Absolutism and Peter the Great Analysis Essays

Absolutism and Peter the Great Analysis Essays Absolutism and Peter the Great Analysis Essay Absolutism and Peter the Great Analysis Essay Absolutism and Peter the Great Analysis paragraph Peter the Great made a great effort to change Russia and he conquered his ideas and what he wanted to do with his nation. He strengthened the military, created a navy, and stopped the isolation of Russia. Since Peter was born in the medieval world he was captivated by the modern clothes and army; he was really interested in ships and navy. He built a ship just to communicate with the west (Europe) to exchange technology, ideas and other goods, he wanted to westernize Russia; he felt it necessary to do so because he thought that if Russia didnt modernize it would be left behind and would get run over by his European neighbors. When he went to europe he learned nautical science, how to build a gun, dentistry, astronomy, surgery, making paper, printing, and rendering. He also went all the way to England to build the strongest navy, after 16 months of absence from his homeland there were revolts in Moscow. When he returned to Moscow he changed the way the nobles dressed, and he wanted everyone including the women to educate themselves and be more European. He took Russia out of the dark ages. He also brought news paper, astronomy, new capital, new navy, new museums, new title (emperor) and hospitals. Peter the Great was a great Tsar for Russia; he brought a lot of goods to his nation and that helped to modernize Russia and also to have contact with other parts of the world.

An Explanation of Acid Mine Drainage

An Explanation of Acid Mine Drainage In a nutshell, acid mine drainage is a form of water pollution that happens when rain, runoff, or streams come in contact with rock that is rich in sulfur. As a result, the water becomes very acidic and damages downstream aquatic ecosystems. In some regions, it is the most common form of stream and river pollution. Sulfur-bearing rock, especially one type of mineral called pyrite, is routinely fractured or crushed during coal or metal mining operations, and accumulated in piles of mine tailings. Pyrite contains iron sulfide which, when in contact with water, dissociates into sulfuric acid and iron. The sulfuric acid dramatically lowers the pH, and the iron can precipitate and form an orange or red deposit of iron oxide that smothers the bottom of the stream. Other harmful elements like lead, copper, arsenic, or mercury may also be stripped from the rocks by the acidic water, further contaminating the stream. Where Does Acid Mine Drainage Happen? It mostly occurs where mining is done to extract coal or metals from sulfur-bearing rocks. Silver, gold, copper, zinc, and lead are commonly found in association with metal sulfates, so their extraction can cause acid mine drainage. Rainwater or streams become acidified after they run through the mine’s tailings. In hilly terrain, older coal mines were sometimes built so that gravity would drain out water from inside the mine. Long after those mines are closed, acid mine drainage continues to come out and contaminate waters downstream. In the coal mining regions of the eastern United States, over 4,000 miles of stream have been impacted by acid mine drainage. These streams are mostly located in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio. In the western U.S., on Forest Service land alone there are over 5,000 miles of affected streams.   In some circumstances, sulfur-bearing rock can be exposed to water in non-mining operations. For example, when construction equipment cuts a path through bedrock to build a road, pyrite can be broken up and exposed to air and water. Many geologists thus prefer the term acid rock drainage, since mining is not always involved. Environmental Effects Drinking water becomes contaminated. Groundwater can be affected, impacting local water wells.Waters with a very low pH can support only severely reduced animal and plant diversity. Fish species are some of the first to disappear. In the most acidic streams, only some specialized bacteria survive.Because of how corrosive it is, acidic stream water damages infrastructure such as culverts, bridges, and stormwater pipes.Any recreational potential (e.g., fishing, swimming) and scenic value for streams or rivers affected by acid mine drainage are greatly reduced.   Solutions Passive treatment of acidic streams can be conducted by routing the water into a purpose-built wetland designed to buffer the low pH. Yet, these systems require complex engineering, regular maintenance, and are applicable only when certain conditions are present.Active treatment options include isolating or treating the waste rock to avoid contact of water with sulfates. Once water has been contaminated, options include pushing it through a permeable reactive barrier that neutralizes the acid or routing it through a specialized wastewater treatment plant. Sources Reclamation Research Group. 2008. Acid Mine Drainage and Effects on Fish Health and Ecology: A Review.U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. 1994. Acid Mine Drainage Prediction.

