Civil Engineering: Reflective Journal

Civil Engineering: Reflective Journal Civil Engineering Technical:  Learning Journal Stage 1: Understanding Me My first degree was in Civil Engineering. I choose the field of civil engineering because I wanted to explore and study the inner details of the structure, also my academic strengths was mathematics and I enjoyed doing civil engineering as the most of the subjects was dealt with calculation and structural concepts. I like studying at the university because of the professors were very cooperative. They give me understanding that how the difficult technical data can be easily understood which really helped me a lot when I start doing my job after the degree. I gain confidence in my university time as I always feel it difficult before my degree to be confident in myself. However, after building structural concepts in Civil engineering I wanted also to learn management skills in depth, as designing the building and running the project effectively at the site are two different fields so to cope with it I decided to take up an MSc. Construction course at Birmingham City University. While C ivil Engineering has been very effective at equipping me with the technical skills of the trade, I find it both useful and practical to be able to acquire the soft skills of management to become a good manager. I feel that in taking up this course, my career horizon would be broadened since I will not be limited only to the Engineering profession. The management component of the course would help me apply it cross functionally. It shall then open new career avenues for me as a professional. Moreover, learning questionnaire results suggests that I am pragmatist type of person according to it I can solve problem in a realistic way which suits the present conditions rather then obeying fixed theories, ideas or rules. Also my MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator) results suggest that I am an INTJ (Introverted Intuition with Extraverted thinking). Stage 2: Learning from Practice Technical Knowledge The first situation which I want to share on the importance of technical knowledge was when I was assigned a new member of staff who was then tasked to handle a fairly important project even if he was new. The organisation I was working was one of the leading construction company of middle east and my role in the office was an assistant project manager. To train the new staff was quite difficult because I had to ensure that his learning curve was quite fast. If not, his project time line would be adversely affected. To be able to ably lead him, I realised that project management skills are a requisite. This necessarily meant being very familiar with the specifications of the project and be able to translate these requirements into a concrete work plan. Moreover, it is also important to be able to have the basic technical knowledge required with working within one’s industry. When the leader does not have such requisite technical knowledge, it becomes a basis for a sense of ine quity among those that he leads. For example, the staff say, ‘How come he was designated to be leader of the group, when I feel that I am even better than him? In this particular case, I felt that I exercised good project management skills since we were able to accomplish what we had set out to reach during the beginning of my assignment as interim superior. However, I was of course limited by my experience. For instance, in this particular case the project that my member of staff has been assigned with was something I was already familiar with, and so I did not have a hard time handling a similar project. In the highly technical aspects of a project, I am honest enough to approach someone who is knowledgeable in that aspect, and ask questions. I am most willing to enter into a buddy up or mentoring relationship with a senior or guru in technical areas, and for this particular situation I also seek help from one of my colleague who was working with me. I took advice from him o n particular matters and issues where I felt that I cannot dealt with it properly (Knowledge boundaries) and convey the information I gained from my colleague to the new staff who was under my supervision to enhance his skills. Organisational Knowledge In the middle of last year, my superior had to take an emergency leave for a substantially long period of time. This necessitated someone taking on the role in the interim. As a direct consequence of this appointment, I had to manage 3 staff who were formerly my equals. This introduced complexity in the way my colleagues and I related to each other. One factor which aggravated the situation was the fact that my superior did not have the time to endorse the role properly because of the flurry with which he had to leave. Although according to company procedures and rules the person who is leaving his post has to give proper understanding about the procedures of the company and the responsibilities he was dealing with to the new coming employee. At first, I felt overwhelmed with my new role, because this meant more responsibility. Moreover, I was very conscious of how my colleagues would react to my appointment. Two of the three staff who then became my staff for two months were happy w ith the arrangement; however one member of staff had very serious motivational issues that were directly brought about by my being appointed to the new post. This man had longer tenure and thus more experience in the company compared to me; a culture of entitlement which has pervaded in the company for a long time has created a strong expectation in him of being the next in line, in terms of leadership of the team. Quite obviously, I had a tough time influencing him to follow my lead to be able to accomplish the tasks in the workplan set for the month. The feelings of anxiety, ambiguity, and pressure all built up within the team. These were clearly attested to by the behaviour of the problematic staff. He had frequent absences, did not respond appropriately when called upon, and did not follow instructions as expected. It was a nightmare! What complicated the matter more was the fact that we belonged to different cultures. This colleague was from a collectivist culture (India), and this introduced peculiarities in the way he reacted to the whole situation. I had to be able comprehend why he reacted the way he did and be able to address issues from its roots. I felt that there was shortcoming in terms of clarifying the organisation that my superior has envisioned while he was absent. Given the circumstances that we were in at that time, there was little time for him to endorse the role formally and to orient my staff about my new role and what the expectations were from their end. Role ambiguity then resulted from the newly established organisation, causing conflict between me as an informal superior and the problematic employee who had aspirations of being promoted. Much had to be done from my end to be able to establish a sense of equity among the members of the team mainly through a thorough