The Goal free essay sample

Do you think that this is an operational methodology or a philosophy? Please explain. The Goal is a management-oriented novel that focuses on the concepts of systems management. The fictional novel focuses around Alex Rogo and the problems in his production plant. The plant is constantly behind schedule and unprofitable. Alex is given three months to turn things around or the plant will be shut down. The Goal introduces the â€Å"Theory of Constraints (TOC)† which is an overall management philosophy that adopts the idiom â€Å"A chain is no stronger than its weakest link†. This emphasizes how organizations and processes are vulnerable because that weakest link can always adversely impact and damage the company. The â€Å"goal† is to make money and anything that assists in doing this is productive, while anything that hinders this is a bottleneck. The Goal goes on to identify bottlenecks (constraints) in the manufacturing process and how identifying them helps reduce impact and allows for controlling the flow of materials. We will write a custom essay sample on The Goal or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page One of the main emphasis points throughout is the communication element. Whenever a problem arises the team discusses the problem amongst themselves to find a solution. The discussion process uses five steps to solve any problem: 1. Identify the system’s constraint 2. Decide how to exploit the system’s constraint 3. Subordinate everything else to the prior decisions 4. Elevate the system’s constraint 5. If, in the prior steps, the constraint has been broken, go back to step one. The line between an operational methodology and a philosophy in my opinion is not clear cut black and white. An operational methodology in certain instances can be well defined. Let’s start with a simple example of putting a computer together. The steps could be: †¢ Installing a motherboard †¢ Installing the Processor †¢ Installing the CPU Cooler †¢ †¦.. While not all computers contain the same parts or pieces, from an abstract layer all computers do require a standard set of pieces to run. This high level standard could be the operational methodology for assembling a PC. It would be tough to argue that this is a philosophy. Now if we are to get into more detail and begin discussing processor optimization, this could blur the lines of operational vs philosophy based on proven facts and research. The actual definition of philosophy as stated by Google is â€Å"A set of views and theories of a particular philosopher concerning such study or an aspect of it†. With that being said I do feel that The Goal is abstract enough to be considered an operational methodology. The thesis of The Goal is that the goal of an organization is to increase throughput while simultaneously reducing both inventory and operating expense. That statement can be applied to all businesses. All organizations have some constraints or bottlenecks. Lack of resources and/or resource allocation is one of the most common and challenging constraints organizations face. A good attempt to try and counter argue The Goal would be to look at one of the world’s most profitable companies in Apple. An initial thought might be what possible constraints could such a large and profitable company have. Apple recently set the records for the most valuable company in history with a net worth of $624 billion. However, this has not come without restraints or bottlenecks in the process. One of the major issues Apple has had for a while is in the manufacturing process. At multiple points in time Apple was having difficulties manufacturing enough iPhones to meet the demand. This of course was a constraint on the system and on the bottom line. More recently, Apple has come under fire about its worker treatment in some of its manufacturing plants in China. These constraints have major impacts on the business and Apple is constantly making an effort to identify them and streamline the process. If we can apply The Goal to the world’s most profitable company it seems safe to say that other companies in some shape or form will fall under this umbrella as well. [pic] Fig 1. 0 How to apply Constraint Management to a Production Facility? How about to a Bank? Assume that we can apply constraint management! A production facility seems like the classical example in terms of analyzing the Theory of Constraints. As time has evolved production facilities have become larger, more complicated and depend on technology more than ever. With that said, even the most advanced of processes have at least one constraint (Theory of Constraints principle) and that constraint must be properly managed. Following the 5 step process the first thing we need to do is identify the issues/constraints in the system. This is quite broad and can cover anything from issues with human capital down to bottlenecks in the shipping process. To correctly identify the issue or issues that are holding the facility back, the identification process must be extremely detail-oriented and thorough in the discovery process. Without this full scope analysis simple errors can occur which in turn will lead to unexpected or undesired results. The next steps would be to exploit and subordinate. Once we actually identify the constraint we have to turn the focus to how to get more production within our current capacity limitations. We have to be extremely careful when doing this as exploiting the constraint does not always ensure output on the other end. In today’s day and age one of the most important factors to look at is the technology behind the processes. The key question here in production facility is are we using the technology in our process flow to a maximum capacity. Can we revise our business process with the help of technology to maximize our output? Keep in mind, human capital can be considered part of the process inclusive of technology. A perfect case study in terms of identifying constraints from a broad (internet) perspective is seen in the world’s largest online retailer in Amazon. Amazon started as an online bookstore in 1994. Amazon soon exploited not only a constraint in their own company, but a constraint in sales as a whole. Amazon soon expanded from selling only books to selling electronics, dvds, cds, and the list continued to expand. By creating a one stop shop where a user can buy anything, they found a need in the market and created a monopoly. Studying Amazon’s warehousing and shipping practices further emphasizes their efficiency, but we will leave that detailed discussion for another time. In terms of applying constraint management to a bank, the first steps in a normal climate would to be to identify which department or area has the weakest link. However, the economy has recently gone through some of the toughest times in history and the landscape has changed significantly. Without understanding the climate and market we are currently in, we are bound to get erroneous results from our analysis phase. With the changing landscape also comes changing laws. Many of the fees that banks were once able to assess without monitoring have now been eliminated. This brings to light a major constraint in generating revenue. Banks now have to be more creative in how to generate the lost revenue from the elimination of many fees and interest rate hikes. Once again technology can be the focal point here. In the case of banks which store an abundance of data, technology can really help or hinder revenue generation. From the top down, the use of analyzing data through current technologies can help identify trends and opportunities that exist for optimization. This can be seen through investment opportunities, mortgage rate optimization and even SLA (Service Level Agreement) timeframes. Can we detect bottlenecks? When†¦ Yes †¦ and†¦ When †¦ Not? Explain this. When JIT is better than the Goal? A bottleneck in a process occurs when input comes in faster than the next step can use it to create output. Detecting these bottlenecks however can be very difficult.. When dealing with bottlenecks in a production line, the problem magnifies. The cause can be due to random events (random machine failure) or other changes. A random event failure example in the IT world is a â€Å"system out of memory exception†. This error is known to be a huge constraint at random times in overused systems. The issue with this error is that it happens at random times and thus reproducing can be almost impossible. Before finding the bottleneck the first thing you must do is define the goal of the system you are working on. Simply put, you can’t find the bottleneck if you have no end goal in sight. For most production operations this would be to make money. There are two main types of bottlenecks: [6] 1. Short-term bottlenecks  Ã¢â‚¬â€œ These are caused by temporary problems. A good example is when key team members become ill or go on vacation. No one else is qualified to take over their projects, which causes a backlog in their work until they return. 2. Long-term bottlenecks  Ã¢â‚¬â€œ These occur all the time. An example would be when a companys month-end reporting process is delayed every month, because one person has to complete a series of time-consuming tasks – and he cant even start until he has the final month-end figures. Identifinyg bottlenecks in production are normally easier to find than in a business process. In the production line you can identify which point has the most pile up or which process is taking the longest and pinpoint that process. However, in a business process there are many other factors to consider. As an example let’s consider a director at a software development team. The irector oversees the whole team and is trying to identify what bottlenecks occur in the development process. Let’s assume the team is made of four people. Three of the members are extremely talented however the fourth team member is not pulling his/her weight. You would assume this would come to light but what if the other team members constantly cover for the fourth member and pick up his slack. The work gets done, however production could be much higher if the fourth member was replaced with a more talented member. This bottleneck would be a tough one to detect and may go undetected for a long amount of time. For reasons like this, bottlenecks in a business processes can be very difficult to detect. The Just in Time philosophy is a stagey aimed at improving a business’s ROI by reducing in-process inventory and associated carrying costs. The JIT philosophy evolved out of the production lines of Toyota and Toyota became a competitive threat to the US in the automotive industry. [pic] Fig 2. 0 Just in Time model JIT/lean manufacturing is well suited to repetitive environments such as those for producing automobiles and consumer electronics; however, it is not a panacea for all production companies. 7] JIT is not well suited to the assembly or fabrication firms and also for small batch or job shop operations,. While the Goal focuses on defining the weakest link, JIT concentrates on inventory reduction and exposure of waste. In terms of a business process where human resources are part of the process there could be a common ground between the two theories. Again, consider a process where the weakest link is a team member. In this sense that team member unfortunately could be seen as the â€Å"waste† in that process. With that said it The Goal and TOC have significant contributions in sales, marketing and product development just to name a few. JIT has had a huge impact on other industries such as oil, which is almost purely supply and demand driven. Based on your Recipe (Question 2). Develop a plan to apply theory of constraints to the business case: â€Å"Paediatric Orthopaedic Clinic at the Childrens Hospital of Western Ontario†. By the way where is the Bottleneck in the case study! (to be uploaded – webcourses ucf – on September 7, 2012) The case study makes note of the surveys the customers were given which were written forms that 218 patients filled out. Based on those surveys key data points were introduced. To analyze utilization rates for job functions we divided the hours spent on the process by the total hours available for work from that worker. (Figure 3. 0) [pic] Fig 3. 0 Utilization Rates Going back to our main focus from question #2 in terms of technology, the case study does not give details in terms of the technology systems it uses or whether each department is using the same system. I think this would be an interesting aspect to look at. We are focusing on the process, but we not know the system dynamics behind this. Some interesting questions to ask which are not mentioned: †¢ Do the different departments have effective communication with each other through software? †¢ Are the notes being recorded and shared across all departments? †¢ What are some of the manual processes/ constraints that software could possible help expedite One of the biggest patient complaining points was that of losing money by missing work to take their child to the hospital. A simple but effective solution for that could be to change the hours of operation to either open very early or close very late so the adults can go during their off work hours. Purchasing additional equipment could also help if the clinic’s research shows that the lack of equipment is a constraint. Lastly, the bottlenecks in the process seem to revolve around the analysis of the wait times and the utilization rates. In The Radiology department the patient wait time at 58 minutes is almost double of any other wait time.

