GOOD CITY FORMS AND HEALTHY COMMUNITY Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

GOOD CITY FORMS AND HEALTHY COMMUNITY - Essay Example In the article, the author argues going back to these basics to make new cities worth living in. A re-examination of the urban planning ideas of Lynch includes efficiency and justice as well. It further appeals to consider city size, future growth, and conservation measures when making plans, as most cities today are also ill and sterile, lacking diversity and vibrancy (Ford 247). In this second article by Y. R. Jabareen, entitled â€Å"Sustainable Urban Forms: Their Typologies, Models, and Concepts† and published in the Journal of Planning Education and Research back in September of 2006, the author who is connected with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in the Department of Urban Studies, he identifies the four sustainable types of major urban forms, namely: neotraditional development, the compact city, urban containment, and lastly, the ecological city. Any of these urban forms utilizes a combination of the seven main design concepts in terms of environmental planning for sustainability which are compactness, transport, density, mixed-land use, diversity, passive solar design, and lastly, greening (Jabareen 39), which is essentially just an elaboration of the ideas of David Lynch. In â€Å"Urban Development and Climate Change† and published in 2008, an entirely new perspective was drawn based on concerns of climate change as countries grapple with the issue of urban sprawl, and that is how to reduce gas emission by reducing the vehicle-miles-traveled (VMT) by using compact development as the role model (Ewing et al. 201). By their estimates, compactness helps to reduce VMT by approximately 20% to 40% because it eliminates long commutes, which in turn reduces the gas emissions by around 7% to 10% as they made some plausible assumptions in their study models, up to the year 2050. For most of local governments worried about global warming, it is a good idea as it

Summary of a reading Outline Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Summary of a reading - Outline Example e1930s, the scars of World War II, and presence of unscrupulous players in the market coupled with legal restrictions kept the general public away from the stock market in the 1950s. A.D.Roy’s paper titled â€Å"Safety First and the Holding of Assets† published three months after Markowitz’s paper appeared in the Journal of Finance, discussed the same lines of arguments, but did not evoke any response. After earning his undergraduate degree in economics, Markowitz continued his graduate work while serving as a Research Associate at the Cowles Commission. He chose stock market as the subject of his doctoral dissertation in consultation with Jacob Marschak (director of Cowles Commission) and Marshall Ketchum (Dean of the Graduate School of Business). The Theory of Investment Value by John Burr Williams fascinated him, but it struck him that people should consider risk as well as return while making investment decisions. So he applied Tjalling Koopmans’ (Prof. of Economics at Chicago University) linear programming technique for solving problems of resource allocation under constraints, to analyze the choices facing an investor who must decide between seeking high returns and attempting to hold down risk at the same time. Diversification protects the investor from losing everything in one swoop. At the same time it reduces the opportunity of earning high returns by concentrating investment in one stock which appears to be the best. Markowitz followed the idea of the tension between risk and return and between diversification and concentration down two separate tracks. The first track, the subject of his 1952 article, tells the investor how to apply the trade off between risk and reward in selecting a portfolio, by applying Koopmans’ linear programming. The second track tells how each investor should go about selecting the single portfolio that most closely conforms to the investor’s goals. This aspect is treated at length in Markowitz’s book, Portfolio

International trade and specialisation

International trade and specialisation The nations economic structures was formed by the pervasive power of internationalisation which is a substantial phenomenon improved rapidly especially in the last decades. International business, one of the constituents of globalisation and liberalization in todays world, International business from Toynes perspective is the process that involves the exchange of goods and /or services across or within national boundaries between two or more social actions in different countries for commercial reasons (Vaghefi et al., 1991). A broad definition provided by Aswathppa those business transactions that involve the crossing of national boundaries which include, product presence in different markets of the world, production bases across the globe, human resource to contain high diversity, investment in international services, transactions involving intellectual properties ( Aswathppa, 2008) , these definitions embraces the immense global companies with high scale operations and coalition ar ound the world, and the small companies which run low scale operations and may be only with one country. International business is the major key drive behind the raising for a lot of economies like China, India and Brazil, also the backbone for thousands of the multinational organisations. Increasingly, world business was shaped by the flow of goods, services and investments among countries under globalization perspectives. The dynamicity of the international business is accessible in two major ways; the international trade and the equities or investments, this paper will discuss in a critically approach these two major categories of international business in favour of free trade, with clarifying the costs and benefits of International trade and specialisation. 