Impact of Technology on Recruitment and Selection Process Essay

Impact of Technology on Recruitment and Selection Process - Essay Example 45-89). Therefore, there have always been new methods and techniques of recruitment as the time changes. Recruitments in the past and in the present have different aspects but still the motive of both remains one, which is to get the best out of thousands. In the past, companies used to advertise vacant positions through newspaper, internal recruitment, or through simple postings in the main plant. Mostly, the most qualified applicants would not be aware of these job vacancies, so the companies often having no other option had to fill the positions with people that did not have sufficient qualification and skills to cope up with requirements of the position (Bergiel, 2008, pp. 20-78). Today in the world of corporate organizations, technology has captured a huge attention and importance. It has acquired this much attention because of its vast and diversified applications that organizations can utilize to make minimal use of capital to make maximum amount of capital. Technology process es and methods are often very flexible, automatic and give quick responses. Technology can record, communicate, and react to a number of data put in by users. It can help organizations in number of processes such as inventory cycles, advertising, financial statements, and other financial processes, record keeping of customers and employees and managing information. Now companies have also started using technology in recruitment process through websites, online portals etc. One of the major advantages of technology is ease and flexibility in recruitment process of organizations. This paper will discuss in detail about the impacts of technology on recruitment (Bowen, 1986, pp. 371-383). Firstly, there are five types of recruitments. In-house recruitment and recruiters look for executives and other top positions. Besides, niche agencies take care of specialized recruitment, employment agencies and job search engines or recruitment websites. Using technology, all kind of recruitment age ncies and employers allow job portals on websites to advertise their open position so that job seekers can see it and submit their resume. Online job search engines have various pricing models; advertisement is there on each job listing. The companies pay money to Job Search Engines for every click on their advertisements (Cascio, 2003, pp. 20-89). The most common method of advertising is still rooted in location, resume views, and duration of the job posting. Some niche engines generate income merely from advertisements because people large number of people is always in the search of good jobs. For this reason, they look into every option available and click on every advertisement they see. Due to current global recession, employers usually get large number of applications for advertised positions and find it difficult to handle all of them and find the best one. For this reason, some of the organizations such as IBM and Volkswagen have created certain web forms for receiving appli cations. In these web forms, applicants enter their basic information, which the company requires in order to preselect the candidates (Dineen, Ash, and Noe, 2002, pp. 723-734). Based on this information, companies preselect few candidates with an automated system. After this employers proof the testimonials of experience and education, they

