...Weekly Reflection Economic Forecasting ECO/372 May 20, 2013 Jamey Burnett Economic Forecasting Economic Forecasting is a process, which is used for making predictions about the economy. Economic forecasting is used to predict Gross Domestic Product, inflation, and unemployment ("Us Department Of Commerce Bureau Of Economic Analysis", n,d.). Here is a list of resources that can be used to gather historical economic date as well as forecast data; Bureau of Economic Analysis, Bureau of Labor Statistics, U. S. Department of Labor, U. S. Census Bureau, National Association of Purchasing Managers, Survey Research Center, University of Michigan, Standard & Poor’s, S&P 500, and the Federal Reserve. In the report we will focus on the Bureau of Economic Analysis, quantitative and qualitative forecasting, and Bureau of labor statistics. Bureau of Economic Analysis Bureau of Economic Analysis is the federal agency responsible for measuring the United States economy. BEA is responsible for what is produced, what is earned and how it is spent ("What Is the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis?" 2012). BEA provides a variety of economic statistics concerning national, international, and regional economic activity. BEA also provides statistics decisions that are influenced by government officials, businesspeople, households, and individuals. The Bureau of Economic Analysis contains both quantitative and qualitative forecasting factors. The Bureau of Economic Analysis...
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...Week Two Team A Reflection In week one of class, our objectives were to; Evaluate individual characteristics of employees, analyze the impact of individual employee characteristics on organizational performance, and to determine management methods based on individual employee characteristics. Our week two objectives added to the knowledge we gained in week one, they were to; determine strategies to motivate employees, and to create effective organizational communication. After discussing what we learned, our team found that overall we agreed with one another, though we sometimes had different perspectives. As a group we all thought that much of what we learned could be applicable to both our professional and personal lives. Understanding peoples characteristics is invaluable because both our personal and professional lives can get hectic, and having an understanding about peoples differences, and how that effects their motivation and perception helps in making life easier. This knowledge allows us to determine how to best approach a person or situation that a person or group of people is involved be the focus work related, or not. Specifically pertaining to work, understanding employee characteristics is invaluable toward creating a balanced work environment. Before making any conclusions about how an employee is performing, it is necessary to understand if they had the characteristics and qualities required to perform as required by the position. As a manager it is important...
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...Throughout the course of week one, we focused as a group on several objectives pertaining to chapters 1,2, and 3. From chapter one for example, we dove into conversation concerning the four functions of management. These include planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. Managers must learn to be skilled in all four areas because it is crucial in achieving organizational goals. We also discussed and learned about the different divisions and levels of management. There exist three primary levels, found more so in bigger organizations, they are: top-level managers, middle-level managers, and frontline managers. Top-level managers consist of the senior executives and are responsible for the overall management and effectiveness of the organization. Top-level management is concerned with long-term issues along with the survival and growth of the company. Some of the titles held in this position are CEO, CIO, and COO. Middle managers are those managers that are responsible for translating the general goals and plans developed by top-level managers into more specific objectives and activities. Middle management often has a vantage point that allows them to be extremely in tune with day-to-day operations and therefore many middle managers develop superb problem solving skills and can be extremely creative. Frontline managers are those managers that take on more of a supervisory role. They interact with non-management employees to achieve specific plans developed by middle management...
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...Wage Differentials Major causes of wage differentials can include ability or physical attributes, for example, brain surgeons, concert violinists, fashion models, and athletes. Members of these groups are noncompeting because the industries they are in require specific skills that everyone does not have. Education and training can also cause wage differentials. In cases in which specific education or training is required, human capital is important. Human capital is the personal stock of knowledge and skills that enable a person to be productive and ultimately earn their income. Making an investment in education, training, or perfecting skills can cause major changes in wages earned. More education almost always results in more wages. The elasticy of resource demand The elasticity of resource demand measures the sensitivity of resource quantity to changes in resource prices. Erd (elasticity of resource demand) is measured by dividing the percentage change in resource quantity by the percentage change in resource price. When Erd is greater than one, resource demand is elastic, when Erd is less than one, RD is inelastic, and when Erd is equal to one, the RD is unit-elastic. Determinants include the ease of resource substitutability and ratio of resource cost to total cost. Four basic market models The chart at the top of page 177 was very helpful in breaking down the 4 basic market model types. It gave us then number of firms the model typically has, the model's control...
