...“Why College Education is important to me” Introduction I have witnessed numerous friends and family members give up to their “dream jobs “, due to them lacking a college education. For Many years, I too applied to many jobs which rejected me because I did not possess the college courses they required. Obtaining an Associate’s degree will not only open doors to my prospecting job opportunities but will also enhance my personal development and allow me to reach my goals. While there are a high level of job opportunities with high salaries, to obtain a job in government and private companies is competitive due to education requirements. The workforce is changing quickly, and the requirements are too. Entry level jobs now require that an individual have a minimum of a Bachelor. With struggles of inflation and lack of well paying jobs for the young graduates, affording an education is almost impossible. College View magazine was quoted stating,” The global economy is becoming increasingly more competitive, and in order to give yourself the best change for a well paying job, you must understand the importance of a college education”. The only way to obtain a job that will provide finance stability is by returning ti school and completing an AA degree. Personal development is very important to me because is a lifelong process. Completing a post secondary education provides me with a sense of accomplishment and heightens myself esteem. Working towards my AA degree ( or college...
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...retailer in Sweden. What was the source of its competitive advantage at that time? --IKEA established itself as the largest furniture retailer in Sweden by the early 1970s by reinventing the wheel of furniture manufacturing at that time. Majority of furniture manufacturers in Sweden produced expensive products with designs that were basic or passed down generation to generation, additionally other manufacturers stores where located in downtown congested areas. IKEA’s strategies which consisted of low cost low priced furniture, brave intricate designs, self-assembly, and stores located in open rural areas all contributed to them becoming the largest furniture retailer in Sweden. 2. Why do you think IKEA’s expansion into Europe went so well? Why did the company subsequently stumble in North America? What lessons did IKEA learn from this experience? How is the company now applying these lessons? --Western European furniture markets were largely fragmented and were served by high-costs retailers located in expensive downtown stores and were not always ready for delivery as IKEA furniture was. The European expansion was fast-paced and IKEA’s furniture had lower prices, offered cleaner lines, and their self-service format which gave European customers a new wave of excitement and choice. Several instances caused IKEA to stumble in America, their beds were measured in centimeters and not the king, queen, and twin sizes, their glasses proved too small for Americans liking, and they were...
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...Homework: In the News... According to the textbook strategic management is a business philosophy that encompasses analysis, decision-making, and actions to establish competitive advantage (Dess, et.al. 2012). Barnes and Noble continue to make headlines for the failure –to-launch of its Nook E-Reader. In the New York Times Leslie Kaufman (2013) writes that Barnes & Noble’s foray into the digital age is a catastrophic failure noting that it’s constant attempt at catch-up which is too little too late to gain any competitive advantage. Barnes and Noble is a perfect example of a nonexistent business strategy, a flying-by-the-seat-of-your-pants business practice that changes with the wind that lacks leadership. Why and how the material is important and relevant to the course content: • The mission statement at Barnes and Noble is ambiguous and does not identify what sort of business they are operating. Its website states “Our mission is to operate the best specialty retail business in America, regardless of the product we sell.” • Though they have a vision that encompasses respect, integrity and teamwork it has been reported that the leadership style of its former CEO did not tolerate those who disagreed with him, squashed creativity and actually encouraged employees to leave. • Strategic goals were too many, not measurable, not specific enough, not timely and not realistic given its competition and entry into new markets. In a letter to shareholders William Lynch wrote:...
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...claim that professional baseball players are paid more than they are worth. Economics is the key to understanding why these athletes earn such tremendous salaries; still, it fails to explain why they actually do deserve it. Giving athlete’s high wages doesn’t only distort them, but also bring downfall to clubs and the country’s economy. The growth and the development of a sport may be reflected from the wages of the athletes and that is all it does. In conclusion, Team owners pay more to keep athletes on the team to be on a winning streak, but whether the drive to win is justifiable remains in doubt. The economic system involving sports, corporate America, and the media is an interdependent one. Athletes make huge sums of money paid to them by owners who make even larger sums of money. Agents, free agency, and other phenomena keep athlete salaries rising. So, too, does increased ticket sales to games, increased TV viewership, enormous media contracts, TV advertising, and corporate sponsorship and endorsement deals. The economic rewards in the sports industry are so enormous that corporate America, the media, and sports franchises are driven to earn a larger slice of the profit pie. Mergers and acquisitions, alliances, cross-promotion, enormous advertising expenditures, staggering media contracts, and a host of other phenomena are used as a means of retaining competitive advantage among teams, among corporations, and among...