Time management Essay Example for Free

Time management Essay I would like to express my gratitude and sincere thanks to my Project Guide Prof. Shailshree Ail, SIES College of Commerce Economics for extending valuable guidance and encourage me from time to time, without which it would not have been possible to undertake and complete this project. I also wish to extend my thanks especially to our Principal Dr. Mrs. Sheela Nabar and also Coordinator of Banking Insurance, Mrs. Aarti Kalyanraman for their kind co-ordination and support. Also I would like to thank all my friends, staff and teaching faculty of S. I. E.S. , my parents and staff of Crosswords who have directly or indirectly helped me during the course of my project. Special thanks to the respondents of the survey and people who have helped me to attain the indepth knowledge about the concept of Time Management. ________________ EXECUTIVE SUMMARY People generally assume that Time Management means managing the time that people have but on the contrary it actually means managing ourselves. As one cannot mend time according its own ways instead one can mend its own ways. Time Management is a broader concept. There are various categories of time such as Biological Time which means time utilized for the biological needs of any particular person. Then there is Fractal Time or widely known as The Theory of Relatively, which in general terms means fragmentation of time according to various situations one faces in life. Time has various dimensions and it is different for different people even though the measurement of time is same. Various studies by various scientists’ states that time always remain but it is the people who pass by it as time is considered to be unconquered, unvanquished and immortal. So to manage such a big factor along with managing our own self is quite a big task. Time management is an ongoing process because every person from any corner of the world, having any amount of money or a pauper or any one for that matter manages itself and the time he has in some or the other way. So no one has created the only and perfect methodology for time management but still people has practiced time management in the past. The present study seeks to analyse the managing habits among the people of Mumbai as it is a big and busy city as it is commercial city and also financial capital of India. People here are always on the run and need to manage their time well to achieve success in their work. The urban life in Mumbai is nothing but a fast life, this study tries to learn how well people in Mumbai manage their time, what are their time stealer, how to get rid of them, how the given grid has benefited them and also to know the miscellaneous benefits that one can get by managing its time. INDEX INTRODUCTION: â€Å"Yesterday is a cancelled cheque. Tomorrow is a promissory note. Today is ready cash, use it. † This is a perfect quote to begin an introduction of time. Time is now, time was yesterday and time is also tomorrow. It’s all in our hands as to how we make the best of it. Time is unique and unrenewable. It favors no one. No one is immune to the relentless, unforgiving passage of time. â€Å"Main Samay hu, Main Akshay, Ajay aur Anant hu. † This is one filmy dialogue but when looked into closely we realize that it has a deep meaning. It means that time is Unvanquished, Unconquerable and Immortal. We say that we are running out of time. So the question arises that does time pass by or do we pass through time? The solution to this question is TIME MANAGEMENT. If you ask any one what do they mean by time management very common response is managing time successfully. This is the simplest definition of Time Management. But the skills of managing time are not easy as its definition is. Planning can be done by anyone who has some knowledge of it but when it comes to executing it people fail miserably. Managing time successfully or in fact executing it effectively is what this project is all about. TIME: Time has historically been closely related with space, the two together comprising space-time in Einsteins special relativity and general relativity. According to these theories, the concept of time depends on the spatial reference frame of the observer, and the human perception as well as the measurement by instruments such as clocks is different for observers in relative motion. The past is the set of events that can send light signals to the observer; the future is the set of events to which the observer can send light signals. Time catches up with the present and overtakes it, so Time is Unvanquished. No one can stop time or reverse it so Time is Unconquered. Time is constant, continuous and infinite process so Time is Immortal. TIME IN THE ORGANIZATION: Time in the organization is constant and irreversible. Nothing can be substituted for time. Worse, once wasted, it can never be regained. Leaders have numerous demands on their limited time. Time keeps getting away and they have trouble controlling it. No matter what their position, they cannot stop time, they cannot slow it down, nor can they speed it up. Thus, time needs to be effectively managed to be effective. On the other hand, you can become such a time fanatic convert by building time management spreadsheets, creating priority folders and lists, color coding tasks, and separating paperwork into priority piles that you start to waste more time by managing it to deeply. TIME MANAGEMENT: Time management is the organization of tasks or events by first estimating how much time a task will take to be completed, when it must be completed, and then adjusting events that would interfere with its completion so that completion is reached in the appropriate amount of time. Calendars and day planners are common examples of time management tools. TIME EQUITY: The one universal distribution of equity is time: Everybody on the planet has ownership of 24 hours per day. Everyone receive the same allotment, day in and day out. Each new day brings an automatic deposit of 24 hours into the time account. It is referred to as Time Equity. Although each day brings a new deposit, each day the entire amount must be withdrawn, with no balance carried over to tomorrow. Use it or lose it. The challenge everyone face is how and where to invest the time equity. These decisions determine success, career path, productivity, and family status. The truth is that where people are in life is a direct reflection of how well they have managed their time portfolio—how and where they spent their time. One often hear people refer to personal activities in terms of time equity: How did you spend your weekend? or During our trip we spent a lot of time doing Time equity is the essence of a full and complete life. People often take it for granted and succumb to its harsh, unforgiving consequences. One has to take responsibility for ourselves and consciously appreciate the positive impact time management can have on our lives. Anyone who expects to achieve sales success should expect to make a serious commitment to working hard and efficiently. Throughout the five principles of time management that follow I share various techniques and suggestions to help streamline your activities. Time cannot think for you, but it can certainly work for you. Like any other investment, time produces returns if invested wisely and treated with respect. Sales professionals constantly explore investment opportunities for their time, maximizing their time. METHODS OF TIME MANAGEMENT: 1. PRINCIPLE METHOD Principle #1: Maximize Your Time Spending your time wisely starts with paying attention to how you spend it. Only when you decide to take control of your time will you have the power to stop squandering it. The best starting point to a better use of time is to conduct your own time-efficiency study. Evaluate your current use of time by breaking down a typical day into hourly increments. Be objective. Include everything throughout your entire day, even the time you sleep. You may need to track a full week or two to get a clear picture of your time usage. The next step is to review your time log and classify the activities as time-wasters, obligations, or priorities. Time-wasters are just that, activities that distract you and contribute nothing toward your goals. Eliminate them. The danger is that time-wasters are activities performed out of habit. Usually, they create a false sense of productivity but actually produce few or no results. The cure comes in the form of personal organization, the process of incorporating structure into your day. Obligations are the dutiful responsibilities of your job. They are necessary yet unimportant activities, usually performed throughout the day. They contribute indirectly to your goals. They are the administrative aspects of your job such as call reports, expense reports, quarterly forecasts, and various other required duties. Despite the challenges of limited time coupled with increased responsibilities, you can be productive by evaluating your current usage of your 24 hours and maximizing time. Obligations cannot be overlooked but be cognizant of the negative impact they have on daily productivity. As you become better organized you can streamline your activities, minimizing the time spent fulfilling obligations. You may be in a position to delegate some of your administrative duties to support people (internal customers) within your office. There are some sales entrepreneurs who have hired a part-time assistant. Maximize your time by doing what you do best, selling. Priorities are the activities that contribute significantly to your time. They are directly responsible for your results, moving you closer to your goals. Remember, companies today pay for results, not activities. They no longer pay for attendance, they expect results. As you evaluate your current use of time, the time-wasters will become clear, allowing you to rethink your activities. Make the shift from a long day filled with unproductive busyness to a shorter day focusing on priorities. As a sales entrepreneur, challenge yourself to be more proactive by prioritizing your tasks. Take control of the activities that prey on your efficiency, compromising your time. Once you complete your time-efficiency study, you will be shocked to see the time wasted reacting to other peoples demands and requests. Most of us habitually spend our days reacting instead of being proactive, unaware of the costly consequence. I suggest that up to 75% of our day is reactive. A sobering thought. Principle #2: Know What Time It Is. If you are like most salespeople, you have too much to do and not enough time to get it all done. To get ahead in todays fast-paced world, youve got to be aware of what time it is. It does not mean talking about telling time, you learned those years ago. What is talked about here is: Its not enough that youre doing a particular job right, youve got to be sure that youre doing the right activity at the right time. By the way, if you dont have a good watch, get one. The best and simplest time management tool is on your wrist. Common sense tells us that we should spend the majority of our time working on high-priority A and B accounts. Most of us dont. We waste a lot of time in the adult day care centre reacting to the demands of C accounts or even performing C activities. The first step is to take control of your entire day by knowing what time it is. Principle #3: Manage Your Time Time management is a personal process. It takes a strong commitment to change long-established habits. According to the 80/20 rule, we get 80% of our results from 20% of the things we do. This statistic supports the observation that we spend a lot of time on time-wasters and obligations. Imagine the impact on our time efficiency if we increased the 20% to 30%! What takes us from a time-starved day of routine, frustration, and stress to a productive day filled with accomplishments? Change. One definition of time management is doing fewer things in less time. Wouldnt that be great? Research suggests that effective time management strategies can free up a minimum of two hours per day. For example, time management studies show that we spend up to 70 minutes a day just looking for stuff. How many times have you said, Just a minute, I know its here somewhere. We misplace files, reports, memos, and letters, and the desks look like the movie Twister was filmed in the office. Clutter can be a huge time-waster, not to mention the embarrassment of lost or unanswered requests. Your goal isnt to have a nice neat desk, but to get organized so that you can convert wasted time into productive time. However, with a clean, orderly desk, youll improve your time working on priorities that will make you money. Your quality of work will also improve. The underlying objective of effective time management is to utilize all available resources to increase face-time; the time spent talking face-to-face with existing customers or potential customers. If youre an inside salesperson, increase talk-time. Take some time to determine how much time you actually spend with customers. Take a stop watch and clock total face-time in one entire week. On average, its only two to four hours. Shocking! This statistic serves as additional proof of the inordinate amount of time consumed by time-wasters and obligations. It is recognized that with leaner companies salespeople are often saddled with more of the administrative aspects of the job. Unfortunately they become high-priced administrators. How many times a day should you ask yourself if you are making the best use of your time. If you answered several, youre right. Only you can answer that question honestly. As the president of ME Inc. , dont compromise your time by blindly filling your day with busyness. Restructure your day to eliminate the time-wasters and minimize the time spent fulfilling obligations. Sometimes working in the office on a project or on a presentation could very well be the best use of your time. It’s doubtful that you can ever eliminate time spent in the adult day care centre, but you certainly need to minimize it. Use janitorial time to fulfil your obligations. As part of your time-efficiency study, you should determine the time of day that you are most efficient and productive. Know your peak time, the time of day you are at high energy. Not everyone has the same peak time. Some of us are morning people and others are afternoon or evening people. Pay attention to your moods and high-energy time of day to determine when youre most productive. Morning people can accomplish more simply by getting up an hour earlier each day, and night owls can carve out time for administrative activities in the evenings. Once you have identified your peak time, do your worst jobs then. They wont go away so you might as well get them done when youre feeling energized. Some authors suggest doing them first thing in the morning when youre feeling fresh. This approach works well if youre a morning person but could be disastrous if youre an afternoon person. Imagine doing your worst job at your worst time of day. Two worst dont make a right! In my case, prime time is during the late afternoon and early evening. Another suggestion in the interest of maximizing your time is to learn how to say no. Many of us are our own worst enemies. Youll never have enough time to finish your own tasks if youre always taking on more than time permits. Do not be afraid to politely refuse a request or task if your plate is already full. This includes saying no to your sales manager. When given a task, simply ask your managers, Would you like me to do this now or would you prefer I spend the time selling? Your manager may decide to delegate the task elsewhere. Its great to want to help others, but not at the expense of ME Inc. Principle #4: Use the Right Tools A professional (sales entrepreneurs included) is anyone paid to perform a task or a job at an acceptable level of proficiency while utilizing the tools of the trade to enhance efficiency and effectiveness. It is amazing to see how often salespeople conducting business with