Comparing the Reigns of Julian and Constantius Essay -- Ancient Civil

For a ruler to be successful, certain characteristics must be present in that specific person. There are many variances to the cookie-cut emperor, though they all share similar passions. For instance, while one ruler emphasizes trade routes and commercial power for expansion of their legion, another may emphasize war and destruction only to rebuild their own version of their legion in the place that had been won. Although both rulers have very different manners and ideas about how to expand their empire, both have the same wish to be fulfilled. This kind of contradiction of power and reason is very implemented into the storyline of Julian. Between Julian and Constantius, they both attempt to reform the state religion, but are at polar opposite ends in regards to what they believe in. Although both are somewhat successful during their turn as emperor, both have very distinct ways of unraveling one another's achievements. Beginning with Constantius, his rule is the foundation to the success of Christianity. By making various changes to the structure of rule and deliberate attacks on those who opposed him, the rise of Christianity as the state religion of Rome came into light. One of Constantius' very prominent strategies involved that of eliminating those who showed signs of threatening his authority. Amongst those in elimination, Julian's father, and eventually Julian's brother [who he technically did not have a close relationship with] [pp 16]. Not only did Constantious strike fear in the hearts of his people, but he also implemented bishops and those who held an office like such, into the core of the government. Constantius granted them power and luxuries that would further promote the Christian faith so the image o... ...mpire became a Christian state. Probably due to the lack of force Julian used, there left open spaces for fear to be set in by another ruler more like that of Constantius. Though a valiant effort to restore the old Roman Empire was made, the imminent fate of the empire soon takes hold after Julian's death. Works Cited Vidal, Gore. Julian. Boston: Little Brown, 1964. Print. Cook, Jeremy. "Review of "Julian" by Gore Vidal." We Are Amused. N.p., 28 Mar 2011. Web. 04 Apr 2012. . tristaprez, . "Julian- Gore Vidal Christianity vs. Paganism." Hubpages. N.p., 10 Aug 2006. Web. 01 Apr 2012. . Author Unknown. "Julian | Summary." BookRags. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Apr 2012. .

War photographer and war photograph

In the poems ‘war photographer’ and ‘war photograph’ the audience are presented with two poems which express the feelings of the authors towards war. I will be comparing these two poems to find the differences between the narrators feelings. Kate Daniels poem is told through the voice of an American citizen looking in a magazine at a war photograph. Whereas, Carol Ann-Duffy’s poem is about a war photographer developing the photos, that he took previously, in a darkroom. In the poem ‘war photograph’, we get the impression that the poem is narrated by a woman. We see this because the narrator shows compassion and is more sympathetic. We’re feeling sorry for her’. Women usually show more compassion and sympathy than men, and we know that the author is female, so it is more of a direct viewpoint. She is displaying her views and compassion through the character. However, in the poem ‘War photographer’, we know that a man is narrating it as it refers to a ‘he’; ‘In his dark room, he is finally alone’. In ‘War photograph’ she feels detached from the child as she keeps referring to the distance between them, she feels helpless for the child. She is also appalled at the war as it is killing so many innocent people ‘being appalled at the war’. The war photographer is also appalled at the war, as he has to see the horrific sights everyday; ‘he remembers the cries of this man’s wife. ’ He is scarred by the things he has seen. We are told ‘he is finally alone’ as if he has been running away from something and now he is happy to be away from the war. ‘Solutions stop in trays beneath his hands which did not tremble then, though seem to now’, this tells us that he did not have the full effect of his surroundings and the horror of it all, but now that he is alone and the photos are slowly developing, he can take it in, and really look at what was there and how terrible it was. This is different to war photograph, as in that poem, the woman can only imagine the horror that’s there. She only knows what’s in the picture and doesn’t have the memories and stay behind getting the picture which has more of an impact. As it isn’t her country or people she’s knows fighting, she has no personal involvement in the war and is merely just an observer, like her character. Both poems describe our lack of care and compassion for the people suffering in the war and the horrific state some of them are in. However, in ‘war photograph’ it describes in detail how she feels and gives an emotional response. In war photographer, Kate Daniels uses lots of language devices and effects, such as oxymoron’s, rhetorical questions and repetition. She repeats the word ‘running’ throughout to add emphasis on the fact that