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...Week II Reflection Paper for Team C Strategic planning is not a new concept and is commonly referred to as the solution to many organizational problems. Strategic planning is a continual and systematic process in which decisions are made about intended future outcomes. Planning takes time, work, and the ability to confront difficult obstacles. Financial outcomes are used as a component to measure the success, failure, and strategy effectiveness. S. Scott (2012) stated in the second paragraph, “The focus of a strategic plan is usually on the entire organization, while the focus of a business strategic plan is usually on a product or service”. Without a realistic plan and obtainable goals an organization has no direction. Market opportunity is a factor in shaping a company’s strategic plan, which is why the advantage and disadvantage evaluation process is important. Team C discussions validate that the following week two course objectives are easily understood and are clear to the team: • Objective 2.1 - Measure an organization’s internal and external environments using environmental scanning. • Objective 2.2 - Determine relevant business competitive strategies. Objective 2.1 is easily understood as it relates to environmental scanning, which is the possession and utilization of information about trends within an organizations internal and external environment. Environmental scanning is similar to the SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis...
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...In every organization, attitude plays a large role in the effectiveness of communication throughout all departments. The attitude of the manager is just as important as the attitude of the employee. As discussed within our group, it was found that without a positive and encouraging attitude within the workforce, productivity of the organization as a whole diminishes. When an employee begins showing signs of a less-than-optimal attitude in the workplace, it is essential that the manager or supervisor takes appropriate actions to try and figure out what might be causing the less than desirable attitude in the employee. A person’s attitude is shaped by three components: cognitive component, affective component, and behavioral component. Cognitive component reflects on a person adopting a belief on how things operate in domestic/international society. The affective component reflects on a person’s feelings, moods, or emotions in different situations. Behavioral component reflects on a person intentionally behaving in a certain manner in a situation. It is important to understand the different components that create a person’s attitude because it shows that there is an interrelated relationship between attitudes and behavior, meaning attitudes shape our behavior in different environments. An employee’s attitude is very important when it comes to job performance. An employee with a poor attitude may not perform his or her job duties at a high performance level. On most occasions...
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...ECO/365 Principles of Microeconomics Team B Weekly Reflection University of Phoenix Carol Szerszen In my industry, there is always a concern for international competition for labor. According to Colander, “central determinant of a country’s competitiveness is the relative wage of labor in that country compared to the relative wage of labor in other countries “(Colander, 2010, p. 438). As companies move to cut costs, moving work overseas to employees that are willing to work for less money, in some cases significantly less money, can improve that company’s bottom line. As a telemarketing firm, our focus is on providing quality service to our clients, but our company has to demonstrate that we are cost effective to prevent that company from outsourcing to a foreign vendor. One of the things that I thought was interesting about this past week that accounting has a different measure of profit compared to what an economist’s measure of profit. When it comes to accounting and their ways of measuring profit which is total revenue minus total costs which will get you profit. Whereas in the economist’s way of getting profit which is explicit revenue and implicit revenue minus explicit cost and implicit cost which will get you the economist’s profit. After this weeks reading, I realize that the effect of changes in marginal revenues and costs on a firm’s profit-making potential is that the best possible performance of any company...