Discuss the Caretaker as A Comedy of Menace. Essay Example

Discuss the Caretaker as A Comedy of Menace. Essay Example Discuss the Caretaker as A Comedy of Menace. Essay Discuss the Caretaker as A Comedy of Menace. Essay Essay Topic: House Of Mirth The Caretaker generally followed a pattern: the brilliance of the actors was celebrated and the questions of influence, primarily Becketts, were linked to discussions of the relationship between the comic and serious elements in the play. Interpretations of the meaning varied from the literal to the fully allegorical, by way of generalized abstract tags. Subsequent academic criticism, deriving from textual study rather than stage performance, has early always followed the serio-tragical-symbolical-abstract line- what we might call Modern Man in Search of His Insurance Cards, or, I stink. Therefore I am. The comedy of The Caretaker is not a dispensable palliative. To discuss meaning without taking this into account is to distort the play as a whole and devalue its achievement. The combination of the comic and the serious, laughter and silence, is often deeply disturbing for art audience: but only in confronting it can we begin to understand the play. For one member of the audience, at least, the relationship between the comic and the serious elements was unacceptable. Leonard Russell, the Sunday Times book reviewer, recorded his impressions of a performance at the Duchess Theatre in an open letter to Harold Pinter: I will go so far as to admit that I found it a strangely menacing and disturbing evening. It was also a highly puzzling evening; and here I refer not to the play but to the behaviour of the audience. On the evening I was present a large majority had no doubt at all that your special contribution to the theatre is to take a heartbreaking themes and treat it facially. Gales of happy, persistent, and, it seemed to me, totally indiscriminate laughter greeted a play which I lake to be, for all its funny moments, a tragic reading of life. May, I ask this question- are you yourself happy with the atmosphere of rollicking good fun? Pinters reply is such crucial importance for an understanding of the play: Your question is not an easy one to answer. Certainly I laughed myself while writing The Caretaker, but not all the time, not indiscriminately. An element of the absurd is, I think, one of the features of the play, but at the same time I did not intend it to be merely a laughable force. If there hadnt been other issues at stake the play would not have been written. Audience reaction cant be regulated, and no one would want it to be; nor is it easy to analyses. But where the comic and tragic (for want of a better word) are closely interwoven, certain members of an audience will always give emphasis to the comic as opposed to the other, for by so doing they rationalize the other out of existence. On most evenings at the Duchess there is a sensible balance of laughter and silence. Where, though, this indiscriminate mirth is found. I feel it represents a cheerful patronage of the characters on the part of the merrymakers, and thus participating is avoided. This laughter is in fact a mode of precaution, a smoke-screen, a refusal to accept what is happening as recognizable (which I think it is) and instead to view the actors (a) as actors always and not as characters and (b) as chimpanzees. From this kind of neasy jollification I must, of cause, dissociate myself, thought I do think you were unfortunate in your choice of evening. As far as Im concerned, The Caretaker is funny, up to a point. Beyond that point it ceases to be funny, and it was because of that point that I wrote it. Pinters letter is an essential starting point for discussion of the play. Adequate criticism must be based on a recognition of both the comic and tragic elements compounded in the paralleled process of stage performance and audience response. Out emotional reaction of laughter or silence complements what happens on stage. Both actors and audience create a structure of feeling that the play has in its living moment, as Pinter puts it. The point where The Caretaker ceases to be funny must be found within the movement of the play itself and within the emotional complex of our participation. In order to do so, I wasnt to focus not so much on the physical structure which is relatively straight forward but rather on the structure of feeling, the emotional rhythm of laughter and silence which culminates in the arrested tension of both. Rather than follow the tendency to generalise from paraphrase and thereby lose the essential drama, one must examine certain passages in order to bring out the deeply sensitive psychological insight that lies behind Pinters plain statement. Deeply Sensitive Psychological Insight When the curtain rises, Mick shares the activity of the audience. He slowly looks about The Room looking at each object in turn. He looks up at the ceiling, and stares at the bucket. Then he brazenly separates himself from the audience. Ceasing, he sits quite still, expressionless, looking out front. Silence for thirty seconds. Mick then leaves upon hearing muffled voices. This silent enigma is in dramatic contrast to the end of the play. At the outset Mick, in effect, rejects the audience by walking offstage after a protracted silence, while at the close it is Davies who is left onstage rejected by the audience insofar as we recognize that he must go. But this formal, inverted symmetry is recognised retrospe ctively. Micks silence and departure stays as a qualm, leaving a question behind the laughter that is immediate. Astons opening invitation to Davies to sit down is manifestly frustrated by the evident disorder of the attic. As Aston sorts out a chair, Davies breaks into the first of so many complaints: Sit down? Huh I havent had a good sit down I havent had a proper sit down well, I couldnt tell you Ten minutes off for a tea-break in the middle of the night in that place and I can’t find a seat, not one. All those Greeks had it, Poles, Greeks, Blacks, the lot of them, all them aliens had it. And they had me working there they had me working All them Blacks had it, Blacks, Greeks, Poles, the lot of them thats what, doing me out of a seat, treating me like dirt. When he come at me tonight I told him Daviess categorical discriminations (sit down good sit down proper sit down) express the degree of deprivation that he feels he has suffered. His present gratitude is deflected and finally demolished by recrimination directed at the immediate past. An aggrieved sense of active and collective discourtesy by default is magnified to a major injustice; it is as if the merely adventitious revealed the latent injustice of victimization as a permanent condition of the world. As so often in comedy a mundane occurrence is given an unwarrantedly inflated significance. Daviess bigotry, aggravated by constitutional self-righteous defensiveness, evidently distorts whatever really happened, and as a consequence we laugh rather than sympathize. The insistent repetition inadvertently suggest that, on the one hand, it is both the multi-racial conditions of work and work itself that has pained Davies, and on the other that his appeal is in part determined by a bit of tobacco coming his way: as Aston begins to roll himself a cigarette. Davies watches him. This initial comedy continues to develop in the ever widening gap between the intentions of Daviess speech and its effect on the audience. Daviess Tramplike Appearance and Mannerisms Even before he speaks Daviess tramp-like appearance has prompted a certain predisposition in the audience. Socially, tramps are at an inferior extreme, and their condition precludes a normative response by definition. Reactions to tramps are nearly always compounded of fear, distaste, embarrassment, seeming indifference, or a degree of sympathy arising from unconscious self-reproach at our own well-being. Whatever feeling predominates depends upon the tramps behaviour on a scale from abasement to aggression. Abasement invites individual, summary charity as a token of Societys larger responsibility for victims of circumstance. Aggression (like Daviess), though frightening on actual encounter, ultimately prompts laughter in the dramatic representation of self-determined viciousness. The transformation of the actual into the dramatic, the street into the theatre, the individual into audience, brings with it the laughter of relief. Before taking a seat, winded by climbing the stairs, Davies must loosen himself up. He exclaims loudly, punches downward with closed fist crying, I could have got done in down there. There is no book and Daviess evidently exaggerated claim is undermined even further by comic colloquialism. The stance of retrospective pugilism suggests a purely mimetic valour. It is clear that the combination of self-assertion and self-deception creates for Davies a fiction to live by. But although the imperatives of his existence have confounded fiction and fact, the distinction is evident to the audience throughout. Aston immediately offers Davies a roll-up but he replies: What? No, no. I never smoke a cigarette Ill tell you what, though, Ill have bit of that tobacco there for my pipe, if you like Thats kind of you, mister. Just enough to fill my pipe, thats all. I had a tin, only only a while ago. But it was knocked off. It was knocked off on the Great West Road. Daviess refusal of the roll-up is reinforced by a categorical statement similar to the earlier example which expresses both the certainty of negative choice and yet an alternative possibility in the suggestion of a latent discrimination. His initial question- What? - is a response to Astons putative motive and means; Davies is rejecting what he feels may be charity but offering to accept Astons tobacco in terms of his own positive preference for the more socially acceptable pipe, all the time leaving the actual decision to Aston. Daviess acknowledged indebtedness is modified by the subsequent etiquette. His self-conscious moderation forestalls any charge of excess, establishing his action as a gen tle manly custom rather than revealing a condition of permanent