THE QUEST FOR FREEDOM Thesis Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

THE QUEST FOR FREEDOM - Thesis Example hand, Douglass’s narrative presents a vivid account of one of the darkest periods in American history, marked with â€Å"lawful† violence and suppression, outrageous cruelty to, and disregard for the human nature of millions of people, whose only fault was the color of their skin. On the other hand, the narrative depicts the bold quest for freedom of a man, born as a chattel, who passed through the whole spectrum of woes and humiliation one would imagine to become an â€Å"American icon† and â€Å"Representative American man† (Stauffer 201). Although Douglass’s quest for freedom was thorny and everlasting, i.e. having continued far beyond the point of achievement of physical freedom, one particular episode in it denotes the actual transformation of the slave into a free man – when a single act of resistance annihilated years of humiliation and century-long collective self-perception of inferiority. Frederick Douglass was born and grew up in slavery; being separated from his mother too early in his life – even before he knew her as his mother – he was unaware about who his father was (Douglass 9). That, in fact, was nothing unwonted in early-nineteenth-century America, especially in the South, where â€Å"the larger part of the slaves know as little of their ages as horses know of theirs†, and more often than not â€Å"before the child has reached its twelfth month, its mother is taken from it and hired out on some farm a considerable distance off† (Douglass 10). It had been a common practice by that time slaveholders to have children from slave-women, which engendered the paradox of being both masters and fathers of those children; which probably was the case of Douglass’s coming into the world – â€Å"the whisper that my master was my father may or may not be true† (Douglass 11). Another common occurrence in the South, also established by the law, was that those â€Å"fathers† had the right to and did torture, as well as sell their children to other

The US Sugar Policy - Case Study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

The US Sugar Policy - Case Study - Essay Example All capital markets are beginning to connect world wide, and this affects even those who are not globally connected. The larger economies will at some point influence those not globally invested as their performance begins to evolve and shape the global financial markets. There may be no other free-trade policy like the U.S. sugar program that illustrates such hypocrisy, and the need for reform. The United States has often prided itself as a world leader in terms of the free trade movement. The culture has always pushed for Globalization and the use of technology to integrate economies. However, there are some industries that remain well protected due to the strength of forceful interest groups and absence of pressure to reform. These protection barriers often hurt our domestic economy and counteract the efforts to promote more open markets and trade negotiations around the world. (Grombride, Mark) In this paper I will examine the flaws in the U.S. Sugar Policy and demonstrate how th ey affect domestic and international farmers. This essay will also demonstrate to show how globalization is reflected in the consumption, production and labor of the sugar industry. The U.S. Sugar policy operates under the Farm Bill, which was overwhelmingly passed in 2008 by Congress. The basic premise behind the sugar policy is that supply should equal demand. The U.S. Department of agriculture has imposed several tools in order to ensure that the sugar policy operates at a minimum cost to the taxpayers. These tools are that: first, they can limit foreign imports to those required in the trade agreement obligation with the exception of Mexico; second, they can control the amount of sugar the U.S. American farmers are allowed to sell; and third, the bill can divert any excess surplus of sugar into ethanol production. (American Sugar Alliance) These tools and policies such as the preferential loan agreements and tariff rate quotas, serve to effectively keep foreign sugar out of the U.S. In return this forces the price of sugar in our market to increase substantially. According to the World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates, the U.S. Production projection for sugar produced in April of 2011 was 7,950,000 short tons raw value and the import amount was 3,135,000 short tons raw value. The amount projected in export equaled just 225,000 short tons. In areas such as the Caribbean, sugar is one of their largest earning industries. However, during the past two decades, Caribbean agriculture has experienced a decline in their agricultural production. Once globalization occurred the countries in the Caribbean were greatly affected as the some of the most vulnerable producers. This was due to their limited physical size not allowing them to benefit from economies of scale. For them this translated into higher world prices for production of their main principal products. The Caribbean exported only 669,630 tones of sugar around 2000. (Ahmed, Belal) There are severa l factors that determine the international competitiveness of sugar production. Some of these factors include: tariffs and quotas, the availability of sugar as a natural resource, the cost of production, and international trade agreements. Tariffs and quotas affect the sugar market as American consumers and business are forced to purchase sugar at the U.S. average price vs. the world price. This is due to our low import of foreign sugar. Government enables have protected domestic sugar growers by placing trade restrictions

Appropriateness Of Integrity And Personality Tests Assignment

Appropriateness Of Integrity And Personality Tests - Assignment Example When an organization recruits, it desires to get the best-qualified persons to higher or promote. Unfortunately, the organization may not be aware of new employees’ capabilities due to no previous contact (DeCenzo & Robbins, 2013). The organization can, for this reason, use the tests as an indication of the presence of desired capabilities as long as ethical, and legal standards are observed. Integrity and personality tests are ostensibly more significant in some jobs than others. For instance, jobs in finance depend on integrity and personality irrespective of the controls used. If the accountant is not honest, the organization can easily collapse as the accountant can scheme against the organization in such a fashion as to steal money from it without being noticed for a long time. Accountants can do so through manipulating loopholes in the accounting systems that a firm employs. Due to the advantages of personality and integrity texts expressed above, companies will most lik ely use more of them in the next five years. However, the use will depend on whether the tests are adjudged to be ethical over time, and their legality is upheld. The rationale is that since the modern business environment is characterized by uncertainty, companies would prefer to keep their risks at the minimum in all avenues in which risks can be controlled. If human resource departments can successfully identify and hire staff with excellent character, companies would be glad due to reduced risk of theft and improved work performance.

