Evaluate the Range of Alternative International Assignment Forms Essay Example for Free

Evaluate the Range of Alternative International Assignment Forms Essay An international assignment of 3-5 years is usually considered as Long Term Assignment. One of the reasons that it is becoming extremely more expensive for MNE’s is due to the nature of the job scope and the International Assignee’s (IA) personal considerations. Interestingly, according to the 2009 Global Relocation Trends Survey [ (Brookfield Global Relocation Services, 2009) ] report, when multinational companies are relocating their employees for assignments overseas these days regardless of short or long term, they tend to dispatch older and more experienced employees due to the low risk of assignment failure. This is one of the reasons why it has become increasingly and extremely more expensive for MNE’s [ (Harzing, 1995) ]. Following the expatriate demographic provided by the survey, family concerns sit on top of the chart which remain the most overwhelming reason of 92% for assignment refusal and also the top reason for early returns from assignments which recorded at high of 27%. Historically, the top five challenges over the years of the survey have been family adjustment, partner resistance, difficult location, children’s education, and partner’s career [ (Borstorff, 1997) ]; [ (Brett, 1995) ]. These are also the reasons why it is difficult to find the right candidates with the right experience to fill the vacancy for long term assignment [ (Shaffer, 2001) ]. Antidotes for the Poisons Exploiting Other Alternatives Due to the above dilemma faced by most of the MNE’s, they are now looking at other alternatives which can provide them with the best ‘antidotes’ to the ‘poisons’ that are stinging them. The ranges of alternatives of international assignments that the multinational companies can consider apart from the long term assignment include short term, self-initiated, commuter, and virtual assignments. Short term assignments This type of assignments can last from a few weeks to months. According to the PricewaterhouseCooper’s survey 2001, there is a sharp increase of almost 60% in the popularity of companies implementing this approach in their respective organizations. This is due to the nature of these assignments which give the companies an ‘instant’ solution in resolving skills shortages and are in general easier to manage [ (Solomon, 1999) ]. Apart from that, in comparison with the long term assignments, short term assignments imposed lower cost to the companies due to the assignment length and duration. In addition, companies do not need to spend on relocation on their entire employees’ family and it is also a good means to circumvent family-related problems which can be seen in most of the traditional assignments such as family upheavel. Self-initiated assignments Over the years, there is this trend that is growing in numbers where the assignees make their arrangements to find work abroad and are employed on local work contracts. According to [ (Suutari, 2000) ], they have identified a series of distinct characteristics of the self-initiated assignees as compared to traditional expatriation. These characteristics, which may not be that ‘bull’s eye’ accurate, however does speaks most common assignees may have and practice. These include young and single, be more motivated in moving abroad due to interest in internationalism and poor employment situations at home, working for companies at lower hierarchical levels, and receive no repatriation promises and view their relocation as a more permanent move. The benefit of recruiting the self-initiated assignees is that it can offer companies the potential of not having to undertake preparation. In fact, the assignees recruited could have been resident in a particular location for years where they are well blend with the socio-cultural of the place. One of the drawbacks is that the assignees are not familiar with the organizational culture which until a certain extent where such familiarity is important will be driven by the nature of the assignment. Commuter assignments This type of assignment involves employees commuting from their home to an office in another country by means of travelling by land, sea or air. One of the examples would be employees travelling by airplane on a weekly or bi-weekly basis [ (Assignment types explained, 2012) ]. In contrast with short term assignments, the commuter assignments allow company to fill in the skills shortage without disrupting the employee’s spouse’s career or the children’s education or family affair. This gives the assignees the opportunity to work abroad without leaving their home when carrying out their assignments. However, the drawbacks of the assignment are the quality life of the assignees may be affected. This is due to the likelihood of the assignees returning late from work due to the unspeakable distance of commuting and not to mention the fatigue due to the travelling journey. This affects the communication and the quality time between the assignees and their family which further prolong may affect their emotional and indirectly affects their productivity in the company. Virtual assignments The assignees manage the variety of international activities across several countries which do not require the assignees to be physically relocated to a foreign organizational unit. Although relocation is not necessary but extensive travel is inevitable. The advantages of a virtual assignment seem to be overwhelming over the traditional expatriate assignment. Firstly, the assignees are less expensive due to their wages are paid on local basis (without expatriate allowance) but perhaps with travel expenses. With the increasing use of video conferencing and other communication development, it has narrow down the possibility of this approach and making it less necessary in the future. Secondly, there is no need for any special scheme for the assignees such as insurance, foreign social security, and pensions as they can stick back to only local scheme. This gives the company another cost saving solution and as well as cutting on the unnecessary procedure in establishing a new scheme for the assignees. Lastly and most importantly, the assignees work-life balance is not tremendously affected. The assignees do not need to move their family abroad and their children’s education are not affected. The current trend of expatriation 2011 As the global economy continues to improve, more and more companies are increasing their presence in the emerging market where international assignments have become key aspect in the global economic recovery. Following the reliable source from the 2011 Global Relocation Trends Survey published by Brookfield Global Relocation Services [ (Brookfield GRS 2011 Global Relocation Trends Survey Report, 2011) ], China is where they are heading. According to the survey, China ranked the most common new destination followed by Brazil, India and Singapore. In terms of difficulties, China still sits on top of the list followed by India, Russia and Brazil. This gives a good reflection of the assignee volume going into these locations and the competition for housing and schooling will create delays and difficulties to the relocation and at the same time giving negative impact on the relocation experience. Conclusion In order to draw a bottom line on the above discussion, I personally view that self-initiated assignment would be the acceptable form of assignment from my generation. The current trend is leaning more towards modern thinking and not being hold back by the conventional belief and thinking. Take for example, the young adult nowadays do not rush through their marriage at early age and the average marriage age have increased to over 30 years old in contradictory with 18-22 years old during the olden days. This has indirectly give an impact to the working trend where employees remain single till the age of over 30 years old and they tend to be mobile and not restricted to family pressure or spouse’s career. Coming to this modern generation, we are starting to adapt to a very competitive environment where the local market is getting more and more saturated. In order to overcome this matter, we have to go out from our home country to get a well-paid jobs rather than saturating further in the local market. Therefore, this type of assignment is some kind of ‘killing two birds with one stone’ where companies can expect to save cost by hiring these assignees on contract basis and the assignees can expect to earn higher foreign exchange rate wages overseas compared to working in their home country. Considering the mutual benefits from this type of assignments, in the coming future we can expect to see the self-initiated assignment to gain popularity among the companies and also the prospective employees.