dependence. The closing anecdote is intended to alter the action of giving and receiving into a form of indirect restitution. A similar rationalisation takes place later in the act when Davies accepts a few bob from Aston: Thank you, thank you, good luck. I just happen to find myself a bit short. You see, I got nothing for all that weeks work I did last week. Thats the position, thats what it is. Though retrospective criticism of this nature articulates the ironies of Daviess gesture and utterance, the immediacy of the audiences experience registers this emotively, responding to the comic moment which is immediately fulfilled when Aston fails to corroborate Daviess revision of his misfortune. You heard me tell him, didnt you? Davies asks, Aston replies I saw him have a go at you, forcing him to attempt to draw sympathy by reference to age, Go at me? You wouldnt grumble. The filthy skate an old man like me. But here Daviess aggressive demotic ironically pre-empts the response he seeks, while the claim that breathlessly follows- Ive had dinner with the best- incites the broadest laughter with its blatant i mprobability. Aston, with a neutral imperturbability that promotes our laughter even further, refuses to comply and calmly repeats himself, Yes, I saw him have a go at you. Daviess only recourse is to recall his persona! standards to bolster his present judgments: All them toe-rags, mate, got the manners of pigs. I might have been on the road a few years but you can take it from me Im clean. I keep myself up. Thats why I left my wife. Fortnight after I married her, no, not so much as that, no more than a week, I took the lid off a saucepan, you know what was in it? A pile of her underclothing, unwashed. The pan for vegetables, it was. The vegetable pan. Thats when I left her and I havent seen her since. Davies has no apparent sense that such demonstrative probity is so farcically disproportionate that it cancels what it claims. Following Daviess earlier revision of events, this exaggeration suggests that what we hear is a ludicrous distortion of whatever may have happened. The indis criminately vulgar language of the opening- All them toe-rags, mate, got the manners of pigs- burlesques the posture of arbiter of decorum which it protects. Immediately following this, Davies describes the row in the cafe. While laiming proper respect due to an old man, if a few years younger he would break in half that Scotch git. All the socially regulative values Davies claims- dignity, respect, propriety, decorum- are confounded by the language and gesture of a caricatured ethic more appropriate to an anti-social wild animal, as Mick later describes him. In short Daviess comic character is founded on a total travesty of the mode of being to which he aspires. The pathos of his deprivation is made comic with the citation of a public lavatory attendant as a promoter of a personal hygiene. Vast significance is given to the quotidian- Shoes? Its life and death to me, man, Daviess scale of values inverts the normative values of the audience, accustomed to more abstract priorities, which remain unquestioned since Davies cannot be taken seriously. We reason not the need when it is rendered in comic picaresque. Elaborating on his need for footwear, Davies launches into the celebrated tale of the quest to the Luton monastery. A ‘bastard monk, the representative of a holy order, warns the suppliant, if you dont piss off Ill kick you all the way to the gate. As Davies expands on his misfortunes, mounting audience laughter accompanies each incident, culminating in applause at the close of the story. And with applause action is temporarily suspended. For a few crucial seconds the actor is divorced on the character as the audience celebrates a comic performance. The reality of whatever happened in Luton is subverted by characteristically jaundiced aggression which is transferred to the monk, dramatically evoking laughter rather than sympathy. Therefore, Davies as a credible being struggles not only with Aston and Mick, but with the theatrically formalised predisposition of the audience, a predisposition to see Davies as a type, a brilliantly embodied act, at best a tramp, but hardly an individual Shortly after the Luton story, the anecdote of Sidecup and the papers consolidates this. Davies insists that the Side up papers prove who I am They tell you who I am, but we know he will never collect those chimerical documents of fifteen years ago. Lack of shoes, or bad weather, or something else will always intervene. His re-assumption of a past bureaucratic identity could not alter what he is. It is being a tramp which has shaped his body and soul, and not the fact that he is called Bernard Jenkins rather than Mac Davies. Every utterance and every gesture he makes denote a class rather than an individual, dialect subsumes idiolect. Davies is finally no more than his languge and appearance- and this is how Mick encounters him at the end of the first act. Micks Insight It is as if throughout most of Act I Mick has been listening in, since he shows an uncanny insight into Daviess character. In this sense Mick is almost a representative of the audience, knowing, sardonically, as much as they know. On the other hand Mick knows his Davieses as he knows his London, but he expresses it indirectly in terms of Astons behaviour: Mick: He doesn’t work. (Pause) Davies: Go on! Mick: No, he just doesnt like work, thats his trouble. Davies: Ay. Mick: Hes just shy of it. Very shy of it Davies: I know that sort. Mick: You know the type. At the end of Act: Mick immediately recognises Daviess work-shy type, and his first words, Whats the game ? are really the later statement, I know what you want, put in the form of a question. Comic Relief It has been shown by Peter Davison that Micks first two speeches derive in form from the traditional music-hall monologue. As such, alongwith something like the bag-passing game, they border on the farcical. But there is more to them than this. In laughing at the combination of the ludicrous, the grotesque and the improbable, the audience join s Mick in laughing at Davies. In other words, Mick provides the relief of a new comic perspective which enlists the audience on its side. At this point the verbal slapstick seems almost innocuous: You remind me of my uncles brother. He was always on the move, that man. Never without his passport. Had an eye for the girls. Very much your build. Bit of an athlete. Long-jump specialist. He had a habit of demonstrating different run-ups in the drawing-room round about Christmas time. Had a penchant for nuts. Thats what it was. Nothing else but a penchant. Couldnt eat enough of them. Peanuts, walnuts, brazil nuts, monkey nuts, wouldnt touch a piece of fruit cake. Had a marvelous stop-watch. Picked it up in Hong Kong. The day after they chucked him out of the Salvation Army. Used to go in number four for Beckenham Reserves. That was before he got his Gold Medal. Had a funny habit of carrying his fiddle on his back. Like a papoose. I think there was a bit of the red Indian in him. To be honest, Ive often thought that may be it was the other way round. I mean that my uncle was his brother and may be he was my uncle. But I never called him uncle. As a matter of fact I called him Sid. My mother called him Sid too. It was a funny business. Your spilling image he was. Married a Chinaman and went to Jamaica. In spite of its seeming inconsequentiality this speech manifestly says a lot about Davies, Mick and Aston on a naturalistic and psychological level. Micks sardonic delivery expresses at once both discursive doubt and impatience with the conversation game and a sadistic playfulness. The verbal barrage parallels the earlier arm-twisting: verbal intimidation follows physical domination. Mick is equally dexterous at both. What Mick is really saying behind the formal obliquity of his narrative is this- I recognized your sort, a tramp (always on the move), with your story of papers (never without his passport), your ridiculous physical posturing (Bit of an athlete), thrown out of a monastery (they chucked him out of the Salvation Army) of questionable background (a bit of the Red Indian in him), now mixed up with my brother (Ive never made out of how he came to be my uncles brother), why dont you clear off (married a Chinaman and went to Jamaica). But at the same time Mick is deflecting a suppressed view of his own brother that is forced into his mind by the fact of Daviess presence: my brother (You remind me of my uncles brother) has picked up this nut (had a penchant or nuts), he must be nutty as a fruit cake (wouldnt touch a piece of fruit cake). Micks feelings only emerge eventually by way of his surrogate; Davies whose exclamation Hes nutty! enables Mick to savour the suppressed, emotionally forbidden, work: Nutty? Whos nutty? (Pause). Did you call my brother nutty? My brother. Micks second speech is also something more than an exercise in intimidation. It is a comically indirect way of elaborating on what is implicit: the foreignness of Davies. The indigenous Mick ironically compares the indigent Davies with a fellow Londoner. Micks irony is sharpened by his reflection on the sense of difference felt by a working-class North Londoner for those from south of the Thames. When I got to know him I found out he was brought up in Putney. That didnt make any difference to me. The bloke, after all, was born in the Caledonian Road, just before you get to the Nags Head. Micks North London references are to neighboring localities linked by bus routes at the centre of which is the blocks old mum still living at the Angel. Mick evokes neighbourhood, pub and home- the self-advertisement of a particular kind of Londoner recognising an outsider and reminding him of the fact. By contrast, Davies lonely wandering existence is reflected by sporadic, peripheral references to places outside of London proper (Sidcup, Luton, Watford, Wembley) and to past friends: I used to know a bookmaker in Acton. He was a good mate to me. Whereas Micks two speeches are littered with familial terms (uncle, brother, mother, cousin). Daviess anecdotes suggest that over the