The impact of stressful employment in the public sector Literature review

The impact of stressful employment in the public sector - Literature review Example ng the theoretical concepts, Christiana & Mahalakshmi (2013) stated that the strategic decisions being practiced by contemporary organisations, with the aim of empowering organisational control mechanism have become a major consideration of the public service organisations. From the last few decades, public organisations across different geographical locations have been observed to become increasingly transparent by deploying effective auditing as well as visualising technologies to prevent stress within the workforce (Christiana & Mahalakshmi, 2013). Employee or workforce stress, identifiable as job dissatisfaction or absenteeism impose direct influences on the organisation that can further lead to increased cost for the organisations and conveys different potential hazards. In relation to the present day scenario, Obiora & Iwuoha (2013) critically asserted that organisations from different publicly owned corporations have been facing a major concern associated with employee stress that is further observed to increase constraints for these organisations to achieve their operational and financial goals. Moreover, organisations are often recognised to face significant constraint due to the continuous and increasing workload on employees. For instance, the workforce in different healthcare and law enforcement departments in a public sector frequently have to experience an increased level of their stress while performing their pre-allocated job roles and responsibilities, given the influences of continuous innovation and instability in the business environment (Obiora & Iwuoha, 2013). Sigler & Thweatt (n.d.) in this regard have clearly stated that stress can be formed in a number of ways derived from both internal and external sources in a public sector organisation. In this context, conflicts amid members within the family structure and/or within the occupational environment and deficiency of self-confidence amid the personnel can be identified as the most common

Appropriateness Of Integrity And Personality Tests Assignment

Appropriateness Of Integrity And Personality Tests - Assignment Example When an organization recruits, it desires to get the best-qualified persons to higher or promote. Unfortunately, the organization may not be aware of new employees’ capabilities due to no previous contact (DeCenzo & Robbins, 2013). The organization can, for this reason, use the tests as an indication of the presence of desired capabilities as long as ethical, and legal standards are observed. Integrity and personality tests are ostensibly more significant in some jobs than others. For instance, jobs in finance depend on integrity and personality irrespective of the controls used. If the accountant is not honest, the organization can easily collapse as the accountant can scheme against the organization in such a fashion as to steal money from it without being noticed for a long time. Accountants can do so through manipulating loopholes in the accounting systems that a firm employs. Due to the advantages of personality and integrity texts expressed above, companies will most lik ely use more of them in the next five years. However, the use will depend on whether the tests are adjudged to be ethical over time, and their legality is upheld. The rationale is that since the modern business environment is characterized by uncertainty, companies would prefer to keep their risks at the minimum in all avenues in which risks can be controlled. If human resource departments can successfully identify and hire staff with excellent character, companies would be glad due to reduced risk of theft and improved work performance.