inappropriate tools. Its as though they are exempt from the requirement to be a professional. Imagine your doctor or dentist using anything but the best instruments. Your customers expect no less of you. As a sales entrepreneur, you have an obligation to invest in the best. You may have heard it before, A carpenter is only as good as his tools. The solution begins with a personal planner—a time management system that offers the convenience of portability while organizing your activities, mapping your week and, most importantly, planning your day. A good planner includes twelve months at-a-glance, 365 individual day-pages, a daily to-do list section, and an appointments section. Some planners come with a rigid set of instructions, so pick a planner that offers simplicity and the flexibility to meet your personal preferences. A planner used effectively not only buys you time, it helps you stay in balance throughout your week, including weekends. Poor time management skills result in overspending your time, running out of day before you get everything done. It is supposed to be compared it to managing a checking account. Imagine opening a checking account at your local bank then not using a check book to track the account activity. Surely you would find yourself out of balance at the end of the month, possibly overspending your available funds. Without the appropriate tool to track your time-related activities, you quickly find yourself out of balance, overdrawn on your time account. Principle #5: Be Proactive, not Reactive I would suggest that up to 75% of our day is spent reacting to the needs and requests of other people such as customers, managers, internal customers, family, and friends. We are constantly bombarded with demands on our limited time, leaving us unable to accomplish our own goals and objectives. No wonder we feel the frustration of, So much to do, so little time. We often succumb to the demands and requests of others because we think it is socially inappropriate to say no. We become victimized by others who may have a strong interest in controlling our activities or behaviour—such as a spouse or a manager. Unfortunately many people, including salespeople, are content to be regulated and manipulated rather than committing to SMART goals and living life guided by their agenda, not someone elses. No one ever accomplished a personal goal by being subservient to others. Successful sales entrepreneurs refuse to be swayed by the whims of others and are quietly effective at managing their own agendas. Employers and managers sometimes do more to demotivate rather than to motivate. Demotivation can take the form of intimidation or high-performance expectations constrained by rigid management policies and limited resources to perform the job. No wonder so many people want to take this job and shove it. A proactive strategy means developing the discipline to stay focused on your agenda, your goals, and your objectives. Part of this discipline comes in the form of qualifying the severity of a problem prior to reacting to it. For example, next time a customer informs you of a problem or a concern, resist the temptation to immediately jump into react mode, drop what you are doing, and race over to console your customer. It may not be necessary. The next time you get an irate customer (or internal customer) demanding to see you right away, follow these two steps: 1. Acknowledge the problem. Allow the customer to vent by explaining the situation and then clarify your understanding of it by paraphrasing. Be sure to take notes of your discussion for future reference. By acknowledging the concern and showing empathy, the customer will begin to feel better about it and may become somewhat flexible as to how and when you resolve the concern. A sympathetic attitude to a real or imaginary product or service failure cannot be overemphasized. A 10-minute phone call to determine the facts and the seriousness of the problem may be a valuable investment, possibly saving you hours of unnecessary running around. Work smart, not hard. 2. Suggest another time. Tell the customer that your day is full with appointments and commitments and ask if first thing tomorrow morning would be okay to get together. Your business and time are just as important and legitimate as that of your customer. You are equals. In the majority of cases, your customer will appreciate your schedule and agree to meet with you the next day. Too often we assume that we must respond immediately, but by following these steps you will save yourself valuable time. Sometimes, however, the customer may be insistent that you respond immediately, in which case you must act accordingly. As a student, there are some basic Principles of Time Management that you can apply. 1. Identify Best Time for Studying: Everyone has high and low periods of attention and concentration. Are you a morning person or a night person. Use your power times to study; use the down times for routines such as laundry and errands. 2. Study Difficult Subjects First: When you are fresh, you can process information more quickly and save time as a result. 3. Use Distributed Learning and Practice: Study in shorter time blocks with short breaks between. This keeps you from getting fatigued and wasting time. This type of studying is efficient because while you are taking a break, the brain is still processing the information. 4. Make Sure the Surroundings are Conducive to Studying: This will allow you to reduce distractions which can waste time. If there are times in the residence halls or your apartment when you know there will be noise and commotion, use that time for mindless tasks. 5. Make Room for Entertainment and Relaxation: College is more than studying. You need to have a social life, yet, you need to have a balance in your life. 6. Make Sure you Have Time to Sleep and Eat Properly: Sleep is often an activity (or lack of activity) that students use as their time management bank. When they need a few extra hours for studying or socializing, they withdraw a few hours of sleep. Doing this makes the time they spend studying less effective because they will need a couple hours of clock time to get an hour of productive time. This is not a good way to manage yourself in relation to time. 7. Try to Combine Activities: Use the Twofer concept. If you are spending time at the laundromat, bring your psychology notes to study. If you are waiting in line for tickets to any concert, bring your biology flashcards to memorize. 2. FIRST THING FIRST (Method by Virginia Tech Division of student Affairs) 1. Each night write on a 35 card the 6 most important tasks you have to do tomorrow. 2. Number them in the order of importance. 3. First thing in the morning look at the task listed as most important and start working on it until it is finished. Then tackle item 2 the same way, item 3 and so forth until your work or school day are completed. 4. Don’t be worried if you only complete 2 or 3 items. You’ve completed the most important tasks and any other method wouldn’t have given you more time to work on the rest of the list. 5. Each night write a new 35 card for the next day. 3. TIME GRID URGENT IMPORTANT NOT URGENT IMPORATNT Crises Pressing problems Dead-line driven projects, meetings, preparations Preparation Prevention Planning Relationship building True recreation empowerment URGENT UNIMPORTANT interruptions, phone calls, mails, reports, meetings many proximate, pressing matters many popular activity NOT URGENT UNIMPORTANT trivia, busy work some phone calls, time wasters, time stealers excessive television. 4. REMEMBERING, SETTING PRIORITIES AND MOTIVATION METHOD: Remembering Three keys to time management are: remembering, setting priorities, and motivation. Its easy to fall into the trap of thinking I wont forget that. But the important thing is not just to remember it, but to remember it at the right time a time when you can take the first step in doing it. Your thoughts are valuable. Write them down, whether theyre ideas on how to save the world or reminders to wash the frying pan. Then figure out some way for the messages to get to you at a time when you can do the things. Use calendars and lists. I have lists of things that can be done at home, lists of things that can be done when the stores are open, lists of things to do before going to work in the morning, etc. By looking at the appropriate list, I can forget about everything else and concentrate on the work appropriate for that moment. Setting Priorities If you write a list of things to do this evening, it probably contains way more things than you can actually accomplish. Thats fine. The list is valuable. By looking over it, you can choose the most important things and do them first. The rest can be transferred to other lists. Some people say they dont need to spend time planning. That may be true. If you have a list of things to do that are all about equally important, and if youre sure that the most important things are on the list, then you dont need to spend any time comparing them. Just start doing one of them, it doesnt matter which one. But for most people most of the time, some of the things are more important than others, so its worthwhile taking a few minutes to read over the list and choose the most important to do first. Its good to have a pen handy all the time to write down ideas. That way you can catch thoughts about important things that you might have forgotten to add to your lists. Motivation Youve set goals, written lists, chosen priorities, and identified whats important to do right now, but you dont feel like doing it. Here are some ideas to help with motivation. In the book Feeling Good, David Burns points out that its not necessary to feel like doing something in order to do it. You can just start. Usually, once youve started, you begin feeling more motivated to continue doing it. I started feeling more in control when I started giving myself permission to cross things off lists. Deciding not to do something and putting an X next to it gives a feeling of relief, almost as satisfying as checking it off as done. Sometimes I graph the total number of check marks per day. This feels good and gives me motivation to finish lots of things on my to-do lists. Plan rewards and celebrations for yourself, such as special snacks after getting certain things done. Just taking a few seconds to admire the finished work such as a tidy table or pile of clean laundry, is an excellent reward. Smile and tell yourself what a good job you did. Even if youre in a hurry, you can plan rewards that take a few seconds, like standing up and stretching, looking out the window for 10 seconds, or tossing a pen in the air and catching it. If you plan them as rewards, they feel like rewards, and give you time to congratulate yourself on getting something done. MYTHS OF TIME MANAGEMENT Myth #1: Theres too much to do; I cant handle it all. This cant be the real reason why I have a messy house. After all, other people manage. Its encouraging to hear that there are others who also have trouble with the little things in life. That means that it isnt just that there are too many things for one person to handle: rather, its possible, theoretically at least, for me to organize my time in a way that gets it all done. Myth #2: Theres plenty of time; I can do that later. This is the exact opposite of myth #1. Yet both myths contribute to procrastinating. Rather than switch from one myth to the other, I need a consistent, realistic view of how much my time is worth and how much of it there is. Myth #3: Im busier than usual right now, so it makes sense to shift some tasks off to another time. Occasionally its really true, of course. But usually, Im about equally busy all the time, really. My time is worth the same all the time, with a few exceptions like if Im trying to be on time for a job interview or something. It SEEMS that Im unusually busy at any given moment, because at that moment, Im AWARE of the things impinging one my time right then. A person can only be aware of so many things at once. The detail of the moment seems complex; the future seems simple, free and clear. But really life is always that complex. I may think, This is an unusually busy day because I have library books due. It seems reasonable; I know I only have books due on a small percentage of all days. But really, there are so many other aspects to life: dentist appointments, parties, holiday celebrations, bike repairs, etc that taking all into consideration, the other days are really just as busy. I also tend to think Ill have plenty of time later the same day, too. And of course I dont. Myth #4: Re-scheduling something to a later time is procrastinating. No, re-scheduling is taking control and responding to new information about priorities and time available. Its only procrastinating if you dont schedule it at all, or if you re-schedule for the wrong reasons which will become apparent when you find yourself re-scheduling the same thing more than about 3 times. In that case, stop and think about whether you really want to do the thing. If its important, go ahead and start. Myth #5: This little task is not important. Example: I cut open a package of food and leave the little bit of plastic I cut off on the kitchen counter. Question: Shall I put the bit of plastic in the garbage right now? It seems that doing so is not important. The plastic isnt doing any harm where it is. It wont hurt me if I leave it there. I can always put it in the garbage later. But actually it is important to put it in the garbage. I ask myself, Is it important not to have it sitting there on the counter all year? Yes. I dont want it there that long. OK, then I have to put it in the garbage now or some time in the next few days. Next question: Is my time more valuable now than it will be, say, tomorrow? I seem in a hurry now, but I will tomorrow, too. (See myth #3. ) Really its best to put it in the garbage right now. Its important enough to be worth the few seconds of my time. The myth really means, Its not important to do it RIGHT NOW. However, it is important. Either its important or it isnt. When its done doesnt affect that. Its important to wash the dishes before eating on them again; therefore its important to wash the dishes. If its important, its probably worth doing now. BEATING PROCRASTINATION Manage Your Time. Get It All Done. If you’ve found yourself putting off important tasks over and over again, you’re not alone. In fact, many people procrastinate to some degree – but some are so chronically affected by procrastination that it stops them achieving things theyre capable of and disrupts their careers. The key to controlling and ultimately combating this destructive habit is to recognize when you start procrastinating, understand why it happens (even to the best of us), and take active steps to better manage your time and outcomes. Why do we Procrastinate? In a nutshell, you procrastinate when you put off things that you should be focusing on right now, usually in favour of doing something that is more enjoyable or that you’re more comfortable doing. Procrastinators work as many hours in the day as other people (and often work longer hours) but they invest their time in the wrong tasks. Sometimes this is simply because they dont understand the difference between urgent tasks and important tasks, and jump straight into getting on with urgent tasks that arent actually important. They may feel that theyre doing the right thing by reacting fast. Or they may not even think about their approach and simply be driven by the person whose demands are loudest. Either way, by doing this, they have little or no time left for the important tasks, despite the unpleasant outcomes this may bring about. Another common cause of procrastination is feeling overwhelmed by the task. You may not know where to begin. Or you may doubt that you have the skills or resources you think you need. So you seek comfort in doing tasks you know youre capable of completing. Unfortunately, the big task isnt going to go away – truly important tasks rarely do. Other causes of procrastin.