1-International trade The first pace to international trade is the Mercantilism that promote to posses more gold and silver by enlarge exporting and shrink importing by tariffs and quotas. But this approach pours the benefits only to one side of the trade neglecting the other side of the trade (Piggott, 2006). However, Mercantilism from Heckschers point of view is a system provides a confederation to the country (Haley, 1936) but, mercantilism does not show the ideal paradigm for free trade it advocated barriers for the foreign investments and does not encourage the competition which can lead to monopolism (Tuldar, 1987). The actual step towards international free trade was the absolute advantage by Smith and it substantiates that trade is a positive-sum game, there are gains for both dealers, opposing the mercantilism that see the trade is zero-sum game. The basic concept of smiths theory is specialisation should be given to the goods which produced efficiently, and certainly not turn out commodities that can purchase it in a lower cost. For example, Saudi Arabia has an absolute advantage in oil, according to Smith Saudi Arabia will specialise on producing oil and within trade Saudi Arabia will export oil and import goods that she can not produce it effectively. Smiths theory is oversimplified because he assumed that the labor is the only factor of production and labor is uniform, nevertheless labor is skilled and unskilled, and labor is not only the comparative factor of production (Piggott and Cook, 2006). Not only absolute advantage in one good can be profitable but also for all good, Ricardo stated in the comparative advantage theory that the trade is also profitable for the state by specialise in the most efficient production and import the goods are less resourceful in production, therefore, the international trade streams is determined by a countrys product that comparative to another country. By an empirical study by Neven to find out the comparative advantage between the European countries using the production factors, he concluded that labor presented the dominated advantage and human capital offered the solidest disadvantage (Neven, 1990:27). Some criticism faced the Ricardian model, for example, the assumption of transferring factors of production and this has limited possibility, the transportation cost and economies of scale were ignored by Ricardo and Smith (Chacholiades, 1990) Alternatively, Heckscher and Ohlin argue that the trade is based on the endowments or the factors of production (land, capital, labour). However, they agree with Ricardo about the lucrativeness of international trade. Consequently, the countries which have abundant of labour should be specialised in products like textile and shoes, and the countries which have abundant of land should produce land intensive goods such as corns and wheat. Therefore, these countries will export those goods because they have a comparative advantage in it, and rare factors dependant goods should be imported. H-O theory was tested by Leontief on the US exports and imports and regarding to H-O theory US is capital rich country it will export capital rich products and import for example labor intensive goods. But, as a result for his test in 1947 and 1951, he found that US imports were more capital intensive goods. However, this result varied with the same test in the 1970s (Piggott, 2006:40). Baldwin claimed that Leontiefs result, in that time was directed by the American tariffs and non-tariffs, like quotas and safety and health regulations and if it was against labor consummate goods so, the capital-consummate goods was the only way to trade with US moreover, he confirmed that the economists who was highly confidences of H-O theory was diminished by Leontief empirical result (Baldwin, 1971). Like H-O theory Leontief ignored the Human capital that considered as one of the factors of production. It displays the knowledge and skills for the labour therefore; human capital intensive goods fo r example computer software and aerospace could be one of the determinants of the trade. (Hill, 2006 global business today) While H-O and Leontief ignored technology, Product life cycle theory takes in the account the technology as a comparative advantage. In the high-tech countries this model put forward that any product starts to be new product to become standardised, in the last stage, where the dispersion and the adoption of innovations form other organisations, the product will be produced massively, and the necessity of shifting production to get a low