Having global mindset and cultural awareness Assignment

Having global mindset and cultural awareness - Assignment Example This focus has helped me deliver brilliantly under pressures and do well in challenging environments like the international crowd that I presently work in. From after college to now, I have been able to understand the different expectations of people from different countries, cultures and backgrounds, who are residing in my native country and working alongside me (Hofstede, 2002, p.3). Understanding different cultures is not equivalent to having a global mindset since all my adjustments to these people and my endeavors to make them comfortable in my land involves me being comfortable already since I am in my birthplace. The time has come when I have to make a move to a new country because there are better career opportunities in there (Nisbett, 2004, p.19). The situation this time, and every time from now on is going to be strikingly different from studying and working in an international environment as the one I am in now with different people holding different notions about Eastern and Western working philosophies surrounding me. We all know that Asian, Russian and European countries have distinct cultures wherein the natives have separate protocols for greeting each other, showing respect and communicating special meaning sentences to each other and elders and youngsters. Also, there will be one or more cultural backgrounds to meet at the workplace and this will lead to me being faced by a multi-variate cultural workplace. Therefore, I am going to relate how developing a global mindset through each perspective is going to be important to me using a strategic approach and not a critical or negative approach (McSweeney, 2002, p.1). Whether in Bangkok, in Israel or in Czech Republic, a foreigner needs to understand, respect and to an extent adopt the different cultural practices in each place. Only then will he be able to interpret the communications happening at the

Leadership And Change Management

Leadership And Change Management Leadership is a sequence of multidirectional, reciprocal influence processes among many individuals at different levels, in different subunits and within executive teams (Yukl 1994, p. 459). It is the way to acheive the gaol and motivate the people to do best. Leadership is the source of inspiration and it shows the action and way of acts to do. Leadership is considered as a product of complex social relationships (Dachler 1988). Current theoretical approaches on leadership research is concern about a greater extent role of leadership research which describe and give some understanding and recommends for effective leader behaviour and normative models. They focus more on explanations of leadership processes, describing leader behaviours, and present why behaviours occur in certain situations. If there are behavioural recommendations are available it means this is usually done more carefully and rarely without any philosophy that anything is possible. Current leadership theories are a ccepting the limits which have leader influence. The best leaders are those most interested in surrounding themselves with assistants and associates smarter than they are. They are frank in admitting this and are willing to pay for such talents.(Amos Parrish). Leader is a person who rules or guides or inspires others(Andrew, 2007). A leader is a person having personality which others want to follow him. They may not always make right decisions but they are confident in hte decion making and they know when they should change their directions and why. Even after a few mistakes a leader will not lose his or her followers confidence . Leaders are recognised, not chosen or selected. In short, leaders have something extraordinary in their personality to inspire their followers. They have the qualities that the others dont have. It is an intengible characteristic that cannot be explained. But hte truth is that when we see it, we will recognise it. Contemporary theoretical concepts have assumptions that leadership has to be understood. Following Hunts classification leadership approaches on a continuum from objectivistic to subjectivistic (Hunt 1991), they are more likely to present it as subjectivistic purpose. If traditional patterns of explanation included in the content of newer approaches, contemporary theories, these are generally have to be understood as an advantage of classical theory. There are some particular people that others follow them, they like there style, work and extraordinary activities. If we look at organisational events, there is someone who have the leadership qualities, these are people who are willing to order and tell the other people what they have to do and what to do, and have the respect of other people or gain that respect. Many images made by inspirations from leadership. They have their own identity and fame in the world. Special individuals like, Hitler, Jinnah, Gandhi or Napoleon. The story around these people show that they passed from so many crisis where acts of one person who is the leading peosonality, are meaningful and people admire to follow decision of their leader. Leaders have the ability to decide, what can do and what they have to do and they deliver thier message to others to communicate and pass thier message to others. When these are absent or cannot deliver their ideas then there may be problem. Quality of leadership is success of groups and organisations. There are so many definitions for the leadership quality. There are so many leadership qualities and four main things are to lead influence on others. Second, where there are leaders and there are followers as well. Third, leaders must appear or involve when there is crisis or special problem. The leaders have quality that they se em to come visible when an innovative action from other side is required. Fourthly, leaders are the people who know that what they have to do and what they should do in future and why they should impliment their stretegy. So, leaders are the people who have clear vision about the thinking and decision that what they should do in uncertain situations and who have the effecting personility in the actions, thoughts and positive views and thinking of others. In this case, leaders qualities are personal. It depends on individuals qualities and actions. Leader can be manager or expert. May be not all managers can be leaders and not all leaders can be managers. In literature of leadership there have been four generations of theories: Trait theories. Behavioural theories. Contingency theories. Transformational theories. Leaders are person who are able to explain themselves(Warren Bennis,2004). If we get the knowledge about the lives of people who have marked