she is running away from the destruction and devastation around her. ‘She is running from the smoke’ ‘She is also running from the Gods’ ‘She is running – my God – to us’. It resembles her desperate attempt to run away from the bombs going off behind her. She uses rhetorical questions ‘how can she know what we really are? ’ She uses ‘what’ instead of ‘who’ as we look like war hungry soldiers, the Americans are responsible for this picture. We seem not human. Rhetorical questions also make us think more and reflect on what we have done. It engages the reader. In War Photographer Duffy uses repetition in her poem on the words ‘he’ and ‘his’. The photographer doesn’t have a name and the use of these words makes us feel more detached from him as we don’t know his name and we don’t feel familiar with him. We are given the feeling of detachment in the poem ‘war photograph’ by using imagery ’10,000 miles away’ ‘In another world’ ‘on another Continent’. She is far away and we feel helpless. Kate Daniels makes us look past the picture. ‘She keeps on running, you know, after the shutter of the camera clicks’. She is telling us that everything doesn’t just become better after the photo has been taken, the girl is still homeless and running for help. Imagery is used in the poem, ‘naked child’. We get the image of a naked child, which shows vulnerability and the fact that it is a child makes us feel sorrier for her, as she can’t look after herself. ‘A naked child is running’; because she is running, we know she is scared of something, which makes us even more pitiful towards her. ‘She is also running from the God’s’ this is extraordinary as God is seen as someone to turn to for help, not to run away from, God is never on the losing side. ‘the God’s who have changed the sky to fire’. We realise that there is lots of destruction and fire around, it makes us imagine that the sky is orange with fire. As she says ‘God’s’ she must not be a Christian, as Christians only believe in one God. Imagery is used in ‘war photographer’ by using metaphors ‘A strangers features faintly start to twist before his eyes, a half formed ghost. ’ He uses this metaphor to describe the pictures being formed, it makes us see it more vividly and feel as if we’re there. ‘Solutions slop in trays beneath his hands’, this if course is talking about the developing liquid in the tray, however, solutions has two meanings and this could suggest the solution of the war, which of course, he doesn’t have. In black-and-white’ is suggests the pictures are in monochrome, but it could also mean the comparison of good and evil from both sides of the war, this is allegory. ‘All flesh is grass’, we think of grass as fresh and bright, this juxtaposes the flesh that he compares it to. Flesh is rotting and means death and devastation , whereas grass is alive. It covers the Earth, meaning that if flesh is grass then flesh must be covering the Earth under his feet. Alliteration is used in ‘war photographer’, for examples; repetition of the letter ‘s’ – ‘she . . . smoke . . . soldiers . . . sister’. The repeating of the letter ‘s’ makes it seem harsh as it’s a harsh letter to pronounce, this resembles the harsh effects of the war. This technique is also used in ‘war photographer’ ‘Something is happening. A strangers features faintly start to twist before his eyes. ’ Repetition of the letter ‘s’ makes it seem harsh and negative, just like the war. ‘Belfast. Beirut. Phnom Penh. ’ This is tripling and alliteration. He says the cities in a blase way, it is just another city he’s seen and he doesn’t care about them , he just says them like the clicker of his camera – fast and sharp. This is intertextuality as it refers to something known, Duffy tries to bring alive the thought of war which makes it more tangible and easier to relate to. As war photographer is written by a woman, the poem is more sympathetic. ‘We’re feeling sorry for her’, as the character in the poem, we are guessing, is also a woman, she can give direct opinions on the war. The poem ‘war photographer’ starts off with the line ‘In his darkroom, he is finally alone’. This tells us straight away that he wanted to be alone, he must want to get away from something. The key word here is finally as it depicts the fact that he has been waiting to be alone for a while. This also shows that he has no emotional attachment to where he has come from, and as though he didn’t want to help the people suffering in the war, just to get back to the peace and quiet of his studio. He states the places that he has been to in a blase way that also makes it seem as though he has no emotional attachment to the places but just tells them as if they mean nothing ‘Belfast. Beirut. Phnom Penh. ’ He states them with full stops between them, so you say them quicker, but you have to pause in between each city. These short sentences also juxtapose the long sentence that was used before, ‘The only light is red and softly glows, as though this were a church and he a priest preparing to intone a mass. Belfast. Beirut. Phnom Penh. ’ She does this to emphasise how blase the cities are, as she has put no affection into describing the cities. ‘All flesh is grass. ’ This short sentence tells us about the horror that there is