Construction ICT Research Proposal Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Construction ICT - Research Proposal Example In this section I will talk about the main problem situation regarding the lacking of implementation in the construction process and management. In this section I will discuss about the main problem situation and its possible effects regarding the effective construction process management and handling. The trouble that causes a serious hurdle in the construction industry is the lack of the communication. In this scenario the worker and management are ignorant to the in progress state of the development of the construction site. We also have less interaction in case of the on site construction management. Then we have a most important problem on the subject of the data transfer. In the absence of the ICT tools it is tremendously complicated to supervise and handle the construction process. The on time data movement is really indispensable for on time project handling. For instance we have traced a new alignment regarding roof settlement. This data requires instantaneous transfer to access the new construction strategy or handling information. There is also the main problem regarding the less effective management of the overall human resource on the site. In the presence of the ICT tools we would be able to handle the overall workforce in a better way. The customary way of construction lacks the on site labour communication and handling of the overall construction resource. Next main problem in absence of ICT tools is regarding the effective resource management and handling on the site. In this scenario the construction site resources are managed manually that is more time consuming and complicated task. In the field construction we have no observation means for the overall workforce performance. This means that workers are working in separation and there is no check on their performance assessment. The automotive vehicle tracking and management is not possible in the overall scenario. IT in Construction In this section I will talk about the implementation of the most modern developed information based technology in the construction industry. This technology has changed the on the whole working structure and configuration of the construction market. "Now the methods of construction engross more enhanced tools and techniques regarding the overall development of the construction business" (Sarshar et al, 2004). This carrying out of the information technology in the field of construction business projected an innovative approach to enhance the construction developments in the course of utilization of mobility and information technology. This policy intended to build up effectiveness, consequently, reducing expenditure as well as time of the resources facilities procurement practice. It is as well intended to build up the freedom of a structuring or capability, meeting customers' needs. The role of ICT in the vision of the construction business was presented, and a multi step technique was planned for carrying about a balanced acceptance through the business of IT (Arayici et al, 2005). ICT based technology All the way through the world the majority of the organizations accept as true that the effectual utilization of

ECON 4131, International Finance, Spring 2002, Exam 2 Essays -- UMN Mi

Midterm Exam International Finance April 7, 2004 Answer all questions in examination booklets 1. (15 points) Define the following a) The â€Å"spot† exchange rate b) The â€Å"forward† exchange rate c) A capital account â€Å"surplus† d) Currency depreciation e) Arbitrage 2. (10 points) Briefly discuss the essential features of forward contracts, currency futures, and currency options. 3. (15 points) Use the BOP accounts guide on the last page of this exam to indicate where each of the following transactions should be recorded in the U.S. balance of payments (e.g.: â€Å"i3†, â€Å"e2†, etc.). Bear in mind that each transaction should generate a capital account and a current account entry. a) A Canadian firm buys a $75 million jet from the American company Boeing, which it pays for with a check drawn on Banc du Quebec b) Cargill (out of Mpls.) buys $10m. of Canadian wheat, which it pays for with a check drawn on Twin Cities Federal c) An American...