years, in all of London between Luton and Sidcup, only two encounters have ever led to friendship- and both friendships of a dubious kind. The style and delivery of Micks speeches suggest the amateur comedian at home in pub, club or family; Davies is only a solitary tramp stranded somewhere on the Great West R oad or the North Circular, an anomaly. But all these serious undertones are checked by a sense of game. Micks interrogation of Davies is deliberately punctured by straight music-hall cross-talk: Mick: Thats my bed Davies: What about that, then Mick: Thats my mother’s bed. Davies: Well she wasnt in it last night! Even when Mick rounds on Davies in this third long speech. Youre stinking the place out. Youre an old robber, theres no getting away from it. Youre an old skate†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. - the serious force of his charges is tempered, firstly by his appropriation of Daviess language (filthy skate, and secondly, by an extended parody of the conditions of tenancy and purchase. Between an outline of costs and recommendation of Aston as decorator. Mick threatens Otherwise Ive got a van outside, I can run you to the police station in five minutes, have you in for trespassing, loitering with intent, daylight robbery, filching, thieving and stinking the place out. Amusing to the audience, this exaggeration is frightening to Davies since the language parallels his own exaggerated sense of persecution. The ludicrous magnification of the obligations, commitments and penalties of legal responsibility in buying a house is a humorous reminder to the audience of an often exhaustingly protracted business, but to Davies it is a manifestation of a bureaucratic world that excludes him. Mick makes the point in his repeated final question Who do your bank with? This complex verbal humour is accentuated by the visual comedy. Throughout the act Davies has been on stage without his trousers, in his long pants, and Mick emphasizes the fact by flicking Daviess trousers in his face- several times. This is then followed, almost immediately, by one of the oldest plays in the slapstick repertoire, the bag-passing game with its knockabout sequence reversal. Threat and menace are conflated in Micks speeches and the bag-passing game is almost wholly funny (but not merely funny, since the same symbolises the way in which Davies himself passes from brother to brother). Then, with the terrifying attack in darkness and the succeeding revelation that it is Mick merely spring cleaning with an electrolux, violence and laughter are powerfully juxtaposed. Thus Pinter exploits different kinds of comedy in a cumulative and structured way: comedy of character is established in Act I and then extended by music-hall monologue and broad farce in Act II. Comedy of language, gesture and action is then allowed to build up to the moment when it is dramatically arrested by Astons long, painful account of treatment in a mental hospital, and the events leading up to it. Astons speech has always been recognized as a major moment in the movement of the play, but its full significance has not been adequately discussed. Astons Behaviour John Russell Brown has pointed out the correspondences between Astons hospital treatment and his present behaviour. He underwent electrical treatment and now fiddles obsessively with electrical equipment: he has a white coat, a pillow and a sheet at the ready: the uncovered light bulb glares down; he stares smilingly over Davies in bed. Brown also points out that Aston did go back to place like the cafe and did talk to strangers again- namely Davies- and suggests that the impetus for this was two-hold. Aston is haunted by revenge and somehow sees his own role as a caretaker of Davies. These are all important points, but need to be taken further. Aston refers to the piles of papers he was shown as medical evidence: Davies refers to the piles of papers kept in the attic. Aston says that the window of his hospital room was barred; the indications are that the attic window was kept open even before Daviess malodorous entry. Aston spent five hours sawing at the bars, and is now preoccupied with saws, ostensibly to carry out the building work. He recognises that in cafe and factory he talked too much, and his long speech is a chilling reminder that he still does. What does all this add up to? Surely the commonly accepted notion of Astons charity in taking in Davies is called a question here. Rather than a disinterested act deriving from an impulse or conviction of moral duty and thus a token of his social rehabilitation it is part of the irreparable damage brought about by his sufferings. Astons charity is a way of simultaneously vindicating himself and impugning those who have harmed him. Davies is there in the attic because of Astons psychology, not because of his ethics: Aston sees. Davies as a version of himself. Astons recollections of the glass of Guinness and the lady in the cafe indicate his continuing disorientation. Both these speeches occur after pauses and have no relation to what precedes them and both after pauses and have no relation to what precedes them, and both contrast forcefully with Astons previous reticence. As conversational gambits they are disastrously bizarre; it is almost as if of an interior monologue has suddenly come to the surface. The preoccupation of Aston and Davies are psychological treadmills imprisoning each in his mutually exclusive world. For Aston to work on the house he needs to clear the garden for a shed. To build the shed on the house he needs to clear the garden for a saw bench, is needed for the shed. Davies, to sort himself out needs his papers at Sidcup. To get to Sidcup he needs good shoes, to get good shoes he needs, money, to get money he needs his papers to sort himself out Both minds have been numbed by the different experiences of being on the road and being in a mental hospital: both are reduced to a preoccupation with the physical function of hands and feet. With Astons speech the laughter ceases. And there is no caretaker for them. The audience is silenced and confounded as the darkness grows. Comic Tableau As Act III opens, and before anything is said, Davies is seen in a comic tableau, pipe in hand and incongruously garbed in a smoking jacket. Here, after the strain of confronting the nature of Astons being, we are at last allowed the relief of laughter. But when Davies speaks, although his concerns seem much the same (the gas stove, blacks, shoes, etc. ) his continual reference to Aston compromise and complicate our response. At this point as subjective coefficient of guilt rises in us, deriving in part from our former complicity with Mick (now more evidently working on his strategy of expulsion) and in part from laughing at Astons expense. Whereas earlier Davies seemed self-determining and thus responsible for what he is, he now seems more like a plaything being used by Mick for certain questionable ends. The serious and the comic are now much more, forcefully counter pointed. Micks dry-mock is still there (You must come up and have a drink something. Listen to some Tchaikovsky and Daviess procrastination, although now invidiously ungrateful, is still lightened to pure comedy (the only way to keep a pair of shoes on, if you havent got no laces, is to tighten the foot, see? But Daviess response to Micks evocation of a penthouse palace- What about me? - gives voice to the inevitable question at the heart of the situation. Micks All this junk here, its no good to anyone, is much less casual than it seems. Davies as, part of the junk, will obviously have to go, and we recognise it. Mick obliquely incites Daviess verbal attack on Aston by giving voice to what the tramp has felt from the outset. Daviess real feelings in surveying the attic are compromised by the fact that Aston has rescued him. As a consequence Davies says the opposite of what he feels: Davies: This your room? Aston: Yes. Davies: You got a good bit of stuff here. Aston: Yes. Davies: Must be worth a few bob, this put it all together. (Pause) Theres enough of it. Aston: Theres a good bit of it, all right. Davies: You sleep here, do you? Aston: Yes. Davies: What, in that? Similarly, Micks pointed summary not only places Davies as part of the rubbish and simultaneously predisposed him to attack Aston, but gives utterance to that protracted stare at the opening of the play: All this junk here, its no good to anyone. Its just a lot of old iron, thats all Clobber. Davies Opportunistic Nastiness Davies echoes this in his viciously prolonged attack on Aston as an irresponsible lunatic, all this junk I got to sleep with this lousy filthy hole. Daviess contemptible vilification is emotionally complex for an audience. If it confirms our opinion, of Daviess opportunist nastiness and strengthen our impulse to reject him as wholly objectionable, at the same time it provides almost a release for our strained protective feelings towards Aston. The opening lines of the speech continue Daviess exaggerated sense of comic victimisation made ludicrous by disproportionate expectation: Its getting so freezing in here I have to keep my trousers on to go to bed. I never done that before in my life. But thats what I got to do here. Just because you wont put in any bleeding heating! We may derive a temporary sense of relief in what follows by intellectually assessing the circularity of Daviess charge- Aston is lunatic because he is irresponsible and irresponsible because he is lunatic- and even maintain our distance when Davies claim the friendship and kindred opinion of Mick. But this relief is completely shattered as Davies sadistically baits Aston with the prospect of renewed electrical treatment. As the emoti on rises both in Davies and the audience it is, paradoxically, both undercut and heightened by localised London slang: Theyd take one look at all this junk I got to sleep with theyd know you were a creamer. Davies charges Aston with what, in all probability, has been levelled at him, acreamer. It is almost funny as an unexpected synonym for the more current nutcase, but at the same time more insidiously mocking for Aston, since Davies uses