Modern European History Essay -- essays research papers

Modern European History 1. What did Paul Valery mean in saying that the mind of Europe doubted itself profoundly?   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Before 1914, people in Europe believed in progress, peace, prosperity, reason, and rights of individuals. During that time, people began to believe in the Enlightenment, industrial developments were just starting and scientific advances began to take place. People then really believed in progression and further developments.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Unfortunately, World War I broke out. Nevertheless, the optimistic people of Europe still did not doubt the outcome and were so convinced that it was not going to have any long term effects. They looked toward happier times and hoped life will go back to where it was before. But little did they know, as a result of the war, total war broke out and crushed all the hopes and accomplishments that the people had established. This shocking reality was unbearable and uncomprehending to the people's hopes and dreams. And as this lasted over the years, the age of anxiety was created. People didn't know or what to expect anymore. They did not know what was going to happen after the war. They're so devastated by the war that many who were still alive lost faith and all hopes. Many intellectuals began to doubt the Enlightenment and even the future of Western civilization. This state of uncertainty and unpredictability brought out many modern philosophers of that time. One of them was a Fren...

H.D.: The Fusion of Classicism and Modernity Essay -- Hilda Doolittle

H.D.: The Fusion of Classicism and Modernity With foundations rooted deeply in an appreciation for and understanding of classicism, H.D. fused ancient Grecian literature, thinking and mythology with modernistic feminism, bisexuality and psychoanalysis to establish for herself a prominent voice among her contemporaries. Born Hilda Doolittle in 1886 to Helen and Charles Doolittle, her education was fostered by the intellectual curiosity of her parents (an artist and an astronomer, respectively) and the proximity of The University of Pennsylvania. Closely associated with poet Ezra Pound, she spent much of her adult and professional life surrounded by literary contemporaries. Doolittle was a woman whose work was not limited to a single interest but instead expanded to envelop several of the most outstanding facets of modernism: the exploration of women within a literary movement, the exploration of homosexuality and the exploration of self through psychoanalysis. H.D.’s major contribution to modernism is most often recognized as her use of poetic imagery. After only two years at Bryn Mawr, H.D. moved to England, where much of her poetry was written. Pound, a close friend and twice-fiancà ©e not only facilitated her acceptance into the literary circles of expatriate American writers, but also her entrance into the literary world. Affixing the signature "H.D., Imagiste," Pound submitted H.D.’s early verses to Harriet Monroe’s Poetry Magazine, which were accepted and published (Scott). Her poetry remains at the forefront of the imagist branch of modernism, a division whose writers dedicate themselves to the direct treatment of the subject, the prohibition of any word that not essential to the presentati... ...://www.literaryhistory.com/20thC/HD.htm http://www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmID=238 Works Cited â€Å"A Brief Biography Of H.D.† < http://www.imagists.org/hd/bio.html> Bryan, Marsha. â€Å"Modern American Poetry.† Doolittle, Hilda. Asphodel. Editor: Spoo, Robert. Durham; Duke University Press, 1992. pp. ix-xix. Doolittle, Hilda. Collected Poems 1912-1944: Martz, Louis L. New York; New Directions. Pp. 39, 118, 128, 281. â€Å"H.D. Poetry Exhibit† <http://www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmID=238> Levertov, Denise. †H.D.: An Appreciation† Modern Critical Views H.D.: Bloom, Harold. New York; Chelsea House Publishers. Scott, Bonnie Kime. â€Å"About H.D.’s Life and Career† Bryan, Marsha. â€Å"Modern American â€Å"Poetry.† <http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/g_l/hd/life.htm>