Global Change Essay

The concept of civil society was reinvented in the late 1980s in response to the rapid market development and the end of the Cold War. The collapse of the Soviet Union marked the rapid development of global market due to higher international security. Market development gradually leads to the development of civil society for two reasons: Firstly, the middle class helps to fight more freedom from the government as they want to gain more and more control of themselves. This situation, allows spaces for civil society to develop. Some donors search for NGOs to implement their civic or economic related interests and visions. 1 Secondly, the retreat of the â€Å"welfare† states in western countries further triggers the emergence of civil society as people want to address the problem themselves instead of solely depending on the invisible hand of the free market. Hong Kong, which is recognized as a newly industrialized economy (NIE) has adopted the minimal-interventionist principle in economic development for a long Low tax rate and free market policies are the priorities of the Hong Kong government. Civil society is said to be very important in the implementation of democracy as civil society is a representation of diverse interests of the people. In the planning system of Hong Kong, though the government was willing to involve more public participation in the process with the increasing force of democratization between 1990 and 1997, the role of civil society in planning policy formulation and implementation was not yet clear. According to the experiences of some UK cities, partnership between civil society and the local governments can facilitate sustainable development. It is yet to know whether such kind of partnership is possible in Hong Kong or not. So the aim of this paper is to find out the challenges and opportunities of mobilizing partnership between the government and civil society. Aims of the study This paper aims to explore the challenges and opportunities in fostering partnership between civil society and the government in the planning system of Hong Kong. This paper is based on the central argument that civil society organizations (â€Å"CSOs†) should play significant role in the planning system to explore the challenges and opportunities. It is argued that CSOs are important for promoting more effective idea in the policy planning in terms of reflecting the needs of the locals as well as the moral values neglected by both market and the government. It is believed that the challenges and opportunities are not that straightforward to be understood as they should involve a lot of other factors. These factors are to be examined in order to provide a clearer picture for the analysis. Structure of the paper This study is composed of six sections:- Session I begins with an introduction. It states the purpose of this paper and the content structure. Section II is the theoretical framework established for understanding the theoretical meaning of civil society and the importance of partnership between the government and the CSOs. Section III is the background about development of citizenship in Hong Kong. It is found that the civil society in Hong Kong is becoming mature. Section IV discusses on the six major factors contributing to the challenges in the relationship between the government and the civil society. Section V seeks to study real-life cases to further strengthen the argument that CSOs should play significant role in the planning system. Section VI, the final section of this paper. It summarizes all the key issues discussed in this paper and highlights the importance of the role of CSOs in planning system.   Defining â€Å"Civil Society† The definitions and meaning of civil society in different mainstream theories are explored and outlined in Appendix 1. The interpretation of civil society by Aristotle is now widely recognized as autonomy, not under direct state control. It emphasized on the formation of government based on voluntary willingness of people and universal election in order to guarantee sovereignty of citizens (for Locke) and the freedom of civil society (for Rousseau). The existing political system in Hong Kong is different as the HKSAR government is not directly elected by the citizens. Hong Kong people can only elect some of the legislative councilors, who act as delegates to deal with legislative issues; and district councilors, who are serving as advisors of the government. The sovereignty is just partly in the hand of Hong Kong people. In fact, the situation of Hong Kong is closer to the idea of Hegel that civil society and family together form the state. Civil society is actually functioning as a partly autonomy body under the government of Hong Kong. However, civil society should perform a more active role in the system in order to balance the power of the state and the market for the benefit of the public. So Friedmanns’ definition of civil society will be applied to support the empowerment of civil society. Civil society, as an association of individual interests, should grow up to balance the power of the state. His definition also separates the concept of market from civil society, which is applicable in the situation of Hong Kong. Friedmann(1998) states that civil society must be seen as standing in â€Å"opposition† to the corporate economy. The relationship of civil society and the market should not be neglected when we understand the relationship of the government and the civil society. 2 To sum up, the combination of Friedmann’s and Hegel’s definition of civil society is applied in this paper. Civil society is defined as a sphere without direct state control, but is not totally separated from the state. The participation in civil society is based on voluntary willingness and it is actually an association of various individual interests. It is different from the concepts of corporate economy and family, but they are related to some extent. Civil society may not necessarily oppose to the corporate economy, but they may interplay to produce good results. Civil society should be empowered to balance the power of the government and market.