cost location arise and steadily the production in the host country will start to export the same product to the Home country for the product. Similarly, because the rapid growth of the multinational organisations around the world, it might be favourable for the organisation to produce the new product from the host or the foreign country (Ajami et al., 2006) Focusing on the economic of scale is the main concept of the new trade theory. By adopting this theory the country can specialise in a limited rang of goods with a high scale of production to gain the low-cost production, and then the free trade will expand the market size beyond national boundaries. So the availability for producing a variety of goods and conducting low cost will attain reciprocally beneficial. However, for the industries that conduct a substantial share in the world demand by accomplish the economies of scale the trade will support a few of the organisation or the first entrants to this industries like aerospace industry. Since the fast growing of international business and according to the trade liberalization , the need for some standards was raised, Criterions for international trade was established to control and arrange the international trade therefore, the idea of World Trade Organisation (WTO) had raisin with a structure designed to offer the coordinated polices and support liberalization in the global market besides the free flow for goods and services (Hornsby, 2010).In addition General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) to insure about the reduction of tariffs and quotas. Moreover, trade blocs were a significant movement towards free trade for example: EU, G20, APEC, NAFTA and CARENS GROUP. (BBC, 2005) Advantages and disadvantages for international trade and specialisation One of the main benefits of international trade is economic growth and this concept was proved by Edwards (1992), the study defined that international trade have a significant influence on growth, how can the developing countries as poor nations attract and adopt the technological progress from the industrial economies the study was based on 30 developing countries and appeared that the more opened and non restrictive trade policies the faster growth. In the same vein specialisation support the economic growth, the economic development can conduct by an efficient specialisation (Enright, 1996). Growth could happen in a long-standing by specialisation as a result of Page study on small mining centres in Canada (Page, 2002). International trade can improve the environment, Bhagwati stated that the economic growth will consequence an expansion in production therefore, the countrys revenue will increase as such the state can spend for improving the environment (Bhagwati, 1993).however, (Mullen et al., 2009) argued that developing countries turn over from agriculture to industrial activities and they may produce for example chemical products which cause absolute pollution. From another side, the more production and the more exporting the more revenues that can spend to improve the environment. For example Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) that signifies in the first phases of the growth it is obvious the dilapidation for the environment and this degradation will decrease by the rising in the income (Gryz, 2008).Hence this could be a benefit and a cost in the same time for international trade. The increases of international trade and in turn the economic growth will raise the gross national product as a result it will recuperating the individual freedom (Mullen et al., 2009) furthermore, higher levels of educations will be an outcome also new initiatives and individual freedom(Mullen et al., 1996 cited in Mullen, 2009) Advance physical quality of life correlated to International trade, according to a study run by (Mullen et al., 2009) importing enhance PQOL since the importing process will increase the supply then decrease the prices so the individuals can satisfy easily they essential needs therefore importing enhance PQOL . But increasing exporting will increase the demand in the country and then will rise the prices consequently it will be difficult for the individuals to satisfy their vital requirements will increasing exports will lessen PQOL. Source: (Mullen et al., 2009) From the environmentalists shore there is a significant drawback for international trade, they see that the more international trade the more pollution, and the more progress of technology the more utilization of the natural resources and deforestation this confirmed by Gryz in a study focusing on the developing countries that international trade contribute in air pollution by enlarge the emissions of CO2 and SO2 (Gryz, 2008). Specialisation as the key driver for the international trade, it can enlarge production of products and services and consequently high quality with lower cost. Specialisation will increase the size of the market resemble international trade which make the option for conducting the economic of scale clear. Consequently, the competition will be a vital element which result low prices for individuals. From the other side, specialisation could bring risks. Using specialisation very excessively is able to bring inflation (Watkins, 1963 cited in Clower and beer 2009). Moreover, specialisation can affect inadequately on the stability of the economy (Barkly et al., 1999). 