discussion of roles, tasks and expectations. First, I had to orient them about the situation, saying that this set-up was in fact only for the interim, until such time that my boss came back to lead our team again. Rapport building also had to be done so that even as the organisational structure was not formal in itself, I would have enough influen ce on them to enable me to deliver the set goals. Next, I had to call frequent meetings to be able to set clear goals. In carrying out the planning process, I ensured that each one’s objectives were specific, measurable, attainable and realistic. I also took the chance to be able to clarify the processes and procedures that we ought to follow during the 3 months that we were tasked to work together. The conflicts that I have encountered are mainly caused by personality clashes –differences in opinions and ideas that have complicated the set-up at the outset. Relationships The third situation which focuses on relationships is one in which I had to deal with the older staff who had aspirations of being promoted (same illustration as that of Organisational Knowledge). At that time, I was assigned as a team lead for 3 months, which caused conflict between the two us. Apart from the fact that he was older in terms of both age and tenure, I have also noticed that we were very different in terms of personality and this all the more aggravated the way we dealt with each other. The primary reasons for conflict were differences in the perceptions among the parties involved in the situation. For instance, I have an INTJ (Introverted Intuition with Extraverted thinking) profile, which precludes me from being expressive of my feelings and emotions. My staff turned out to be very vocal and confrontational about how they felt about the situation, and I felt it took a lot of effort on my end to be able to reach an equilibrium within the team. One of my weaknesses is not being too open to feedback and constructive criticism, which also did not help in establishing rapport with my staff. There was much that needed to be delivered during that period, by the team, and it did not help that my staff did not have the motivation to deliver these because of psychological and emotional hurdles. I tried my best to motivate them by matching tasks with people very prudently, considering both their strengths and weaknesses. I accorded them autonomy in doing things, and was only there on a consultative role, rather than dictating what they should do on a day-to-day basis. When I was asked by my boss to act as a team lead for 3 months with this difficult staff in tow, I had to make sure that I gave him and the rest of my team members effective feedback without sounding too bossy or authoritative. This was important since improving work performance and providing feedback about it should be a routine part of the performance management process. Feedback should be based on observed and/or verifiable work-related behaviours, actions, statements, and results. This type of feedback is called behavioural feedback. Effective feedback helps the employee sustain good performance, to develop new skills and to improve performance when necessary. I also ensured that each member of my team knew what I expected from him or her in terms of goals. Goals or objectives are statements of intent to achieve specific business results. I ensured that they were measurable, controllable and were directly related to such results. I realised that in setting goals or objectives, they should be specific and significant, measurable, achievable, results-oriented, time-bound, engaging, and reviewed. Apart from this, I ensured that my team should be given constant feedback to know how well they are doing their tasks. Feedback giving also increases the effectiveness of goal setting, feedback should be provided to the employee on his progress in reaching his goal. My feedback can include verbally telling my staff how he is doing, placing a chart on a wall, or displaying a certain color of light in work pace will result in goal attainment and a different color of light when the pace is too slow to reach the goal. I also learned that feedback increases performance best when it is positive and informational rather than negative and controlling. Situation outside of organizational perspective In my role as a family member, there was a time when conflict arose because of lack of role clarification. In our households, we have various roles to play which may be equally important: parent, son, father, and so on. We also have tasks to deliver to be able to sufficiently perform these roles. In one instance, my sibling and I had conflict because it was not clear who would prepare a particular family activity. Both of us were busy with our respective professions/careers and nobody seemed to have the time to prepare this social activity. They expected that I will handle all the arrangements of the activity myself as I am elder in my brother and sisters. Although I was not good in arranging and managing the big party functions at home. The matter come to critical point when at the time of the party function no formal or informal arrangements have been made for the coming guests and this create embarrassment in the family and i was made responsible for this situation. In the end, we were able to resolve the conflict by thoroughly communicating about the activity, specifying who would do what and by when. I realised through this experience the criticality of effective communication, not only within the sphere of the enterprise, but even within the realm of personal relationships. Assigning job responsibilities among participants before the time of any event is important and necessary. Wider learning and New Narrative Technical development. I have realised that one source of power and authority is the level of technical knowledge that one has. To be able to develop a stronger business sense, achievement orientation, and technical competence as well, I would like to have a mentoring relationship with a guru, or at least someone who is more senior than me who works in a field I am interested in pursuing. I want to learn both technical and soft competencies through this mentoring relationship. It would also be useful to attend seminars or workshops that focus on business acumen and strategy since these are among my weaknesses. I am also interested in pursuing classes that may sharpen my interpersonal relationship skills so that I may leverage more on my social networks and see things from a long term view. Areas which I need to develop. In the end, the situation which I have discussed above in technical, organizational knowledge and relationships has been very helpful in making me realise what I need to improve in myself. I realised that first and foremost, I must be able to understand myself to be able to better relate with others. In fact, because of the experience I got during my job, I have volunteered to take the MBTI just to provide better insight on how my personality affects the way I relate to others. Based on my personal assessment and