Organizational Behaviour And Employee Development Business Essay - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 9 Words: 2738 Downloads: 3 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Business Essay Type Argumentative essay Did you like this example? Can managers create employee motivation? Discuss with reference to the theoretical material outlined in the module. Motivation is the driving force in which human being achieve their goals. Motivation is the power that strengthens behavior, gives the route to the behavior and it triggers the tendency to continue. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Organizational Behaviour And Employee Development Business Essay" essay for you Create order Motivation is a course that is concerned with a kind of strength that boosts the performance and directs one towards accomplishing some definite target. Motivation is a force that helps individual to achieve their desires. It is a strength that helps individual to stay focus and determined. Over the years many authors have defined motivation but up till date there is no single definition for motivation. According to Goddard et al (2006) it is an accumulation of diverse routes which put across and manipulates our activities to attaining some particular ambitions. However, despite different definition of motivation there are some common concerns expressed such as the individuality phenomenon. Individual can be motivated differently due to their behavior, attitudes, goals and values. Employee behaviors can be change toward achieving success in an organization by applying a sort of motivation. Employee motivation is one of the policies that managers use to increase the effectual job mana gement among the employees in the organization. An employee who is motivated is responsive of the goals and objectives that she or he must achieve and she therefore directs her efforts towards that direction. Motivation usually formulates an organization more successfully because the provoked employees are constantly looking for the improved practices to do the work. It is therefore important for organization to persuade employees motivation. One key factor in employee motivation is the opportunity that the employees want to continue to develop and grow the job and career enhancing skills. According to Goddard et al (2006) training is the planned intervention which is designed to enhance the determinants of an individuals job performance. Managers are individuals that are responsible for heading organizations. Managers are also accountable for overseeing of the various departments within an organization. In any organization, the management of employees should be the first prio rity of all managers. How employees functions within the organization is highly dependent on the relationship that they have with the management. Managers thus play a vital role in motivating employees. A motivated employee will be more productive and effective in his work station than an employee with strained relations with the manager. Managers should strive to maintain a positive relationship as such productive relationships enable managers to accomplish the organizational goals and objectives. Effective management allows managers to capitalize on the strengths of individuals employees. A manager can motivate his employees to use their strengths to see a business venture succeed. The success of a manager in encouraging his employees to be productive translates to success in the organizational operations as the company is able to attain its set goals and objectives. Managers who have a vision for their organization can create employee motivation that will see an organization soar and become successful. According to McGregory (1960), the management should strive to organize the element of productive enterprise which includes the finances, raw materials, resources and the people within the organization. It is only through the proper management of these elements of productive enterprise that a manager can effectively lead an organization towards reaching its economic ends. The people within an organization refer to employees. The management is responsible for the direction, motivation and control of the actions of its employees  [i]  . The behavior of employees within an organization is reflective of the kind of leadership and management that persists within the organization. The active intervention of the management in the functioning of employees within an organization reduces the risks of resistance among employees. According to McGregory (1960) employees need to be persuaded, rewarded, directed, punished and controlled by the management. Managers need to establish the ideal approach to use so as to motivate employees to work harder and efficiently within the organization. The hard approach of management involves the use of coercion, threats and extreme control to get functions of the organization operational. The hard approach to management of employees may bear result, but it breeds negativity such as demoralization of employee, high employee turn out and sabotage of organization objectives. Alternatively, employees can choose to select the soft approach of managing employees. The soft approach of management involves satisfying employee demands, and emphasizing on harmony. The soft approach may be the ideal strategy, though it can also lead to abdication of management and indifferent performance. Managers should thus strive to establish a firm but fair approach that adopts bits of the hard and the soft approach of management of employees. Managers can also motivate its employees by considering the diverse needs of emplo yees as presented in Maslows theory of human motivation. Managers should ensure that employees are able to meet their physiological needs by working in the organization. The job description that an individual undertake should be satisfactory enough in terms of financial benefits. An employee would be motivated to perform if his job enables him to meet his basic needs. Other needs such as safety