An interventional approach for patient and nurse safety Dissertation

An interventional approach for patient and nurse safety - Dissertation Example The theoretical framework that was used in this study was the model of impaired sleep developed by Lee et al. The framework is based on a scientific theory (Burns & Grove, 2009) as it uses previous research linking sleep quality with errors and lack of alertnessTheoretical Model Discussion The theoretical framework is clearly discussed as having a direct significance with the research topic It is stated impaired sleep consists of either sleep deprivation (inadequate sleep) or sleep disruption (fragmented sleep). The model implies that impaired sleep results in cognitive, behavioural, physiological, social, and emotional responses. The paper elaborates how a targeted fatigue countermeasures program for nurses (FCMPN) can intervene and prevent or alleviate the cognitive and behavioural impacts (like sleep duration, daytime sleepiness, and alertness) and reduce patient-care errors. The following figure from the paper captures the conceptual and the theoretical framework employed: The fr amework is therefore discussed well to outline what variables are to be measured pre and post the FCMPN intervention. 2. Major Study Variables Research Variables: 1. Sleep Quality 2. Sleep Duration 3. Daytime Sleepiness 4. Vigilance 5. Risk for Accidents and Errors 6. Short Term Memory 7. Problem Solving and Coping. Conceptual Definition Sleep Duration was defined as the time duration that participants spent in uninterrupted sleep. Sleep Quality was clearly conceptualized to mean sleep which is not fragmented and which is of adequate duration. While the remaining variables were not clearly defined, conceptually they could be understood to mean the following: Daytime Sleepiness – tendency to doze during the daytime work-hours Vigilance – Drowsiness and Unplanned Sleep Episodes during work hours Risk for Errors – Any perceived deviations from standard practice Short Term Memory – Recall of errors Problem Solving and Coping – How errors were managed O perational Definition Sleep Duration was measured using the log book entries made by the participants. Sleep Quality was measured using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index PSQI (Buysse, Reynolds, Monk, Berman, & Kupfer, 1989). Daytime Sleepiness was measured using Epworth Sleepiness Scale (Johns, 1991) while other variables (Vigilance, Risk for Accidents and Errors, Short Term Memory, Problem Solving and Coping) were measured using the log book entries using the self-report method 3. Sample and Setting a. Sample Inclusion/Exclusion Criteria Full-Time Hospital Staff Surgical nurses were used as the sample. In addition, the selection criteria included that the nurses should be working at least 36 hour per week. Advanced practice nurses, nurse managers, or nurses in specialized roles such as discharge planning were excluded. b. Sampling Method The paper mentions using three surgical nursing units in Michigan using convenience method for selection, though the rationale or the specific fa ctors that led to the selection of the method is not listed. The qualifying nurses were contacted using the official mailing list and out of the 126, 62 consented to participate in the research. c. Sample Size 62 Power analysis indicated that 30 sample size would be sufficient to establish the impacts of FCMPN on the variables that are researched. d. Refusal to Participate Number and Percentage 62 out of the 147 full-time hospital staff nurses (43%). e. Sample attrition or Mortality Number and Percentage Out of the 62 selected for participation, 15 (24%) did not continue with the study for the complete duration. f. Informed Consent Process/Institutional Review Board The 147 nurses that comprised of the qualified the inclusion criteria were sent a preliminary survey to provide demographic information and give their interest to participate. Once the intent of

History of Advertising Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

History of Advertising - Essay Example The very first form of advertising that dates back to 3000 B.C was outdoor display of Signs. Then advertising was done in the form of Word-of-mouth or were done vocally. The graphical forms of advertising then came including the paper ads, print ads, and newspaper ads. The very first form of advertising was through signs. The signs that were painted and displayed on the walls of the buildings in the ancient Rome and Pompeii were the very first forms of advertising [5]. These signs were ads about any property for rent or the ads were to attract the travelers of one town to the taverns in the same or some other town. These signs also consisted of the any matches, for example circus matches [2] that needed to be advertised. Next, the advertising took the vocal form of word-of-mouth or street or town cries [5]. These street criers used to read public notices aloud or praised the products aloud for their advertising. These kinds of advertisements also included the announcements for the sales of any cattle and slaves [2]. These town criers were the predecessors of the announcers of the later radio and TV ads. Then the newspapers came in the seventeenth century. The newspaper ads initially included short ads of product descriptions and prices [1]. The color and headlines and all the complementary stuff came later. The first newspaper was printed in England by the name of "Weekly News" in 1622 [2]. The magazine ads then followed. When the company's' name emerged in the advertisements, the emergence of brand name in the history of advertising took place. In the 1700s pasted-up notices, brochures and posters came into existence [2] and a lot of advertising through posters began. These then lead to the billboards. In the 1800s, printed media ads arrived [3]. This was the time when advertising through billboards started and started to be used abundantly. A movable type printing press was invented by a German printer Johannes Gutenberg which made the distribution of posters possible [5]. After the emergence of radio, long time later, advertising through radio started. Then advertising through video and TV advertisements also started after the invention of TV, later in the 19th century TV advertisements started to come on TV and gained a lot of popularity among all other forms of advertising. Producing a Successful TV Advertisement Producing a successful TV advertisement requires some important steps and factors that need to be checked and need to be kept in mind. These are as stated as under: 1. The target audience [6] and the budget should be planned and kept in mind. Before making an ad you should know it very well that for whom are you making the ad and what are the needs and requirements of the customers. It is also important to know what financial standing or budget you need in order to deliver the target audience that is intended. 2. A well-conceived plan needs to be made that should cover the budget and all the necessary steps that are needed. The plan for advertising is really important as it is the basis on which you continue with your ad and also the success or failure of the ad depends on how appropriate is the advertising plan. 3. It is important to include in your TV advertisement the company's brand and the company's overall business objectives