feedback from others, my strengths as a leader (at least during the time I took on the post of my boss) include leading by example and being a strategic thinker. However, I have several areas for improvement which I may further develop, including being more imaginative and creative; being mature and developing a clear and convincing vision for the future; creating a performing organisation and team and being a team player myself; extracting val ue from social networks; pursuing goals long term; positive framing of events and people; recognizing opportunities for absorbing uncertainty; learning from all over the world; and seeing and preserving the whole venture in a long-term prospective. I am also very good at probing attested to my high score in being an investigator. However, a weakness may be not being too open to feedback and constructive criticism. Moreover, my MBTI results suggest that I am an INTJ. This suggests that I am insightful, conceptual and creative; rational, detached and objectively critical; am likely to have a clear vision of future possibilities; apt to enjoy complex challenges; am likely to value knowledge and competence; apply high standards to themselves and others; independent; trust their own judgments and perceptions more than those of others; and usually seen by others as private, reserved and hard to know. While I may be able to work more effectively with those who have the same profile, I must be able to adapt to those who have a different preference. To make this possible, I should be able to exercise situational leadership – that is, being able to assess both the needs of my staff and the circumstances to be able to manage or lead him more effectively. Many of the areas that I need to develop are not necessarily technical but have much to do with people Finally, after experiencing this situation, I have a more staunch desire to develop my leadership potential in the upcoming years. Everything that I will do or say as a leader will be greater than before in importance beyond all reason. Having the aim to develop and achieve objectives has geared me for success. I have enough motivation to exert all my best efforts to realise my capabilities and be able to use them in harnessing my skills. Aiming to be a leader entails a lot of effort; I should be responsible with my actions and be sympathetic with others. I should be prepared with radical changes in behaviours and become a critical thinker towards management affairs and issues. All people have their own abilities to lead, but not all are given the opportunity to lead, so, given the chance to lead I will definitely grab the chance of proving my capabilities in leading people and making a difference in future. After this experience, my belief that effective leaders are not born with the talent of knowing how to lead has been reinforced. To a certain extent, they absorb knowledge, they gain experience, they listen to and see the world around and beyond their organisation. They are also competent of providing the qualities of leadership required for particular conditions. There are various types of effective leaders and they are the transformational leader, the pragmatic leader and the charismatic leader; however these unique qualities can be mixed altogether in one person in different times and ways . I have learned that leaders can truly become transformational when they boost awareness of what is good, right, beautiful and important; when they facilitate to raise the needs of the followers in terms of self-actualisation and achievement; when they cultivate high moral maturity in followers; and when they push followers to go further than their self-interests for the benefit of their organisation, society or group. Embracing the theory of transformational leadership and having the objective of developing my leadership skills, I would like to see myself as a transformational leader, who can so meday rebuild and organisation without having to enforce personality but instead appeal to people, influence them and be able to gain their respect and trust ,As a leader, I would like to develop my ability to portray a clear vision, to see a realisable goal for the team’s action and efforts of accomplishing unified goals. I would like to be someone who will trust people, who will provide their needed resources and someone who will encourage them to go forward. I know I can lead, since everyone can learn how to lead by realizing the capability of each person to respond to the call of leadership and be able to make a difference. Having the will to learn, anyone can take the challenge of leadership to another level, because leadership can be practised in all aspects of life; it is a an aptitude that I can learn to broaden my perception, set goals and have a holistic understanding of human behaviour and act in full force to be able to get to where I want to be. Because of the serious time constraints which I have experienced, I realised that I should strive to live the time management principles that are taught by Stephen Covey to seriously develop my leadership potential. According to the third habit, a manager must be able to â€Å"put first things first† . In my line of work, I have to learn how to prioritize tasks based on sense of urgency and importance. Many times during that period, there were so many things, people and situations that easily distracted me from the task that I have at hand. I have observed this among the staff that I supervised. The phone ringing, emails, unnecessary breaks, among others. I am striving to make efficient use of my time by reducing if not totally avoiding activities that do are both not urgent and not important. These are activities that fall under Stephen Covey’s 4th quadrant. I also wish to emphasise those tasks which are important and yet are not urgent. In being able to constantly pri oritise these tasks, I will not have to cram or be up in a flurry all the time. Sometimes, these activities start out as not urgent, and yet because of procrastination, they eventually turn out to be urgent. This discipline of constant work (and not cramming) is important in effective time management. I should also be able to allot sufficient time for other facets of my life, including social, spiritual, and emotional facets, which are as equally important as my work or professional life Organizational structural development I have realized that organizational structure change and development needs to be effectively and constantly managed to ensure the team shall be able to deliver the results expected. I feel that it is very important for a successful leader to know how to motivate his employees. Why was the transition to my leadership difficult? The difficulty actually lies in intangible factors, particularly spelling out our team’s culture. I now learn that there is both a visible and an invisible organisation. The former focuses on the easily observable components of the organisation, including its tools, processes, roles, and other components within the formal parameters of the group. Underneath these tangibles are the