flesh pummelled into the Earth and how gory the settings are around him. Grass is usually so fresh, clean and full of life, yet it juxtaposes with the rotting, bloody flesh that surrounds him. He says it shortly, with no description of what effect that had on him, or any distress it may have caused. It seems like the horrible things he has seen have no impact on him, or they do, but as he is a man he does not want to sound ‘soppy’ or ‘soft’. The fact that it says ‘He has a job to do’ backs up the fact that the surroundings don’t have an impact on him and he only gets the picture and leaves, he doesn’t get any feelings towards these people, he just wants the money. He describes that he must do the job whether he likes it or not, ‘to do what someone must’. This gives the impression that he realises he cannot get emotionally attached as it is only a job and he needs to do it on a daily basis. He doesn’t particularly want to do the job, but he has to, as many people don’t want to do it. ‘The readers eyeballs prick with tears between bath and pre-lunch beers’ this shows that the author is trying to get out a point of view that even though it may affect you for a little bit, unless you were the one of the people who actually got injured in the war, or lost somebody close to you because of it, you won’t be affected by the war. In the poem ‘war photograph’, the author seems to try and get the message across that no matter how far away from the war you are, it will always have an impact on you. She describes this well as the poem about the effect a photograph has on a woman, the woman being herself. ‘All over the country we’re feeling sorry for her and being appalled at the war’. This line is similar to Carol Ann Duffy’s line about the reader’s eyeballs pricking with tears. Kate Daniels relates the poem to us using ‘we’re’; this makes us feel as though we are more involved in the poem. Its describing how we are affected even though we are no way near the war zone, and probably don’t know the people involved in it either. Daniels feels sorry for the girl and realises how terrible we are to let this happen in the first place ‘How can she know what we really are? ’ She is so horrified at us that she says ‘what’ instead of ‘who’, as if we are some war hungry monsters. She thinks that we should be ashamed of ourselves for letting this happen. ‘From the distance, we look so terribly human’. Carol Ann Duffy clearly feels something in common with the subject of war. She uses her own opinions and experiences through the character to explain her views of how us British people just sit and look at the pictures but don’t know the reality of the situation. She judges the photographer as both a priest and a journalist. She uses a simile which compares him to a priest, this shows us how seriously he takes his job and also how he stands up for those who cannot help themselves. She describes his studio to resemble a church with a dim red light, which could resemble a lantern, which most churches have. The image is also suitable as he tries to get the message across how fragile life is. She has a passion for the war and feels that we do not think about the suffering enough. The reader’s response to the pictures in the paper, do not affect the people in the war, however, the sufferers of the war still let him take pictures to show other countries what is happening to them. We only get affected for a little while, but soon enough, we have forgotten about the tragedies out there. Kate Daniels tries to get the message across to us that no matter how far away from the war you are, there is always some way you will get attached. She makes reference throughout the poem on how detached she is from the war, but she still describes the impact it has on her. She gets her feelings across directly through the character in the poem as they are both female so she can get her opinions through. The picture has a lasting impression on her, we know this because she thinks to herself about the picture and asks rhetorical questions ‘how can she know what we really are? ’. A modern audience reading ‘war photographer’ would feel sorry for the war victims as we just do not know the reality of the situation they are in, but as in the poem suggests, we will have forgotten about it soon enough. A modern audience reading ‘war photograph’ would also feel sorry for the war victims. We feel especially sorry for the little girl in the poem as she is young and helpless. Daniels describes this picture as it shows a vulnerable and feeble young girl, which we feel more sympathetic towards. She does this to get the message across of how bad the war is that it is harming young children that aren’t even taking part in the war. Both poems try to show us the horror of the war and how it should have an impact on you. In ‘war photographer’ she describes how we will just forget about it and care about other things instead, whereas in ‘war photograph’ she describes how it will have a lasting impression on you. In both poems, the authors get their opinions across through their character, which gives a more honest opinion. We know that no matter how far we are away from the war, it will always have an effect on us, whether or not it is temporary or permanent.