the highly specific argot of Astons own background. Yet even at this point we are tempted to laugh as Daviess expression gets more and more Welsh in self-righteous anger: You want me to do all the dirty work all up and down them stairs just so I can sleep in this lousy filthy hole every night? Not me, boy. Not for your, boy. But the idioms that provoke laughter also arrest it: Youre up the creek! Youre half off! Our awareness of the possibility of this being true checks our natural tendency to respond humorously to figurative exaggeration. Daviess subsequent question Whoever saw you slip me a few bob? Simultaneously recalls Astons kindness in doing just that, and predisposes the audience to take up a defensive position, on Astons behalf, against Daviess final callousness- I never been inside a nuthouse! Even here, the colloquially derisive reduction makes us want to laugh, as we have laughed at the peremptory idiom of Micks attack on Davies. But as Davies draws his knife on ominous silence supervenes. This tableau recalls Davies ineptitude in threatening Mick earlier, and Aston finally breaks the tension with a delayed understatement that is totally deflating: I think its about time you found somewhere else. I dont think were hitting it off! This is precisely what Mick has been worming towards. He could have thrown Davies out whenever he liked, but he has waited two weeks for Aston to see through Daviess character. Mick has promoted the exposure in order that Aston will see and feel as he does. The usual interpretation of Mick and Astons relationship- that there is an unspoken bond of brotherly love between them- is really rather naive and sentimental. Mick smashes the Buddha to pieces out of a frustrated rage that derives from his suppressed acknowledgement of the truth of Daviess previous accusation (Hes nutty), and his subsequent passionate outburst is a wilful attempt to see Astons condition in terms of his failure to decorate the house, rather than in terms of what lies beneath it. To have thrown Davies out would have been a tacit admission that Aston was a lunatic to have brought him there in the first place. (Perhaps Davies wasnt the first? ) Mick and Aston In other words, Micks obligation to his brother is formal rather than affective. Micks character- tough, sardonic, worldly-wise- is similar to that of the people in the cafe and the factory who found Aston funny and were instrumental in having him put away. Like his mother and the doctor, Mick wants Aston to live like the others. He understands Davies so well because they both have a kind of bureaucratic view of the world. They both see human activity in terms of status conferred by institutions that regulate society (social security, solicitors, etc). Whereas the Buddha for Aston was an example of something well made, for Mick it embodies all that he cannot face in his brother- the inscrutable, the passive, and the alien. But, in tarring over the roof Aston is learning to take over of himself, in Micks term. At the opening of the play the suspended bucker focuses for Mick his brothers condition as he understands it, and their only exchange in Act II concerns the problem of tarring over the leaking roof. As Act III opens, Davies contemplates Astons silence in terms of his single activity of doing the job (ironically this anticipates his own expulsion). This small task signalises that Aston will comply with Micks view of things, a complicity dramatized by the taint smile they exchange towards the close. Mick smiles in recognition of what he sees as his rightness in paying off Davies, and Aston smiles back conceding the fact- his last words to Davies were Get your stuff. Davies must go, however plangent his appeal: What am I going to do?. Where am I going to go. The pauses between each utterance are lengthened into the long silence of the final stage direction. Aston turns back to the window, remains still, his back to him, at the window, but we are faced with Daviess concrete questioning presence. We are forced here to confront not only what laughter has created but also what laughter has suppressed. The repetitions of Davies language echo those moments of comedy which are now stifled by the specter of destitution. Daviess need for material items has created moments of high comedy, but the serious moral implications of such subsistence culminate in those questions. The material, social and cultural privileges that presuppose our presence in the theatre are indices of the totality of Daviess deprivation. Throughout the play Davies has been the object of the solidarity of laughter, but now the audience itself is exposed in its own silence before him. The possibilities of food, shelter and warmth are now to be replaced by the possibilities of hunger, cold and exposure, intimation of which have been present all along (I could have died on the road, Davies says at one point. Was this the substance of his nightmares? ). The harsh regimen of the doss-house has been evoked earlier in Daviess hurried attempt to forestall what he knows must happen as the rule of each daybreak: Dont you want me to get out. Rhythm of the Play The points where the laughter spasmodically ceases are obvious enough in the rhythm of the play. These dramatic moments correspond psychologically to the point in each of us where conflicting impulses and vestigial atavism and ostensible civility meet. We experience in The Caretaker the Hobbesian triumph of superior of laughter ovger inferior objects and ludicrousness transforms the socially embarrassing. But beneath this is the self-protective impulse to remove what is psychologically painful. Just as children laugh at (and thus exorcise) the sight of physical deformity, so we react to Daviess warped morality- all the time expecting him to ask for our compassion. But Davies remains intransigent, he does not offer us the adult compromise of compassion. In our laughter there stirs an uneasy atavism which grows in proportion as Daviess nastiness increases. We cannot finally accept Davies on his own terms- as he is. He has to be either killed off by our laughter, or transformed by the tragic dignity of self-awareness. Our emotional expectations are in part shaped by dramatic convention. Davies must be either contemptible or pitiful, a comic vice exposed in laughter, or, by token of some redemptive self-insight, an ultimately traffic figure. But he is actually neither, and this is what is almost too painful. In the theatre adult emotions are customarily channeled into a comforting species of self-protective compassion. Pinter refuses to provide this. Initially Pinter felt that there would have to be a death at the end of the play, but it is clear that this would have only provided another kind of emotional release- and evasion. Pinter not only dropped this notion but in revision, chose to stress the ineluctable concrete actuality of Davies there, before us: resistant to allegory, abstraction, and moral formula. Here, in the long silence, no longer so much an audience as a disparate assembly of individuals which includes Davies, we are forced to confront the limits of our human response, the edges of emotional vulnerability, the barriers of social ordinance that join and divide us all. This is our participation, and this is where the point of laughter and silence, as Pinters letter reminds us, both begins and ends. Bibliography: http://plays. about. com/od/playwrights/a/pinter. htm

The argument Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 4

The argument - Essay Example On the one hand, it is rather necessary to consider increasing the minimum age of a driving license holder from 16 to 17. This is because this action can significantly reduce the number of accidents in the roads. According to various researchers, numerous accidents are attributed by the young drivers on the roads. This is a clear indication that raising the minimum age of obtaining a driving license to 17 years would immensely lead to a reduction of the road accidents (Jacobs 29). In fact, the young drivers are usually inexperienced and under-developed cognitively hence, as teenagers they have a higher probability of being involved in automobile accidents. These young drivers should also be involved in more hours of practice with the licensed drivers in order to prevent the countless deaths that are caused by accidents. From a mathematical perspective, the raise in the minimum age would amount to less road users. This clearly asserts that the numerous road accidents will also be decreased substantially. According to various psychologists, the mindset of most young drivers is not fully mature until when the individual hits the 20’s. Thus, increasing the minimum age of the drivers can be considered as a vast step in improving road safety. Statistics assert that most of the road users in numerous countries are approximately ages 16 to 24 (Jacobs 32). The lack of experience and responsibility in this age group has led to a radical change in road transportation. This is because most of these individuals are faced with the dangers of reckless driving, drinking under the influence of drugs among other conditions. Most of the individuals in this age group are victims of drug abuse, which affects road safety. For example, when such individuals drive under the influence of drugs, there is a high probability that they can cause accidents. This endangers the lives of other innocent road users including the pedestrians and other motorists who

