped, the permissions originally set can be modified with the Mprotect system call. If a program attempts to perform an operation on a memory location that is not permitted, it is terminated with a segmentation fault(FIGURE 10(Top terminal)). (Mitchell, 2001) Tutorial 2 -Exercise 3 The goal of this experiment is to understand how the operating system manages protections dynamically. (FIGURE 11) is a segment of code taken from the experiment, it shows a handler for the segmentation fault. This code is in place to take care of the segmentation fault, the problem with the above code is the fact that this is an infinite loop, the segmentation error is given when attempts to perform an operation on a memory location that is not permitted, meaning that the code will continue at the point the signal occurred, creating an infinite loop. The solution to this is to change the permissions within the Mprotect system call allowing the ability to write as well as read. Tutorial 2 Exercise 4 The goal of this experiment is to understand how the operating system manages protections dynamically. As opposed to the previous experiment, this program changes the permissions of the page that is being accessed using Mprotect. The handler is in place to ensure that an infinite loop doesnt happen like in the previous experiment. With the permissions being set within the handler itself, the handler will be able to completely handle the error resulting in no segmentation error stopping the program. Tutorial 3 Exercise 1 The goal of this research is to understand that each file in Linux has a respective Inode. Figure 14 The results of this experiment (Figure 14) show the Inodes for 3 separate files in 3 separate directories, the Inode is a data structure in a Unix file system to describe an object like a file or a directory. The Inode is a pointer with a the Inode number being unique, if a file is moved then its Inode number will also change. When an application needs a file, the application exchanges the file name for the Inode number from the directory listing, after that the application uses the Inode for a reference to the file. Tutorial 3 -Exercise 2 The goal of this experiment is to understand some system calls that manipulate files and directories. (figure 15) Shows the files and directories of several locations using a program which snippet is shown (figure 16). This program returns a list of what is in the present working directory, notice that the type of the file is shown on the left of (figure x). The system call lstat returns information about a file, in this case it is returning the type of the file. Tutorial 3 Exercise 3 The goal of this experiment is to understand how a logical mapping (file) is related to its physical one. Figure 17 The program used in this experiment determines the number of blocks associated with the given file and maps its logical and physical addressing, as can be seen in (figure 17). This is achieved using the stat system call which returns information about a file, for this exercise the only information required from stat is the number of blocks used by the file. Another system call used in this program is ioctl, used on a file descriptor fd. The ioctl function allows the user to manipulate the underlying device parameters (manuals, 2016). Using ioctl with FIBMAP allows the user to return the physical block mapping to its logical mapping. Tutorial 3 Exercise 4 The goal of this Tutorial 4 Exercise 1 The goal of this experiment is to understand the process of exchanging messages between client and server using blocking communication. Two programs were used in this experiment, a server program (Figure 20 left) and a client program (figure 20 right). Running on separate terminals the programs communicate with each other, if another client program were to try and connect to the server program the messages wouldnt arrive at the server, this happens because of blocking. When blocking is in use, control isnt returned to the server program until at least one byte of data is read from the client program (Klement, 2002). By default, sockets are set to blocking, if a socket call is issued that cant be completed immediately then the process is put to sleep, waiting for the condition to be true. Tutorial 4 Exercise 2 The goal of this experiment is to understand the process of exchanging messages between client and server using non-blocking communication. Figure 21 As opposed to the previous experiment, the client and server programs are now using non-blocking sockets. As a default when a socket is created, its set to blocking. If the input operation cannot be satisfied with at least 1 byte of data* then a return is made immediately with an error (Figure 21 left) (Stevens, 2001). *(This applies to TCP, For a UDP socket it would be a complete datagram). Tutorial 4 Exercise 3 The goal of this experiment is too understanding the basic process of exchanging messages between client and signal-driven server using non-blocking communication. Tutorial 4 Exercise 4 The goal of this experiment is to gain a better understanding about the differences between blocking and unblocking programs

Networking Report Essay example -- essays research papers fc

Networking Report Contents The report is broken down in 30 main sections in them the following can be viewed: 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  INTRODUCTION 2.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  WHAT IS A NETWORK? 3.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS FROM NETWORKING? 4.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  NETWORK RELATIONSHIP TYPES 5.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  WIDE AREA NETWORKS (WAN) 6.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  LOCAL AREA NETWORKS (LAN) 7.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  METROPOLITAN AREA NETWORK (MAN) 8.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  PEER-TO-PEER NETWORK RELATIONSHIP 9.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  CLIENT/SERVER NETWORK RELATIONSHIP 10.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  COMPARING PEER-TO-PEER AND CLIENT/SERVER 11.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  ADVANTAGES OF PEER-TO-PEER 12.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  DISADVANTAGES OF PEER-TO-PEER 13.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  ADVANTAGES OF CLIENT/SERVER 14.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  DISADVANTAGES OF CLIENT/SERVER NETWORKS 15.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  NETWORK FEATURES OF CLIENT/SERVER 1 FILE SHARING 2 PRINTER SHARING 3 APPLICATION SERVICES 4 E-MAIL 16.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  THE INTERNET 17.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  NETWORK SECURITY 18.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  WORKSTATION HARDWARE 19.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  BUS TOPOLOGY 20.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  STAR TOPOLOGY 21.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  RING TOPOLOGY 22.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  TREE TOPOLOGY 23.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  FIREWALLS 24.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  DIGITAL SUBSCRIBER LINE (DSL) 25.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  ACCOUNT SECURITY 26.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  CONCLUSION 27.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  RECOMMENDATION 28.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  BIBLIOGRAPHY 29.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 30.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  APPENDICES APPENDIX 1.1: THE SERVER APPENDIX 1.2: THE NETWORK CARD APPENDIX 1.3: THE ROUTER INTRODUCTION I have decided to research into Networking as my individual assignment for CP2099, because I am interested in setting up networks, as I already have set up my own small network at home. I also want to find out some of the advantages and disadvantages of the different types of networks. I will research extensively in order to find the best possible network for:  ·Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  &... ...ughput of 100mbps (using 100mbps hub and cabling) even the most demanding multi-player games will run smoother and more reliably. Ideal for games like Quake, Half-Life and Unreal Tournament, Windows networking and data transfer. Supplied with drivers for Windows 95, 98 and Windows NT. Appendix 1.3: The Router ADSL 16port Router with built in Modem & Firewall Source: PC World  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Instant Broadband EtherFast Cable/DSL VPN Router is the ideal solution for remotely accessing a network securely over the Internet using cutting edge encryption and authentication methods.16Port Router, which expands its functionality and security, features by utilizing 56-bit DES and 168-bit 3DES encryption, and Internet Key Exchange (IKE). A built-in IPSec coprocessor from Hifn allows for complete data privacy for the access and exchange of your most sensitive data from your home to your corporate network or between remote branch offices without the additional cost of IPSec VPN client software for each computer. The Router is capable of conducting up to 70 simultaneous IPSec VPN tunnels while allowing additional savings with no upgrade fees or technical support costs.