Ishikawa

A Forefather of TQM Principles: Kaoru Ishikawa Total Quality Management (TQM) principles are based off of the philosophies of numerous individuals – W. Edward Deming, Joseph Juran and Philip Crosby, to name a few. One such individual is Kaoru Ishikawa. Touted as the â€Å"Father of Quality Circles and as a founder of the Japanese quality movement† (Beckford, 2002), his philosophy on quality control is critical to understand TQM in general. Knowing the fundamentals/ building blocks of TQM can be used to shape the future direction and improvement of TQM.Ishikawa hoped his philosophy would improve quality in work, which in turn would lead to improvement in quality of life (Beckford, 2002). Ishikawa was born July 13, 1915. He graduated from the University of Tokyo where he received an engineering degree in Applied Chemistry. Later he would become a professor of the same University. After graduating, he joined the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) in 1949. Th is could be seen as the first steps he took towards developing his quality control philosophy and following in the footsteps of his father in Management Science (Hutchins, 1989. The core ideas of Ishikawa’s philosophy on quality control – companywide quality control (CWQC) – can be divided into three main concepts (Beckford, 2002). The first is that quality is based off of a holistic approach. The second core idea of Ishikawa’s philosophy is that there is active participation in the quality program amongst the employees. The third core idea is that there is direct, simple communication between management and workers. A holistic approach means that not only is the end product/service a quality product/service but also extends to the process that developed it.The end is just as important as the means. The company has a program in place that strives for quality management, quality workers and quality processes within all levels of the company. I think this c oncept of quality at all levels within a company is especially important in today’s society where it is not enough to know a company provides a quality product but is socially and environmentally conscious. For example, if a company has a quality process in place when choosing and working with certain suppliers – they lessen the chance of being surprised that the supplier uses child labor or contaminates the environment.Ishikawa’s second core idea of active participation among employees emphasizes the importance the workers. It’s not enough to have a quality program in place; the employees (including leadership) have to be involved and to have a voice within the company. This is based off of the idea that employees not only can recognize the problems in a process but also the solutions (Beckford, 2002). One of the main complaints that employees have is that management is not in touch with what they actually do so they don’t listen when there is a p roblem or a solution. Ishikawa’s second core idea looks to avoid this phenomenon.The last core idea of direct, open communication between workers and management rounds out Ishikawa’s philosophy on quality control. It stresses the importance of group communication to be understandable and in â€Å"layman terms† so it can be pertinent for all levels of the company. Ishikawa’s contributions to quality management were numerous. He wrote 600+ articles and 31 books (Smith, 2011). He had 2 English translated books – â€Å"Introduction to Quality Control† and â€Å"What is Total Quality Control? The Japanese Way†. He was also behind the concept of quality circles and the Fishbone Diagram.Quality circles can be seen as a method of creating active participation within a company. It shows how Ishikawa believed that â€Å"all workers must be involved in quality improvement through teams to enhance the capability of individual workers and improve work processes† (Watson, 2004). Quality circles are groups of workers within a company that is formed to review, analyze and make recommendations for issues and problems. The Fishbone diagram was developed in 1943 as a problem-solving tool and was used to identify possible root causes to problems in a simple and straightforward presentation.It is one of the seven tools of quality control that is recognized worldwide (Smith, 2011). While all the tools of quality control is important, this diagram can be used in numerous disciplines ranging from not only quality management, but science, education, etc. The other tools of quality control is Pareto Charts, Stratification, Check sheets, Histograms, Scatter graphs and Control charts (Beckford, 2002) Throughout his career, Ishikawa was the recipient of numerous awards. Per Beckford, he received the Deming, Nihon Keizai Press and Industrial Standardization prizes and the Grant Award from the American Society for Quality Control.Ishik awa’’s work also prompted an award to be given out in his honor. In 1993, ASQ established the Ishikawa Medal where it is awarded â€Å"to an individual or a team whose work has had a major positive impact on the human aspects of quality† (ASQ, 2012) Ishikawa passed away April 16, 1989. Although he is no longer with us, his work and his philosophy is still vibrant and in use today. Understanding the core concepts behind Ishikawa’s CWCQ sheds light on TQM principles. His philosophies help shape how companies today develop their quality control programs.Maybe from the lessons and philosophy of Ishikawa, a future TQM guru could emerge, giving the world another individual that further advances quality in work and ultimately in life. References Beckford, J. (2002). Part two: The quality gurus: Chapter 8: Kaoru Ishikawa. Quality (Routledge), pg. 93 – 104. Watson, G. (2004). The Legacy Of Ishikawa. Quality Progress, 37(4), 54-57. SMITH, J. (2011). The Last ing Legacy OF THE MODERN QUALITY GIANTS. Quality, 50(10), 40-47. Kaoru Ishikawa 1915-1989. (2010). Quality Progress, 43(11), 19. Bauer, K. (2005). KPI Identification With Fishbone Enlightenment.DM Review, 15(3), 12. Hackman, J. , & Wageman, R. (1995). Total Quality Management: Empirical, Conceptual, and Practical Issues. Administrative Science Quarterly, 40(2), 309-342. Hutchins, David. (1989). Obituary: Professor Kaoru Ishikawa. The Independent. April 26, 1989. http://asq. org/about-asq/who-we-are/bio_ishikawa. html http://asq. org/about-asq/awards/ishikawa. html (Evans, James R.. Managing for Quality and Performance Excellence, 8th Edition. South Western Educational Publishing, 01/2010. p. 110). <vbk:1111509360#outline(3. 7. 2)>

web advertising essays

web advertising essays Web Advertising Web advertising, not to mention the Internet itself, finds itself in a stage of relative infancy and therefore provides marketers with novel challenges and situations which need to be dealt with caution . The realm of Web advertising is unchartered terri tory! In terms of South Africa, the country finds itsef somewhat behind technologically. However, this may not prove to be a disadvantage as the uncertain nature of Web advertising may make a policy of 'watching and learning' most viable. What implications will this new technology have for marketing? What is the nature of Web advertising? How can a business use the medium effectively Where is all this going These questions appear to be most pertinent in the process of understanding interact ive marketing on the Internet. The qualified opinion of John Matthee, a Web site designer employed by Adept Internet (an Internet service provider), was sought in accumulation of a large sum of the following data. This seems approp riate as the novelty of Web advertising at this stage h as led to generral lack of academic data in the practicalities of advertising via this medium. 2) THE INTERNET: AN INTRODUCTION 2.1) Original development of the Internet What was originally created by the US military to provide a secure means of communication in case of nuclear war, which has now become known as the Internet, has metamorphosed into the strategic global communications tool of our era. The end of the cold w ar left this massive installed structure - initially dubbed ARPANET- without much of a purpose. Soon universities, major corporations and governments began to piggyback on to the global framework, extending its reach and commercialising it. Known as the N et to aficionados, the Availability of cheap, accessible and easy-to-use Net access points throughout the world has seen the number of global Internet users increase dramatically each month. While the convenience of electronic mail w...

Ecosystem Essay Example

Ecosystem Essay Example Ecosystem Essay Ecosystem Essay There are various reasons Of over-breed. The first one would be global effect, it is one of the main concern for the problem of over-breeding. Global warming changes the climate. Those are tolerant enough to survive can survive and increase the population; those who are not will decrease in number. This leads to the extinction of species. The lower atrophic level will increase in population size. Secondly, untreated pollution such as sewage and industrial discharge are toxic materials. When they leak to the environment, it will cause the same result as the global warming. Thirdly, Species are imported to a new place where they do not have predator and can adapted to the environment will have increase in the number of population. Fourthly, human abandon animals without concern would leads to the problem of over-breeding. Over-breeding will interfere the ecosystem. For the environment, the over, breed species might damage the plants, destroy the shelter and breakdown food chain. In the living organisms, species in the same ecosystem might change their usual prey, decrease the initial resources, aboriginal living organisms might disappear and be edged out from the original habitat. Finally, biodiversity will be lost. The variability among living organisms from all sources including terrestrial, marine, other aquatic ecosystems, and the ecological complexes of which they are part; this includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystem. Species are hardly to recover after disturbances such as bush fires or volcanic eruption. Example Chinese mitten crab Chinese mitten crab (Ricochet genesis/-X%N) is Medium-sized burrowing crab which is native to the coastal estuaries Of eastern Asia. In 1 9005, the crab seeds from Shanghai Wesson were carried by European merchant ships, entered the sump with water. When merchant ships arrived Rhine and Thames in Germany, crab seeds and water were pulled out of the ship. Then the mitten crab adjusted Europe rivers swiftly. The rivers provided a good living environment for the Chinese mitten crabs. The warm water contained lots of nutrition which could speed up crabs breeding. Because of Chinese mitten crabs were from China, theres no local predictor can harm crabs, which also cause the over-breeding of Chinese mitten crab. There are 3 main consequences to the ecosystem after the crab numbers increase. The crabs would undermine dams. Chinese mitten crabs over Germany There are lots of consequences which are unavoidable when the number of Chinese mitten crabs increased. The crabs will undermine the nearby dams. As the dams are harmed, flooding will be caused, the whole area will be covered by water. Then the trees are drowned by water, because plants can not live without the air. A broken dam may also damage the sewage facilities, break down the tools. The polluted water will mix with the flash water, which will cause the water pollution. Besides, the crab is able the excavate holes on river bank to build crab shelter. As the holes become more and larger, it will cell the subsidence. In the other way, crabs will become new consumer in the river. Crabs usually eat fish and prawn as food. It will cause the monopoly of small size fish and prawn because of the growing number of the crabs. Crabs will pie the original food chain and then upset the whole river ecosystem. Mile-a-minute Weed Mile-a-minute Weed is a tropical plant in the Assistance from South America . It has several strong survival abilities allow them to become an over-breeding specie-let is a vigorously growing perennial creeper which single stalk can reduce between 20 and 40 thousand seeds a season. Its light seed can spread widely by wind. We can find this specie in the sub-tropical zones of North, Central, and South America. Mile-a-minute Weed is also highly adaptable to the undesirable environment as it can still grow well in less fertile soil. We have first found the Mile-a-minute Weed in 1884 in Hong Kong and believed that it would be transported by human through luggage or logistic into Hong Kong illegally . Due to the favorable conditions of Hong Kong ( high humidity, light and soil fertility) and its strong survival abilities, Mile-a-minute Weed becomes an over-breeding specie in Hong Kong which causing serious ecological destruction to the ecosystem of Hong Kong . Due to the rapid growing (as fast as 80 to 90 mm in 24 hours for a young plant) of Mile-a-minute Weed, it can cover other plants, shrubs and even trees in large scale with short period of time . The covered plants cannot absorbed enough sunlight for Photosynthesis and they would die eventually. It would also attach to other plants in order to absorb nutrients from them . When all the nutrients were lost, the plants then wither and die. Feasibility and limitation of eating The feasibility of encouraging eating over breeding species is limited by some reasons. There may be no natural enemy (helper) of over-breeding species to consume them and fail to reduce their population such as Chinese mitten crab and Mile-a-minute Weed. Absence of higher atrophic level of species allows over-breeding species grow rapidly without disturbance from eating. For human, they would not eat food that are distasteful and contain no nutrient. Different countries have different eating habit and culture. For example, western people seldom eat seafood (fish or crab). Chinese mitten Arab is over-breeding specie in Germany and the selling price would be very low , however German would not want to eat the crab. Pet overpopulation is a tragic problem but we wont eat pet because of ethics concern. As dog and cat are humans friends, eating pet violates our social ethic and it is so cruel and inhuman. So there are several reasons for us to refuse eating the over- breeding species as best solution . Introducing of their natural enemies increases the population of invasive alien species as new over-breeding species which may lead to a vicious circle , bad consequences to local ecology are resulted. The growing population of the foreign natural enemies would hunt on the over-breeding specie ,but also the local native species ,compete natural resources and habitats with the local species and may introduce pathogen or parasite that sicken or degrade habitats of native species. The explosion of alien predator causes the extinction of local species,thus imbalance in the ecological biodiversity. Serious disturbances of the food chain upset the whole ecosystem. We have found the example of Asian Carps invasion of North America. The local government introduced Asian Carp from China to South America in order to control the excessive phytoplankton and microbial in the ponds in 30 years ago. This kind offish occupies the main river drainage system of America(97% offish is Asian Carp in the Mississippi River at North America),then consume most of local species in the river and further make potential threat to the ecology and the food chain of Great Lakes. Solution We suggested 3 main solution to solve the over-breeding issue, which are: Education Transaction Sterile action Citizens have to be educated that never release any animal to the wild environment because the animals might adjust the new living environment easily and sire swiftly. Then the over-breeding problem will happen. Using the rabbit disaster in Austria in asses as an example, a field owner released 24 rabbits to the wild. Then the rabbits lived on grass land without any predator, they reproduced fast. Which caused native plants, animals and soil collapsed. Transaction is to transfer species to an unfamiliar region. Introduce animals to place with new environment which have different humidity, temperature and etc. The species might be arduous to adjust new environment, and the breeding rate can be reduced. For example, if a specie is used to live in tropic rest, when they are placed to a dry hot area, male sperm amount will be decreased. Sterilization is to remove the function of reproduction. There are two main methods to do the Sterilization, Chemical castration and Physical castration. Chemical castration is using chemicals to castrate the animals. Wild monkeys in Hong Kong are neutered by AFC since 2007. Males were sterilized by chemical vasectomy. Females were injected with an neoconservatives vaccine. Physical castration is using Surgery to castrate. Dogs and cats undergo surgery every years. Males were Testicle removal. Female were uterus and ovaries removal. Conclusion Eating is the only one of the solutions but not the best among all of them.