Research Bibliography Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Bibliography - Research Paper Example Visual arts and film studies is a broad body of knowledge that requires adequate research in a variety of fields. Several scholars in the field of visual arts and film studies have wrote useful research books that can be used for comprehensive studies. Francisco Goya is among the scholars who have made a great contribution in the field of visual arts and film studies. A critical analysis of his works portrays a cognitive combination of various artistic features aimed at broadening the reader’s mind in analyzing artistic aspects. Francisco Goya developed the los Caprichos, which comprise of 80 sets of prints put out as an album (Goya, 50). Francisco’s works are organized as an artistic experiment tailored to picture the flaws in the knowledge base of the Spanish society, a place he spent much of his time. Francisco elaborated the issue of dominance of superstition in the society, high level of ignorance, defective leadership approach, and marital slipups. Generally, his works can be described as depicting since they are concerned with outlining misconceptions that are evident in any civilized society. In essence, most of his works point out deceptive features in the society such as ignorance, self-interest by leaders, and unclear means of acquiring wealth. For the purpose of studying various aspects of visual arts and film studies, we can focus on the fourth series of Francisco’s artistic genre. The series is a critique of the practices experienced in the 18th century in the Spanish society and the human race at large. Francisco uses a unique informal style of writing to convey crucial information regarding the contemporary society and people behavior. His style of presenting ideas laid a foundation for quality print production for future generations. From studying the works of Francisco Goya, people understood that information can be passed through prints and animation. In addition, blending color with a combination of

Strategic Corporate Development History Of Cadbury Marketing Essay

Strategic Corporate Development History Of Cadbury Marketing Essay Strategic management is the dynamic process of formulation, implementation, evaluation and control of strategies to realize the organizations strategic intent. Strategic management is a dynamic process. In this particular course work of strategic planning module the company which I have selected is Cadbury India, a company with a great marketing structure, strategic planning and with a strong value among the customers all over the globe. Company History Cadbury India The Company was incorporated on 19th July 1948, as a private limited company under the name of Cadbury-Fry (India) Private Limited and commences business soon thereafter. Gradually the Company undertook at its own cost and responsibility the development of cocoa growing in the country. A specialist cocoa advisory service was created. A cocoa research centre was also created together with seeding nurseries and distribution centers. Through its subsidiary, Induri Farm Ltd., the Company had set up facilities near Pune to breed cattle that would give improved yield of milk at economic feeding costs. Strategic Corporate Development History of Cadbury Inc . 1919 undertook a merger with J. S. Fry Sons, another chocolate manufacturer which saw the integration of well-known brands such as Frys Chocolate Cream and Frys Turkish Delight Cadbury merged with drinks company Schweppes to form Cadbury Schweppes in 1969 Cadbury Schweppes went on to acquire Sunkist, Canada Dry, Typhoo Tea and more. In the US, Schweppes Beverages was created and the manufactures of Cadbury confectionery brands were licensed to Hersheys. Triarc sold Snapple, Mistic and Stewarts (formerly Cable Car Beverage) to Cadbury Schweppes in 2000 for $1.45  billion. In October of that same year, Cadbury Schweppes purchased Royal Crown from Triarc. In March 2007, it was revealed that Cadbury Schweppes was planning to split its business into two separate entities: one focusing on its main chocolate and confectionery market; the other on its US drinks business. The demerger took effect on 2 May 2008, with the drinks business becoming Dr. Pepper Snapple Group Inc. In December 2008 it was announced that Cadbury was to sell its Australian beverage unit to Asahi Breweries. In 2008 Monkhill Confectionery, the Own Label trading division of Cadbury Trebor Bassett was sold to Tangerine Confectionery for  £58million cash. This sale included factories at Pontefract, Cleckheaton and York and a distribution centre near Chesterfield, and the transfer of around 800 employees. On 19 January 2010, it was announced that Cadbury and Kraft Foods had reached a deal and that Kraft would purchase Cadbury for  £8.40 per share, valuing Cadbury at  £11.5bn (US$18.9bn). Kraft, which issued a statement stating that the deal will create a global confectionery leader, had to borrow  £7  billion (US$11.5bn) in order to finance the takeover. These are the main strategic developments, which took place within Cadbury Inc. till now. Cadbury Inc has taken major strategic decision throughout their operations but at the end it is being taken over by Krafts. Above-mentioned are the strategic developments of Cadbury Inc. Cadbury India has applied both Corporate-Level Strategies as well as Business-Level Strategies. Corporate-Level Strategies and business-Level Strategies of Cadbury India Introduction of new product-line named Star and Gems chocolates in 1967 and 1968 respectively. After the conversion of Cadbury India from private limited company to public limited company on 11th June in 1977, an agreement was entered into with Cadbury Overseas Ltd., (COL) U.K., on 3rd May1977, for technical services concerning new products and processes. Cadbury India entered into an agreement with CSOL for the grant of a license for continued use of the word `Cadbury as part of the Companys corporate name. Industrial license for the apple juice project was received and the project was commissioned on 16th September, 1980. On 17th December 1982, the name of the Company was changed from Cadbury India Ltd. to Hindustan Cocoa Products Ltd., consequent to 60% of its shares being held by the Indian public. In 1985, Cadbury India explored the possibilities of entering into the business of software export. In 1987, in chocolate group, the Company launched new products such as `Crackle, `Orange, `Strawberry Krisp, `Mello, and `Wildlife bar. In the foods drinks, the Cadbury India launched `Choc O Cheer. In 1988, the Chocolate division introduced some more new products to upper and lower ends of the market. In the food drinks area, a higher protein drink under the brand name `Enriche was successfully introduced. The Company diversified into ice-cream market and a product under the Brand name `Dollops. With effect from 18th July 1993, the Companys Ice Cream business comprising manufacturing arrangements with two well known brands Dollops Lopstop was transferred to Brooke Bond India Ltd. for a consideration of Rs 1062.65 lakhs and an assurance from the company to Brooke Bond that they would not make or sell Ice creams for a period of 8 years. In 1994, The Company undertook a modernization and rationalization programme at its Malanpur factory at a cost of Rs 40 crores. In 1995, Perk was launched from its Malanpur plant. Towards the end of1996, the Company has launched a new range of sugar confectionery, `Googly, a trangy, fizzy fruit flavored candy in Chennai under the brand name `Trebor. In 1997, Cadbury India Ltd has launched Truffle flavored soft centre moulded chocolate bar. The product was launched in Calcutta, Mumbai and New Delhi during October with subsequent launches planned in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and other mini-metros in a phased-manner in November. In 1997, Cadbury India launched its well-known beverage Bournvita in sachets. In 1999, Cadbury India Ltd has launched a new product, `Nice Cream, under its sugar confectioner business. The sugar candy has been launched only in Mumbai. In 2000, Cadburys has introduced Perk Slims, a slimmer version of the wafe. The Company has re-launched Perk, its chocolate-coated wafer; it has four new layers covered in Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate. Cadbury India Ltd. has launched a range of gift packs for Diwali. The Company had entered into a Memorandum of understanding on July 5th, to sell its immovable property at Colaba, Mumbai. Cadbury Schweppes Plc acquires 39.34% stake in its Indian subsidiary Cadbury India Ltd. Cadbury Schweppes Pcl developed a new phenomenon allowing its consumers to define its brand profile. Cadbury India tapping unconventional marketing channels like non-retail chains to drive their market expansion. In 2002, Cadburys buy out of Pfizers confectionary brand is expected to set a strong base in the oral gratification category. In 2003, Cadbury has roped in advertising firm called Lemon to handle creative for its products temptation and milt treat. Cadbury India has dropped Carat India and roped in Madison Media for the media planning and buying. Cadbury India tied up with BPL Mobile for SMS vending services. Thus, we can see from above almost all the corporate -level as well as Business-Level Strategies are adopted by Cadbury India to expand as well as to avoid mishaps. Cadbury India Cadbury India has used different strategies at different situation. They have under gone mergers and acquisition, buyouts, demergers, tie-ups, etc. Current Strategic Situation Cadbury India is a fully owned subsidy of Kraft Foods Inc. The combination of Kraft Foods and Cadbury creates a global powerhouse in snacks, confectionery and quick meals. Cadbury India is currently the worlds No.1 confectionery and biscuit company. Cadbury India is the worlds second-largest food company with sales in approximately 160 countries. Currently, Cadbury India operates in four categories viz. Chocolate Confectionery, Milk Food Drinks, Candy and Gum category. In the Chocolate Confectionery business, Cadbury has maintained its undisputed leadership over the years. Some of the key brands in India are Cadbury Dairy Milk, 5 Star, Perk, Éclairs and Celebrations. In the Milk Food drinks segment Cadburys main product is Bournvitta the leading Malted Food Drink (MFD) in the country. Similarly, in the medicated candy category Halls is the undisputed leader. Recently, Cadbury entered the gums category with the launch of our worldwide dominant bubble gumbrandBubbaloo. Since 1965 Cadbury has also pioneered the development of cocoa cultivation in India. For over two decades, Cadbury have worked with the Kerala Agriculture University to undertake cocoa research and released clones, hybrids that improve the cocoa yield. Cadbury conduct farmers meetings seminars to