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...Weekly Reflection – Week 2 This week’s primary objectives were to evaluate how attitudes and emotions influence behaviors, to explain ways personality and values influence behaviors, and to create a plan to increase employee motivation, satisfaction, and performance. This paper will analyze the information discussed by Learning Team A. Evaluate How Attitudes and Emotions Influence Behaviors Attitudes and emotions influence behaviors by the way a person acts. Their character, how they take criticism, and their composure under stress and pressure all directly affect their behavior. From a business standpoint, these things that would affect behavior would also affect how someone interacts with others which would be a determining factor as to how successful someone could be. Some people have negative attitudes about work and fall behind, while others stay positive and work through their issues. Sometimes, how an employee is treated by management can affect how employees work. Trying to build a good rapport and a positive work environment is vital to the overall success of a company. Attitudes and emotions influence behavior in a number of areas, not only in interpersonal relations, but also in life in general. A person’s attitude can determine how they handle stressful events, and their emotions guide those attitudes in the eventual construct of behavior in relation to those events. Explain Ways Personality and Values Influence Behaviors A person who has a caring...
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...Team B Week Two Reflection MKT/421 June 20, 2013 Donna Falloon Team B discussed week’s two objectives thoroughly, the objective that Team B related to the most was market segmentation and the various criteria that impacts market selection. Creating a consumer driven marketing strategy is imperative for companies inspiring to be or are successful. “Companies today recognize that they cannot appeal to all buyers in the marketplace or at least not to all buyers in the same way (Armstrong & Kotler, 2011, p. 174).” Consumers vary in age, location, income, nationality, social class, gender, family size, education, religion, and many more variables. Thus companies are straying from mass marketing and focusing more on target marketing (2011). Market targeting is the process of evaluating each market segment’s attractiveness and selecting one or more segments to enter (2011). It is a critical piece that aids with the segmentation, differentiation, and positioning of the consumer driven marketing strategy. Each member of team b reflected on their personal experiences of market targeting. For example, two team members are mother’s, although the ages of their children vary, each mother at one point was targeted with the age and life-cycle stage from a company like Toys “R” Us. Some companies use the age and life-cycle segmentation, since consumers needs drastically change with age. For Example, Toys “R” Us primarily target babies to teenagers, most likely an adult will not...
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...Team Week 2 Reflection Summary RES/351 Team C Week 2 Reflection Summary Week 1 taught us the importance of learning about business research. Business research is important because it helps business owners find solutions to problems they may have within their company. If one wonders why he or she is not getting more customers, researching the problem is a great way to find an answer or multiple answers to this question or problem. Even though it is good to do research it is just as important to know how to research a problem. Good scientific method standards are important because it generates dependable data that executives use to make reliable and accurate decisions within the company. If scientific method standards are not met, it produces unreliable data that executives cannot use, which is a waste of time. It highly increases the risk of the managers making decisions for the business. In week one the focus was to understand how business research improves managerial decision making. The research process starts with clarifying the research question that involves defining the dilemma. Stage two of the research process is proposing research that includes resource allocation and budgets. The next two stages of the process are designing the research project and data collection and preparation. The results can be communicated in various ways, but should always be from the researcher’s perspective. We learned there are ethical dilemmas managers face when using business...
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...Learning Team Weekly Reflection Jennifer Naccarato, Nancy Perez, Anthony Aguirre, Edward Felix MGT/498 May 5, 2015 Dr. Tim Fish Learning Team Weekly Reflection The team discussed the topics covered in the reading material and concluded that it is difficult to forecast and foresee what is significant enough to understand what is applicable information to work with for the success of each of the companies. Seeing as we have each worked in an individual department within the organization, we are unable to predict and foresee when we are not aware of necessary information to understand what direction to go in. We are expecting to learn how to think outside the box and have the capacity to see the big picture. The team knows how strategic management could be advantageous to an organization, and how ethics should be a part of that too. We have seen in our companies on various occasions where people have committed wrong actions and how it could hurt the organization. Those actions can slowly or swiftly take over and destroy an organization. Such unethical behaviors can disrupt the goals of the company to perform efficiently and effectively. After finishing the homework and reading the objectives, the team was comfortable discussing both internal and external environmental scans and how it is not the same as a SWOT analysis. Environmental scanning is composed of observation, reviewing, and finally circulating the data assembled from internal and external environments based...