that they are the great personalities or great effective leaders, it make it clears that they have very different qualities. If we think about political personalities like Nelson Mandela, Ghandi, Margeret Thatcher and Mao Zedong then we will confirm that these are the personalities who have great impact on the followers. The general qualities or traits should be in leaders. Stogdill (1948) and Mann (1959) reported in a survey that many studies have resulted that the personality and characteristics differentiate leaders from thier followers(Stogdill,1948). John Gardner(1989) studied a large number of North American organisations and leaders and conclude that there are some qualities or behaviours that appear in a leader. These include:  · Physical, mentally and mind making stamina  · Most Intelligence and action taking judgement  · Crucuial to accept responsibility and challenges  · Task accepting  · Understanding of people and meet and fullfil their needs  · Skill in communication with people and followers.  · Courage to acheive their goal  · Courage to motivate people  · Resolution  · Trustable personality and attitude  · Courage to decieve  · Self confidence . Couraging personality  · Challenges accepting personality We mostly have heard that leaders lists concerns their apparent maleness (Rosener, 1997). Rarely, we heard that women is leader. The attributes which are related with leadership are mostly male. May be the leadership characteristics are gendered and mostly these characteristics are in male. The behaviour of leader also counts. They moved from leader to leadership. If leaders are liked and respected then they can have more support and backup from their followers. The successful leadership is based on definable and learnable behaviours i.e, leaders are made, not born. These extensive and systematic studies aimed to identify behaviors associated with effective group leadership. Blake and Mouton (1964) developed the Managerial Grid which categorised leaders based on their dominant behaviours. These researchers were making progress in indentifying what behavior distinguished from followers. These behaviours could be taught. That is why these researchers conclude that leaders are made, not born. Although behavioural approaches to leadership offered a wider scope than trait theory. Researchers are unable to identify a specific set of leadership behaviours. Contingency Theory operates on the premise that the leaders ability is based on different situations and the structure of the task at hand of the leaders (Fred Feidler,2001). Fred Feidler argued that leader effectiveness depends on two related factors one is that the leadership style and the education or situation which force the person to become a leader. He also developed a scale (LPC) to measure the degree to which a persons leadership style tended towards the followers. There are four leader behaviours: directives, supportive, participative and achievement oriented and also attempts to account for many more achievement factors than previous studies (R.J.House and T.R.Mitchells Path goal Theory (1974)). Path goal theory explain how and why certain leader behaviours result in desired outcomes. This theory suggest that leaders are basically responsible for helping their followers develop behaviours that leads to achieve their goal or desired outcome. Victor.H.Vroom and Philip. W. Yetton (1973) suggest the use of co-operative decision making in an organisational context. They create a decion tree to answer the questions about the nature of the followres and problem to be resolved. A leader can determine what sort of leadership style should be used by following the useful ideas of the decision tree. Transactional leadership is basically in contingncy and is contingnt upon performance . The leader, who have power and control over his or her employees or followers, provides new ideas or suggestions for followers to do what the leader wants. The research depends on its limitations. Transactional approach is carried on with the supply and demand situation. However, transactional leadership is less effective than others and it needs more approaches. Transactional leadership works on the assumption that people follow the person who inspires them. The latter is a process in which all leaders and followers can help and familiarise everyone with the new ideas and their thoughts (Jamess. Burns ,1978). He introduced the concepts of both transactional and transformational leadership. This approach creates significance change in the life of people and organisations. (Bernard.M. Bass, 1985) contrasts transformational leadership with transactional leadership. While transactional leadership simply involves an exchange that leads to desired outcomes, transformational leadership motivates the people to do more than expectations( Bass, 1985). Recent theories on leadership are the process in which leaders are not considered as individuals in charge of the followers, but are consider as members of a community of practice. This community can be defined that the people combine their ideas and share history and familiarise the people with the way of communication. This model of leadership do not concentrate on the concept of dominance, motivation and influence which are the primary situations of leadership. If the workgroup is one where groups of people are engaged in activity together then leadership becomes the process of coordinating efforts. In todays world of corporate America, mostly people belief that it is possible to provide the education facility to make them a leader. But In my point of view Leaders are born not made(Adison,1995 ). We mostly see the people in promoted. But in many there are no special qualities to effect or attract the people or their followers (Everett Lockhart). Nowadays we have a lot of managers and supervisor but there are few which are leader and having leadership qualities. Sure, everyone can be a good manager or supervisor but everyone by nature is a manager or supervisor(Everett Lockhart, 1991). It is not the case that every leader is a manager first, but it is also can be possible that leader can give up the information to the manager and the fact is that, everyone by nature having management and supervising personality and qualities. We often point out one person and say, now he is a leader, without thinking that how the person becomes leaders? And how they can attract the people. Sometimes we can say that it is the genetic quality which is in some of the people or we can say that it may be God gifted quality. Those people have this gene, they get to lead. They have all the ability to make decision. There is some good saying that Leadership DNA is myth. There are the natural or God gifted abilities in the leaders personality. These