needs, love needs and esteem needs. The management can motivate employees by reviewing the esteem needs of employees. This can be done by giving recognition to employees for their efforts. Managers should also hold each of employees with equal importance so as to motivate each to work in their respective work stations. Employees must be able to work in organizations that allow self actualization. Employees need to have a sense of growth and development as they work in their organizations. Managers can achieve this by engaging employees in strategies such as training and development programs. Employees will be motivated to work for institutions that give them a chance to grow. Managers must strive to see their employees receive training and educational opportunities as they work in the organization. The ability of an employee to shift from one job description to another motivates them to remain productive and efficient. Managers should motivate employees to perform by creating career growth opportunities. Training program within the organization are indicators that a manager desires to retain its employees. It is also an indicator that the management desires to take its employees to greater levels of achievement. Managers should ensure that the organization embraces an elaborate training system from the time an employee is hired. How the organization orientate a new employee is critical on the success of the organization. An orientation activity can drive or destroy employee relationships, which in turn affect their motivation and performance within the organization. Alderfer (1972) presents an alternative look of the human needs rather than the one provided by Maslow in his hierarchy of needs. Alderfers theory is known as the Existence, Relatedness and Growth (ERG) theory. The existence category as provided by Alderfer refers to the basic needs that human begins desire for so as to survive. These are basic needs such as food and shelter as provided in Maslows physiological and safety needs. Just like in Maslows an individual will be motivated to work for an organization that enable him to satisfy these needs. With this in mind manager should ensure that they adopt a pay system that guarantees reasonable payment to employees. The second category refers to needs associated, with relatedness and ability to form personal relationships. Managers should be able to create an environment that fosters unity and a sense of belonging among employees. A sense of belonging leads to productivity and performance as employees considers themselves a unit. Th e employees, as a unit, strive to achieve the organizations goals as well as set targets. An employee will be motivated to operate in an environment with warmth rather than hostility and conflict. Vroom (1964) the expectancy theory looked at how individual perceived the attractiveness of reward and how to achieve it. Individuals work in an organization with the intention of benefiting in one way. The reward system covers the drive to acquire among employees within an organization. Managers should strive to establish an elaborate reward scheme that note high performers and low performance. Rewards in the form of commissions and compensation packages to high performing employees motivate the winners to keep up the exemplary work. Similarly, those identified as average or low performers will strive to work harder. Subsequently, the organization ends up with a highly motivated team that strives to achieve the overall goals of the organization. Rewards for performance motivate employe es to achieve the target that managers set for the organization. It is the incentives that the managers offer to the employees that determines their levels of motivation to see the company achieve its targets. Some individual may also think that the target is unattainable therefore affecting their expectations of meeting the set target It is the responsibility of managers to ensure that they create a healthy relationship with the employees. Employees must be able to function where they can demonstrate their potential without barriers. Creating an environment where employees work at their level best means that there is minimal conflict. Conflict interferes with the work environment; managers should thus strive to ensure that all employees understand the need to avoid all forms of conflict and focus on working in unison. Employees must function in a scenario where they trust each other; where employees are comfortable working with each other. It is the presence of such environments that employees feel motivated to work and become fully committed to the responsibilities assigned to them. The manager plays a vital role in ensuring that employees have healthy relations at the workplace. The manger must take the role of the team leaders. As a team leader, he should strive to understand and know his employees well. It through understanding their employees well that the manager will understand the interests and specialization of each employees. He will then assign task and responsibilities based on the employees specialization. A motivated employee is one who is given an opportunity to demonstrate his potential, managers can encourage this by allowing employees to select task and responsibilities they believe they can perform best. Managers should also motivate their employees by being good role models. Manager should encourage team work and working towards one goal. He should also avoid negative subjectivism as well as partialities that strain relationships in the workplace. Acts of favoritism of some employees over others should be avoided. Managers should also strive to compliment employees when they perform exceptionally. Similarly, he should correct them when they fail to perform as expected. The model job characteristics which consist of five core dimension help to describes motivation in the context of job satisfaction. ( Hackman and Oldhams 1975). The five core dimensions that can be associated with job satisfaction levels of employees within an organization. The skill variety