A Case Study On Computer Viruses Information Technology Essay

A Case Study On Computer Viruses Information Technology Essay In this project we have been asked to consider and discuss the different aspects of the above statement. We have asked to create a case study of an organization to help with our case and we have chosen for our case study to look at North Lanarkshire Council. The case study will be a report based on 2 interviews and a short look at the council and its history and what services it offers. There will also be a critical review arguing as to the rights and wrongs of the statement and finally a conclusion in which we will be a brief summary of what we have discovered during the report. Before we can begin to discuss the statement, we should take a quick look at exactly what a computer virus and phishing are and also take a quick look at their history. The computer virus was so named as it has similar properties as a human virus in the way they can pass form computer to computer and in that they need a host to survive. The first viruses were created during the 1980s, although there programs that worked on the same principle created maybe as early as the late 1960s. The first program of this type to appear on a computer other than the one it was written for was called Elk Cloner and was written by Rich Skrenta in 1982 and surprisingly was written to attack the Apple operating system as today viruses are very rarely written with Apple in mind. The most common virus of that period was written to infect PCs and was called the Brain and was written by two brothers Basit and Amjad Farooq Alvi in 1986. Both these virus were spread by floppy disks and since then the virus concept has grown and become more sophisticated. (antiviruswear.com, 2010) There are 3 main types of common virus today Worms Trojan Horse Email Virus A worm uses security flaws and computer networks to replicate itself. They can be very complex programs and once on an infected machine, will search for other flows to exploit. A Trojan Horse, named after the famous wooden horse in Homers Iliad. The virus disguises as itself as another file, e.g. a sound file with a .wav extension and once on the host computer does not reproduce but will make the host computer susceptible to attack by third parties by opening ports and can be a major threat to the users personal data. Am email virus once opened on an infected machine will send copies of itself to everyone on the email clients contacts list. They payload can also include Worms and Trojan Horses. (spamlaws.com, 2009)The term Phishing appears to have been first coined in 1996 and was applied to hackers who were stealing AOL passwords. It is now a broader term applied to a form of social engineering where the angler (phisher) throws a hook by maybe sending an spam email pretending to be from the recipients bank stating there has been a breach of security and asking for the customer to enter their password and user name on a website that is linked to on the email. This website may look like the persons online banking website but is a fake set up to steal the user names and passwords and allow the phishers to then gain access to the persons bank account details and transfer monies to other accounts. (allspammedup) Review For-end user protection Software-every user should have security software installed on their computer the software will help protect your computer from viruses, worms and other harmful programs. You should scan your computer on a regular basis and also update your operating system. anti virus anti spyware anti malware firewall botnet Antivirus you must update regularly to benefit for the latest threats. A computer virus is a computer program with the intent of copying itself and contaminating a computer. Viruses can boost their chances of spreading to other computers by infecting files on a group of networks or a file structure that is accessed by another computer. You need antivirus software to prevent, detect and remove viruses from your computer. There are quite a lot of different types of viruses like worms and Trojan horse.Millions of computer users suffered billion of dollars in losses from real attack experienced over the internet. Most of the damages were caused by fast moving computer viruses and worms that travelled by email (Simson, 2002) Antispyware- Spyware is a sort of malware that can be setup on computers and gather small pieces of information over time and the users has no awareness that it is there. The existence of spyware is usually concealed from the consumer, and it can be hard to notice. Normally, spyware is secretly installed on the consumers own computer. Now and then spywares is like a key logger and is installed by the vendor of a joint, company, or public computer with the intention to secretly watch other users. Anti malware- A computer worm is a self reproducing malware computer program. It makes a computer network send duplicates of itself to computers that are on the same network and it will do it with no user intervention. This is due to weak security on the computer. Firewall-A firewall is to prevent unauthorized access to or from a network. Firewalls can also be implemented in both hardware and software they prevent unauthorized internet users from accessing a private network. All messages leaving the intranet pass through the firewall. Botnet- Once a solitary machine inside a network has become part of the botnet it will put other computers on the same network at risk. The infected computer is able to read emails and email addresses and copying files and also able to record keystrokes and send spam as well as capturing screen shots. Phishing- You could be sent an e-mail wrongly claiming to be a recognized genuine company in an attempt to scam the user into giving away their private information that will then be used for identity theft. The email will guide the user to visit a web site where they are asked to input their personal information, like your credit card details, passwords and bank account numbers. The website is a phony website and is only set up to steal the users information. Access- Its up to the end user if they want people accessing data so their privacy is in their hands, it is up to the user who they allow access to their computer. They should only allow people they trust to protect their computer with any personal information that is received or collected. Your personal information is under your control your privacy is your property so be aware of what information you store on your computer. Naivety is not an excuse, attackers will take advantage of a computers vulnerability. Legitimate companies will not ask for personal information in an email. Hardware like your router use password protection to constantly secure your wireless connection and will only allow named computers that you know access to the network. Awareness-Every user