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...Training A few years ago, the DeVry technical institute released a commercial that compared two brothers in their educational pursuits. The younger brother started school at DeVry and graduated in two years. The older brother had chosen college and was still stuck in his dorm room studying history while his younger brother worked on the future. The question this commercial presented was obvious, why waste all that time in a university learning trivial facts which don’t apply to the real world when you can bypass it and still learn an important skill.... [tags: Argumentative Persuasive Educating Essays] 1329 words (3.8 pages) $29.95 [preview] America: Culturally Constipated? - ... Cultural pluralism or cultural diversity replaces the melting pot image with what is frequently described as a “mosaic” or almost a “tossed salad.” As Christine Bennett stated “each part retains some of its uniqueness while contributing to the beauty and strength of the whole composition.” The United States still has failed to become part of the tossed salad idea we don’t diversify with other cultures, why. Prejudice and racism is a root problem for cultural barriers within the borders of the United States.... [tags: American Culture] 763 words (2.2 pages) $19.95 [preview] Cultural Challenges Of Doing Business Overseas - The Cultural Challenges of Doing Business Overseas Steve Kafka, an American of Czech origin and a franchiser of Chicago Style Pizza, has decided to expand his business and...
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...POLICINA, JULPHA CLARISSE P. SABLAN, JUSTINE ABIGAIL C. STRAMAN K33 Case 2 – Competition among the North American Warehouse Clubs 1. What is competition like in the North American wholesale club industry? Which of the five competitive forces is strongest and why? Competition in North American wholesale club industry is mainly about offering lower prices than other competitors. But with this low price that warehouse clubs are offering, they still have to offer something different in order for them to generate more income and get more clients than their competitors. The strongest among the five competitive forces is the rivalry among competing sellers. From all the membership warehouse and clubs, they are competing too much considering that they all offer at lower prices. They need to offer something different wherein the other competitors shouldn’t have to be able to achieve a competitive advantage. They are competing in same market and that is by selling those manufactured goods at almost same price levels. 2. Do all three warehouse club rivals – Costco, Sam’s, and BJ’s Wholesale – have highly similar strategies? What differences in their strategies are apparent? Does one rival have a better strategy than the others? Does one rival have a somewhat weaker strategy than the other two? Yes, these three have highly similar strategy being used. Costco, Sam’s and BJ’s offer low cost, and that’s mainly their similar strategy. Costco follows the strategy wherein they would offer...
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...Bank of America: Decisions for the Future ECO 550: Managerial Economics 16 June 2013 Abstract Long-term capital budgeting is the process used by many companies to make substantial term investments, in order to receive the greatest cash flow. A company must first look at an analysis of cash flows and cost and earnings of the project to determine whether to accept or reject a capital budgeting project. The three rules used to make decisions towards capital budgeting; the payback period, net present value (NPV), and internal rate of return (IRR). The Payback Period is the tool that is used to determine how long it takes for the project to recover its initial costs for funding the project. The Net Present Value shows how the present project will affect the company. The Internal Rate of Return reveals the discount rate if the NPV equals zero. The antitrust law is a federal and state law regulation of corporations. The law insures that company does not grow too large which may prevent the growth of other corporations. The government believes that without this law that prices can become fixed and demand will be unfair in the market. In Assignment 3, I discussed the publicly traded company, Bank of America Corporation, and how the corporation deals with competition and change. In this paper, I will discuss the government regulations for mergers, the possible merger that could occur, and how the merger could be profitable. Explain why government...