the extent to which an employee is required to used multiple or different level of skills. The core dimension is task identity this is where an individual is identifiable in completing a piece of work from start to finish. The third core dimension is task significance whether an individual job affect other people work which relate to the importance of the work. The fourth core dimension is autonomy the freedom or discretion for people to perform and org anized work. The fifth core dimension the task feedback this is the feedback that employee receive after completion of task. It could also be feedback receive on job performance. The element of bonding within an organization determines the ability of employees to work together and achieve set goals. The sense of belonging that employees achieve within an organization determines their level of motivation. Managers can strive to enhance the motivation levels of employees by formulating an organization culture that promotes positive aspects of work such as team work, collaboration and friendship. Managers should strive to foster mutual reliance and friendship among employees. Employees must be able to recognize each other as not only co-workers, but also friends who they can entrust with their personal stories. The ability of implementing a strong culture that emphasizes on oneness encourages best practices within the organization. The third drive is the drive to comprehend event s and situations that occur around human beings. It is by understanding different aspects of events that individuals are able to establish reasonable actions and responses. In the workplace, the drive to comprehend means that employees must be capable of making viable contributions. Manager should be able to create job descriptions that pose a challenge to the employees. Challenging job descriptions give employees an opportunity to learn and grow. It also eliminates the risk of monotony which discourages employees as they feel trapped and without any prospects of growth  [ii]  . Managers should also strive to give employees job designs that are distinct and give important roles for employees within the organization. The job designs must be meaningful so that employees get a sense of purpose within the organization. Employees must be able to see that there are integral parts of the organization due to the specific role they are undertaking within the organization. Creating a f eeling of security and confidence Manager should ensure that they participate in transparent performance management and resource allocation process. Employees who are certain of their job security regardless of business actions such as mergers and acquisitions are motivated to perform rather than employees that are unsure of their future within the organization. Managers should ensure that they engage in fair organizational process. If the management intends to engage in a retrenchment exercise for instance, they should strive to ensure all employees comprehend the need of the restricting exercise and the effects of the process  [iii]  . Manager should also be just and transparent in processes such as rewarding and recognizing employees for their efforts within the organization. According to Gitman, McDaniel, (2008) managers who desire to motivate their employees to perform exemplary must be able to detect talent among employees. A manager can detect positive traits among a few employees. Instead of picking out the exemplary employees from the rest, an ideal manager will formulate a strategy to capitalize on these unique traits. The manager must determine an effective strategy to capture a talent and turn it into performance. In any organization, it is impossible to find employees that function the same way. Employees exhibit different skills and talents that a manager must be able to tap and use to realize the company success. A manager that focuses on employee strength is able to lead the employee to success. The manager is also able to encourage employees to embrace the spirit of team work that they can rely on so as to achieve organizational objectives. Conclusion Employees are valuable assets of any institution; it is the responsibility of management, to ensure that he employees have the morale to work and see the organization soar to success. Managers should take a hand-on approach in their management efforts. Employees need to see their managers putting as much effort in seeing the company succeeds. Manager should be the role models of their employees by guiding them through hardships of employment. Managers can also select the ideal approach to handle the employees. The hard approach may appear too dictatorial, whereas the soft approach may lead to lack of seriousness on the part of the employees. A middle stand enables the managers to be strict, but helpful to employees to achieve their greatest potential. Managers should also consider having a training and development strategy to assist its employees grow. Employees will be motivated to work for an employer who takes the time to see their employees grow and develop in their career path s. Managers must also adopt reasonable pay and compensation packages that will motivate employees to perform. The pay and compensation package must be one that enables employees to meet their basic needs and also secure their future. Reference Alderfer, C. (1972). Existence, relatedness and growth: human needs in organizational settings. London: New York: free press. Bratton (2007) extract from motivation at work, in work and organizational behavior, pp257-269, 272-273 and 487-519. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Gitman, L. McDaniel, C. (2008). The future of business. ASTD Publishers Herzberg, F. (1962) work and the nature of man. London: staple press. Cengage learning Maslow, A. (1943) a theory of human motivation, psychology review 50:370-396. McGregor, D. (1960) the human side of enterprise. New York: London: Mcgraw-hill Lauby, S. (2005). Motivating employees. Cengage Learning Vroom, V. (1964) work and motivation, New York: Wiley