human genome project :: essays research papers fc

What would you do if you were given the power to change your genetic code from brown hair to blond?. Man has had this ability through natural selection for some time without knowing it, but in the near future scientist will be able to speed the process of natural selection by changing a persons genes. Scientists have identified what constitutes human DNA located in the nucleus of a cell. The Human Genome Project was established to identify the genes that make us who we are and is now an international organization. The massive task of identifying the numerous gene combinations has created a problem. In the nucleus are 22 genomes, plus two sex chromosomes which have already been identified. In the 22 genomes there are approximately 3 billion base pairs of DNA, which contain 50,000 to 100,000 genes, a basic unit of heredity. The identification of these base pairs is the goal of the Human Genome Project, which started in 1990 and whose job it is to identify the letters or chromosomes in DNA. These letters represent nucleotides called adenine, guanine, thymine, and cytosine (or A, C, T, G). ('92 BSCS pg. 1) The Human Genome Project idea originated in the mid 1980's and was discussed in the scientific community and media through the latter part of that decade. In the United States the combined effort of the Department of Energy and the National Institute of Health were involved in the project planning. (The National Center For Genetic Research) The Human Genome Project has several goals including identifying the genes of a human assessing the genes and comparing human DNA to that of bacteria, yeasts, the fruit fly, mice, and the Arabidopis thaliana, a small genome plant that grows rapidly. A major purpose is to determine how evolution proceeds from lower organisms to humans, and discover why the smaller genomes of animals have less junk or unneeded DNA. Geneticists use two types of maps to characterize the genes they discover--a genetic linkage map and a physical map. A genetic map registers the distance between the fragments of DNA we know according to the frequency with which they are inherited. The physical map measures the actual physical distance between two markers. Scientists want to map and develop technology for rapid genotyping, plus develop markers that are easy to use as well as generate new mapping techniques. (Instrumentation) Scientists can map genes but it is still expensive.