PreDarwinism Views essays

PreDarwinism Views essays Before November 24, 1859, many people simply believed that species were created by God in their present forms, or that it was possible for organic matter to be spawned from inorganic matter. However, Charles Darwin used these ideas to create his thesis, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. The first true theories on evolution arise during the classical Greek period. On a handful of Greek philosophers believed in the theory of evolution and natural selection. Unfortunately, the two philosophers who influenced western civilization the most, Plato and Aristotle, opposed any theory of evolution. Plato believed that there were two worlds, one real world, and one imperfect world that we perceive with our senses. Any variations in life were imperfect images of their ideal forms. However, Aristotle didnt believe in two worlds; instead, he believed in a scale of nature. Each life form was arranged on a type of ladder. It started at the bottom with the least complex organism and continued up to the most complex organism. Each organism had a pre-determined rung, which allowed no ability to move up, and no open spaces for a new organism to According to Neil Campbell in his book, Biology: Fourth Edition, Juedo-Christian culture fortified anti-evolution theories. (p. 400-401) The creationist-essentialist dogma that species were permanent and created for a specific purpose became deeply embedded in Western thought. Any person who dared to theorize or believe in theories about evolution were instantly labeled heretics. The medieval church saw evolution as saying that God did not exist, that we are not the supreme creation, and that humans could just However, in the later 1700s and early 1800s there was a scientific revolution taking place. People began to use scientifi ...

B322 Investigating entrepreneurial opportunities Essay

B322 Investigating entrepreneurial opportunities - Essay Example However the treatments are frequently conducted over a fairly long period of time and at considerable expense. The acupressure complimentary treatment centre deploys modern technology in order to provide complimentary health benefits at an affordable price to the general public. The target market is the general public. Competitors are complimentary treatment centres and individual practices and also allopathic general medical treatment centres and individual practices. Also to a lesser degree health spas and beauty salons. Acupressure is a derivative of acupuncture which out of all the complimentary healing systems is the most recognised. In particular acupressure has the advantage over acupuncture in that no needles are used in the treatment plan. The acupressure centre will employ state of the art technology to derive benefits similar to acupressure to its customers, however at a much more competitive price and in a manner which allows for considerable longer and more frequent treatments than provided for by the traditional acupressure practices. I have considerable commercial experience combined with a long term interest and experience of complementary medicine. While I believe in complimentary medicine I find the present practice of complimentary medicine to be laborious and expensive. By leveraging my commercial experience I believe I can create a unique twist on the present complimentary health offering. Question 2 Prepare a report of up to 1,200 words addressed to your tutor. Describe the main features of the competitive market in which you intend to do business and explain how and why your idea will be innovative. Explain clearly what particular innovation or market gap your idea addresses and what benefits it will offer to your target customers. Explain how you will acquire or develop the skills necessary for successfully launching your idea. You should take into account: l the concepts covered in the

Developing Interdisciplinary curriculum materials Essay

Developing Interdisciplinary curriculum materials - Essay Example guage has resulted in efforts to expand and improve second language education, since knowing only English is as much a disadvantage as is knowing no English at all.2 This must be the basis upon which lessons are designed so that students are convinced of the need to learn a second language within the framework of rapid globalization. Gough has especially highlighted the importance of critical thinking skills in the new era of globalization : â€Å"If students are to function successfully in a highly technical society, then they must be equipped with life long learning and thinking skills necessary to acquire and process information in an ever changing world.†3 The Year level for this test that comprises a written and an oral component is Level 6 – year level of 9 or 10 and will also test cognitive thinking skills. These are group based tasks with three members in each group. The topic for this lesson is â€Å"Tourism and Culture†. Interdisciplinary links will be history, technology, science and environment. The students will see pictures of tourist spots in Sumatra, which will be shown to them through a series of power point slides. The slides will include shots of the volcanic crater, Lake Toba and the island that sits at its centre. Also included will be some slides of the beaches, and the tsunami destroyed area in the north province of Aceh. There are several wildlife reserves in Sumatra such as Bengkulu and Gedung Wani and the students will be shot pictures of tapir and other animals that may be viewed on safari in these parks. The slide show may consist of about 12 slides in total which will be shown three times with appropriate music and sound effects. This aspect will form the written part of the assignment. Once the slides have been viewed, the students will write a short essay listing the things that they have seen in the slide show. They will list the items and provide a brief description of what they have seen, while also relating it to the

Homeless person and health Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Homeless person and health - Essay Example As Hudson and Nandy found out in their research, homeless youth registered a higher level of substance abuse (178). In this essay, I will compare various views of different authors about health and homelessness, and compare their study findings and assumptions about the same, to establish how they agree or disagree about various aspects in health and homelessness. Hudson and Nandy compared different health issues among homeless people. These are substance abuse and high-risk sexual behaviour (178). In their study, they aimed at establishing the rate of substance abuse, high-risk sexual behaviour, and depression symptoms among youth, who were homeless. McNeil on the other hand, in his research, aimed at finding out how substance abuse among homeless people was a health concern among the population in Canada. In another study, Walls and Bell studied the correlates of the young and adult homeless youth, in engaging in survival sex. Finally, Nicholson, et al in their study, used a generalized approach to study the overall health situation of the homeless in Downtown Calgary. The findings of the different researches mainly agree about different health aspects and situations of the studied homeless populations. First, Hudson and Nandy pointed out that both the homeless youth exposed to foster care and those not exposed to foster care use tobacco, alcohol, and other illicit substances. They also studied the variance of depression and risky sexual behaviours among the group. However, only their degree of use varied within these groups. While the homeless youth who had previously been exposed to foster care used more drugs, compared to those not exposed to foster care. They have argued that when youth are rendered homeless, they always suffer from anxiety and depression. Since these cannot access health care while on the streets, they turn to â€Å"self-medication† through use of drugs and alcohol

Law enforcement 5 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Law enforcement 5 - Essay Example There are a number of considerable statistics related to domestic violence. One of the most notable recognitions is the potential that domestic violence incidents may ultimately lead to death. In this way it’s noted that 30% of all women murdered in the United States were murdered by intimates (Gaines 2011, p. 231). One of the primary recognitions is that in domestic violence incidents there is a strong tendency towards cyclical recurrence. These cyclical recurrences can then result in increased levels of violence that can potentially lead to death if police do not implement proper discretion. Another prominent consideration related to domestic violence is the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment. Specifically, the Minneapolis domestic violence experiment argued that arrest was the most effective way deterring violence against women. The experiment considered statistics in Minneapolis within a six month time period. The findings compared â€Å"abusers who were either arrested, temporarily separated from their victims by the police, or given some sort of police counseling† (Lerman 1992, p. 217). The study indicated that only 10% of individuals who were arrested were repeat offenders. This is was the lowest rate among the three elements examined. While the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment supports increased arrests, ultimately it seems that the most effective course of action is to not require that all individuals be arrested on domestic violence calls. While the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment found that arrest was the most effective deterrent other studies have conflicted with these findings. Buzawa & Buzawa (1990, p. 150) indicated that there were significant disparities between forms and circumstances of domestic violence. Sherman himself, one of the contributors to the Minneapolis study, argued that it would be counter-productive to enact laws that demanded all individuals be arrested on domestic violence calls. While it