should be aware of the threats that is out there and what they can do. They should be aware of the different types of viruses and spyware and of what phishing is and what the stakes are. There is your privacy, time, money and your computer. Credit card fraud is on the increase and identity theft also. Your children are exposed to pornographic material and can be targeted by pedophiles. You also need to be aware of shopping when using your credit card most magstripe cards conform to ISO standard that the card contains three tracks of data referred to as track 1,2,3 the majority of magstripe cards contains no security measures to protect the data stored on the card (Stuart, 2009) Education-Most people are not aware of installing software to stop viruses, they have never been taught that your computer needs to be maintained and that there are viruses and worms they dont know of and the damage they can cause. You would not leave your home without locking your door so why leave a personal computer without protecting it. New users and children should be educated before being allowed access to a computer. Naivety is a weapon used by malware and phishers and children and teens are targeted, parents should take steps as well, there is a parental control that will help block websites and file downloads. Computer virus traps over 2,000 tourists on Russia-chinese border Over 2,000 Russian tourists were stranded in the Chinese town of Heihe on the Russian-Chinese border after a computer virus paralyzed the borders electronic pass entry system (Alexey, 2010) Internet service providers are facing an ever increasing amount of pressure to make sure their networks are virus and phishing free-not only would this be advantageous to their customers, but also very beneficial for the internet in general. Against-end user protection With the escalation of zombie-fed threats like phishing, securing the consumers PCs should no longer be down to the user themselves, the internet service providers should in this day and age be protecting the Internet traffic they are providing. ISPs should be taking more responsibility to monitor what is passing through their networks more closely. A zombie computer is a PC that has been secretly hacked, this then allows an outside person to control the computer with the intentions to infect, copy, corrupt and for erasing the hard drive. The hacker can then install tools that will store everything that is typed into the PC, this includes passwords, usernames and credit card and bank account details. Once this information is in the hands of the hackers it can be used for identity theft, committing fraud or sold on to the highest bidder. Related topics There has been a huge rise in cases that involve malicious code, also referred to as bot code that infects computers turning them into zombies, from April to June this year the number of reported cases have quadrupled to 13000. ISPs have been doing somethings to combat the threats of bot code by providing customers with online help on how to keep their PCs secure and some apply spam and virus filters for email as bot code is quite often spread through instant message worms, email and also through Trojans hidden in spam. The ISPs should however be offering a greater protection against these infestations than by just trying to control the threats from e-mail. Getting filtering to work effectively and properly takes a vast amount of time, patience, resources and money. Because the people writing the malware get better and better on a constant basis, it is a never ending struggle to keep up to pace with them so that filtering works. Some Internet service providers are using a technique called port 25 blocking to halt zombie computers that are connecting through their network sending out junk emails, this allows only emails that comes from its own server to be sent out, and this then helps eliminates spam that originates from another server. But those steps dont appear to be enough to tackle the threat of zombies, according to some experts. To take down zombies, ISPs should monitor their networks closer for traffic generated by the compromised PCs, said Dmitri Alperovitch, research engineer at CipherTrust, a security vendor in Alpharetta, USA.ISPs allow these machines to communicate with the rest of the world. They have the power to do a lot about the zombie threat, and they should be doing a lot about it Alperovitch said.A start for Internet companies would be for them to participate more actively in security groups and to use data on zombies collected by third-party security companies such as CipherTrust, he said. ISPs should monitor their networks more closely for anything suspicious, the ISPs should also be improving customer education and possibly even providing their customers with Anti-virus, Anti-spyware and firewalls for their own machines. If the ISPs were to provide customers with all the necessary software to protect themselves then there should no longer be any problems, as long as the customer uses the protection. Maybe the ISPs should enter in their contracts with customers that they will provide the software and if the customer chooses not to use it or take other preventative measures their internet connection will be cut off. If the ISPs were to do their part in helping to protect their customers then naivety in people using the internet should not be an excuse in this day and age, there has been enough cyber crime and virus and it has also been about long enough now that it is no longer excusable for people not to be protecting themselves while surfing the net. There are danger s in most things we do in life and we are expected to take preventative measures, if we go out for a walk we put shoes on to protect our feet, if we go out for a drive we put our seatbelt on and if we surf the net we should also protect ourselves in advance. We are not allowed to drive a car on the road if it is not roadworthy so maybe we should not be allowed to surf the net if our computer is not properly equipped. Although customers can be encouraged to keep their PCs clean with the threat of disconnection, the pressure should be on the ISPS to take more responsibility to tackle any threats coming through their network. With the amount of threats on the increase, ISPs should be taking a more hands on approach, as the hands-off method has been proven not to work. (1) Dmitri Alperovitch, research engineer at CipherTrust, a security vendor in Alpharetta (news.cnet.com, 2010) Case Study North Lanarkshire Council For our case study we chose North Lanarkshire Council, there were two reasons for this, the first being that they are a large organization with a huge computer infrastructure that would allow us to speak to a qualified IT specialist and also an end user to get both views across and the second reason being one of our team had previously worked there and was confident he would get the interviews arranged with the minimum of fuss. North Lanarkshire Council is the fourth largest local Authority in Scotland employing over 18,000 staff and serving a population of 321,000 people mainly in the following towns