The Effects Of Fracking On The United States - 1090 Words

Imagine an economy in the United States if we were an oil exporting country, like those in the Middle East. The States falls victim to those countries because we do not export quite as much as they do. This problem could potentially be solved by upping the amount of oil and gas fracking. Then, that now unused oil can be sent out to other countries, turning a profit here. Although many people believe that it is harmful to the environment, and bad for the public around it. The largest being that it will contaminate the underground water supply. Despite this, many people can agree that it is overall beneficial. Hydraulic fracturing is essential to the United States, because it creates jobs, it generates income, it could potentially turn the economy around, and it is crucial to our energy production as a whole. Fracking, although highly debated, offers a form of stimulation to local economies. It involves many different operations that that is often contracted off to local small businesses. One good example of this, is water transport. Fracs require a good amount of water, which needs to be brought in. Large corporations like Range Resources contract small companies, usually only with a handful of trucks to bring them water. Since it isn’t cheap to harvest gas from deep underground, neither is the water they bring. These independent companies make a large income when working for a well. That is just water transfer alone. Dozens of companies are contracted to one well pad, dueShow MoreRelatedThe Effects Of Hydraulic Fracking On The United States Essay1934 Words   |  8 Pagessocial and economic of hydraulic fracturing in the United States. This has been a heated issue with environmentalists and surrounding community members concerned over the environmental and health related proble ms associated with this practice while providing substantial economic benefits. 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In 2011, the United States used 18.83 million barrels of raw oil daily, and in 2010 19.18 million barrels of petroleum products and biofuels. In 2010 and 2011, that was nearly 22% of the world’s oil supply. (U.S Department of Energy) Previously inaccessible areas in the Marcellus Shale region of the United States, stretching from West Virginia to New York, are being unearthed by a controversial method of extracting natural gas, called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. A Healthy alternative

IMO Ballast Water Exchange and Performance Standards

In order to reduce damage from aquatic invasive species the International Maritime Organization (IMO) developed the â€Å"International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships Ballast Water and Sediments†. The BWM convention began with the IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) in 1991. Since then there have been many revisions. Some of these revisions were driven by advancing technology to remove unwanted organisms at flow rates that would not severely impact operations. Treatment of ballast water with the latest technology can meet standards at a rate of 2500 cubic meters (660,430 US Gallons) per hour. A large vessel may still take several hours per exchange to flush her ballast tanks at this rate. Flow rates and energy consumption must be acceptable to operators while producing no harmful effects on the environment. Ballast Water Standards There are two types of ballast water standards in the convention. Their differences are significant and they should not be directly compared. The first, Ballast Water Exchange, is based on specified distances and depths where a vessel may discharge. Ballast Water Performance is a standard based on the number of viable organisms allowed per unit of treated water. Some areas are instituting standards which exceed the IMO guidelines. Both California and the Great Lakes region of the United States have adopted stringent local guidelines. The US is one of many major shipping nations that have not signed the convention. Thirty nations who have a combined merchant gross tonnage of thirty-five percent of the global tonnage are needed to ratify the convention. Ballast Water Exchange The standard for ballast water exchange is fairly simple. A vessel must discharge foreign ballasts at a specified distance from shore and at a specified depth using a submerged discharge device. Regulation B-4 and D-1 of the BWM convention gives us the specifics. Exchange may take place 200 Nautical Miles (NM) from shore at a depth of 200 meters. If that is not possible for safety or other reasons then a vessel may use the next procedure.If neither of these scenarios is possible then a vessel may exchange â€Å"in an area designated by the port state†. While undertaking ballast water exchange a port state must not cause deviation or delay of