2-Equities The second category of the international business is equities which composing of: foreign direct investments (FDI) and foreign portfolio investments (FPI) 2-1 foreign portfolio investment (FPI) The investments by individual, firms or public bodies in foreign financial instrument like bonds and stocks or other financial assets and the portfolio proportion in the total foreign equity is less than 10% (Hill, 2006) without managing or controlling these investments. Although most of the barriers were fallen in favor of international business, the foreign portfolio investment is tremendously limited; Kang and Stulz justify this phenomenon that most of the investment was held by the domestic investors raising the home-bias issue as a determinant of FPI. (Kang and Stulz, 1995) Two main obstacles facing the FPI: First, political threat in the foreign market and the caution from impound the shares or the potentialities to return the investments so that, we find the majority investors in FPI are home residents. However, the risk in the short-term money market is less than the FPI equity because is more liquidity with low cost. Second, information asymmetric, Kang and Stulz stated the positive relationship between information and investments if the foreign investor has less information he will invest fewer. FPI could be a good source for foreign investors if they familiar with these investments abroad like the weighty exporters, and they concluded that the more organisations export the more shares possessed by foreign investors (Metro, 1987). In addition, Razin and Goldstein see the information problem arises when the investors need to sell the shares in advance, therefore the investors will go through the FPI if their probability to get liquidity shock fewer and invest in the FDI if they are less expected to get liquidity shock (Goldstein and Razin, 2006), liquidity shock could be considered a determinant for FPI. 2-2 foreign direct investment (FDI) FDI is the investment that happen directly in production or other facilities in a foreign country over Which it has effective control. (Shenkar and Luo, 2004) The main important feature that differentiates between FDI and FPI is control over the assets in the foreign countries by the affiliates, supporting these affiliates with management team locating near the selected market, therefore the decisions that related to this market will be effective. There are three types for FDI: First, Greenfield investment, and this form occurs when the company decides to start a new business in a foreign country. Second, mergers and acquisitions by merging with the local companies in the host countries or acquiring companies in the host market this, this is the widespread element to FDI, M As share in FDI raised from 80% in 1997 (UNCTAD, 2007).However, it is argued that MA will diminish the competition because there is no add to the capital, but the supporter for this pattern argued that MA is mainstay to stand in the global competition by insert new technologies and new management strategies (Shenkar and Luo, 2004:78) Third, reinvestment by using the profits in the foreign markets to make further investments. FDI theories Product life cycle theory, the same theory of international trade. Internalization theory, the way that the diffused operations in the foreign countries internalized by unified governance structure, it argues that because the deficiency of the intermediate products the internalization will create contracting. However, Shenkar and Luo see that the internalization a way to gain from intra-organizational system. (Shenkar and Luo, 2004:62) The Eclectic paradigm, this theory show the joint of microeconomic of the firm and macroeconomic of international trade by perceiving three interdependent factors: ownership specific factors like tangible assets and intangible assets, location specific factor like endowments and countries policies and internalization. It argued that this theory is broad-spectrum and does not propose a macro clarification for FDI and its factors is not reliant. Dunning the founder of the theory replied that he presented a general framework with interdependence level, and from a perspective of the country level he provides a macro-analysis of FDI. (Piggott and Cook, 2006) Reasons for FDI Penetrating the foreign market could be with exporting, licensing or FDI. Companies adopting FDI rather than exporting to keep away from the tariffs and quotas that imposed by host markets, and avoid the high transportation cost especially with the low value-to- weight ratio goods for example, cement products. Also firms choose FDI than licensing (allow certain foreign firms to produce home firms product and gain fees on each product) because the licensing does not give the stiff control over the production or marketing also, licensing could be a way to present a significant technological idea to a likely foreign rivals. (Hill, 2006) Increase sales and profits in the foreign markets is main reason for FDI most of the firms to fulfill considerable profits in the foreign markets especially if the local firms are not able