Airdrie, Bellshill, Coatbridge, Cumbernauld, Kilsyth, Motherwell, Shotts, Wishaw and their surrounding districts. The council is split into 5 key service areas: Finance and Customer Services incorporating all finance and IT services (including housing benefits and rebates) as well as public access via first stop shops, customer contact centre and website. Corporate Services which includes central support unit, human resources, legal services, design and property services. Environmental Services including planning and development, roads and transportation and protective services amongst others. Housing and Social Work services Learning leisure Services which includes education and community education services. The nature of this case study will dictate we concentrate on Finance and Customer Services, and in particular the government and development division which includes the IT function within the council and we will get a flavour as to how it protects its end users from Virus and Phishing attacks. The finance department has many functions and these include council tax, purchasing and debtors, housing benefits and rebates and as you can see there is much personal and financial data to be protected within even this small selection of councils services. If we add in the data that the social work also has to protect then we can see the security has to be comprehensive. We will now take a look at the interviews. Interviews overview We had chosen to contact North Lanarkshire Council to see if it was possible to interview 2 of their employees for the project. We decided to contact Alex Mitchell, Assistant Service Delivery Manager, as one of our team had already worked quite closely with him in the past when he worked for the North Lanarkshire Council IT Department. Alex agreed in principle and asked we email him 2 sets of questions one aimed at the end user and the other aimed at someone who would be more aware of the security measures in place from the IT section. He duly replied and said that the head of IT Security, Kenny Yates would be happy to meet for an interview and also gave us the name of an end user, namely a Lesley Bone who was happy to answer the end user questions. Due to adverse weather conditions it became very difficult to arrange the interviews and in the end Lesley emailed her answers to us and we carried out a telephone interview with Kenny. Happily, they were both fairly frank and gave a good indication of how the council deals with computer security and how it protects the end user. As was said earlier there were 2 sets of questions as some questions were asked to both people and others didnt make sense to ask the individual concerned so were more tailored as to an end user or the more technical question. The results were as follows. Lesley showed that as an end user she had an awareness of threats and had security in place in the house but was very vague as to what to do if she was affected by one and it seemed to be apparent that when given these questions she realized that maybe security is something she should look into and give more thought to in general. Kenny on the other hand gave us a great insight as to how difficult a job it is to protect an organisation such as NLC. He showed that it was not just down to the councils duty of care to its employees to protect them and the data they hold but there are many legal requirements some of which also get audited that have to be followed and can result in fines and removal from government secure networks if that audit is failed. He also said that awareness training is now taking place and this seemed to tie in as Lesley had said she had received no specific training as such but there had been a responsible use policy available for a long time. The main issues for the council as Kenny sees as the growth of remote and home working and as users have more scope to use unauthorized equipment on council networks and he also said naivety is the main cause of infection in council equipment. Finally when asked what was the main threats he said that spam and email type worm viruses are the main concern and social engineering techniques are getting more sophisticated but the main threat was could be lack of investment due to recent cutbacks and this could leave the council open to attack. The full interviews can be read. See appendices. Conclusion We were asked to comment and discuss the following statement It is up to end-users to protect themselves sufficiently from threats such as viruses and phishing they are responsible, naivety is not an excuse. And here is the conclusion our team has come up with. Firstly the user has a degree of responsibility, a home user especially must at least have the awareness that these threats exist, what they are, what they do and must know and carry out the minimum steps to protect themselves by at least installing a full security suite on all pcs and also making sure that anyone with internet access has the same awareness. Also they should be wary as to who has access and should protect their computers and wireless devices with a secure password. There is also a lot going on in the background that the end user is not aware of and this is also helping to protect them from threats, from working groups, the law and government acts and even their banks and retailers to their Internet service Provider and the security software writers. They are all working hard to minimize the effects of virus and phishing. In an organisation it is much different and the end user has very little to do to protect themselves as we saw in the interviews. That job is taken on by the IT department and it is a very difficult job to protect an organisation. Due to legal obligations there has to be very tight security, especially in organisations like the one we looked at North Lanarkshire Council and surprisingly it turned out that the main source of protection turned out to be the amount of investment made in it and keeping up to date as everything moves so fast in the IT world and if the organisations dont keep up they will get caught out. Finally is naivety an excuse, the answer has to be a resounding no, it appears to be one of the main causes of infection and more so it is also the main tool of the people who write the virus or use their social engineering tools in the phishing attacks. Bibliography Alexey, K. (2010, 04 19). WorldComputer virus traps over 2,000 tourists on Russian-Chinese border. Retrieved from rianovosti: http://en.rian.ru/world/20100419/158646482.html allspammedup. (n.d.). allspammedup. Retrieved from allspammedup: http://www.allspammedup.com/2009/02/history-of-phishing/ antiviruswear.com. (2010). antivirus. Retrieved from antivirus: http://www.antivirusware.com/articles/history-computer-viruses.html news.cnet.com. (2010). news.cnet.com. Retrieved from news.cnet.com: http://news.cnet.com/ISPs-versus-the-zombies/2100-7349_3-5793719.html#ixzz16FkK89Lv Simson, G. (2002). web security,privacy and commerce. cambridge: o,reilly. spamlaws.com. (2009). spamlaws. Retrieved from spamlaws: http://www.spamlaws.com/virus-comtypes.html Stuart, M. (2009). hacking exposed 6. new york: mcgraw.