a ship.Efficiency of exchange should be at least 95% of volume and must be repeated three times. Vessels which demonstrate high-efficiency exchanges may reduce the number of exchange cycles.Ballast Water Exchange should only be undertaken when the safety of the vessel and crew are guaranteed. Ballast Water Performance In the case of Ballast Water Exchange, ship operators are flushing untreated ballast out of the tanks. This is a practical if not perfect way of allowing older vessels to operate without the expense and logistical problems of ballast water treatment retrofits. New and retrofitted vessels are much less likely to transport unwanted species because the ballast water treatment systems eliminate a large proportion of the viable organisms from the ballast tanks before discharge. Systems like these significantly reduce the chances of unwanted species being introduced by inefficient exchange practices or in the event of an untreated near shore discharge for safety reasons. The IMO uses the following guidelines for the Ballast Water Exchange standard in regulation D-2. Ballast water must contain less than 10 viable organisms which are greater than or equal to 50 microns in size per cubic meter (264 US Gallons). For reference, 50 microns is about half the thickness of an average human hair.In addition, ballast water must contain less than 10 viable organisms that are less than 50 microns but greater than or equal to 10 microns per milliliter (1/1000th of a liter).Indicator Microbes may not exceed the following amounts; Vibrio Cholerae - less than 1 CFU (colony forming unit) per 100 Ml, E. Coli – less than 250 CFU per 100Ml, Enterococci – less than 100 CFU per 100Ml. Water treated to this standard is considered pure enough to discharge in most ports. These steps to re-mediate ballast water are only effective in the removal of unwanted organisms. It is still possible to carry toxins like copper and heavy metals often found in ports to other destinations in ballast water and these pollutants may concentrate in ballast tank sediment. Radioactive substances can also be transported in ballast but any serious cases would likely be found quickly by monitoring personnel.

The Fall Of Singapore And The Malaya Campaign - 1420 Words

The events of World War Two such as the failed Malaya campaign, the fall of Singapore, the bombing of Pearl Harbour and the stretched resources of Britain, led to Australia developing a more independent foreign policy however, independent of Britain. The changing of alliance between Britain, Australia and the United States of America has led to a substantial impact on shaping Australian society and where Australia are today. The fall of Singapore and the Malaya campaign brought the war extremely close to Australia even reaching Australian soil for the first time and generated new opinions and perspectives on the war for all Australians. Furthermore, with its greatest military defeat of all time, Britain had to recover and Australia had to†¦show more content†¦208). This led to the fall of Singapore which lasted from 8th-15th February 1942, which resulted in the surrender of all British and Empire forces in Singapore. This horrific event caused many Australians to fear for th e safety of the nation. A well-known newspaper at the time wrote: â€Å"Australia sent her best men and some of her equipment now sorely needed at home to relieve British needs elsewhere †¦ the United Kingdom turned deaf ears to every plea.† (‘The Fall of Singapore’ 1942, The Canberra Times) This article indicates Britain couldn’t provide assistance for Australia which was under threat by the Japanese despite Australia supplying its available resources to Britain which was in a desperate struggle to win against Nazi Germany (Mason, 2014 pg. 200). This was a significant issue for Australia as they saw Britain as their protector within Asia and counted on their strong military force which was weak in the Pacific due to the fall of Singapore as they were no longer able to use Singapore as a place for communication and supplies. This cartoon from the Daily Telegraph created towards the end of the fall of Singapore, corroborates with the newspaper quote above: Mahony, 1942, Daily Telegraph. This cartoon emphasises the relationship between Winston Churchill the British Prime Minister (Left) and the Australian Prime Minister John Curtin (Right). The

Real Workplace Communication Situation-Free-Samples for Students