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...strategy? Which of the five generic competitive strategies discussed in Chapter 5 most closely fit the competitive approach that Panera Bread is taking? What type of competitive advantage is Panera Bread trying to achieve? Strategy was to aggressively expand its market presence across North America and improve the quality of the dining experience it provided to customers. From the five competitive strategies discussed in chapter 5 I would Best-Cost Provider strategy. Panera Bread provides common café beverages around the country. They do however manage to offer products at lower cost to it rivals and still give their customers more value for their money by incorporating good to excellent product qualities. Panera is striving for to achieve a type of competitive advantage that is a lower cost then its rivals with a market that targets a broad cross-section of buyers. 2. What does a SWOT analysis of Panera Bread reveal about the overall attractiveness of its situation? Does the company have any core competencies or distinctive competencies? Strengths: • Attractive & appealing menu • Bread-baking expertise • Artisan breads are Panera’s signature product. • Nationwide leader in the bakery-café segment • High ratings in customer satisfaction • Solid brand name • Initial success in catering • Good franchisees higher sales in franchised stores compared to company-owned • Financial strength of the company able to grow without taking on too much debt Weaknesses: • A...
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...International Management (Fall Semester) Individual Case Write Up 1: Amazon Goes Global 1. Why did Amazon choose the United Kingdom as its first entry location? Why not other countries such as Canada and Austrlia? With the emergence of a global marketplace, Amazon has since ridden on the waves of the opportunities that comes with globalisation. After more than a decade of expansion, Amazon’s international operations accounted for about 43 per cent of its revenue, bringing in $26.28 billion in 2012. This shows the significance of targeting the international markets. However, entry into foreign market does not come without risks and costs that resulted from barriers created by distance. The CAGE Framework of distance by Ghemawat explained distance as 4 main attributes – Cultural, Administrative, Geographic, Economic.1 To address these risks and costs, it is crucial to first assess the extent and type of differences between the USA market and the United Kingdom market. Amazon’s entry into United Kingdom (UK) can be attributed to minimal distance and various similarities, which allowed Amazon to significantly reduce risks and costs. Primarily, the UK market has a lot of similarities to the US market in terms of cultural, administrative and economic distance. UK has the second most number of native English speakers (60 million), after US (231 million), and is also the place where English was first spoken. Since books were the primary products sold by Amazon, the similarity...
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...Alternative Courses of Action 1. Concentrate on the Americas 2. Diversify Production 3. Expand to Europe More Aggressively 4. Diversify Product Line 1.Concentrate on the Americas Based on our analysis of Chiquita Banana’s financial struggles we have a number of possible solutions for improving the company. Chiquita Bananas had no way of predicting that the European Union would favour its former colonies over Chiquita’s locations in Latin America. After the European Union put quotas and tariffs on Chiquita’s products, Chiquita should have re-evaluated whether or not to continue to export to Europe. Although they would lose a significant amount of business if they stopped exporting to Europe, the reason they were in debt in the first place was because Europe restricted import of their products and this was a problem since Europe was Chiquita’s main market. If the company had concentrated within the Americas then they would not have been forced into so much debt. 2. Diversify Production In order to limit the amount they were affected by natural disasters, the company could have grown bananas in other parts of the world. This would be better for the company because if natural disasters did strike in an area where they grow their products then it would not be such a financial blow as they would have more sources to receive...
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...Bank of America Stetson O’Flaherty Mark Cole Lithonia Campus Date: 11 - 5 - 2014 Strayer University Use data from within the past three (3) years to identify the profit margin, debt to asset ratio, price-earnings (PE) ratio, inventory turnover, current ratio, and times interest earned for the firm that you have selected. Bank of America Corporation (NYSE:BAC) is the world's largest holding bank company in terms of 2009 assets and total revenue. Through its numerous subsidiaries, the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank offers a full range of financial and non-financial services in three principal divisions: Global Consumer and Small Business Banking, Global Corporate and Investment Banking, and Global Wealth and Investment Management. The firm has a strong geographical presence in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia, as well as in 40 foreign countries, and serves over 55 million consumer and small business clients. For the full year 2010, Bank of America reported total revenue of $111.4B and a net loss of $2.2B. (NYSE USA2004- 2014) The weak US housing market causes the rate of foreclosures to remain high with approximately 1.8M homes either delinquent or in foreclosure.[Increased or sustained foreclosures puts a significant cost on Bank of America's Home Loans and Insurance segment. Debt to asset ratio, price-earnings (PE) As of today, Bank of America Corporation's share price is$16.72. Bank of America Corporation's earnings per share without non-recurring...