more influential facets which make up our culture, namely, our customers, values, beliefs, taboos, stereotypes, traditions, language, and behaviours. In effect, when transitioning into this new set-up of leadership, I had to understand all these intangibles. If this is not done , then the leadership change would have ostensibly failed because only the formal structures have been moved for the change, but not those which are practically more important. I have seen how my staff have set goals and teams can influence work behaviour by influencing these goals. I encouraged participation in goal setting among my staff to increase commitment and acceptance of the new set-up. I also realised that individual goal setting was more effective than group goals because it is the impact of goals on intentions that is important. However, I also do realise that although participation in goal setting may increase satisfaction, it does not always lead to higher performance. As much as possible, I would strive to involve my staff in decisions that affect them and ensure that their targets are challenging enough to keep them motivated. Due to fact that the problematic employee had a different culture, I also learned that the way in which the social environment is interpreted is strongly influenced by the cultural background of the perceiver. This implies that the attributes that are seen as characteristic or prototypical for leaders may also strongly vary in different cultures. I had to exert influence and exercise leadership with prudent consideration of the culture of the staff. Finally, knowledge on the peculiarities of motivating employees from across cultures is critical if I am to espouse a multi-cultural work setting, And I will motivate people in future by keeping a deep look at their needs, for example some people get motivated if their salary is increased and some people like that their job responsibilities increase. I want to develop further my ability to create a strong sense of equity among my employees or staff in future. Through this experience, I realised that people choose the behaviour they believe will maximize their payoff. It states that people look at various actions and choose the one they believe is most likely to lead to the rewards they want the most. I learned that anticipation of rewards is important as well as the perceived contingency between the behaviours desired by the organisation and the desired rewards I also learned that since different people desire different rewards, I must, as superior, try to match rewards with what my staff want. On my end as an interim superior, it is important that I have a knowledge of the rewards that appeal to them so that I may match these with their attainment of objectives, and in future I will try to be more socialise among my employees so that I better know about their need and demands. References Bass, B. (1990). Bass Stogdills handbook of leadership: theory, research and managerial applications. New York: The Free Press. Covey, S. (2000). The 7 habits of highly effective people. Running Press Publishers. Hartog, D. N., House, R.. J., Hanges, P. J., et al. (1999). Culture specific and cross-culturally generalisable implicit leadership theories: Are attributes of charismatic/ transformational leadership universally endorsed? Leadership Quarterly, 10(2), 219-256. Hofstede, G. (1983). Dimension of national cultures in fifty countries and three regions. In Deregowski, J.B., Dziurawiec, S, Annis, R.C. (eds.). Explications in Cross-Cultural Psychology. Lisse, The Netherlands: Swets and Zeitlinger. House, R. J. (1995). Leadership in the 21st century: A speculative inquiry. In Howard, A. (ed.) The changing nature of work. San Francisco Jossey-Bass. Tichy, N. M., Devanna, M. A. (1990). The transformational leader (2nd ed.). New York: Wiley. Yukl, G., Van Fleet, D. D. (1992). Theory and research on leadership in organizations. In Dunette, M. Hough, L. M. (Eds.), Handbook of industrial and organizational psychology (pp. 147-197). (2nd ed., Vol. 3). Palo Alto, CA: Consulting.

Building Natural Hazard Resilient Communities In India Environmental Sciences Essay

India is extremely vulnerable utmost natural catastrophes chiefly due to its instead alone geographical location and climatic conditions. Earthquakes, cyclones, inundations, drouth and landslides have been witnessed independently. More than half of the land mass is vulnerable to temblors of different strengths. Large parts of its land mass are prone to cyclones and drouth. These events have led to the deceases of several people, supplanting of colonies and devastation to belongingss. As exemplified by the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 and the south Asia temblor of 2005, India can be said to be one of the most disaster prone states in the universe. Our universe can be a dynamic and dramatic topographic point to populate in. Extreme natural jeopardies nevertheless threaten the being of adult male, species and communities likewise. More often than was antecedently witnessed, the electronic and print media study scenes of decease, desolation and desperation brought about by immense temblors, volcanic eruptions, cyclones, inundations, drought etc. These catastrophes have grown to go a major cause for concern in countries of the universe with really long coastlines like India because the happening of these catastrophes have become really frequent in the recent yesteryear and hold had their effects on life and supports. Existing low degrees of technological development every bit good as societal, economic and gender inequalities enhance the exposure of the hapless, illiterate and unskilled coastal communities in India. As a consequence of these conditions, the resiliency required to resile back to pre catastrophe conditions is extremely limited. Of greater concern presently is the identified inter relationship between poorness, clime alteration environment debasement and related natural catastrophes interacting in a reciprocally reinforcing mode. This identified relationship earnestly shackles sustainable development and can do nonsensical any little additions that may hold been recorded in natural jeopardy extenuation planning and policy development. In recent times, authorities governments in charge have implemented a displacement in paradigm in their attack to disaster direction. This new school of idea is borne out of the belief that development can non be sustained unless catastrophe extenuation is built into the procedure of development. Another of import portion of this attack is that extenuation and planning have to encompass a multi disciplinary attack crossing across all sectors of development. This attack besides embraces the fact that investings in extenuation and planning are much more cost effectual than outgo on alleviation and rehabilitation. This bottom up attack adopted helps beef up the edifice of sustainable patterns undertaken by resource hapless households of this part Influence OF NATURAL DISASTERS Natural jeopardies and later catastrophes have become a portion and package of