Competencies

Did you realize that you have some competencies that make you as a desirable employee, boss or an entrepreneur? At the heart of any successful activity lies a competence of a skill. In today’s competitive world it is becoming particularly important to build on the competitive activities of business. It is your competency that allows you to compete in this environment and makes your desirable when compared to another.

This message now seems to be getting across. But global efforts to tackle climate change are failing badly, with large and accelerating global increases in greenhouse gas emissions in the decade since Kyoto, as well as a threefold growth in emissions from fossil fuels since the 1990s. The booklet will argue that the market-based solutions advocated by many politicians, celebrities, scientists and large NGOs compound the problem. 

This can be illustrated from the case of cotton. From field to end product, cotton passes through a number of distinct production stages with different impacts on water resources. These stages of production are often located in different places and final consumption can be in yet another place. For example, Malaysia does not grow cotton, but imports raw cotton from China, India and Pakistan for processing in the textile industry and exports cotton clothes to the European market.

Grinnell further adds: ‘research is a structured inquiry that utilises acceptable scientific methodology to solve problems and create new knowledge that is generally applicable. Lundberg draws a parallel between the social research process, which is considered scientific, and process that we use in our daily lives. Scientific methods consist of systematic observation, classification and interpretation of data. Now, obviously, this process is one in which nearly all people engage in the course of their daily lives.

Current economic variables capable of impacting the airline industry include but are not limited to rising fuel prices which have skyrocketed from $9.6 million in 1995 to $41.5 million in 2007. The rise in the crude oil prices have led to $5-$8 billion losses for the combined United States airline industry in 2008 (Thompson et al, 2010). Unforeseen economic conditions like economic recession  (1992 and 2000-2002) can also have a negative impact on the industry as passengers consider cheaper alternatives to air travel.

As a supervisor, administrator or manager of an agency, again different questions relating to effectiveness and efficiency of a service may come to your mind. For example, how many people are coming to my agency? What are the socioeconomic – demographic characteristics of my clients? How many cases in a day can a worker effectively handle? Why do some people use the service while others do not? How effective is the service?

The small hydroelectric power plant at the Gwangyang Works was registered as a CDM project, securing 26,000 tons of CERs over the next 10 years. POSCO started environmental reporting since 1995 and started publishing sustainability report since 2003. Because of increasing interest in climate change POSCO started to publish carbon report based on G3 guidelines of Global reporting Initiative. All the data in the carbon report is verified by Samil PricewaterhouseCoopers for authentication purpose.

Macro Environment

A company’s macro environment includes all the relevant factors and influences outside the boundaries of the company itself (Thompson et al, 2010). These forces are vital to a company’s business and will influence the company’s decisions, help define the business model and ultimately direct strategy. Strategic groups that are being affected by driving forces may try to shift toward a more favourable position on the map (Thompson et al, 2010). The airline industry is highly dependent on external market conditions (Andal-Ancion, Stravato & Yip, 2002) which are subject to change from time to time.

The improved understanding can form a basis for a better management of the globe’s freshwater resources. Freshwater is increasingly becoming a global resource, driven by growing international trade in water intensive commodities. Apart from regional markets, there are also global markets for water intensive goods such as crop and livestock products, natural fibres and bio-energy. As a result, use of water resources has become spatially disconnected from the consumers. 

The IPCC warns that if present trends continue unchecked, temperatures could rise by over 6 degrees Celsius and sea levels by up to 60 centimetres globally by 2100. This is a conservative estimate compared to more recent studies, which have shown that the geological record of ice melt was non-linear and responded more rapidly. The like consequences of climate change vary from region to region, but include widespread drought, desertification, flooding and glacial melt.

The recent Western fashion for distancing responsibility for climate change, both spatially and temporarily, by attributing it to future car – hungry Chinese or Indians, is a diversion possible only under assumption – shared by elites in North and South alike – that a society that mandates over-consumption is the universal human destiny. Current global efforts to address climate change, however, look absurdly inadequate. 

This has resulted into a series of scandals that characterized significant erosion of values in the business world. This gave us a universal fever in form of economic meltdown, unemployment and financial uncertainties from which we are still trying to recover. The evolutionary landscape of corporate governance is full of analysis and versions that have tested the elasticity of the time. Several committees in different nations have contributed in the evolution of corporate governance.