Gap Model

Gaps Model of Service Quality Table of Contents Executive Summary3 Customer Gap4 Example of Customer Gap4 Listening Gap5 Example of Listening Gap6 Standard Design And Standard Gap7 Example of Design and Standard Gap8 Service Performance Gap9 Example of Service Performance Gap10 Communication Gap11 Example of Communication Gap12 Closing Gap12 Diagram of Gap Model of Service Quality 13 Bibliography14 Customers realize that the current system is not flawless. Companies see that providing better service quality will create and obtain the customers loyalty, continuation of business and enhance the quality of the organization.Service quality is suppose to be consistent, reliable and accountable for any business, however gaps in service quality can lead to unsatisfied customers and loss of business. The Gaps Model of Service Quality is used to fix the gaps of the service that is being provided. They include: †¢ The Customer Gap- The difference between customer’s expectations and perceptions. †¢ Gap 1 (Listening Gap) –The difference between the customers expectations of service and the companies understanding of those expectations. Gap 2 (Service Design and Standard Gap) – The difference between the company or firm understanding the customer expectation and development of customer-driven service designs and standards. †¢ Gap 3 (Service Performance Gap) – Represents the development of customer-driven service standards and the actual performance by the companies employees. †¢ Gap 4 (Communication Gap) -The difference between the service delivery and the service providers external communications. †¢ Closing Gap- Closing gaps 1-4 and keeping them closed.Real life experiences are a way to illustrate how gaps in service quality can be addressed and predetermined in every day life. Possessing too many gaps in a service that are left unnoticed or unfixed can lead to a decline in the company and the overall reputation of the business. Learning how to close the Gaps is a way to reflect the type of foundation and service quality that the business will demonstrate through services. Customer Gap The Customer Gap is critical in delivering quality service as it is the backbone of the model. The Customer Gap is the difference between customer expectations and perceptions in service quality.Customer expectations deals with what a customer believes should or will happen in the service. In order to deliver quality service the firms need to close the gap between what the customer expects and what they perceive will happen (Services, 32). Managers can find this hard to do because in some cases they are not in direct contact with the customers; rather it is their employees that are. This can be a problem because it is important to get a clear understanding of the customer’s wants and or needs to fulfill the customer’s expectations (Bianca, 1).The customer’s behavior does have an effect on the qu ality of service that they feel they are provided with as well. Example of Customer Gap An example of this would be my last trip to Applebee’s. I was not too fond of going to Applebee’s because the last time I went I expected my food to be a certain way but it did not come out that way. The staff and even the managers seemed to give me a problem because my food was not cooked to my liking. A new store opened up in Yonkers so I decided to try out the new restaurant with my family.Already having a chip on my shoulder about going was enough to make me not hungry. However their service was amazing from the minute we walked into the door to when we walked out. Everyone had a kind smile and was very attentive to my families’ special needs. They also payed close attention to my nephew who loved the attention. The food came out fast and tasted amazing and was every bit to my liking. One meal came out wrong, or not to my father’s expectation and they kindly took i t back and fixed what he wanted.Applebee was fulfilling their mission to have every customer leave happy, and the next thing we knew the manager came over with another drink as my father waited for the meal and then he brought it to the table himself and apologized. They had great deals that did not break our pockets and they did not rush us. Overall the experience was exceptional and we now make it our weekly dinner stop. Applebee’s staff changed my feelings about their restaurant. The manager devoted their time to us, and proved that the company understands the customer’s expectations as well as their perceptions of service quality.Listening Gap Gap 1 also known as the Listening Gap is the difference between the customers expectations of service and the companies understanding of the customers expectations. As stated in the customer gap another cause for this gap is because a firm is not meeting the expectations of the customers or the firm is faulted for not knowing what these unique expectations are. This again can be because the managers lack direct communication with the customer or even because they are not prepared to address the situations at hand.This is a problem because upper management or whomever is in charge can start a bad pattern of bad decision making which initially will provide bad quality service to the customers. There are four key factors that are responsible for the gap in provider gap one which includes inadequate marketing research orientation, lack of upward communication, insufficient relationship focus and inadequate service recovery. Inadequate marketing research can cause a large gap because the firm has insufficient marketing research which means that the firm does not acquire adequate information from the customers.Firms should use customer interviews or surveys to get feedback to see if they are reaching the customers expectations in order to stay closer to the customer. Lack of communication between management a nd the customers is a reoccurring problem in some firms because there is little direct communication if any on behalf of management (Service, 1). There can also be a lack of communication between the employees and management which creates havoc in the company because employees do not understand what management knows or is expecting. Firms also show lack a of relationship focus which is crucial (Services, 34-36).Keeping communication with current customers should be top priority rather then focusing only on new customers. This happens when firms worry more about new transactions then they do about the relationship with existing customers. The gap continues to widen with insufficient service recovery which is critical in provider gap 1. This happens when