human being. It has been said that the impact of a meteorite on earth lead to the pass overing out of dinosaurs and several carnal species about 65 million old ages ago. These sorts of events are really rare nevertheless. Geophysical jeopardies like temblors which can trip tsunami moving ridges and volcanic eruptions on the other manus have assumed more frequent happening rates. These jeopardies have their beginning from deep within the Earth ‘s inside and they occur as a consequence of perpendicular supplanting of tectonic home bases at the underside of the ocean. Earthquakes that trigger extremely destructive tsunamis moving ridges can happen as was the instance with the catastrophe of December 26, 2004 ( Bilham, 2005 ) . Hydro-meteorological jeopardies like cyclones, inundations, drouth, landslides etc were responsible for a high per centum of deceases recorded in the 1890ss. The rate at which geophysical jeopardies have occurred in the past few decennaries has remained comparatively changeless while the hydro-meteorological jeopardies have witnessed a important addition in recent times. There have been important events like the thaw of ice caps in the polar part, sea degree rise and a more frequent happening of jeopardies like inundations, drouths, hurricanes, typhoons etc. These events lend acceptance to the premise that planetary heating is helping and act uponing clime alteration ( IFRC, 2001 ) . Experts have discovered that the cap of sea ice in the artic ocean melted to its smallest size for over a century ( Revkin, 2005 ) . The terrible storms of the past decennary have besides been blamed on higher sea surface temperature and increased H2O vapor in the lower ambiance which in bend are a effect of planetary heating ( Trenberth, 2005 ) . It has besides been reported that planetary heating may take to an upward tendency in tropical destructive potency. More late, terrible hurricanes that devastated New Orleans and some parts of Texas in the USA in 2005 and the tsunami that ravaged states around the Indian Ocean in 2004 were attributed to the effects of planetary heating by experts and media houses likewise. It must be mentioned here that the bulk of these natural catastrophes largely affect the development states and the hapless in developed 1s merely because they have limited get bying capacity as a consequence of terrible deficiency of proficient and fiscal resources. The negative impacts of clime alteration like heavy rainfall which lead to inundations and worsening rainfall taking to drought hold inauspicious effects on the economic system and nutrient security in local communities. Climate alteration besides puts more stress on socio-economic and ecological set-up of coastal India which is already stressed as a consequence of urbanization, globalisation and industrialisation. These jeopardies even cause greater adversity to occupants of states with long coastlines. India with a dumbly populated low lying coastline widening to over 7000km, is extremely vulnerable to sea degree rise. A great per centum of Paddy Fieldss in coastal parts are extremely vulnerable to flood by sea H2O ( Gupta, 2005 ) . Small island states like Maldives and Seychelles have about all their land mass at less than one metre above sea degree. The effects of sea degree rise for such countries of the universe as predicted by planetary climatic theoretical accounts will be drastic and lay waste toing as several lives will be lost and belongingss destroyed. The hazard of temblor happening is rather high for several parts of India ( Rao, 2005 ) . Predictions of high magnitude temblors along the mistake of Sumatra which lies south E of the old event of 2005 ruptures and the part adjacent have been made by experts. This part last failed in the 19th century, sometime in 1833 and it is believed that accrued significant strain exists within this country ( Lay et wholly, 2005 ) . Current attempts by the local governments and the international community to better tsunami warning capablenesss appear justified given the fact that future big graduated table temblors along the Sumatra mistake are extremely likely to happen. As a consequence of this states of the Indian Ocean have created and continually better on a part broad warning system in readying for the following at hand catastrophe ( Stone and Kerr, 2005 ) . The of all time turning population along the coastline of India will hold to be prepared for a much higher strength of hydro-meteorological jeopardies. Consequently, there is demand for little island states with long coastlines to pay equal attending to disaster direction with peculiar accent on the coastal parts. There is pressing demand for conjunct attempts at diversifying coastal economic systems with a position to heightening catastrophe recovery and edifice resiliency to the effects of these natural catastrophes ( Allenby and Fink, 2005 ) Vulnerability The exposure of any given country of community to natural catastrophes has societal, economic and ecological positions in add-on to fiscal and proficient capacities of the countries concerned. It refers to the degree to which physical assets and socio-economic apparatus are susceptible or resilient to the impacts of these natural jeopardies. Vulnerability is besides enhanced if susceptibleness to natural jeopardies in non provided for in development patterns. A close relationship can be seen between population addition in developing states, debasement of the environment, higher human exposure and the frequence and strength of natural jeopardy happening. An illustration of this can be seen in the fact that both loss of human life and strength of harm were much worse where the Rhizophora mangle had experienced debasement when the Orisa Cyclone occurred in 1999. Environmental debasement particularly with respects to forest screen remotion, is a critical factor in the transmutation of a jeopardy or climatic extreme such as heavy rainfall, into a catastrophe ( Myers, 1989 ) . A barbarous and reciprocally reinforcing rhythm is formed by environmental debasement, poorness and natural jeopardy exposure. In this state of affairs, the hapless are forced unrecorded alarmingly near to natural jeopardy hot musca volitanss and at the same exploit environmental resources for endurance. As a consequence of this, they become extremely vulnerable to the impact of temblors, cyclones, tsunamis etc. Among the hapless population, adult female and kids appear to be more vulnerable because of physical and socio-economic disabilities. Economic globalization has sped up the migration of immature work forces from the rural to the urban countries in hunt of employment chances. This leads to the ‘feminization of poorness ‘ where much of the rural agribusiness remains at the subsistence degree. Already faced with gender related disadvantages, the deterioration of economic position makes adult females much more vulnerable. It has been reported that four times as many adult female died in the December, 2004 tsunami as work forces ( Aglionby, 2005 ) . The of import thing here lies in the fact that both