Competitors from other strategic groups will attempt to improve their market position and close the gap with Southwest Airlines. Southwest Airlines must sustain their competitive advantage through continued strategic analysis and drawing conclusions about where is the best place to be situated and why (Thompson et al, 2010). In addition to defensive strategies to protect their market position, Southwest Airlines should also seek to exploit changes in the macro environment to benefit their business.

POSCO is heavily involved in offsetting its carbon emissions in the steel making processes. POSCO is involved in a forestation project in Uruguay, through which 206,000 tons of CERs will be obtained over the next 30 years. POSCO has been involved in the GHG registry, organized by the Korea Energy Management Corp., since 2005. In 2010, the company acquired 719,050 tons of Korea-CERs through seven GHG reduction projects.

POSCO to reduce GHG

Few methods adopted by POSCO to reduce GHG are installation of censors to reduce eliminate unnecessary use of electricity. Reuse slag generated in steel making process to manufacture cement rather dumping slag in landfills. Recuse of 70% of by-product gases to in house electricity generation. Encourage employees to adopt greener habits and look out for opportunities to support projects to reduce carbon emissions.

As a result, there is little awareness regarding the fact that the organisation and characteristics of a production and supply chain strongly influence the volumes of water consumption and pollution that can be associated with a final consumer product. Hoekstra and Chapagain (2008) have shown that visualizing the hidden water use behind products can help in understanding the global character of fresh water and in quantifying the effects of consumption and trade on water resources use.

Nowadays, few people doubt that the climate is changing and that human activity is the major cause. The evidence is unequivocal according to 2007 fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an assessment that synthesises the research of 2500 scientists. The period from 1997 to 2008 includes the 10 warmest years since global records began in 1850, while average sea level rises are accelerating.

The word research is composed of two syllables re and search. The dictionary defines the former as a prefix meaning again, anew or over again and the latter as verb meaning to examine closely and carefully, to test and try or to probe. Together they form a noun describing a careful systematic patient study and investigation in some field of knowledge, undertaken to establish facts or principles.

The market position and strategies adopted to counter certain situations is ultimately going to decide the fate of these strategic groups. The analysis also indicates that Southwest Airlines are relatively differentiated from the majority of other strategic groups in both price and customer satisfaction. Rivalry is generally less for differentiated strategic groups and with fewer rivals with similar capabilities, but competitive pressure often intensifies with price cuts and as successful strategies are implemented (Thompson et al, 2010).

What are my clients’ most common presenting problems? What are their most common underlying problems? What is the socioeconomic background of my clients? Why am I successful in certain cases and not in others? What resources are available in the community to help a client with a particular need? What intervention strategies are appropriate for this problem? How satisfied are my clients with my services?

Your philosophical orientation may stem from one of the several paradigms and approaches in research – positivist, interpretive, phenomenology, action or participatory, feminist, qualitative, quantitative – and the academic discipline in which you have been trained. The concept of validity can be applied to any aspect of the research process. It ensures that in a research study correct procedures have been applied to find answers to a question.

What POSCO can do to reduce its emissions? POSCO can concentrate on improving its recycling efficiency. We studied one the competitors of POSCO, Nippon Steel, which uses same steel making process (i.e. blast furnace process) to manufacture steel. Nippon’s current emissions are 1.94 tons of GHG per 1 ton of steel production. This .2 ton less when compared to POSCO.

Middle class consumers

There has been little attention paid to the fact that in end total water consumption and pollution relate to what and how much communities consume and to the structure of the global economy that supplies the various consumer goods and services. Until the recent past, there have been few thoughts in the science and practice of water management about water consumption and pollution along whole production and supply chains.

The headlines tell the story. ‘Billions wasted on UN climate programme.’ Truth about Kyoto: huge profits, little carbon saved. UN effort to curtail emissions in turmoil. Behind these headlines lies a tale of the growing failure of the main tool that governments, financial institutions and corporations have adopted to address climate change. This is carbon trading – a multibillion dollar scheme whose basic premise is that polluters can pay someone else to clean up their mess so they don’t have to.

What do consumers like or dislike about this product? What type of packaging do consumers prefer for this product? What training does the salesperson need to promote the sale of this product? What are the attributes of a good salesperson? To take a different example, let us assume that you work as a psychologist, counsellor or social worker. While engaging in the helping process you make ask yourself the following questions.