Question: Identify a real workplace communication situation that requires, or required, the production of a written text. If you have workplace experience, this could be a situation in which you were (or are) incloved (not necessarily as a writer). If you have not had relevant workplace experience. Answer: Introduction: The purpose of a written assignment is to send a message to the recipient with an intention of that person reading it, understanding the message and thereby responding to it. If the purpose of the written communication is not achieved, the important information will not be understood which can thereby result in a particular outcome not being achieved and even to sever loss. The assignment will mainly comprise on two important parts. It will first consist of a rhetorical survey which will mainly be pointing out the mistakes made during the written communication and the issues that arise out of it. The second part will mainly comprise of the recommendations that should be provided to the writer so that similar incidences do not occur in the future. Rhetoric survey: The situation took place when I was a project leader in my internship months in XYZ Company. I had a team of ten members whom I used to meet every morning before beginning the day at office and distribute that days work by pointing out their names and assigning their duties. On the particular morning, I had to take day off and for that the duty was assigned to another project leader who was a working in a separate branch in other part of the city. Instead of talking with my teammates, he chose to write a mail to the team, assigning them of their duties. The triggering event took place when the new project lead sent a very long mail with a large number of details of the work they had to conduct those them. Not only that, it was found that the job segmentation that I used to do for my teammates were not done properly. A huge list of work was noted down and that too was down in a clumsy manner. It was very long mail and the important information was scattered all throughout. Moreover in place of sending the assigned duties to each member, it was sent to a single member of the team in a strict tone which affected the emotions of the workers and was asked to circulate. The actor identified in the event was the project leader of the other branch and my teammates. The primary audience was the member of the team who got the mail from the other project lead. The secondary audience was the other nine members of the team whom the first member would be circulating the information. Additional secondary audience may be those members whom my team members would approach to complete the assigned tasks like the consumers, or the store heads, franchise heads, accountants, other managers and others. The primary goal of the mail was to make the team members work together for making the every stakeholder aware of the new products which are being launched for limited edition for the Christmas sales. The project lead was to assign different duties to different members where one of them would be handling the meetings with the accounts departments, the other two team members would be working on the data collections and sales figures of the products sold in the last week, another who would be tackling the meetings with franchise holders who would be described about the new products and services which the company is launching and others. However, instead of assigning different members of different duties, he wrote a mail clumsily of the activities to be done. He wrote a very long mail where the information was lost and he did not refer to any members while writing the mail. Audience dynamics was not achieved as the project lead could not successfully convey the message properly and the entire incident did not have a proper outcome. The tone of the email was highly strict and affected the go of the team members. The informal environment in maintain in my team made them feel that the new project lead was unnecessarily strict and demanding. The email could not help them understand their job role and they were not able to understand how to proceed with the work individually. The main information was not being able to be adopted by the members in their work as they were not getting their role clarity. The team members were quite uncomfortable with their project lead as the communication happened from another office and they had never seen the project lead before. Therefore they were quite concerned about how the new project lead would react about their inefficiency to follow his instructions. Therefore, out of fear to lose their self esteem and make them look inefficient in front of those project leaders, they responded with a mail where they misinformed him that they had entirely understood the entire work and the work would be completed within time. Critical reflection and recommendations: Written communication needs to be followed by a number of rules to make the information reach the recipient properly. Reaching the information is not enough as the information should be written in way so that it can be properly understood, ever information followed and the main points are properly noted (Holtbrugge et al. 2013). The first problem found in the mail was