utmost and non so violent jeopardies exert their utmost effects unevenly in urban and rural environments, males and females and the rich and hapless. Natural Hazard Map of India Fig 1. Hazard Map of India. Beginning: www.mapsofindia.com Poverty, ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION AND NATURAL DISASTERS The section of economic sciences of the United Nations came up with a background papers for sustainable development at the universe acme held in South Africa in 2002. One of the documents submitted on the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction asked if sustainable development along with other instruments aimed at the protection of the environment and poorness decrease can be successful without seting into consideration the hazard and impacts of natural jeopardies. The obvious echoing reply was negative. Policies and steps aimed at catastrophe decrease should enable communities to go resilient to natural jeopardies while guaranting development attempts do non increase exposure. There exists linkages between poorness, environmental debasement and natural catastrophes and they are reciprocally reenforcing. Forest debasement straight and indirectly increases exposure to natural catastrophes. Resource hapless landless rural adult females and work forces migrate to neighboring urban countries in order to do a life and stop up as ‘environmental refugees ( Myers, 2002 ) . Any sensible attempt to undo these barbarous linkages will necessitate pressing attending to the decrease of menaces to sustainable rural development, preservation, Restoration, cut downing environmental debasement and sustainable use of natural resources. Developing states like India should try to ship on vigorous household be aftering programmes in order to look into the scaring rate of population addition. Developed states with high rates of human resource development have to cut down their trust on fossil fuels but besides portion their production engineerings and schemes of salvaging energy with the less developed 1s. The harmful effects of clime alteration possess a transboundary nature as it impacts are felt in every portion of the Earth. This fact leaves human sort with no other option but to join forces and collaborate with respects to minimising the negative impacts. As a consequence, the integrating of catastrophe direction with programmes and policies that support sustainable development is imperative. Vulnerability to natural catastrophe Ds Environmental debasement & A ; clime alteration Poverty and hungriness Barbarous spiral Set back to sustainable development Fig 2. Diagrammatic look of feedback relationship RISK REDUCTION MEASURES As a consequence of the annihilating effects of the Orisa cyclone of 1999, the Gujarat temblor of 2001, the tsunami of 2004 and a series of natural catastrophes, a high exposure to natural catastrophes has been identified. This owes to physical exposure, propinquity to guess prone zones, ailment maintained safety criterions to counter effects of jeopardies and socio-economic disabilities. A witting attempt for catastrophe hazard decrease later developed with support from several organisations. The spread that existed between information coordination and sharing was identified as experience and cognition by catastrophe professionals was remaining put with them. The authorities of India has adopted bar and extenuation as important parts of developmental scheme. The program merely supports the fact that development if planning and extenuation are non built into the development procedure. Each state or province is to develop a strategy for catastrophe direction in line with the attack of the defined program. Simply put, extenuation is being integrated into developmental planning. One of the several enterprises is fundamentally about the application of corporate cognition of the full work force to accomplish laid down organizational ends. It aids the procedure by which cognition is created, shared and applied. The cognition direction rhythm is made up of three positions viz. direction, application and organisation. Management which focuses on capturing, organizing and easing cognition Application trades with the smooth retrieval of required information through hunts. It relies on the cognition combination portion of the theoretical account. Organization trades with acquisition, sharing and partnering. This is chiefly the instruction part of the rhythm. Information about catastrophe readiness and extenuation steps policy guidelines have been available from assorted beginnings for some clip now. Faced with these natural catastrophes, 1000000s of people are badly affected due to non-existent or unequal header mechanisms. The ground for this is that information is non been transformed into life salvaging cognition for and by the existent communities at hazard. Due to the fact that India remains one of the most disaster prone states in the universe because of its big population, geo-climatic and socio economic conditions, authorities of India, through the place personal businesss office, in concurrence with nongovernmental administrations, educational and research establishments has been able to set this cognition program into action. With respects to temblors, a national nucleus group consisting experts in temblor technology and decision makers. They were assigned the undertaking of pulling up a scheme for extenuating the impacts of temblors, supplying advice on temblor extenuation, developing enchiridions for temblor immune buildings and working out systems for helping seismically vulnerable countries to follow and incorporate appropriate criterions and codifications in edifice byelaws. They were besides tasked with germinating systems for preparation of local applied scientists and practising designers in the private sector and developing a enfranchisement system for applied scientists and designers for proving their cognition of temblor immune building. They were besides staked with preparation Masons and shiping n public consciousness runs. The provinces were tasked with developing Hazard Safety Cells ( HSCs ) with the main applied scientist of the province public works section in charge in order to set up a mechanism for proper execution of edifice codifications and safety of constructions and edifices from assorted jeopardies. These cells will transport out appropriate design reappraisal of all authorities edifices to be constructed and act as advisers to authorities for retrofitting lifeline edifices. Some of these cells exist in Rajasthan, West Benghal and a few other provinces. RESILIENCE AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT The major aim of sustainable development is to make and keep comfortable ecological, societal and economic systems. There exists an confidant nexus between these systems as worlds can transform the ecological system and they besides depend on it for nutrient, wealth and security. Human actions can badly impact the ability of the ecosystem to execute its natural maps with inauspicious effects for exposure, human life and