educate them on Cocoa cultivation aspects. These efforts have increased cocoa productivity and touched the lives of thousands of farmers. The strategies, which Cadbury follows, include: Build a high performing organization Reframe our categories Exploit our sales capabilities Drive down costs à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ without compromising quality Environmental activity of Cadbury: Cadbury India takes care of the environment and enriches the quality of lives of the communities through a variety of result-oriented programs. Cadbury aim to look after the health and safety of our people and minimize the environmental impact of our business around the world. Cadbury India is committed to growing community value around the world. For our employees, this is about making a difference in the community. Other successful strategies adapted by Cadbury to their brands include: The interactive campaign for Pappu Pass Ho Gaya bagged a Bronze Lion at the prestigious Cannes Advertising Festival 2006 for Best use of internet and new media. The idea involved a tie-up with Reliance India Mobile service, allowed students to check their exam results using their mobile service, and encouraged those who passed their examinations to celebrate with Cadbury Dairy Milk. Cadbury Bytes is targeted at teens, as they are the largest consuming segment of packaged snack category. They are also the gateway to the family, especially for a new sweet snack. Cadbury Bytes is positioned as the only sweet snack in the world of salty snacks. Cadbury introduced Cadbury Bournvitta Quiz Contest, which started airing on April 12th 1972, is Indias longest running national school quiz contest. It was really a good strategy to boost-up the sales. The task was to get the youth audience to adopt Cadbury Dairy Milk in the sweet eating or muh meetha karna moments The campaign of Jab Pappu Pass Ho jaye, Kuch Meetha Ho jaye captured the thought of celebrating a moment of delight with Dairy Milk A campaign was built around the idea of how pappu celebrated passing his exams with Dairy Milk A multi-media campaign was launched on TV, Internet, Radio and Outdoor The key was how do own the moment of pappu passing his exams in the media space An innovative tie -up with Reliance web world was executed, wherein students across 66 examination boards across the company could access their results on Reword through their Reliance mobiles. If they passed a message congratulating them on their moment of delight from Dairy Milk was displayed We can see that how Cadbury India has managed and implemented their strategies over a period of time. The company has undergone various strategies like digitalization, various innovation were made to improve their products. Apart from that, they have introduced various products with good features and promoted them with the latest mode of promotion activities. It has been seen that one of the most important strategy at corporate-level was to launch products with innovation and their market strategies like campaigning. It was the trend with Cadbury, which has seen in the past decade. Moreover, in the present situation the company has underwent a turnaround strategy. It has been acquired by another company in Feb 2010 by Kraft Food. At present, it is fully owned subsidiary of Kraft Food. The company has made efficient use of internal and external sources their internal and sources are: Internal Sources: Employees: Employee of Cadbury India were well dedicated to their work and based upon their work only the company has reached to maximum height. In the same way the company has also provided ways and means to satisfy their employees. Employee retrenchment was very low in Cadbury India. Information System: Cadbury has a very good information system adopted. Later, they introduced digitalisation. Finance: the products produced by the company were in great demand that it generated large sales to the company, which helped in increased revenue for the firm. Marketing: The Company adopted various marketing techniques for the promotion of its products like campaigning, conducting contests in schools etc. Operations: In 1994, the company introduced rationalization and modernisation programmes. External Sources: Economic : The economic environment of Cadbury India includes the economic conditions like growth of company in India. Cadbury has very efficiently utilized the economic advantages. Market: The products of Cadbury India have been very efficiently targeted based upon the feature of the product. Cadbury India focused almost all the age group International: Cadbury has their branches in almost most all the countries. They adopted various international strategies like business alliance, mergers etc. To have international access. Technology: More and more efforts were being made to have technological advancement in their products. More or less, they have succeeded in delivering quality products like Cadbury milk chocolate, Bournvitta Energy Drink etc. Social: Cadbury India has undertaken various Corporate Social Responsibility Programmes, which has helped the society. As a part of their social activity, the company has constructed check water dam to store water. Cadbury India is committed to growing community value around the world. Conclusion Thus, we can say that Cadbury India has undergone various Corporate and Business-Level strategies to boost up their activities in almost all the spheres, both internal and external. They have strived a lot to attain the best position in the world. They have attained this with the strategies, which they followed in timely basis. They adopted various measures to face the competition. At last, they could not stop the hostile acquisition from Kraft Food Corporation. It was then with mutual understanding and agreement were converted into a mutual takeover by Kraft Food Corporation. At present Cadbury India is a fully owned subsidiary of Kraft Food. Again, the company should think of various other strategies, learning from the past pitfalls made. They should adopt various other strategies both in Corporate -level as well as in Business-Level. They should try to develop their RD and should come up with new products with greater level of innovation. Consumers need value to the product. Thus, Cadbury India should strive to attain maximum value to their products with reasonable cost targeting almost the entire community as a whole. The company should develop more and more community welfare programmes to improvise community growth as well. They should undertake programmes to develop the nation of the world. Cadbury India should try to concentrate on their strengths to face the threats and should work on their weaknesses to capture the opportunities that are there in the external environment. For that the first steps is to have a SWOT analysis and move on as per the requirement. Strategic Direction for the future In 2006, Cadbury chocolate was linked to a salmonella outbreak, later paying a hefty fine over a leaking factory pipe that contaminated its products. The company suffered a loss of  £30 million. There product have been recalled. Cadbury was looking to re-jig its image and make some smart decisions to save money on resources. Green promises may not put to rest consumers fears of contaminated products. To face this situation, the company set certain targets that include: 50% reduction of net absolute carbon emissions by 2020 with a minimum of 30% from in-company actions. 10% reduction in packaging used per tonne of product and 25% in the more highly packaged seasonal and gifting items. Use more environmentally sustainable forms of packaging aim for 60% biodegradable, with 100% of secondary packaging being recyclable? All water scarce sites to have water reduction programmes in place. The Company worked on these targets efficiently, and to a certain extent, still Cadbury is the market leader in Chocolates and energy drinks like Bournvitta. The company has to go long way to handle this situation. Recently Kraft Food has acquired them. Even though they are the subsidiary of Kraft Food, they should try taking necessary steps to have necessary long-term strategies to improve their standard in the market and continue their leadership in the market. They should try to learn from their past, the mistake or the mishaps, which occurred to them and destroyed their reputation in the market. The first think, which the company should do, is to have a SWOT analysis. Strengths of Cadbury India Global Coverage: the company has maintained a global level in its operations and have a good market share. Quality Products: The company offers quality products to the consumers which is a strength to the company Personnels: The Company is having well Hard-Woking staffs with them who are indulged in their work with full enthusiasm. Information technology: The Company has adopted digitalisation, which will help in networking processes. This can be utilised as strength by the company to improvise their market entry in a new market. Innovations: The Company has made innovations in their products as well as their process to face competition. They have adopted rationalisation and modernisation in their operations. Value to customers: The Company is providing value to customers by various ways and means. Cadbury is providing various well-accepted brands. Cadbury Chocolate: Cadbury is blessed with the brand Cadbury Chocolate. Still it is the best choice among the customers. Cadbury Bournvitta: In beverage section, Cadbury is blessed with Cadbury Bournvitta, a energy during mostly liked by kids and moms. Weaknesses of Cadbury India Past out break of contamination: Cadbury has gone through an out break of contamination in their products. It caused a bad reputation among the consumers. Incurred loss: The Company has incurred loss and lost its stability for the past three years from 2007. Opportunities to Cadbury India Cadbury India can enter new markets with the help of proper market research With the available technology, Cadbury can bring up with new version of the existing products and can grab the opportunities in the market. Cadbury can adopt various innovations in the products like adding extra flavour etc. The company can come up with new product-line Threats to Cadbury India Competition is the mostly affected threat to Cadbury. Competitors like Nestle are also the largest manufacturers of confectionery items. So, Cadbury has to take appropriate steps to face the competitive situation Consumers dislike with regard to the past out break issues may become a threat in future. These are the major developmental strategies, which have been adopted by Cadbury India to meet the target for 2011. 