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

Finance Calculation - Research Paper Example This is the factor for the argument and criticism of the Millionaires Factory by the Australian Shareholder's Association. If the market required rate of return is higher than the coupon rate of a bond, the price of the bond goes down. Because there are available bonds in the market, which give more interest than it does. Therefore, investors do not feel interest to invest on the bond, which offers lower interest rate than market's other bond. If the market required rate of return is lower than the coupon rate of a bond, the price of the bond goes up. Because there are available bonds in the market, which give lower interest than it does. So, investors feel interest to invest on the bond, which offers higher interest rate than market's other bond. .. Price of bond at 4% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .04) ^5} .04] + 1000 / (1+.04) ^ 5 = $1177.62 Price of bond at 6% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .06) ^5} .06] + 1000 / (1+.06) ^ 5 = $1084.20 Price of bond at 8% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .08) ^5} .08] + 1000 / (1+.08) ^ 5 = $999.99 Price of bond at 10% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .10) ^5} .10] + 1000 / (1+.10) ^ 5 = $684.66 Price of bond at 12% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .12) ^5} .12] + 1000 / (1+.12) ^ 5 = $598.42 Price of bond at 14% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .14) ^5} .14] + 1000 / (1+.14) ^ 5 = $553.20 Price of bond at 16% market interest = [80{1-1/ (1+ .16) ^5} .16] + 1000 / (1+.16) ^ 5 = $479.47 In while, 1 = 16% 2 = 14% 3 = 12% 4 = 10 % 5 = 08% 6 = 06% 7 = 04% 8 = 02%. Relationship between bond value and market required rates of return If the market required rate of return is higher than the coupon rate of a bond, the price of the bond goes down. Because there are available bonds in the market, which give more interest than it does. Therefore, investors do not feel interest to invest on the bond, which offers lower interest rate than market's other bond. If the market required rate of return is lower than the coupon rate of a bond, the price of the bond goes up. Because there are available bonds in the market, which give lower interest than it does. So, investors feel interest to invest on the bond, which offers higher interest rate than market's other bond. Answer to the question no.6 Part 1 We know, P = (D + p) / 1 + k In while, P = Opening share value D = Dividend p = Closing share value k = .12 g ( growth) = (3.5- 3.24) / 3.24 = 8.02% So, D = 3.5 + 3.5 8.02% = 3.78 So now,

Law enforcement 5 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Law enforcement 5 - Essay Example There are a number of considerable statistics related to domestic violence. One of the most notable recognitions is the potential that domestic violence incidents may ultimately lead to death. In this way it’s noted that 30% of all women murdered in the United States were murdered by intimates (Gaines 2011, p. 231). One of the primary recognitions is that in domestic violence incidents there is a strong tendency towards cyclical recurrence. These cyclical recurrences can then result in increased levels of violence that can potentially lead to death if police do not implement proper discretion. Another prominent consideration related to domestic violence is the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment. Specifically, the Minneapolis domestic violence experiment argued that arrest was the most effective way deterring violence against women. The experiment considered statistics in Minneapolis within a six month time period. The findings compared â€Å"abusers who were either arrested, temporarily separated from their victims by the police, or given some sort of police counseling† (Lerman 1992, p. 217). The study indicated that only 10% of individuals who were arrested were repeat offenders. This is was the lowest rate among the three elements examined. While the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment supports increased arrests, ultimately it seems that the most effective course of action is to not require that all individuals be arrested on domestic violence calls. While the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment found that arrest was the most effective deterrent other studies have conflicted with these findings. Buzawa & Buzawa (1990, p. 150) indicated that there were significant disparities between forms and circumstances of domestic violence. Sherman himself, one of the contributors to the Minneapolis study, argued that it would be counter-productive to enact laws that demanded all individuals be arrested on domestic violence calls. While it

Comparison and contrast Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 1

Comparison and contrast - Research Paper Example This is due to various reasons to be covered later in the paper. In this paper, we shall compare and contrast variations between the Twilight book by Stephanie Meyer and the twilight movie. The twilight saga is a series of young fantasy of a young girl who falls in love with a vampire. It was in 2005 that Stephanie Meyers published the twilight saga as the first part of the series in hardcopy. It was among the many nominations as the best selling book in the States. Later director Catherine Hardwicke adapted a film from the novel Twilight and released it on November 8, 2008 (Baptiste 10). The young seventeen year old girl, Bella Swan falls in love with a handsome young vampire, Edward Cullen. Their relationship is faced by many challenges due to the fact that Bella is human and Edward is a vampire. Edward has to fight off the urge to hurt Bells due to the blood scent (Meyer 42). There also exists a feud between the vampires and the wolves. In the wolf territory a young and handsome man falls in love with Bella too. But their love scene is dwelled more in the next series which is the new moon. In this first series, Bella finds out that she is in trouble from a vampire tracker, James. She attends a vampire baseball game and from that time James hunts for her blood. The vampire family attempt to save Bella from James, but finally he catches her. Later on they save her and kill James. Edward then promises to love her and take care of her as long they are together. It is a romantic young love story basically but with fiction about vampires. This is the saga we are going t o analyze the comparison of plot development of the book and the movie. Some reasons why the movies may be disappointed would be due to various reasons. There could be changes, omissions, additions and many more. In the Twilight movie a lot of things do not match along with the book. In most movies this is done to give the movie the proper length. This is especially the omissions of

The mayor of Casterbridge Essay Example for Free

The mayor of Casterbridge Essay Analyse the first two chapters of The Mayor of Casterbridge and discuss how far they act as a prologue to the rest of the novel In The Mayor of Casterbridge the opening two chapters are a good indicator of Hardys style and act as a prologue to the rest of the novel. Hardys style places considerable focus on imagery and the scene around the characters. He used the writing techniques at this scene setting to help you understand the context in which the characters act. During the first chapter, Hardy describes Henchard as a fine figure, swarthy, and stern in aspect however he is not named at first. It symbolises that this could be any man, or could relate to the reader in someway and makes the reader look at this character from a different angle as if we might know him rather then seeing him as Henchard. Susan Henchard, Henchards wife, is described to be so faint as to be almost invisible; she becomes a less important part as the plot thickens. Another character mentioned is Elizabeth-Jane the first. The reader is given very few descriptions towards her because she is only a small child. We call her the first because beyond chapter 2 the reader is told that this Elizabeth-Jane died 3 months after the auction and the second child of Susan Henchard is called Elizabeth-Jane but is the sailors daughter not Henchards. Elizabeth the second is much like a father in a way but at her meeting with Henchard, she gives him her name and Henchard believes her to be his daughter. In the second chapter the reader only knows Elizabeth as Susans grown up daughter not Elizabeth-Jane. The reader is given other characters, the furmity lady who offered Henchard the rum that got him drunk leading to the auction, the country people who were in the tent who egged on and teased Henchard to sell his wife and Newton, Susan Henchards second husband, who bought Susan. They represent the country people of the time. Hardy draws the readers imagination away from the business of the cities and into the openness of the countryside. This gives the effect of a close village, that everyone knows everyone elses name, age and business round the community and that a large event like an auction of a wife would be unforgettable. They are used to the quiet and simple way of life rather than the complex ways of the cities. Hardy illustrates the characters act in their setting by using lots of imagery. He uses natures harmony to show humans disharmony. The description of the characters and their surroundings is excellently detailed, with use of a broad vocabulary. He uses description effectively. He draws the readers attention to the characters by using strong imagery, showing natures harmony, to represent the tension and strain on the marriage of the Henchards, humans disharmony. The characters are similarly of their time period with their language, they use dialectal English as well as their regional accents. Henchard was very open about his marriage life while he was in his drunken state. He seemed to feel that marriage is the biggest mistake a man can make and that it is for fools. When the couple met the turnip-hoer, Henchard asked about work needed in the village. This is evidence to show, due to the industrial revolution, work in the country was short, and with all these new machines around, many homes were taken down. Although Henchard doesnt approve of all these new ways of life, he eventually will use them showing that he realises people must change. Another theme present is the concept of is fate. If the auctioneer had not got involved and shouted what was up for auction, the sailor may not have bought her, had the furmity lady not had the rum, Henchard would never have got the idea to sell Susan. Hardy changes Henchard from a poor, unknown man to a respected and powerful member to the society. The auction had turned him in to a new man because it forced him to reconsider his life. Hardy uses third person narration for this story. He obviously likes to be the narrator of the story rather than be involved. He encourages readers to carry on reading by only giving us certain information about hes characters for example he says a young man and woman but he does not give us their names. His language gives a great contribution to the opening of the novel. He uses varied sentences structure to keep the writing interesting. He continues this with a great variety of vocabulary making use of his education. The opening chapters are probably the most important parts of the story. By the terrible action of the wife sale, Henchard goes on to make himself a better man by vowing never to touch another drink the years he had lived. As he grows older, he has achieved himself a high position in life and his community. Susan did not change; she was still the same person, quiet, faint still she was almost invisible. This makes it her most crucial part to the novel. The time lapse seems interesting, as the setting changes but not the personality of the characters, excluding Henchard. This is where we met Elizabeth-Jane as a young adult but not Henchards daughter but the sailors, Newton. This novel and its opening chapters are a typical Hardy style. From looking closely at Chapters 1 and 2, it is clear that this is an unusual way to start a book but yet it is interesting. It encourages you to read on and find out more about the man the woman and the latter they carried with them as they walked into Weydon-Priars.