security. The indispensable function of resiliency for comfortable societal development has been revisited in the last decennary ( Gunderson and Holling, 2002 ) . Several instance surveies have helped cast more visible radiation on the connexion between resiliency, sustainability of societal ecological systems and diverseness ( Berkes and Folke, 1998 ) . Resilience fundamentally refers to the magnitude of daze that concerned system can defy and stay within a given province. It can besides be the grade to which the system concerned can form itself or construct capacity for larning and version. It has been argued that two constituents of any given system impact its resiliency, one being its adaptive capacity which is straight related to its heterogeneousness and loosely tantamount t the diverseness of its establishments and assets available in societal systems ( Folke et wholly, 2002 ) . The 2nd is its hardiness and this refers to the belongingss of a given system that allow it accommodate perturbation without extra version ( Webb and Levin, 2005 ) . Resilience and hardiness refer t the capacity of the system to suit perturbation without losing functionality. Catastrophe direction manner or process can destruct or construct resiliency depending on how the community concerned organises itself in response to direction actions. Building social resiliency requires understanding of ecosystems that incorporates cognition of local users ( Olsson and Folke, 2001 ) . The incorrect perceptual experience that adult male is decoupled from and in control of nature is the underlying cause of social exposure ( Kasperson, 2001 ) . Structured Scenarios and active adaptative direction have been identified as important to constructing resiliency. Scenarios are used to visualize alternate hereafter scenarios. By so making, resiliency edifice policies can be identified and used within the context of sustainable development. The likeliness of sustainable development is enhanced by pull offing for resiliency in a dynamic universe full of surprises. OPERATIONALIZING SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Sustainable development is a form of resource usage aimed at run intoing human demands while continuing the environment so that these demands can be met non merely in the present but besides for future coevalss ( Bruntland Commission, 1987 ) . It brings together the concern for transporting capacity of natural systems and societal challenges faced by humanity. hypertext transfer protocol: //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/70/Sustainable_development.svg/300px-Sustainable_development.svg.png Fig 3. Scheme of sustainable development demoing three constitutional parts. Beginning: ( Adams, 2006 ) It is now clear that sustainable development that considers the impact of adult male ‘s activities on the natural environment and efforts to cut down harm to the natural environment is the key to poverty decrease, environmental security and direction and extenuation of conditions and H2O related jeopardies. The programmes and development enterprises of the MSSRF have come up with theoretical accounts that are replicable for sustainable development ( Swaminathan, 2005 ) . It fundamentally targets resource hapless and landless communities particularly in the coastal parts because of population denseness, quickly worsening natural resources, work and income security and a high degree of exposure to these jeopardies. A typical illustration of a biological heritage in India is the Gulf of Mannar Biosphere Reserve in Tamil Nahdu. It is a typical illustration of a biological heritage earnestly affected by the reciprocally reenforcing relationship between poorness, debasement and natural resources. With this in head and the house belief that environmental debasement can be tackled by cognition and technological authorization of the resource hapless, illiterate rural adult male and adult females, the MSSRF came up with a programme for furthering sustainable supports in the Gulf of Mannar part with aid from the United Nations development programme. The major purpose of these programmes is to intermix technological frontier with local cognition in order to supply an incorporate orientation to technological development and airing. This aids the attendant ‘ecotechnologies ‘ to be adopted by rural households because of their ecological and economic advantages. When acquisition is done through work experience the hapless become able to get the hang engineerings in a short period. Womans organize themselves into self help groups ( SHGs ) and these groups undergo preparation and capacity edifice based n the resources available in that peculiar part, while small towns are grouped into biovillages with attending been paid to natural resource preservation and sweetening. As a follow up to this biocenters are established to supervise and supply support to biovillages with a position to constructing the capacity of rural households to pull off the assorted ventures. The MSSRF has come up with a kit for the description of this engineering and how to develop them. Fig 4. Location of biovillages in India in green Beginning: ( Kesavan and Swaminathan, 2006 ) In 1997, the MSSRF set up village information Centres and they are now called VKCs. These Centres generated clip, local particular and demand driven information refering to endure, harvest, poorness, authorities relief programmes, instruction, inside informations of eco-enterprises etc. It is documented that on the forenoon of December 26, 2004, proclamations from the VKC talkers saved many lives. Damage to belongings could non be stopped but many cherished human lives were saved. Decision We are faced with an increasing frequence in the happening of natural jeopardies and this can be attributed to a more complex universe where population detonation stares us in the face. The exposure of communities is besides increasing due to human activities. However, climate alteration and sea degree rise may be responsible for increased happening of some of these jeopardies. Globalization besides spreads the effects of natural jeopardies traveling beyond the boundary lines of the state straight affected. The international community responds to natural catastrophes when they occur in hapless or developing states but when they occur in the developed universe like USA, so there can be inauspicious effects for the universe at big. It would look that with all our technological and scientific discipline based progresss in our pursuit to understand natural jeopardies, applications and technological responses have clearly been deficient. Like ( Shah, 2006 ) justly noted ‘there is need to go the last stat mi ‘ . Response to catastrophe go on largely after the event and adequate demands to be done to back up research and pull up programmes for hazard appraisal, recommend countermeasures, physique and strengthen resiliency in communities at hazard. Scientists and catastrophe directors likewise need t work difficult to do certain robust scientific discipline takes a cardinal function in policy development.