abilities are present in some of us other do not have these abilities and qualities which leads to leadership. The main quality in the leadership is that they have command to give up their ideas and they know how and which ideas effect the people. The desire to lead is the motivational quality that put them to lead the followers. Obviously there are people who dominate on their followers. They dominate on them because of abilities and good decision-making. They are the good and attractive leaders among us and have the excellent performance. Leadership is the collection of skills that produce results. They are able to identify the requirement of their followers and they direct them on the right way to success. Leaders can learn leadership ideas and can get all the information in so many ways for example it also provide training observation on other leaders. Self study etc. Development is the key factor which opens the leadership getaway. It is the an increase in skills or abilities and a continuously learning process through life experiences. No one can be a leader just by saying that I am a leader. Leadership needs to be work hard. The main keys of leadership are as follows; Leadership involves in the critical situations and solve them by giving ideas. So good leaders analyse and plan and adapt their plans to new conditions and opportunities. Leaders have a vision and they share their vision as well. A leader takes charge. They cannot just talk a good game to be a leader; they also can take ac and take effective action for the good of our small business and leader inspires through example. In conclusion, leaders are the effective personalities. Their act, behaviour and decision making policies show their leadership qualities. There are some classical view also in this leadership overview. In which its described that how commentators have searched for special leading personalities and behaviours and look at the different circumstances. Classical views of leadership tend to identified by position. Where, leaders become focus for answers and solution. People look at them when they dont know what to do. They give direction and have vision. Leaders have special qualities. These create the difference between leaders and followers. This leadership view stands for forms of organisations that are common in business. Where the purpose is to achieve the goal in short period of time. Classical leaders can have a more participating style. They have power and opportunity to take responsibilities. It can be a great- man model of leadership. The leadership traits or qualities discussed are honesty, forward-looking, competent, inspiring and intelligent. (Kouzes and Posner, 1984). These qualities are strongly correlated with people. Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile. (Vince Lombardi). True leaders are rare. This is because of combination of skills, personality and ambition. Some personality traits are natural in leaders roles. This is the trait theory. Extraordinary qualities in an ordinary person which help him or her to leadership. This is the Great Events Theory. People can learn leadership skills. This is the Transformational Leadership Theory(Bernard Bass and Don Clark,2010). These thories discribes the leadership traits. Leadership And Change Management Leadership And Change Management Change refers to any alteration which occurs in over all work environment of an organization. It may relate to change in technology, organizational structure, working processes, work environment, organizational policy and even the roles people play. Introduction of change in one part in an organization forces change in other part. If the change is beneficial people accept it willingly. If it is not desirable, there is great resistance. If it is of no consequence to the people, they may adopt an attitude of indifference. If they consider the change detrimental to their growth and prosperity, they may resist through counter pressure. This reaction is based not necessarily on the reality or facts but on their perception. The change therefore should be sufficiently strong enough to overcome the counter pressure. Due to advancement of technology and social environment change has become a necessity. If the change takes place, a balance or equilibrium is achieved by the organization. Thus p eople learn to expect various environment relationships within the organization. They learn adaptation. The essence is that when people feel that there is need to change, and when they change, they actually are adjusting to changed situation thus equilibrium is achieved with the changed environment. This process carries on and is never ending because change takes place continuously. 1.1 Change Processes 1Lewin developed a theoretical structure to deal with change process and carried out a program of search on change. The result was a good theory that has indeed turned out to be very practical. Recent work suggests that Lewins force-field analysis applies within a limited domain and that Lewins views are less applicable beyond the boundaries of that domain. Lewins views on change came under attack as simplistic and outmoded, but today they continue to receive strong support (Burnes 2004) 1.2 Lewins Force Field Theory of change 2As we know a wide variety of forces make organizations resistance to change and a wide variety of forces push organizational change. According to his force-field theory, these two sets of forces are always in opposition in an organization. When the forces are evenly balanced, the organization is in state of inertia and does not change. To get an organization to change, managers must find a way to increase the forces for change, reduce resistance to change or do both simultaneously. Any of these strategies will overcome inertia and cause an organization to change. The following figure illustrates Lewins theory. An organization at performance level P1 is in balance: forces for change and resistance to change are equal. Management , however ,decides that the organization should strive to achieve performance level P2.To get level P2 , managers must increase the forces for change(the increase is represented by lengthening of up-arrows) ,reduce resistance to change(the reduction is represented by shortening of down-arrows),or do both. If they pursue any of the three strategies successfully, the organization will change and reach performance level P2. 