to gratify the demand of goods and services, for example, Intel corporation, Coca Cola, Wal-mart, Carrefour, Pepsi Cola, CEMEX, Aflac and a lot of them. But there is a criticism on most of these opportunities seized in the same area for example Wal-mart has 72.36% (Wal-mart, annual report 2010) of his stores only in North America. Tesco has 73% (Tesco annual report 2009) of his Stores in Europe. Reducing costs is another motive for FDI, seeking for the low-cost production is crucial aspects for gaining profits so, firms decide to go through the foreign markets to accomplish low labor cost especially in the developing countries Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Moreover, low material cost, low power cost and low transportation cost. Acquiring a place in the powerful economic community like EU in Europe, NAFTA In North America and ASEAN in Asia, could be very profitable to a firm to gain alliance in one those blocs without any restrictions besides the entrants firms can acquire new technological and managerial concepts by observing and analysis the top competitors in the market. (Rugman and Collinson, 2006) Mostly the FPI located in the developed countries than developing countries because: first, the unambiguousness in the developed economics makes the FPI efficient. Second, FDI will not be profitable in the atmosphere of the high production cost of developed countries. So, FDI located in the low-cost environments apparently the developing countries. From an empirical study by Razin and Goldstein they stated that FPI is more volatility and more withdrawal rates that FDI. (Goldstein and Razin, 2006) Conclusion International business with its both significant categories: international trade and equities created an evolution in the global business. While the mercantilism established the theory on base of the restrictions to gain economic-political power, the follow theories stated that international trade is beneficial game and the key driver is specialisation with awareness of the control of inflows and outflows of goods and services (Warburton, 2010) through WTO, GATT or trade blocs. Equities was shaped with FPI and FDI, FPI is limited, less controlled and provides the investors with fast liquidity investments and FDI has the big share of equities and depend on control and management. The significance of these topics rises in its consequences. In other words the economic growth and quality of life for some of the developing countries attributed to international business. Vaghefi M., Paulson S. and Tomlinson W. (1991) International business theory and practice. New York: Taylor and Francis New York Inc. Piggott J. and Cook M. (2006) International Business Economics, a European Perspectives. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Haley, B. (1936) Heckscher, Mercantilism. The Quarterly Journal of Economics.50 (2) pp. 347-354 Tuldar R. (1987)subsidy polices for production automation mercantilism and liberalism revisited. Comparative Political Studies.20 (2) pp. 192-228 Baldwin R. (1971)Determinants of The Commodity structure of US Trade. The American Economic Review.61 (1) March pp.126-146 BBC (2005) BBC News: Business. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4510792.stm [Accessed 28th Oct 2010] Hornsby D. (2010)WTO effectiveness in resolving transatlantic trade-environment conflict. Journal of international trade law and policy. 9 (3), pp. 297-309 Warburton C. (2010)International trade law and trade theory. Journal of international trade law and policy.9(1) pp.64-82 Edwards S. (1992) Trade orientation, distortion and growth in developing countries, journal of development economics.39 (1) pp.31-57 Beer A. and Clower T. (2009) Specialisation and Growth: Evidence from Australias Regional Cities. Urban studies. 46(2) pp.369-389 Mullen et al., (2009) Effects of International Trade and Economic Development on Quality of Life. Journal of Macromarketing. (29)3 pp.244-258 Gryz A. (2008) Economic growth, international trade and air pollution: A decomposition analysis. Ecological Economics.68 (5) pp.1329-1339 Riley G. (2006) Economics: As markets and market system. Available at http://tutor2u.net/economics/revision-notes/as-markets-specialisation-trade.html. [Accessed 29th Oct 2010]. Kang J. and Stulz R. (1997) Why is there a home bias? An analysis of foreign portfolio equity ownership in Japan. Journal of Financial Economics.46 (1) pp.3-28 Merton, R.C., 1987. A simple model of capital market equilibrium with incomplete information. Journal of Finance 42(1) pp. 483 510 Goldstein I. and Razin A. (2006) An information-based trade off between foreign direct investment and foreign portfolio investment. Journal of international economics.70 (1) pp.271-295 Chacholiades, M. (1990) international economics. New York: McGraw Hill Neven D. (1990) EEC integration towards 1992: some distributional aspects. Economic policy. 5(1) pp.13-62 UNCTAD (2007) World investment report 2007.transnational corporations, extractive Industries and development. United Nations. Ajami R. et al. (2006) International Business: trade and theory. New York: M.E. Sharp Inc. Aswathappa K. (2008) International Business (3ed). 3rd ed. Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill publishing Company Limited.