Why should fracking be banned?

Because liberals are an autoimmune disease that want this country to fail at any possible costs. It shouldn't be, fracking doesn't do anything with the water, studies have proven that, plus â€Å"Green cars† actually leave a bigger biological footprint. It shouldn't. Low information people are scared because they are being lied to. Because coal miners don't like it. Power plant companies are making a transition from coal to natural gas due to fracking, and we're putting less pollution in the air these days. Guarantee you coal miners will be behind funding any â€Å"ban fracking† campaigns.It shouldn't. People believe that it pollutes our water reserves underground. However, they do not understand that we have been fracking for years without much pollution being done to the water and we've only improved upon our methods of fracking, causing less pollution than before. Fracking is cost effective. Banning fracking would only increase costs. The only people who want it bann ed are the Saudis and people who believe their lies. Perhaps they're lying because they don't have any interests if we start more oil production in the U.  S.Anyone who thinks that you can contain high pressure fluid that is DESIGNED to fracture rock†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ with a concrete well casing†¦.. has never taken a physics class in their entire life. Because places like North Dakota and Oklahoma typically don't get 4. 5 magnitude earthquakes! I am NOT a tree hugging liberal, but I've read enough about â€Å"fracking† to know that it makes the ground VERY unstable. Removing anything from the ground in mass quantities, whether it's rock, minerals, or gas, leaves cavities and weakness.This explains the loud â€Å"booms† many experienced in the northern midwest. No major fault lines in Oklahoma, so how else can you explain it. Because it poisons everything around it. If you are truly interested look up LINK TV and watch their programs on fracking. It is absolutely the worst thing that can happen to an area. Under Bush/CHENEY, they passed laws exempting the oil and gas companies doing this from all of the environmental protection laws such as Clean Water and Air laws. Why would they need that if they didn't violate those laws.This is another thing that is being steamrolled through by the extremely wealthy who make money off of fossil fuels. This one though is way scary and dangerous and they are promoting its growth at a rapid rate. They tell us it will produce jobs but how helpful is that if we are too sick to go to work. Look it up on LINK TV. Nationally it should be permitted but subject to local legislation and banned where the local people don't want it. Actually most people would accept it because of the money to be made and they don't mind chemicals and methane in their tap water.

Staffing Policies - Pros N Cons - 1319 Words

The Pros and Cons of International Staffing 1. Introduction There has been a rapid pace of internationalization and globalization over the last decade. Expanding business operations beyond national boundaries while continuing commitment to local markets requires more complex business structures. One of the most critical determinants of an organization s success in global ventures is the effective management of its human resources. The purpose of this paper is to summarize the advantages and disadvantages of the different international staffing approaches with special focus on the positive impacts as well as on the challenges of expatriation. 2. What is International Staffing? International management encounters many†¦show more content†¦7. Parent country nationals are not always sensitive to the needs and expectations of their host country subordinates. 8. Tensions between the expatriate executives and the HCNs (caused by philosophical issues such as the clash of cultures and also by some fairly hard issues such as the often substantial income gap). 9. Expatriates are very expensive in relation to HCNs. 10. Legal regulations of the host country. 11. Government restrictions. 12. Repatriation. 13. High failure rate. 2.2 The Polycentric Staffing Policy The polycentric staffing policy describes a multinational s approach of recruiting host country nationals to manage subsidiaries in their own country. There is The Pros and Cons of International Staffing little or no flow of personnel between the various countries (Mayrhofer and Brewster: In Praise of Ethnocentricity: 754). A number of advantages to this approach have been identified (Global Human Resource Management): 1. Language barriers as well as adjustment problems of expatriates and their families are eliminated (no adaptation problems). 2. Allows continuity of management within the host country. 3. The employment of HCNs is generally less expensive. 4. No tension between the locals and the watchdogs sent from headquarters occurs (Mayrhofer and Brewster: In Praise of Ethnocentricity: 754). 5. EnhancesShow MoreRelatedThe Success Of A Company1706 Words   |  7 Pagesn operational arrange is significant to the success of a company. A well-designed structure arrange may be a roadmap for folks to perform the responsibilities expeditiously at intervals the organization. The operational arrange identifies the following: what task should be completed, the personnel accountable for finishing same task, the timeframe or point for finishing a task, and also the price associated to finish work. Select Few may be a staffing firm placed in sharer, Georgia. 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