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...Obesity is a real problem here in America. A problem that I can personally relate to due to my family’s history with this disease. How did we get here? It’s more complex than what I will show here in this essay, but I will give three main reason why the United States has such a struggle with weight and why more than 1/3 of our nation is facing obesity and 68% of Americans are overweight. The world as we know it today has become fast-paced and very competitive. The days of people working one job per family to make ends meet or to casually live, slowly developed into two people earning an income in a household just to survive. Sometimes it is the same person having more than one job. This fast-paced world and drive to stay competitive has exponentially pushed our society to levels of stress not seen in times past. It’s a common known fact that workplace stress is part of our everyday lives, but in today’s times where schedules of work and production is always under the microscope, it causes excessive stress and thus affects the physical health. Time is money, and so a person hits the ground running, starting the morning with several cups of Joe or the all too famous Red Bull or Monster that are loaded with sugar. If you are lucky, there is time to hit the drive thru and grab a #3 for the road. I remember as a kid growing up in rural Alabama where the life seemed to be like the Andy Griffin show. We sat down at the table with the family and enjoyed a nice healthy meal in the...
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...Edouard Beaude Shanghaï, November 2015 Global Strategy: Arcor global strategy, Local turbulence Executive Summary: The following analysis will focus on studying the international development of Arcor, an Argentinian company producing chocolate and candies. The confectionary industry is a competitive industry with some major actors sharing the market on very specific market segment . Arcor’s has adopted a low-cost leadership strategy providing “Good quality at an affordable price”. Their main strengths are their complete vertical integration (See exhibit 2), their efficient distribution channels and their production capacities. Arcor is growing at a strong pace and is expanding fast. However, the questions of which market and which distribution channels has quickly arisen. In order to provide more insights about the best market to penetrate, the historical strategy will be studied along with their competitive advantage. The consumers’ habits will be reviewed and the geographical specificities will be identified to highlight the key factors that will drive the expansion. Issues / Problems: The international expansion of Arcor has highlighted some weaknesses of his model. The first and major problem is the transportation costs that are very high ending up being higher than the local standards. A second issue comes from the absence of marketing which create a strong barrier when they want to penetrate market where the customers value the brand. A third issue is...
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...moving towards a strategic approach by focusing on centralization. While the global nature of AES’s business and the presence of suppliers worldwide makes the transformation to a centralized structure difficult, it is definitely a step in the right direction. The decentralization approach early on allowed AES to grow rapidly and capitalize on regional developmental opportunities, however, recent loses, and price and currency pressure in major markets, such as Brazil, has forced AES to think about reducing cost by employing reduced capital expenditure, controlled business developmental spending, exits from nonperforming businesses, and a centralized organization structure that makes global sourcing and efficient supply chain management a competitive advantage. 2. How should the electric meters team proceed? The team will have to be strategic in their approach considering the team’s forecast that demand for single and three phased meters will remain the same with demand for electronic meters continually rising. Less than 10% of the meter spend was expended on AMRs...
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...ancient Rome have changed dramatically over the years, but have also impacted modern day America and our sports today significantly. There are some sports that ancient Rome didn’t have but modern America has such as basketball, football, soccer, tennis, and hockey. Also back in ancient Rome there were lots of rules that America didn't have. One of the rules were women could not take part in these activities. Ancient Rome was strict about who was allowed to play in typical sports. Some people hated to play sports because of the rules. One of the most popular sports in ancient Rome was boxing. Boxing gloves were made of raw ox-hide. In America, boxing gloves are made of soft leather straps. In ancient Rome, you used your right hand to fight and your left hand to defend. Today, America uses both of your hands to fight...
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