the firm does not take the time to listen to the customer’s complaints or when they do not make amends when something has gone wrong. Service recovery strategies are used on behalf of the firm to guarantee ways to fix the probl em or their unfulfilled promise.This is a huge problem because if the situation is not properly fixed then the gap continues to widen. Example of Listening Gap I currently have Sprint as my cell phone provider and I absolutely hate calling if there is something wrong with my bill, and I’ve only had to do it three times. When I call I get connected to the customer service department and give them all my information. From there they transfer me over to the billing department. At the billing department I have to explain myself again and then I get put on hold.Most of the time its not long but then I have to get switched to another department, then I have to explain myself all over again and the more it happens the more frustrated I get. I immediately get upset and wonder, â€Å"If I pay my service on time every month then why they can’t they provide me with the exceptional customer service that they promised? † I am a paying customer and I except not to be transfer red around and for you to solve the problem for me. It’s just that simple. Miss communication is a big problem with Sprint but if you are paying for something you want it to work right.This is a good example of Gap 1 because there are many people listening to my problem but no one can seem to help me. This does hurt my relationship with the company because if problems like this continue to happen because of miss communication it will lead me in the direction of a new cell phone service. Standard Design and Standard Gap Provider Gap 2 also known as the Service design and Standard Gap is the difference between the company or firm understanding the customer expectation and development of customer-driven service designs and standards.Most companies have a problem with this because they experience difficulty when they are translating customer expectations into quality necessities that employees would be able to understand and then be able to perform. The service design and standar ds gap include poor service design, absence of customer-driven standards and inappropriate physical evidence and servicescape. In any firm an important component of the business is to have a solid marketing strategy that everyone in the firm understands as well as maintain and presents their understand to each customer.All people involved with the company need to be on the same page working with the same concepts which are usually the customer needs and expectations or else there will be a large gap (Brown, 2). Having the same vision creates an understanding of a new service or an existing one. In order to avoid this gap it is important for the company to design a service that is developed and or improved as carefully as possible avoiding oversimplification and incompleteness.Not understanding the customer’s standards creates a situation in which the standards do not reflect the customer’s expectation then the quality of service to the customer is going to suffer. When the standards do reflect the customer’s expectations then the company will most likely do extremely well and will have a positive impact on the company. The servicescape is the way the service is delivered such as reports, signage, or equipment (Services,36-38). By effectively understanding the customer driven standard, physical evidence, and servicescape the firm will be able to close both the customer gap and Gap 2.Example of Standard Design and Standard Gap For this example of Service Design and Standard Gap the instance that I recall that affected me was a cruise that I took in the Caribbean. I had gotten sick and was sent to the ship infirmary. They had two nurses that took care of me. The only problem was an hour later a new shift of nurses came in. The two new nurses were very different then the first two and did everything completely different. The first two nurses new that I was sick with my Diabetes but they said that they were going to take care of me and re hydra te me.The second shift thought that I was too sick and wanted to send me off the ship to a hospital. The only problem with this situation was they were not thinking in the best interest of me. They were thinking of the easiest way to get me off the ship for liability purposes. The second shift ladies kept fighting with the first shift ladies right in front me like I was not there. It made me feel very uncomfortable and scared on top of being sick. As they were fighting back and forth and from what I could hear they both had two very different ideas and different topics during their fight.It seemed to me that their vision and understanding of the rules and regulations were two very different missions. To me it seemed like their entire strategic plan was different. The worse part was they were showing this through their argument. They were all very unprofessional but the second shift didn’t seem to keep my best interest up front. My expectations were to feel comfortable and be taken care of in a quality manor. This was not done therefore to me there was a large gap in service design and the standard gap. Service Performance Gap The Service Performance Gap is the third gap in which the firm is doing well.However like any company they are going to make sure that everything is in place from systems to the people and make sure the service is being delivered to its highest. This model represents the development of customer-driven service standards and the actual performance by the company employees. The gap will widen if the service delivery falls short or the standards are not backed up by support (Service, 1). Therefore employees should get paid according to how well they are doing their job and exceed the customer’s expectations . There are many reasons why a gap could widen, and most involve the human resource department.This is by the company not hiring the right person for the job. As in they do not have good teamwork, they lack empowerment, there ’s inappropriate compensation or even inadequate technology. The customer is another factor in the service performance gap. The customer needs to play their positive role as well. Customers can negatively influence their quality of service by simply using too much of the providers time or becoming disruptive to other customers. The gap can also be because the capacity of inventory is underutilized or over utilized.For example when the company’s capacity is inadequate to handle the company