1.3 Evolutionary and Revolutionary Change in Organizations Evolutionary change is gradual, incremental and narrowly focused. Evolutionary change involves not drastic or sudden altering of the basic nature of an organizations strategy and structures but a constant attempt to improve, adapt, and adjust strategy and structures but a constant attempt to improve, adapt, and adjust strategy and structure incrementally to accommodate to changes taking place in the environments. Revolutionary Change is rapid, dramatic and broadly focused. Revolutionary change involves a bold attempt to quickly find new ways to be effective. It is likely to result in a radical shift in ways of doing things, new goals and new structure. It has repercussions at all levels in the organization-corporate, divisional, functional, group and individual. Reengineering, restructuring and innovation are three important instruments of revolutionary change. 2.0 My Organizations study 3The history of Nokia goes back 1865 when the company was established as a forest industry enterprise in south-western Finland on the Nokia River by a mining engineer called Frerik Idestam.This was not particularly remarkable event as numerous forest industry enterprise existed in Finland at the time. Later, Nokia came into contact with two enterprises that were outside the traditional forest industry. These firms were the Finnish Rubber works Ltd (founded 1898) and the Finnish Cable Works Ltd (founded in 1912).The gradual concentration of the ownership of these companies led in 1966 to the establishment of Nokia Corporation, into which all the above-mentioned companies were merged. Nokia grew fairly rapidly in 1970s and 1980s, partly because of the then-flourishing (bilateral) Soviet trade, which was boosted by the oil crises in 1973 and 1980.When the Soviet trade collapsed in 1991.Nokia ran into difficulties. Serious consideration was given to selling Nokia in its entirely to the Swedish company Ericsson , but the merger did not materialize .Nokias solution to the crises was to concentrate on the production of the electronics( and thus to abandon the production of paper and pulp ,tires , rubber boots ,cables and so on) ,to invest massively in R D and to adapt a new management strategy that relied extensively on domestic and foreign subsidiaries and subcontractors .Nokia also actively sought to become a genuinely international firm By Finnish standards , the management strategy was really revolutionary because previously companies had tried to be as self-sufficient as possible in production .Nokia decided to concentrate solely on final product and on the high tech end of the production .Nokias new strategy also involved investment in R D .Besides investing heavily in research and development , Nokia created a very useful network of research contacts between universities and itself .This cooperation has been of great benefit to both Nokia and Finnish universities. Currently , Nokia accounts for more than 20 percent of Finlands total exports and its growth contribution is estimated at 1.5 percent .Nokia alone accounts for about 40 percent of the R D expenditures by private enterprises in Finland .Moreover , it accounts for 70 percent of the stock market value of the Helsinki Stock market Almost 60 percent of Nokias workforce is currently outside Finland .Its success shows up most dramatically in its earnings and market capitalization values. Thus, in 1999 Nokias profits equaled the combined profits of its two main rivals Ericsson and Motorola and its market capitalization was over $ 200 million almost twice Finlands GDP 2.1 Nokia Environmental Analysis There are several forces surrounding the external environment of Nokia including demographic, economical, natural, social-cultural, technological and political-legal environment The Demographic Forces 4Population-wise, Europe is made up of five largish countries (France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Spain) , with Germany well ahead with some 82 million inhabitants. The rest are small countries with only Netherland qualifying as middle-sized country. Urbanization is highest in Belgium and Israel and lowest in Switzerland, Finland, and Italy. This is modestly correlated with population density , the Netherlands being the most crowded , followed closely by Belgium and then three of the big five: the United Kingdom ,Germany , and Italy; the least crowded countries are Sweden and Finland The Economical Forces People in Europe are reasonably wealthy and income distribution between people is relatively even. Growing economy in Europe leads to increasing income of the people. People will buy more luxury goods (such as mobile phones).If the economy of Europe is in decline the average income will not increase and even more likely to decrease. In this case the people will have less money for luxurious goods and will spent less on mobile phones, which would be very negative for Nokia Nokia has big share in European market which is 37% which is now heavily hit by global economic recession. This has affected customers potential to buy mobile phones which in turn causes in reduction in Nokias profit. As we know technological innovation is the main competence of Nokia but due to this recession Nokia is spending less on R D budget in this way Nokia is losing its competitive advantage and may signal to move away from product differentiation which is a chief outcome of Nokia R D activity Nokia has strongly differentiated product and services at the same time Nokia is the cost leader too, as product differentiation is capital intensive while the differences with the cost savings are inevitable in these conditions these two strategies are usually incompatible .Nokia product differentiation strategy has also diminished due to the introduction of Iphone, flip phones, RAZR etc 5Nokia is not focusing on the following issues in the rapidly changing economic environment, Technological invention of a new substitute product like IPod, Iphone A foreign governments adverse economic policy affecting the companys product Diversification by high profile organization into the companys existing products Slowing down in the market growth Change in the habits and tastes of the consumers Potentially damaging demographic changes Changing technology and digital convergence 6In this rapidly changing world, Nokia is facing challenging threats on which they need to focus. The biggest threat for Nokia in Europe is the increasing mature market in Western Europe. Almost everyone in Western Europe has a mobile phone and there are a lot of competitors on the market. If Nokia wants to keep their market share it have to keep innovative, keep working on their image and most important they should keep listening to their customers. The danger of mobile phone radiation through wireless electronics is not more a fantasy. For instance, the new way to communicate per internet gains more and more fans 7Technological development of mobile phones is an important technological force because the technology in the mobile phone business is constantly innovating and developing which can lead to big chances for