found that it was unnecessarily clumsy. Researchers are of the opinion that when certain instructions of works needed to be given to recipients, it should be done in the form of bullets. Human brains can process the latter in better ways than a long page of information written in scattered ways (Bergila et al., 2013). Secondly, the project lead knew that it is a team of ten members who are interns and are not much experienced. Researchers therefore also say that, the sender should rightly address the recipient properly so that they can understand what was expected from them (Argenti, 2015). If the work was properly segregated and separately mailed to the team members or even if the mail was written with separate members being mentioned about their work proper outcomes would have taken place (Grace et al., 2015). The third issue which was also noticed was the tone of the mail. As the project lead was given the work of assigning jobs to the team members, he should have first introduced himself in the mail with informal tone before directly entering into responsibility of assigning works. The tone of the mail seemed to be highly strict for the team members. Therefore they could not gather courage to mail him back for reconfirmation or clarifying any issues that they were facing (Bovee, Thill Raina, 2016). Rather, out of fear, they responded with a positive reply which actually resulted in miscommunication issue. The work outcomes were not achieved and it led to loss of productivity for the entire team. Conclusion: From the entire scenario, it was seen that an improper email resulted not only affecting the morale of the employees and made them confused about their role but resulted in complete loss of the productivity of the team. Therefore every working professional should develop proper communication skills so that different issues can be avoided and productivity is not hampered. References: Argenti, P. A. (2015).Corporate communication. McGraw-Hill Higher Education. Bargiela-Chiappini, F., Nickerson, C., Planken, B. (2013). What is business discourse?. InBusiness Discourse(pp. 3-44). Palgrave Macmillan, London. Bovee, C. L., Thill, J. V., Raina, R. L. (2016).Business communication today. Pearson Education India. Grace, A., Kemp, N., Martin, F. H., Parrila, R. (2015). Undergraduates attitudes to text messaging language use and intrusions of textisms into formal writing.new media society,17(5), 792-809. Holtbrgge, D., Weldon, A., Rogers, H. (2013). Cultural determinants of email communication styles.International Journal of Cross Cultural Management,13(1), 89-110

Enterprises free essay sample

The budding entrepreneur Sam Marcus along with investor Mr. Walter saw the potential of dynamic growth in Mike’s cabinet making company and purchased a small 25 year old cabinet-making company from its founder 2 year earlier. The company competed in basically two segments, commercial and residential construction markets. Sam envisioned the company to grow to 70 Million in sales by 2007. Though commercial market offered the growth opportunity, the operating cycles were rigid because of bidding process which only has 32 % success ratio. On the other hand, the residential market was small but has the ‘got’ ratio of 70 %. The case raised many interesting facts about the value of the customer for an organization perspective. Blackstone being the biggest customer offered annual sales of about 2. 4 % to CMR, but does this relationship offered any value add to the CMR? In the end Sam Marcus must decide whether to continue this relationship without increasing prices or to increase prices thereby threatening a relationship with CMR’s biggest customer. We will write a custom essay sample on Enterprises or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Relationship with Blackstone: Clearly, initiating a relationship with the Blackstone was a complete strategic fit for the CMR enterprises. CMR wanted to increase its revenue 10 times in coming 10 years by creating a scalable and replicable business model. Blackstone will not only offer CMR high volume of sales but also will give them the strong foothold in the residential market share. More so, with aggressive growth strategy in mind, alliance with the Blackstone will gave CMR an opportunity to standardize its business processes in order to benefit from improved operational efficiencies that comes because of scale of operations. The following calculation specifies quantitative value of relationship of black stone for CMR enterprises. Blackstone contribution towards the CMR for year 1998 Fiscal year 1998 | Revenue| Total Residential | 1596000| Blackstone Contribution| 210314| % of contribution in Residential Segment | 13. 