will loses sales. Operating strategies such as cross training would be a way to manage the supply of the company. It is important to motivate and control the mediators to meet the company’s goals (Services, 38-39). Example of Service Performance Gap The example I have for the service performance gap is my most recent trip to A & P to get some last minute groceries. There were many factors that have influenced my decision to go to A & P rather then Stop and Shop or another marke t. The most important influence to my decision was my past experience at A & P.The last time I was there I talked to a man in the Seafood department and he took the time to talk to me about how to cook certain Seafood in a way that would be new to me. He gave me advice and also gave me recipe cards to make it easier when I got home. He took the time with me to help and explain to me the best type of fish or crab legs and really showed how well he knew his job. It was a very pleasant experience. Other factors influencing my decision were the great deals that they had, amazing actually for this week, and word of mouth from my neighbor was having a seafood night like I was.There was also explicit service that was nonpersonal and personal. For example I saw and add in the paper for this week with the sale and a few days ago the seafood worker told me about the deal and to wait. This is a great example of how gap 3 can be narrowed down with the employees being properly educated and excee ding customer service quality. Communication Gap Provider gap 4 also known as the Communication Gap is the difference between the service delivery and the service providers external communications. A large part of Gap 4 is the difference between the actual and promised service.Broken promises, over promising, and false advertisement are example of what can widen the gap. Failing to communicate with the customer and using exaggerated promises is what employees do to try and serve them to their expectations. A way to narrow the gap would be to properly communicate with the customer and educate them to be able to use the service properly(Services, 42-43). With communication come service transactions and the relationship that you build with the customer which is important in the communication gap because as an employee you are in direct communication with the customer.Pricing products at a reasonable price is also important, as well as strategizing how to keep customer expectations high by improving service delivery. Overall communicating properly with the customer and understanding their expectations should and will improve their perception. Example of Communication Gap An instance that still gets me upset to this day in which explicit service promises were exaggerated to the point where I was disappointed was for an oil change by Goodyear.I was extremely upset because when I asked how long it was going to take they told me only a half hour to 45 minutes. I waited 2 hours and they then told me that they did not have the correct funnel for the job and had to wait to get one. I was extremely pissed off because they did not have the decency to tell me what was going on. This was horrible service because it was like they kept lying to me when they said only a few more minutes. Goodyear then told me that they were sorry and then did not make me pay, however it still took up a lot of time, without any communication.I then learned that I would not go back to Goodyear be cause even though I made the appointment days earlier they did not have the supplies needed or the decency to communicate with me. Closing Gap The last gap is the closing gap where everything is put together. In order to close the customer gap all of the gaps 1-4 need to be closed and they also need to stay that way(Services, 43). It is very important to make sure that the customer is pleased with the customer service they were provided. By making sure they are satisfied with their service is a way to keep the customer coming back to continue to do business with the company. pic] Works Cited Bianca, Audra. Organizational Gap Analysis. E How. 22, November 2010. http://www. ehow. com/about_5304768_organizational-gap-analysis. html Brown, Gene, Plenert, Gerhard. Gap Analysis. Reference for Business. 21, November 2010. http://www. referenceforbusiness. com/management/Ex-Gov/Gap-Analysis. html. Service Gap Analysis. Project Tools. 21, November 2010. http://projecttools. co. uk/ProjectToo ls/Gap. htm Services Marketing, 5th Edition, by Bitner, Mary Joe and Valerie A. Zeithaml, published by McGraw Hill, 2009.

The Nature of Thought in Joyce Essay - 2205 Words

The Nature of Thought in Joyce Thought is a problem in Joyces work. His characters obscure trains of thought and remembrance constantly challenge the reader to keep up. I will argue that the depths of this obscurity are not, in fact, murky; they are a response to his introspection about the nature of thought, and reflect a coherent theory. Joyce often repeats phrases, and he makes such repetitions noticeable in order to direct the reader to the questions: What is thought? And what are the unconscious processes of the mind? His characters are unpredictable, experiencing truly surprising emotional reactions. This unexpectedness adds depth and verisimilitude to characterization; as in life, the strongest emotional experiences are ones†¦show more content†¦When he makes the speech, the comparison between his aunts and the Three Graces pleases them very much. He decides that, since his speech has been so successful, it would be safer not to risk offense, and hastens to his close (139). The events of the story, and not so much Gabriel, are the reason he chooses to leave the quotation out. There is another factor that contributes to his willingness to drop the verses: he has already accomplished his aim of working in Browning, by spontaneously borrowing from his own review of the poets recent work: But we are living in a skeptical and, if I may use the phrase, a thought-tormented age (138). His original words were One feels that one is listened to a thought-tormented music (130). Because the article is on Gabriels mind (after his confrontation with Miss Ivors), the phrase thought-tormented is there for him to use. The fact that he does preface it with if I may use the phrase suggests that he is aware of what he is doing. However, Gabriel makes two other crucial word choices that are unconscious but telling. They are apparent under a close reading, and even produce a vague feeling of familiarity under casual reading. 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