Nokia .There is a constant research going on within the mobile phone business to try to develop new gadgets and new systems for mobile phones. Nokia has to be aware of these developments, because when the competitors develop a new gadget that Nokia does not it means that the competitors will have a comparative advantage over Nokia. The technological development of substitutes is important when there will be a new developed substitute, it can mean that people will buy this product instead of Nokia mobile phone and so sales for Nokia will drop along with the profit 8According to Nokia due to fast speed internet information technology ,media ,music and mobile communications are converging to one industry.Net books and other computer based products are posing new threats of substitute for Nokia as phones and PCs become more homogenous. The customers are becoming more sophisticated due to rapidly changing technological environment and now Nokia can heralds the threats of mighty Microsoft who has more experience and resources as compared to relatively in-experience Nokia which may result in comparative disadvantage for Nokia. Through merger and acquisition Nokia can overcome this threat which still Nokia is not considering. Nokia is financially very strong company, there is need for the company to enter into new markets to achieve new experience and market shares by overcoming the weak rivals. Nokia new possible target can be Acer which has 11.9% share in the notebook market (Kwong, 2009) 9The advancement of new technologies is also creating new threats in the areas of security. Nokia can provide security by creating sound business practices and careful processes. The companys threat scenarios include as the worst root causes of threats: Employees who are careless and over-trusting Sub-contractors who also work with the companys competitors and implement lax security measures Poor information security that compromises data Industrial espionage by competitors, either alone or with the assistance of state investigation agencies Social engineering specifically as a means of industrial espionage Specific environments in so-called emerging markets which pose new threats to personnel security such as kidnappings and ransom activities and can give rise to large-scale armed robbery of valuable cargoes The Political-Legal Forces Finnish law European law Domestic laws in each of Nokias foreign markets International Laws Health regulations Because Nokia is a Finnish company and has its headquarters in Finland, the board of directors has to be run in accordance with The Finnish law. Since Nokia is also an international company, it has to comply with the international laws such European law, International laws are actually a collection of treaties, conventions and agreements between nations .Nokia must also comply with every foreign countrys domestic laws , which it is doing business with laws affect every aspect of Nokias business product safety, consumer protection dealing with competition , packaging and labeling and advertising etc Legislation is useless if it is not enforced. Nokia has to know the legal environment because it constitutes as the rules of the game. At the same time, it must know the political environment because it determines how the laws are enforced and indicates the direction of new legislation. Health regulations are also important because of danger of mobile phone radiation and the way Nokia has to handle with this threat. The natural Forces Environmental Issues are something that has become more important in the last few years. People are becoming more aware of pollution and want companies to do something about that. Nokia should be aware of this growing sense of awareness for the environment and should change the ways of production and should focus on producing environmental friendly products. The Social-Cultural Forces The population is very diverse. People can be divided into different subcultures that have several ways to spend their money .Subcultures could be different age groups ,interest group and immigrants .They have also different attitudes towards mobile communication Trends in the market 10During the last few years, multimedia applications, such as camera, Mp3 player or radio have become trends that reveal the shape of the future and provide many opportunities for new mobile phones. The crucial factors in fad period are features feel , look ,shape ,coolness especially for teenagers. One example of fad is Nokia N-Gage .This is a mobile phone and a game computer as well .It failed because it could not compete with big game device manufacturers such as Nintendo Consumer Buying Behaviour The changes of such personal factors like age, family life cycle or social class and changes of reference groups unquestionably influence the buying behaviour on the whole mobile phone market and corresponding on Nokias target market. Nokia should know this and has to develop solutions for all these life circumstances 11Global changes like changes of consumer needs, tastes and preferences, the emergence of new technology or nay new development in the marketing environment could potentially affect the fortunes of brand .Nokia also made a straightforward mistake: It didnt produce the clamshell-design mobile phones that customers wanted. And the customers jumped ship so that the companys sales Went down .Consequently, Nokia faced a loss of $6 billion in equity . Nokia faced a very difficult time particularly in year 2004.There were many drawbacks in Nokia strategies like failure to read market trends and act according to these trends. Also Nokia was not up to the demands of his customers which wants innovation in the designs of Nokia sets. The old days were Nokia classic style dominated the market are not returning and company needs to accept it .Nokia always insist on removing some functions or screwing up the keypad. For customers sometimes it is frustrating to have some phones with Bluetooth support but not having Wireless LAN, mp3 support but no FM, camera but no Mp3 and etc .As a result Nokia has lost customers, average sales prices have fallen .Therefore Nokia decided to change its policy in developed and emerging markets 3.0 Assessment of Implementation of change Issues 12Nokia the worlds biggest mobile manufacturer , had a bad year in 2004.Its shares lost over half their value between march and August-from a high of $23 to a low of $11 on 13 August-its sales declined and its market share, having stabilized around 35 percent for many years , fell to a low of 28.9 per cent. And in April 2004, one of its main rivals Samsung over took Nokia in market capitalization. However, some commentators thought that Nokias decline began even earlier than this. Sales peaked at  £ 30.4bn in 2000 when 128m phones were