Evidence from International Stock Markets

Evidence from International Stock Markets Portfolio Selection with Four Moments: Evidence from International Stock Markets Despite the international diversification suggested by several researchers (e.g. Grulbel, 1968; Levy and Sarnat, 1970; Solnik, 1974) and the increased integration of capital markets, the home bias has not decreased (Thomas et. al., 2004 and Coeurdacier and Rey, 2013) and there is no complete explanation of this puzzle. Furthermore, there are the fastgrowing concerns of investor for extreme risks[1] and the investors preference toward odd moments (e.g. mean and skewness) and an aversion toward even moments (e.g. variance and kurtosis) considered by numerous studies (e.g. Levy, 1969; Arditti, 1967 and 1971; Jurczenko and Maillet, 2006). According to these reasons, this paper propose to investigate whether the incorporation of investor preferences in the higher moments into the international asset allocation problem can help explain the home bias puzzle. The study will allow investor preferences to depend not only the first two moments (i.e. mean and variance) but also on the higher moments, such as skewness and kurtosis, by using the polynomial goal programming (PGP) approach and then generate the three-dimensional efficient frontier. The main objective of the proposed study is to investigate whether the incorporation of skewness and kurtosis into the international stock portfolio selection causes these issues: The changes in the construction of optimal portfolios, the patterns of relationships between moments, and the less diversification compared to the mean-variance model. Since several researchers (e.g. Grulbel, 1968; Levy and Sarnat, 1970; Solnik, 1974) suggest that investment in a portfolio of equities across foreign markets provide great diversification opportunities, then investors should rebalance there portfolio away from domestic toward foreign equities. However, US investors continue to hold equity portfolios that are largely dominated by domestic assets. Thomas et. al. (2004) reported that by the end of 2003 US investors held only 14 percent of their equity portfolios in foreign stocks. Furthermore, Coeurdacier and Rey (2013) also reported that in 2007, US investors hold more than 80 percent of domestic equities. Many explanations have been recommended in the literature to explain this home bias puzzle include direct barriers such as capital controls and transaction costs (e.g. Stulz, 1981; Black, 1990; Chaieb and Errunza, 2007), and indirect barriers such as information costs and higher estimation uncertainty for foreign than domestic equities (e.g. Brennan and Cao, 1997; Guidolin, 2005; Ahearne et. al., 2004). Nevertheless, several studies (e.g. Karolyi and Stulz, 1996; Lewis, 1999) suggests that these explanations are weakened since the direct costs to international investment have come down significantly overtime and the financial globalization by electronic trading increases exchanges of information and decreases uncertainty across markets. Since the modern portfolio theory of Markowitz (1952) indicates how risk-averse investors can construct optimal portfolios based upon mean-variance trade-off, there are numerous studies on portfolio selection in the framework of the first two moments of the return distributions. However, as many researchers (e.g., Kendall and Hill, 1953; Mandelbrot, 1963a and 1963b; Fama, 1965) discovered that the presence of significant skewness and excess kurtosis in asset return distributions, there is a great concern that highermoments than the variance should be accounted in portfolio selection. The motivation for the generalization to higher moments arises from the theoretical work of Levy (1969) provided the cubic utility function depending on the first three moments. Later, the empirical works of Arditti (1967 and 1971) documented the investors preference for positive skewness and aversion negative skewness in return distributions of individual stocks and mutual funds, respectively. Even Markowitz (1959) himself also supports this aspect by suggesting that a mean-semi-variance trade-off [2], which gives priority to avoiding downside risk, would be superior to the original mean-variance approach. While the importance of the first three moments was recognized, there were some arguments on the incorporation of higher moments than the third into the analysis. First, Arditti (1967) suggested that most of the information about any probability distribution is contained in its first three moments. Later, Levy (1969) argued that even the higher moments are approximately functions of the first moments, but not that they are small in magnitude. Several authors (Levy, 1969; Samuelson, 1970; Rubinstein, 1973) also recommend that in general the higher moments than the variance cannot be neglected, except when at least one of the following conditions must be true: All the higher moments beyond the first are zero. The derivatives of utility function are zero for the higher moments beyond the second. The distributions of asset returns are normal or the utility functions are quadratic. However, ample evidence (e.g., Kendall and Hill, 1953; Mandelbrot, 1963a and 1963b; Fama, 1965) presented not only the higher moments beyond the first and their derivatives of the utility function are not zero, but also the asset returns are not normally distributed. Furthermore, several researchers (Tobin, 1958; Pratt, 1964; Samuelson, 1970; Levy and Sarnat, 1972) indicate that the assumption of quadratic utility function is appropriate only when return distributions are compact. Therefore, the higher moments of return distributions, such as skewness, are relevant to the investors decision on portfolio selection and cannot be ignored. In the field of portfolio theory with higher moments, Samuelson (1970) was the first author who recommends the importance of higher moments than the second for portfolio analysis. He shows that when the investment decision restrict to the finite time horizon, the use of mean-variance analysis becomes insufficient and the higher moments than the variance become more relevant in portfolio selection. Therefore, he developed three-moment model based on the cubic utility function which expressed by Levy (1969)3. Following Samuelson (1970), number of studies (e.g. Jean, 1971, 1972 and 1973; Ingersoll, 1975; and Schweser, 1978) explained the importance of skewness in security returns, derived the risk premium as functions of the first three moments, and generated the three-dimensional efficient frontier with a risk-free asset. Later, Diacogiannis (1994) proposed the multi-moment portfolio optimization programme by minimizing variance at any given level of expected return and skewness. Consequently, Athayde and Flores (1997) developed portfolio theory taking the higher moments than the variance into consideration in a utility maximizing context. The expressions in this paper greatly simplified the numerical solutions of the multi-moment portfolio optimal asset allocation problems4. 23 Levy (1969) defines the cubic utility function as U(x) which has the form: U(x) = ax + bx + cx , where x is a random variable and a,b,c are coefficients. This function is concave in a certain range but convex in another. Jurczenko, E. and Maillet, B. (2006) Multi-Moment Asset Allocation and Pricing Models, Wiley Finance, p. xxii. Different approaches have been developed to incorporate the individual preferences for higher-order moments into portfolio optimization. These approaches can be divided into two main groups, the primal and dual approaches. The dual approach starts from a specification of the higher-moment utility function by using the Taylors series expansion to link between the utility function and the moments of the return distribution. Then, the dual approaches will determine the optimal portfolio via its parameters reflecting preferences for the moments of asset return distribution. Harvey et. al. (2004) uses this approach to construct the set of the three-moment efficient frontier by using two sets of returns[3]. The results show that as the investors preference in skewness increases, there are sudden change points in the expected utility that lead to dramatically modifications in the allocation of the optimal portfolio. Jondeau and Rockinger (2003 and 2006) and Guidolin and Timmermann (2008) extend the dual approach in portfolio selection from three- to four-moment framework. A shortcoming of this dual approach is that the Taylor series expansion may converge to the expected utility under restrictive conditions. That is for some utility functions (e.g. the exponential function), the expansion converges for all possible levels of return, whereas for some types of utility function (e.g. the logarithm-power function), the convergence of Taylor series expansion to the expected utility is ensured only over a restricted range6. Furthermore, since Taylor series expansion have an infinite number of terms, then using a finite number of terms creates the truncation error. To circumvent these problems, the primal approach parameters that used to weight the moment deviations are not relate precisely to the utility function. Tayi and Leonard (1988) introduced the Polynomial Goal Programming (PGP), which is a primal approach to solve the goal in portfolio optimization by trade-off between competing and conflicting objectives. Later, Lai (1991) is the first researcher who proposed this method to solve the multiple objectives determining the set of the mean-variance-skewness efficient portfolios. He illustrated the three-moment portfolio selection with three objectives, which are maximizing both the expected return and the skewness, and minimizing the variance of asset returns. Follows Lai (1991) who uses a sample of five stocks and a risk-free asset, Chunhachinda et. al. (1997) and Prakash et. al. (2003) examines three-moment portfolio selection by using international stock indices. Regarding the under-diversification, many studies (e.g. Simkowitz and Beedles, 1978; Mitton and Vorkink, 2004; and Briec et. al., 2007) suggested that incorporation of the higher moments in the investors objective functions can explain portfolio under-diversification. Home bias puzzle is one of the under-diversification. It is a tendency to invest in a large proportion in domestic securities, even there are potential gains from diversification of investment portfolios across national markets. Guidolin and Timmermann (2008)[4] indicate that home bias in US can be explained by incorporate the higher moments (i.e. skewness and kurtosis) with distinct bull and bear regimes in the investors objective functions. Several researchers use the primal and the dual approaches to examine the  international portfolio selection. Jondeau and Rockinger (2003 and 2006) and Guidolin and Timmermann (2008) applied the dual approaches using a higher-order Taylor expansion of the utility function. They provide the empirical evidence that under large departure from normality of the return distribution, the higher-moment optimization is more efficient than the mean-variance framework. Chunhachinda et. al. (1997) and Prakash (2003) applied the Polynomial Goal Programming (PGP), which is a primal approach, to determine the optimal portfolios of international stock indices. Their results indicated that the incorporation of skewness into the portfolio selection problem causes a major change in the allocation of the optimal portfolio and the trade-off between expected return and skewness of the efficient portfolio. Appendix 1 presents methodology and data of the previous papers that study international portfolio selection with higher moments. In the proposed study, I will extend PGP approach to the mean-variance-skewnesskurtosis framework and investigate the international asset allocation problem that whether the incorporation of investor preferences in the higher moments of stock return distributions returns can help explain the home bias puzzle. Since previous research (e.g. Levy, 1972; Singleton and Wingerder, 1986) points out that the estimated values of the moments of the asset return distribution sensitive to the choices of an investment horizon, I will examine daily, weekly, and monthly data sets in the study[5]. The sample data will consist of daily, weekly, and monthly rates of return of five international indices for all available data from January 1975 to December 2016. These five indices cover the stock markets in the main geographical areas, namely the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, the Pacific region (excluding Japan), and Europe (excluding United Kingdom)[6]. Moreover, the study also use three-month US Treasury bill rates as the existence of the risk-free asset in order that the investor is not restricted to invest only in risky assets. The data source of these indices is the Morgan Stanley Capital International Index (MSCI) who reports these international price indices as converted into US dollar at the spot foreign exchange rate. The MSCI stock price indices and T-bill rates are available in Datastream. The methodology proposed in the study consists of two parts. First, the rate of return distribution of each international index will be tested for normality by using the Shapiro-Wilk test. Then, the PGP approach will be utilized to determine the optimal portfolio in the fourmoment framework. 4.1 Testing for normality of return distribution At the beginning of the empirical work, I will test the normality of return distributions of international stock indices and the US T-bill rates. This test provides the foundation for examine the portfolio selection problem in the mean-variance-skewness-kurtosis framework. Although several methods are developed, there is an ample evidence that the ShapiroWilk is the best choice for evaluating normality of data under various specifications of the probability distribution. Shapiro et. al. (1968) provide an empirical sampling study of the sensitivities of nine normality-testing procedures and concluded that among those procedures, the Shapiro-Wilk statistic is a generally superior measure of non-normality. More recently, Razali and Wah (2011) compared the power of four statistical tests of normality via Monte Carlo simulation of sample data generated from various alternation distributions. Their results support that Shapiro-Wilk test is the most powerful normality test for all types of the distributions and sample sizes. The Shapiro-Wilk statistic is defined as where is the i th order statistic (rate of returns), à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã‚ ¯ . à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã‚ ¯ / is the sample mean, are the expected values of the order statistics of independent and identically distributed random variables sampled from the standard normal, and V is the covariance matrix of those order statistics. Note that the values of are provided in Shapiro-Wilk (1965) table based on the order i. The Shapiro-Wilk tests the null hypothesis of normality: H0: The population is normally distributed. H1: The population is not normally distributed.    If the p-value is less than the significant level (i.e. 1%, 5%, or 10%), then the null hypothesis of normal distribution is rejected. Thus, there is statistical evidence that the sample return distribution does not came from a normally distributed population. On the other hand, if the p-value is greater than the chosen alpha level, then the null hypothesis that the return distribution came from a normally distributed population cannot be rejected. 4.2 Solving for the multi-objective portfolio problem Following Lai (1991) and Chunhachinda et. al. (1997), the multi-objective portfolio selection with higher momentscan be examined based on the following assumptions: Investors are risk-averse individuals who maximize the expected utility of their end-ofperiod wealth. There are n + 1 assets and the (n + 1)th asset is the risk-free asset. All assets are marketable, perfectly divisible, and have limited liability. The borrowing and lending rates are equal to the rate of return r on the risk-free asset. The capital market is perfect, there are no taxes and transaction costs. Unlimited short sales of all assets with full use of the proceeds are allowed. The mean, variance, skewness, and kurtosis of the rate of return on asset are assumed to exist for all risky assets for 1,2, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ . Then, I define the variables in the analysis as = ,, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ , be the transpose of portfolio component , where is the percentage of wealth invested in the th risky asset, = ,, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ , be the transpose of whose mean denoted by , = the rate of return on the th risky asset, = the rate of return on the risk-free asset, = a (n x 1) vector of expected excess rates of return, = the expectation operator, = the (n x 1) vector of ones, = the variance-covariance (n x n) matrix of , = the skewness-coskewness (n x n2) matrix of ,= the kurtosis-cokurtosis (n x n3) matrix of . Then, the mean, the variance, the skewness, and the kurtosis of the portfolio returns can be defined as:[7] , , à ¢Ã…  -,[8] Kurtosis = = à ¢Ã…  - à ¢Ã…  - . Note that because of certain symmetries, only ((n+1)*n)/2 elements of the skewnesscoskewness matrix and ((n+2)*(n+1)*n)/6 elements of the kurtosis-cokurtosis matrix must be computed. The components of the variance-covariance matrix, the skewness-coskewness matrix, and the kurtosis-cokurtosis matrix can be computed as follows: à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ, à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ, à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ, à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ, à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ, à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ. Therefore, the optimal solution is to select a portfolio component . The portfolio selection can be determined by solving the following multiple objectives, which are maximizing the expected return and the skewness while minimizing the variance and the kurtosis: , , à ¢Ã…  -, = à ¢Ã…  - à ¢Ã…  - . subject to 1. Since the percentage invested in each asset is the main concern of the portfolio decision, Lai (1991) suggests that the portfolio choice can be rescaled and restricted on the unit variance space (i.e. | 1 ). Under the condition of unit variance, the portfolio selection problem with skewness and kurtosis (P1) can be formulated as follows: , à ¢Ã…  -, (P1) = à ¢Ã…  - à ¢Ã…  - , subject to 1 , 1 . Usually, the solution of the problem (P1) does not satisfy three objectives (, , ) simultaneously. As a result, the above multi-objective problem (P1) involves a two-step procedure. First, a set of non-dominated solutions independent of investors preferences is developed. Then, the next step can be accomplished by incorporating investors preferences for objectives into the construction of a polynomial goal programming (PGP). Consequently, portfolio selection by satisfying the multiple objectives that is the solution of PGP can be achieved. In PGP the objective function ( ) does not contain a portfolio component , it contains deviational variables ( , , ) which represent deviations between goals and what can be achieved, given a set of constrains. Therefore, the objective function ( ) is minimization of the deviation variables ( , , ) to determine the portfolio component . Moreover, if the goals are at the same priority level, the deviations from the goals ( , , ) are non-negative variables. Given an investors preferences among mean, skewness, and kurtosis ( , , ), a PGP model can be expressed as: . subject to à ¢Ã‹â€ - , à ¢Ã…  -à ¢Ã‹â€ - , (P2) à ¢Ã…  - à ¢Ã…  - = à ¢Ã‹â€ - , 1 , 1 , ,, 0 . where à ¢Ã‹â€ - = the extreme value of objective when they are optimized individually, then à ¢Ã‹â€ - |1 , à ¢Ã‹â€ - |1 , and à ¢Ã‹â€ - |1 , = the non-negative variables which represent the deviation of and à ¢Ã‹â€ -, = the non-negative parameters representing the investors subjective degree of preferences between objectives, The combinations of represent different preferences of the mean, the skewness, and the kurtosis of a portfolio return. For example, the higher , the more important the mean (skewness or kurtosis) of the portfolio return is to the investor. Thus, the efficient portfolios are the solutions of problem (P2) for various combinations of preferences . The expected results provided in this section refer to two parts of methodology, the normality test and the international portfolio optimization in four-moment framework. 5.1 The expected results of the normality test Many researches examine the international stock indices and found that most of the stock return distributions exhibit skewness and their excess kurtosis are far from zero. For instance, in the work of Chunhachinda et. al. (1997), the Shapiro-Wilk statistics indicate 5 markets and 11 markets reject the null hypothesis of normal distribution at ten percent significant level, for weekly and monthly data, respectively. Prakash et. al. (2003) use the Jarque-Bera test to trial the normality of each international stock index, their results indicate that for 17 markets for weekly returns and 10 markets for monthly returns reject the null hypothesis of normal distribution five percent significant level. Therefore, I expected that the Shapiro-Wilk tests in the proposed study will be significant and reject the null hypothesis of normality. In other words, the return distributions of international stock markets during the period under study are expected to be non-normal. 5.2 The expected results of the multi-objective portfolio selection 5.2.1 The changes in the allocation of optimal portfolios Chunhachinda et. al. (1997) and Prakash et. al. (2003) both indicated that the incorporation of skewness into the portfolio selection problem causes a major change in the allocation of the optimal portfolio. However, their definitions of a major change are different. Chunhachinda et. al. (1997) found that there is a modification in the allocation when they compare between the mean-variance and the mean-variance-skewness efficient portfolios. However, both types of portfolios are dominated by the investment components of only four markets[9]. On the other hand, Prakash (2003) results show that the structural weights of the mean-variance and the mean-variance-skewness optimal portfolios are dominated by different markets. Therefore, I expected that when I compare between of the mean-variance efficient portfolios, the three-moment efficient portfolios, and the mean-variance efficient portfolios, the percentage invested in each asset will be different in magnitude and ranking. 5.2.2 The trade-off between expected return and skewness Most of the studies of international portfolio selection with higher moments (e.g. Chunhachinda et. al., 1997; Prakash et. al., 2003; Jondeau and Rockinger, 2003 and 2006) reported that the mean-variance efficient portfolios have the higher expected return while the three-moment efficient portfolios have greater skewness. Thus, they indicated that after incorporation of skewness into portfolio selection problem, the investor will trade the expected return of the portfolio for the skewness. More recently, Davies et. al. (2005) applied PGP to determine the set of the four-moment efficient funds of hedge funds and found not only the trade-off between the mean and the skewness, but also the trade-off between the variance and the kurtosis. Thus, I expected to discover the trade-off between the expected return and the skewness and the trade-off between the variance and the kurtosis. In addition, I will also investigate other relationships between the moments of return distribution and report them in both numerical and graphical ways. 5.2.3 The less diversification compared to the mean-variance model. To investigate whether the incorporation of higher moments than the second (i.e. skewness and kurtosis) can help explain the home bias puzzle, I will examine the hypothesis: H0: ZMV à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ °Ã‚ ¤ ZMVSK. H1: ZMV > ZMVSK. where ZMV and ZMVSK are the number of nonzero weights of the mean-variance efficient portfolios and the four-moment efficient portfolios, respectively. If the number of nonzero weights of the mean-variance efficient portfolios (ZMV) is greater than the number of nonzero weights of the four-moment efficient portfolios (ZMVSK), then I will rejected the null hypothesis. This implies that the incorporation of the higher moments into the portfolio decision can help explain the home bias puzzle. However, the results from the literature are mixed. On one hand, several researchers (e.g. Prakash et. al., 2003; Briec et. al., 2007; Guidolin and Timmermann, 2008) provided the evidence that the incorporation of skewness into the portfolio selection causes the less diversification in the efficient portfolio. On the other hand, the results of some studies (e.g. Chunhachinda et. al., 1997; Jondeau and Rockinger, 2003 and 2006) found that when compare with the mean-variance efficient portfolios, the diversification of the higher-moment efficient portfolios seem to be same or even became more diversify. I expected the results to show that the four-moment efficient portfolio is less diversified than the mean-variance one. In other words, the incorporation of the skewness and the kurtosis into the international portfolio selection can help explain the home bias. [1] Jurczenko, E. and Maillet, B. (2006) Multi-Moment Asset Allocation and Pricing Models, Wiley Finance, p. xxii. [2] Semi-variance is a measure of the dispersion of all observations that fall below the average or target value of a data set. [3] The first set consists of four stocks and the second set consists of four equity indices, two commodities, and a risk-free asset. 6 Jurczenko, E. Maillet, B., and Merlin, P. (2006) Multi-Moment Asset Allocation and Pricing Models, Wiley Finance, p. 52. [4] Guidolin and Timmermann (2008) analyze the portfolio selection problem by using the dual approach. [5] Chunhachinda et. al. (1997) and Prakash et. al. (2003) studied the portfolio selection across national stock markets by using two data sets, weekly and monthly data. [6] Guidolin and Timmermann (2008) reported that these markets represent roughly 97% of the world equity market capitalization. [7] I use the derivations of skewness and kurtosis as provided in the textbook Multi-Moment Asset Allocation and Pricing Models of Jurczenko and Maillet (2006) to transform the expectation operators into the matrix terms. [8] Let A be an (nÃÆ'-p) matrix and B an (mÃÆ'-q) matrix. The (mnÃÆ'-pq) matrix Aà ¢Ã…  -B is called the of matrix A and matrix B: [9] The four markets are Hong Kong, Netherlands, Singapore, and Switzerland. These markets have high rankings of the coefficient of variation under the sample period.