3D forming chocolate increased investment we have made in innovation, marketing and sales Thermostatic food grade packaging Methods for producing microscopic aeration in candy to provide new textures and mouth feel. Healthy additions to hard candy Alternative ingredients to menthol Cadbury India has grabbed opportunies in the market by these ways. Apart from these innovative strategies, Cadbury India has to undergo various other international strategies to increase the market share. Following are the likely ways by which Cadbury can increase there market share: The company should analysis the competitors strategies, their capabilities and future goals. By analysing this, Cadbury will be able to re-think of their strategies, their future goals and the capabilities they posses. This will help them to re-frame their strategies, goals with the capabilities they have, if need. Cadbury India can have niche strategies. They can concentrate on one particular brand and create niche market with proper innovation and product improvement. They can have integrative Cost leadership and differentiation strategies. It is possible through providing the product at low cost with the help of technologies that enable differentiation through focus on niche segment. Cadbury can adopt focus strategy by identifying a narrow target in terms of markets and customers. The company can have restructuring strategies in certain areas where they feel are weak. Cadbury India should identify an area where the company is incurring loss. After identifying that particular area or brand, they can adopt divesting strategy to stop completely the area which is causing loss to the company The company should analyse the internal environment prevailing in the organisation and should find out the loopholes. After identifying the correct problem, proper rehabilitation should be made. If the company finds that every thing is fine in the organisation and the organisation is ready to go forward with the existing products and plan, then the organisation should adopt No-change strategy. The company can have tie-ups with companies who can provide better expertise in all respect. Cadbury as what they have done in the past can have business alliance with other companies to boost up the profits. By have strategic alliances Cadbury can enter new markets, reduce their manufacturing costs, develop new technologies and diffuse them. Cadbury can have Joint ventures to gain access to new business in order to have advantage like, shared risks, combined expertise and effective utilisation of resources available with in the joint venture. They can reduce the hurdles like import quotas, tariffs, nationalistic-political interests and cultural roadblocks. Cadbury can either acquire a company, which is in the same line of production to have the advantage of efficient production of products with the available expertise of both the companies, and innovative ideas and improved processes or the company can merge with another company and start a new business having the same products with innovations. In the first case, the company need to have investment and in the second case, the company need not to invest more. Conclusion A company can expand their business in corporate level as well as in business level by many ways. The company has to choose the best among the available strategies based on the resources they have and what is their actual need. They have clearly identify what is their need and how are they going to achieve those need keeping in mind the internal and external environment.

Stephen Dedalus Perception of Aesthetics in James Joyce’s novel A Port

Aesthetics is the philosophy of art. By appreciating the value of aesthetics, one can comprehend the meaning of the abstract notion of beauty. In James Joyce’s novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Stephen Dedalus’ perception of aesthetics is a key component in the main character’s pursuit of individuality and purpose. Through the use of literary techniques such as diction and tone, Joyce conveys the protagonist’s aesthetic development. This artistic growth, paralleled throughout the novel’s external structure with Dedalus’ coming of age, illustrates the life, purpose and aesthetic ambition of an artist: â€Å"To discover the mode of life or of art whereby the spirit can express itself in unfettered freedom† (Joyce 231). Stephen’s early childhood, depicted in chapter one, exposes the protagonist’s understanding of art through his naà ¯ve tone and childlike diction. In this stage of his development, the protagonist’s perception of aesthetics is defined according to what is nice. Also, the interesting use of the rhythmic and phonetic quality of words, along with the integration of verse, contributes to his infantile definition of the nature of art and beauty. The opening of the chapter demonstrates this wordplay through the childish story of the baby tuckoo and the moocow. Furthermore, Dedalus is shown to have an innate comprehension of art: â€Å"He wanted to cry quietly but not for himself: for the words, so beautiful and sad, like music† (Joyce 18). As Stephen becomes aware of his surroundings, his perception of art begins to change. In chapter two, the protagonist’s eager tone leads him to develop a different understanding of the qualities of art. The author makes a literary allusion to Alexander Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cr... ...nd pursuit of purpose. The different visions of aesthetics, particular to each stage of his life, define his character development and the author’s portrayal of his artistic destiny. Following the â€Å"bildungsroman† style, Dedalus attains maturity through his conception of the value of art. His treatise on aesthetics leads him to conclude that in order to gain the necessary claritas, or clearness of mind for his artistic endeavors, he must voluntarily severe all bonds of faith, family and country. Only through this exile can the artist gain the unfettered freedom necessary for the production of life out of life and the fulfillment of art with the sole purpose of aesthetic accomplishment. Whether it’s art for art’s sake, or for any other purpose, as long as it complies with the parameters of aesthetic fulfillment and spiritual freedom, art will undoubtedly be beautiful.

Bullying Essay

According to cyberbullying. org, cyber bullying can be defined as the harassment, humiliation, torment, embarrassment a child, preteen, or teen faces from another child, preteen, or teen. The perpetrator uses the Internet, interchangeable technologies, or even their cellular phones to carry out the illegal act. Those who are faced with such an issue should reach out and make their voices heard. Bullying by any means, is undoubtedly wrong and painful for those who are victimized by it the effects cyber bullying can have on a child or teen can be utterly dangerous or in some extreme cases, deadly. Quite recently, in the news, was a story about Rutgers University student, Tyler Clementi, committing suicide allegedly due to two students streaming a video of him and another male being intimate. The two students who live streamed and recorded Clementi were charged with two counts each of invasion of privacy. It is reported that 9 out of 10 gay children are harassed or bullied and are four times more likely to commit suicide than heterosexual children. In my high school, a dear friend of mine felled prey to cyber bullying. A group of classmates discovered a video online of a girl, who looked somewhat similar to my friend, in a sexual act. These classmates then went around the entire school, showed everyone the video, and attempted to convince students that the girl recorded was in fact my friend. However, the girl in the video and my friend had significant differences about them that made it clear to me that these bullies were simply targeting her based on their personal vendetta against her. As a result, unfortunately, my friend started missing many school days and later I discovered she was cutting not only her arms but her legs as well. Any type of bullying can lead to emotional distress, lack of self confidence, and thoughts of suicide; these effects could last a lifetime. According to bullyingstatistics. org and statistics from the I-safe  foundation, over half of adolescents and teens have been bullied online, and about the same number have engaged in cyber bullying. Countless amount of teens are unaware of the fact that the many things they post online, whether it be good or bad, can eventually come back and haunt them in the future, especially when applying for a job or college. What can truly be done about cyber bullying? Sadly, most incidents of cyber bullying go unreported; possibly because a great number of people don’t find the issue that big of a deal. In my opinion, cyber bullying can be averted by educating students on the matter, not only in schools but at home as well. Schools should set up programs and seminars educating students about bullying and its effects. The College of Mount Saint Vincent has taken the initiative of creating the counseling center where students can walk in and discuss any issues that their having with counselors who are more than willing to listen and offer their support. Parents should monitor their children and their actions. They should be conscious of who their children are talking to and who their friends are. For many like my friend and Tyler Clementi, cyber bullying has already taken a dramatic toll on their lives, but if more students come forth and speak on their experiences on the issue it is without a question that this horrific trend can  end.