sold. In 2003 despite selling 179m handsets revenues was  £29.5bn .Samsung in contrast was able to achieve higher average selling prices for its photos, even though its volume were lower Although some thought that Nokias problems were partly because it had reached saturation in its main markets as well as facing increased competition, others laid the blame for Nokias problems at the companys strategy of focusing on high volume, lower price sales and ignoring design. The needs of increasingly fashion-conscious young mobile phone owners were ignored and Nokia was accused of missing the change from brand to style. This is surprising given that Nokia had previously been the pioneer of the handset as a fashion item with choices of colors and styles. But in 2003/2004 Nokia was sticking to its traditional monobloc or candy bar format for its handsets; meanwhile his rivals were bringing out more innovative models A particular problem was demand for folding calm-shell phones , especially in Asia and North America .Motorolas RAZR v3 model , a slim-line design with stylish aluminum shell , was a particular hit with consumers .Nokia has admitted that it failed to anticipate how successful clamshells would be .But other design features were also missing. Cameras , high-quality colour screens and user interface , that had formerly been streets ahead of the competition , were all less well developed than they needed to be .This meant that previously loyal customers were forced to turn to competitions models. I think Nokia just does not seem to have changed its look much over the last 10 years Nokias design problems happened at the same time as mobile phone service providers were wanting customized handsets as a means of increasing their own brand differentiation .Operator specific handsets are normally locked to prevent them being used by another operators network thereby attempting to boost customer loyalty as well as security .Operators in Europe and America were contracting with smaller Asians original design manufacturers to provide handsets to their own design specifications .And Vodafone , the worlds largest mobile services provider ,chose to provide its Vodafone live data services on handsets supplied by sharp. Similar problems affected the development of 3G services Japanese and South Korean companies were some years ahead in this technology .Vodafone for one choose Samsung and Sony Ericsson to supply its 3G handsets as a result .And Hutchison Whampoas there , a new entrant to the 3G market in Europe ,declined to sell Nokias handset because it lacked video-calling capabilities to embrace customized handsets was actually the result of technological factors .Given Nokias reliance on volume and sale ,it could not make different handsets for individual operators without a reorganization of its value chain .Until 2005 this was oriented towards large-scale production of relatively undifferentiated handsets .It preferred to hold off adding new features , such as high-quality colours screens or higher-resolution cameras ,until the components were available in large volumes. It also preferred to customize handsets through software .Its series 60 software, which is run on high-end phones is especial ly configurable, allowing the same hardware to support providers various services However ,the shock appeared to stimulate Nokia into making the necessary changes .It has since moved into operator-focused hardware customization despite its preferences for software customization and made the changes to its logistics system .Nokias new modular hardware designs made it easier for the company to customize products faster , and it set a target for 50 percent of its products to have alternative designs such as clamshells ,sliders and swivels by the end of 2005.One of its products the Nokia 6230 was so popular that Nokia was at times unable to meet demand and Nokia became a beehive of experiments. It launched a range of innovative handsets ,the N-series ,which had additional features as well as being phones and its 770 Internet Tablet is a hand-held computer that does not contain a phone at all but supports web-browsing e-mail and voice-over-internet calls using Google Talk software and Wi-Fi technology .Nokias then CEO Jorma Ollila has since retired directed R D to are as where Nokia had particular strengths for example radio technology and mobile-phone software ,not wasting it on technologies that the company could buy it .In 2004 it spent more than $4.8bn on R D of which 60 percent on software .At 12.8 percent of sales Nokia R D ratio was 3 percent higher than Motorolas and about twice that of Sony Nokia now the largest Camera Company in the world and convergence means that its phones provide music-playing, video-recording and computing facilities so that its competitors include Apple, Sony, Canon and other consumer-electronics firms .By may 2006 Nokia described as having a renewed spring in its step .Its market share has recovered to 35 percent 4.0 Analysis Conclusions 13In the environmental analysis, we took into account the different environmental forces which have impact on Nokia. Nokia has a very strong position in the mobile phone market in Europe. It is a strong brand because of their good quality products and powerful image and has just few weaknesses However, changes in consumer needs, preferences or too fast development of new technologies, could have negative impact on the consumer buying behavior in Nokias segment. Nokia should be prepared for it Currently Nokia sells its products in over 130 countries. The company divides the market not only into geographical and behavioral qualities of the customers are similar-to better satisfy their needs .Sometimes Nokia has a wrong strategy to keep its customers .Nokia removes some functions in its phone so that customers have the need for more .Moreover after producing new models Nokia sometimes does not focus enough on their positioning through advertising and packaging .Nevertheless, Nokia is still has the one of the best brand value in the world .The customer-based brand equity is also positive , people still prefer Nokia among the others .Customers have many associations with Nokia brand which differentiate it from other competitors .Competition is fierce and many competitors are attacking against Nokia to become the market leader .However ,Nokia has several advantages over its competitors such as economies of scales and innovative high technology .Europe is its home market ,Nokia has good possibilities to succeed and maintain its market leader position also in the future .However it cannot make misjudgments anymore. Now it is aware of the threats. It has to observe and predict what is happening in its environment and be sensitive in listening to its customers and trends