Essays --

Description of Technology and Associated Science When considering technology and its history, defining technology is crucial. According to David Banta from the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands, technology can be described as â€Å"science or knowledge applied to a specific purpose.† An even more advanced, specific definition would be â€Å"a broad concept that deals with use and knowledge of tools and crafts and how its use affects the ability to control and adapt to the social and physical environment.† Technology consists not only of material objects, but also of systems, methods of organization, and techniques. Technology can involve specific areas like: electricity, computers, cellphones, etc. or more broad areas like: construction technology, health technology, business technology, etc. (Banta, 2009). Technology can be broken down further into five specific categories. Tangible technology pertains to physical things like blueprints, models, prototypes, etc. The second category is intangible technology, referring to problem solving and training methods. The third category, High technology, focuses on completely automated technology or intelligent technology. Artificial Intelligence is one example of this. The intermediate category includes somewhat intelligent technology. Finally, low technology involves a lot of labor and the rare use of intelligent tools. Simple farming tools like a hoe and rake would fit in the category of low level technology. Every invention in history was designed for a specific purpose in order to meet a specific need of the society in which it was created. In the midst of the industrial revolution, for example, people were restricted by daylight hours and unable to work after dark. After the inv... ...hungho Com Net Co., Ltd. begins developing Teller Machines for banks. 1994: ICL, the IT services company, has designed the first  cash dispenser  (CD) with a bill paying facility.   Over the years there has been a big controversy on who actually invented the ATM first. The reason for this is because so many people had the idea over the years and inventors created similar machines around the same time. Here are some of the ideas of who actually created the ATM first: Luther George Simjian developed the idea in 1939, but he couldn't make a commercial success out of it. James Goodfellow of Scottland holds a patent from 1966 for a full service ATM. There is also John Shepherd-Barron's machine from Barclay's Bank in London in 1967. Finally there is the more modern ATM from 1968 created by Don Witzel and his colleagues. (Automatic teller machine ATM. n.d.)

Implementing 5S Concept in Warehouse Management Essay

xThe practice of 5S aims to embed the values of organization, neatness, cleaning, standardization and discipline into the workplace (Osada, 1991). Besides, the 5S concept also widely apply into warehouse management because the 5S concept are emphasize on the effective organize and arrangement of the item in the warehouse in order to eliminate the unnecessary items from the warehouse for improve the efficiency of the storage methods. The implementation of 5S concept also can uncover hidden problems that may have otherwise remained unnoticed. According to Rod Gapp, Ron Fisher and Kaoru Kobayashi (2008), the benefit and advantages of implementing the 5S can be summarize as follow: †¢Orderliness (seiri and seiton) – can maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of the warehouse operation, productivity and cycle time performance by reducing the employees workload and human errors through simplify the process in the material handling in order to reduce the warehouse order cycle time and increase inventory turnover. Cleanliness (seiso and seiketsu) – to maximize effectiveness by contributing to a healthier life, safety and wellbeing as well as enhancing transparency. The comfortable working condition can motivate the employees to work hard for the company that can directly increase the warehouse productivity performance. In addition, the cleanliness of the warehouse can prevent the pollution cases from happening to care for the welfare and right of the employees that working in the warehouse. Moreover, the cleanliness and well arrangement of the inventory can directly increase the transparency because all the inventory are visible for reduce the stealing cases, increase the put away and inventory accuracy. †¢Discipline (shitsuke) – through continuous training and education to the employees can enhance their morale, knowledge, and skills which lead to increased quality of work life and work standards (Osada, 1991). The training program to the employees can directly increase the productivity of he warehouse because the employees are adapted to the effective skills in material handling and they can eliminate the unnecessary step in order to improve the warehouse order cycle time and reach to the cost effectiveness. The well discipline among the employees can increase the unity level among the employees that come