17757| Es CM | 65,344| Though the contribution of the sales given by Blackstone does give a positive contribution margin to the business of $ 65344, but with reference to the detailed calculation mention in the exhibit1, the relationship does hurt the CMR bottom line once the SGamp;A costs were taken into account. The overall effect was negative 3,444 which clearly mean that CMR has lost money on this account. Clearly I believe this wasn’t the case when Sam decided to initiate the relationship with Blackstone. So what went wrong and where for CMR? CMR relationship with Blackstone deteriorated over time because of the multiple implementation difficulties that arises over time. CMR was not able to garner the operational efficiencies which they thought they would be achieving, like for example, homeowners were still visiting showrooms of CMR for which CMR has to have a salesperson available in stores to serve them. Secondly, neither CMR and nor Blackstone was able to limit the involvement of the homeowners in the design phase, which again costs money to CMR. Also, as homeowners were working with many other sub-contractors, it created a project –coordination problem for both CMR and Blackstone, resulting in last minute design changes. Such changes entail last minute workings on manufacturing process and often results in loss of material and increases shop floor time etc. Hence I believe, because of the above mentioned reason, there exists a gap between the budgeted shop floor hours and the actual shop floor hours put in on the job. CMR will be right because they can justify the price increase but from the Blackstone perspective, any increase in price might results in non-conformance of the agreement that existed between CMR and Blackstone. Subsequent to my understanding of the above mentioned problems, mentioned below are some of my recommendations that can help CMR in improving the overall customer value chain. Improve the Operational Efficiency on the shop floor: As evident from the data, CMR was clearly not doing a good job in budgeting shop floor hours put in on the Job. It will be tough to believe that much of 69 % of unfavorable variance shown in exhibit 6 of case can be explained by above mentioned problems. Therefore, my hunch is that either the Project Managers/Design engineers were not making right assumptions about a particular job or it is the workforce who is putting inflated numbers on the shop floor time spent on one particular job. In both the cases, it is project manager’s job to improve the operational efficiency in order to reduce the difference between the actual and the budgeted hours. As evident from the calculation mentioned in the attached exhibit1 , if the revenues are to be calculated only using budgeted hours which means only the budged hours are spent on the Job , CMR can get the positive 16% value add on its EBIT / Revenues. Price based on Actual shop floor hours spent in the Job : Going forward, CMR can change its strategy and can start charging based on actual time spent on the job but such a strategy entails a risk that it will open up their margins to Blackstone which again can beat the prices down. This is the price increase option, but the price increase can be justified to the Blackstone management. Based on my calculation In Exhibit1 (If priced right Colum), using such a strategy will again bring positive contribution margin to CMR enterprises. Improve project coordination: As much of the problems results from poor project coordination, having a strong agreement in place will give both CMR and Blackstone an advantage if the other party fails to deliver on its promise. I recommend the penalty clause in the agreement if any party fails to deliver on its promises. CMR should make the agreement more strong like limiting the no of changes, requiring sufficient time to make changes, and pre budget approvals before initiating any change on the job. Similarly from Blackstone perspective, they can penalize CMR on late delivery or wrongful delivery, qualities issue, etc. By having a risk and reward relationship, the project coordination problems can be improved. CMR can selectively outsource some Jobs to different contractor: If CMR can’t bring in operational efficiency into their company on certain jobs or in fact as a whole, what they can do is to hire a subcontractor who can do the job for them in much less price. Rather than losing a complete business with Blackstone, what they can do is to pick and choose which project they would want to do and leave the rest for their subcontractors. This way they can really optimize their efforts and any risks associated with poor jobs get transferred to other sub-contractors. Increase the Prices: If CMR thinks they are right and believes that their price doesn’t justify the amount of work needed on the particular job, they can go ahead and increase their prices up to the minimum whereby they can make the positive return. As mentioned in the case, the market will follow sooner than later.