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...Running Head: ECONOMIC FORECASTING PAPER Team B Weekly Reflection - Economic Forecasting Paper Chelsea Heyd, Andrea Zugelder, Roberto Foster, Pam Pudans, Kelly Day August, 26th 2014 ECO/372 BARNHILL Team B Weekly Reflection - Economic Forecasting Paper The following includes a list of resources that could be used to gather historical economic data as well as economic forecast data. The resources included are general enough to be applicable to a broad range of potential research project types. However, the data that is accessible in any of the following resources is specific enough to not only represent correctly quantifiable theories with facts, but also to display facts relevant to a variety of potential historical economic research as well as economic forecasting. Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) Monthly, this resource measures overall economic activity and inflation based on production and income. Also, employment, unemployment, and hours worked is tracked and displayed using this web resource. Several other unique, key data that can be found her includes personal consumption and housing; and sales, orders, and inventories. The data shown in this resource is valuable for predicting inflation, as well as gauging current and future economic activity in the US on a Macroeconomic level. FDIC State Profiles These state profiles have recently been updated as a quarterly data sheet that summarizes the banking and economic conditions of each...
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...Learning Team A Reflection There are many databases to research historical economic data and forecast future economic data. This week’s topics help understand the data we are looking at which once understood can help us improve the economic future within our country. Understanding our strengths and weaknesses will also help us find economic data to improve the economy. The Federal Reserve Economic Data, also known as FRED, is a resource for historical economic data. FRED is an online database with thousands of economic data from different resources. It is maintained by the Research Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louise. FRED combines data with other tools that help users understand, interact and display the data. This is important because the data can become overwhelming and difficult to comprehend. (“Economic Research-Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis”. n.d). The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) provides independent budget analysis, conducts objectives impartial to analysis and economic issues to support congressional budget process. The BEA is another possible resource it contains a large amount of valuable information in one place. Using the National, International, Regional, Industry, Integrated Accounts all include national income and product accounts (NIPAs), and the gross domestic product to complete an accurate economic forecast (U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis 2012). The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is one resource when forecasting economic data...
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..." Reflection Summary" Week 2 ACC/291 In last week readings, this is what each of my Team members learned: We stated, it was a great experience learning about the basic issues that related to accounting for intangible assets. I also gained knowledge of the differences between revenue expenditures and capital expenditures within a company's financial statements. I just realize how important these basic issues are to the companies financial status. There are many businesses that have no earned income, which will be a liability to the company. I do seem to have great knowledge on intangible assets just by listening and comprehending in the readings and class discussion. There has been so much I have learned within in the first week of class. We the class was discussing the intangible assets, it was very interesting to me and I definitely wanted to learn more and I did. We stated, he was confident and knowledgeable about intangible assets like copyrights and franchising, mainly due to fact the owner of the independent restaurant I manage for has franchised the restaurant name to a restaurant management company and he receives a large amount of revenue from the company for using the concept and name of the restaurant for the foreseeable future. And the owner also copyrighted the name so that anyone wanting to use the name of the restaurant anywhere in America must pay him to use it. Another item that was interesting to learn about was...
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...Team A Weekly Reflection HRM 513 Team A Weekly Reflection The purpose of this paper is to summarize the key discussion points from the learning objectives during week two. This week’s topic focused on the functions of a job description. Objective 1: Explain how a job analysis is used to create a job description. A job analysis is defined as “the process used to break a job into its component duty or functional areas and the task statements associated with those duty areas” (Hartley, 2010). The job analysis identifies requirements and duties involves in the job. It will also establish guidelines on the education level, skill set, and work environment. The completed job analysis will be used to create the job description. The US Department of Interior (1998) website states that a job analysis “can be used to identify documents and other elements vital to the candidate evaluation, referral and selection process, such as measurement methods and interview requirements”. Each member on the team understands how the job analysis is used and the purpose. A job analysis provides an understanding and specifications for a position. A job analysis consists of a job description and the specifications required. The team agrees that an analysis should be reviewed periodically to remain current and not waste unnecessary resources. Potential problems exist with a job analysis. The accuracy and stability of an analysis could prevent a precise job description...
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