from various departments and finally eliminate the communication barrier among them that lead to the well interaction among them. There are 5 elements in the 5S concept that should be implementing by the company in order to improve the performance of the warehouse and achieve costs effectiveness. These 5 elements in 5S concept will be discussed and summarize as follow: †¢Sort – (Seiri) – The first S focused on eliminating unnecessary items from the warehouse to increase the space utilization of the warehouse because the cost space of the warehouse is very expensive that including the utilities, wages of employees, and insurances costs. The products was placed strategically so that heavy products could be picked first and smaller lighter items picked last, in order to eliminate the need to restack pallets and avoid any accident to occur. The walk paths were set up in the warehouse with no loop back during order picking to complete an order. Man up order pickers were used to eliminate the need for ladders, and to assist with order picking from level 2 and 3. †¢Set In Order (Seiton) – The second S focuses on efficient and effective storage methods. Racking was purchased and erected in the warehouse to increase the available space in the warehouse and wide aisles is very important to allow fast movement for picking and replenishment (and use all available space) and to support the ability to use all materials handling equipment in all areas of the warehouse in order to increase put away accuracy and minimize the physical effort during material handling process. †¢Shine (Seiso) – The third S is to thoroughly clean the warehouse and this elements are strongly emphasize that all racking were fixed to the floor and each location was labeled. No product was allowed in the aisles and no product was allowed into the pick face from bulk until all stretch wrap was removed. Pyramid picking was not allowed and the cleanliness of the warehouse is the responsibility of all the staffs in the warehouse. The staffs in the warehouse are requiring cleaning the floor with an electric sweeper and not a broom and everyone takes turns as part of their duties. †¢Standardize (Seiketsu) –The fourth S is standardizing practice in warehouse in order to maintain the first three S’s. Organization, orderliness, and cleanliness are maintained and made habitual by instituting those duties into regular work routines. The methods need to be standardized and followed company-wide. Once the first three S’s are in place, standardize the details and create a plan to maintain and continue improving everything. This plan should include creating procedures and simple daily checklists, which are posted very visibly in each work area. The checklist should serve as a visual reminder to ensure that the daily 5S requirements are being met. Sustain (Shitsuke) – The fifth â€Å"S† (Sustain) allows an organization to sustain the 5S program due to the human nature is to resist change and some companies implement 5S for several months only to find themselves soon back to their previous habits. To make 5S work, it is critical that performance is measured and that top management is committed to ensure that 5S becomes part of the company culture, makes periodic walk through inspections, audits and posts results.

Odysseus (Epic Hero)

Will Rodgers, an American humorist and social commentator, once remarked that â€Å"Being a hero is about the shortest lived profession on earth† (atd. in carnival of wit 222). While this may be literally true, most heroes live on figuratively in the recorded stories of their exploits, and in many cases they model characteristics that can inspire readers to emulate they're behavior. One obvious example is Homer's Odysseus the fictional king of Ithaca whose courage, strength, and quest for immortality define him as the prototypical epic hero.His encounters with the Trojan war, the Cyclopes, the land of Aeolia with the bag of winds, a witch that accidentally turned his men to pigs and more. Odysseus manages to maintain the delicate balance between hubris and humbleness all throughout his ten year journey home from the Trojan War. This shows that he has potential in being a hero. Homer established the fact that Odysseus was willing to take help in addition to friendship from Athe na when he wrote, â€Å"For I never knew the gods to show such open friendship and Pallas Athene standing by Odysseus. † (The Odyssey, Homer, 23).The meaning of courage is a quality of spirit that enables you to face danger or pain without showing fear, and that's where Odysseus comes in. Odysseus has been through so much just to get back home to his family. From being in the arms of his loving wife to risking his life at war and the sea adventures with his men. Odysseus is faithful to those whom he loves and is determined to return to his home of Ithaca. As he was on the island with Calypso and she asked him to stay with her, he responded to Calypso by stating, â€Å"Every day I long to travel home and see my day of coming. † (Homer, 49).