The emergence of middle class society in the US has created more demand for air travel which has attracted attention of many low cost carriers. The airline industry still faces the challenge of catering to the different social and economic classes. Because firms vary in their strategies and market positions, the strength of competition varies from group to group (Thomas et al, 2010). The above analysis has clearly indicated that the change in the macro environment is going to favour some groups and hurt others.

This issue of critical currents examines what carbon trading is and why it was adopted in the first place. It tells the story of how, from its global beginnings as part of Kyoto protocol in 1997, carbon trading has failed to change the way we acquire and use energy, while short-circuiting demands for the fundamental reforms needed. In the process, it has rewarded polluters for continued pollution while at the same time causing social and environmental injustice.

To see if Southwest Airlines are one of the rare exceptions that can apply this strategy, we undertook a strategic group analysis using both cost leadership (Passenger Revenue per Equivalent Seat Mile/PRESM) and differentiation (customer complaints) as measures and compare how they are placed relative to their competitors. The strategic mapping exercise (below) identifies America West and US Air as Southwest Airline’s primary competition in price and Continental Airlines as their primary competition in providing customer satisfaction.

Research is undertaken within most professions. More than a set of skills, research is a way of thinking: examining critically the various aspects of your day – to – day professional work; understanding and formulating guiding principles that govern a particular procedure; and developing and testing new theories that contribute to the advancement of your practice and profession.

Across the globe corporate governance is shifting gears and ascending to newer heights. Over the years the concept of corporate governance has been largely perspective. We have seen governances being driven by regulators who played an aggressive role as market referees and custodians of investor’s interest. The approach in the past was very mechanical in nature and had many loop-holes in the corporate governance systems worldwide. The main focus was to gain financial gains at any price.

Lifestyle and spending pattern

Human activities consume and pollute a lot of water. At a global scale, most of the water use occurs in agricultural production, but there are also substantial water volumes consumed and polluted in the industrial and domestic sectors. Water consumption and pollution can be associated with specific activities, such as irrigation, bathing, washing, cleaning, cooling and processing. Total water consumption and pollution are generally regarded as the sum of multitude of independent water demanding and polluting activities Low cost competition has increased as leisure travellers are more price sensitive and business travellers were more time conscious (Thompson et al, 2010).

Current societal variables capable of impacting the airline industry include but are not limited to Changes in the lifestyle and spending pattern of people. A combination of increased economic activity and affordable air travel has led to an increase in the number of people travelling by air. This is evident from the increase in the number of people flying from a mere 469,000 in 1931 to 769.2 million in 2007 (Dalal, 2006). Secondly, the firm’s commitment to both internal (employees) and external customers can be classified as a differentiating key success factor. Although generic strategies are, generally, mutually exclusive, on rare occasions, a firm can successfully pursue more than one approach (Yoshina & Srinivasa, 1995).

Thompson et al (2010) labels this strategic approach as the best-cost provider strategy. Corporate Governance is a wide term and different committees have defined it differently in the past. Whatever the actual definition of corporate governance may be; one thing that we can be sure is that it is going to evolve with time and add new key aspects to itself to make the governance system more suitable for changing times. Thanks to so many corporate frauds, today there is a considerable focus on corporate governance.

 Research procedures can also be employed to formulate intricate theories or laws that govern our lives. The difference between research and non-research activity is as mentioned in the way we find answers to our research questions. For a process to be called research, it is important that it meets certain requirements and possesses certain characteristics. To identify these requirements and characteristics let us examine some definition of research. There are several ways to obtaining answers to your professional questions. These methods range from the fairly informal, based upon clinical impressions, to strictly scientific, adhering to the conventional expectations of scientific procedures.

Research is one of the ways to find answers your questions. When you say that you are undertaking a research study to find out answers to a question, you are implying that the process being applied. There has never been a lack of materials or ingenuity for dealing with climate change. Like many other social problems, global warming is a crisis created by the actions of a minority of the world’s people – what Ramachandra Guha and Madhav Gadgik have called the omnivores, the development – aided class of modern consumerism. For the world’s majority, global warming remains a problem for which they already have the solution: for going excessive use of fossil fuel.