Analysing And Contrasting Two Poems Essay

The poet has described the sound of the whistle as a melody, which gives us the impression of a sound, which is very popular to the workers and a part of their daily routines. â€Å"The melody men & women built lives around†. This gives us an image of the workers being very unhappy with their Jobs because it mentioned that they have built lives around work. This implies that either they have been forced to work or that they have no other option to choose from because they have had to change their lifestyles to adapt to their jobs. The poet has compared the whistle to a queen bee by using a simile, â€Å"Sonorous as the queen bee’s fat hum drawing workers from the flowers back to the colonized heart. † This is a very good comparison because it shows how the whistle is similar to the queen bee. The whistles â€Å"Syncopation† wakes up the workers where as the â€Å"queen bee’s fat hum† calls the working bees from the flowers and back to the beehive, which is also the workplace of all the people. The workplace is referred to as the â€Å"colonized heart† because all the workers make up a single colony or a strong organisation, which is the key ingredient to a company, as if the heart is to the humans. Without the heart, we are nothing and the same goes for the workplace, no workers means no business. The whistle is also known to be loud. The first nine lines are a very effective part of the poem as it not only sets the scene but also describes what the whistle is and what it exactly does. The poet has now decided to begin to describe where the workers work. He does this by describing a piece of machinery, â€Å"a titanous puff of steam rose from the dragon trapped below iron, bricks and wood†. This quote is an example of personification because the â€Å"dragon trapped below† has been given a living characteristic which is the dragon. The poet gives us an image of fire by using a dragon, which is known to breathe fire. This image also gives us the idea that the workplace could possibly be a factory of some kind. This image of a dragon breathing out fire seem as though it would come from a child’s point of view especially because the image of a dragon is a myth. This nostalgic way of writing is very effective because it puts a clearer image of what exactly goes on and with this writing technique, many writers can create good linguistic devises. The next couple of lines give us a clearer view of what the factory could be. I believe that the factory could be a logging mill, â€Å"the whole black machine shuddered: blue jays & red birds wove light through leaves & something dead under the foundation brought worms to life†. The reason I believe it could be a logging mill is that I get the impression from this quote that a tree is being pulled out of the soil and worms are being exposed to the outside world. I believe that the â€Å"whole black machine† could be a piece of machinery, which is pulling the tree out of the ground. By doing this the wildlife, such as birds, which live in the tree, have been frightened by the sudden movement. The movement of the tree has now exposed the worms to sunlight, which has also caused sudden movement. I believe that this is the true meaning, however, Yusef Komunyakaa could be implying something totalling different. The black machine could be the whistle, which caused a loud vibration, which led to the sudden movement of the birds. This whistle has people working and waking up the foremen and employers. Yusef Komunyakaa could also be implying that the foremen are worms considering that they are white. Lines eighteen to twenty discuss the narrative of the men arriving to work, â€Å"men capped their thermoses, switched off Loretta Lynn, & slid from trucks and cars†. These lines are very unambiguous and straightforward. These three lines allow us to set a date the poem was written in. The poet mentioning Loretta Lynn allows us to date the poem because we know that she was a country singer and she made a number one hit in 1961. From this, we now know that the poem was probably written during the 1960’s. The poet has now described more about what the workers jobs consist of and I believe that this gives more evidence backing my prediction of the factory being a logging mill, â€Å"the rip saws throttled and swung out over logs on conveyer belts†. Here the poet has used personification to Describe the ripsaws. The word throttled means to strangle or choke. This gives us an image of aggression, however, up until this point of the poem there has been no mention of violence, this foreshadows something, which could possible happen later on in the poem. The equipment which have been described are heavy duty machinery, by this we understand that the logging mill is a very big factory and this leads to the question of, how many workers there are?

History Of Marketing And The Marketing Strategy - 2516 Words

The history of marketing can be traced back to the longest possible time- probably further than you thought. It will not be an exaggeration to say that it is as old as civilization itself. The probability of success of any business lies in the marketing strategy it adopts. Simply put, if you are not marketing your business, you are in for a loss. While this concept remained unchanged, the ways of marketing have changed several folds over the last few centuries. 1450-1700- Printed Advertisements Appears The concept of marketing started many moons back, as far back as 1450! The first printed advertising started with the invention of ‘moveable type’, which made mass printing possible for the first time. If an advertisement is printed on†¦show more content†¦Fruits and vegetables were sold in the city square in the carts and wagons and their proprietors used street callers (town criers) to announce their whereabouts for the convenience of the customers. In the 18th century weekly advertisements began to be featured in newspapers in England. These early print advertisements were mainly used to promote books, newspapers and research papers, which became increasingly affordable with advances in the printing press; and medicines, which were increasingly in demand as disease ravaged Europe. 1730’s -Magazines Used as a Marketing Tool One of the earliest examples of magazine is Erbauliche Monaths Unterredungen, a literary and philosophy magazine, which was first published in 1663 in Germany. The Gentleman s Magazine which was first published in 1731 in London, is considered as the first general-interest magazine. Edward Cave, who edited The Gentleman s Magazine under the pen name Sylvanus Urban, was the first one to use the term magazine, which was derived from the Arabic makhazin (or, storehouses). One of the oldest consumer magazines still in print is The Scots Magazine, which was first published in 1739. But soon the concept of magazine as marketing tools lost its