Leadership theories in the context of healthcare management

Leadership theories in the context of healthcare management Do healthcare mangers need leadership theories? Critically evaluate at least two leadership theories in the context of healthcare management. According to Huczynski and Buchanan (2007), Leadership is defined as the process of influencing the activities of an organised group in its effort towards goal setting and goal achievement. Grint (2005:2) describes leadership as a function of relationship between leaders and followers, rather than simply focused on the person of the leader. According to Bass (1990:19), leadership is an interaction between two or more members of the group that often involves a structuring or restructuring of the situations, perceptions and expectations of the members. Thus it can be said from the above definitions that leadership is enacted through relationships with others i.e. the followers and leadership is widely distributed throughout the organization. Healthcare organisations around the world spend enormous amount of money in infrastructure and renovating facilities in hospitals, but spend a relatively less time or effort for the management of people who work in it. Effective leadership is therefore necessary for the smooth functioning of healthcare organization. According to Gunderman R. (2009), healthcare leaders should understand the nature of the organization where they work and should work in harmony with physicians, nurses, technologists, administrators and other members of organization. The people who work in healthcare organizations as leaders should understand the needs of the people they work with and should motivate them in order to increase their performance. Thus the overall performance of the organization depends upon the behaviour of leaders with their followers. Failure to understand human motivation can result in downfall of the organization. Medical leaders should look at the following questions: Which is more effective way to deal with the workers, benefits such as salary raises and public praise, or sticks, such as threat of termination and reduction in compensation? How can we improve workers performance, through tighter control or by increasing autonomy and empowerment? If the crucial needs of the workers are not fulfill ed it can affect their commitment towards organization and may result in financial instability of the organization. Leadership and management are often compared under the same platform. People are often confused and ask a question, Are managers leaders? The answer is NO, they differ from each other in many ways. Leadership is one of the roles that managers have to play and is therefore a subset of management. According to Gopee and Galloway (2009), management is about measuring and monitoring performance against pre-determined goals, following policies and procedures, controlling and organizing the structure and systems, working within resource allocation and maximizing output and productivity for the organization. Whilst on the other side leadership is about being visionary, anticipating change, motivating and inspiring workers and focusing on development of individuals. Watson (1983), describes seven Ss models to distinguish between leaders and managers. According to Watson (1983), managers mainly rely upon 3 Ss namely strategy, structure and systems, whereas leaders depends on 4 soft Ss called style, staff, skills and shared goals. Hollingsworth (1999) suggests fundamental differences between leaders and managers. According to him managers do things right i.e. they are transactional, while leaders do the right things i.e. transformational, managers administer while leaders innovate, manager focus on systems and structure while leaders focus on people. Thus leadership is a two-way process based on leader-follower relationship while management is based on relationship between the people working in the organization as individuals or teams. (Gopee and Gathway, 2009). Theories of Leadership: Several leadership theories have emerged over the past suggesting practical applications of leadership and its concept. Different leadership theories that are developed since 1920s are listed below: Time period 1920s 1940s Theory Trait or Great man theory Barnard (1938) for prescriptives: Ghiselli and Wald Doty (1954) for the descriptives. Style or behavioural theory Blake and Mouton (1964), Likert (1961) and McGregor (1960) Focus Intelligence, initiative and self-assurance. Participative culture, Represented a more democratic humanistic approach to the use of man in organisations and come at the time of reaction against scientific management. 1960s Contingency theory Fielder (1967), Schein (1980) and Vroom and Yetton (1973) An integrative way of looking at leadership, more specific to task work group and position of leader within that work group. A best fit approach. 1980s Post contingencies theory Bennis (1992), Kotter (1982), Mant (1983) and Peters and Waterman (1982) This theory particularly focused on American Business leaders with some perceptive comments as well as Anglo-Saxon leadership habits. 1990s Transformational leadership Bass and Avolio (1993), Cunningham and Kitson (2000a, 2000b) and Sushter (1994) Four components. 1. Idealised influence; 2. Inspirational motivation; 3. Intellectual stimulation; and 4. Individualised consideration. Late 90s-2000s Contemporary theories. Goleman (1999), Jumaa (2001), Alleyne (2002), Goffee and Jones (2000) Charismatic leadership Connective leadership Servant leadership Transactional leadership Transformational leadership Adapted from- Jasper M. and Jumaa M (2005), Effective Healthcare Leadership,page-25-26 Trait or Great man leadership theory. According to this theory certain persons have inborn leadership traits. Many studies were conducted by the end of 1950s which explored specific characteristics of effective leaders. (Handy 1993). These studies described significant correlation between leadership effectiveness and following traits: Intelligence Self-confidence Knowledge Initiative Supervisory ability Integrity Bass (1990), based on several findings from studies developed a profile of traits that are marked in effective leaders. These are categorised in 3 areas mainly: Intelligence -Judgement -Decisiveness -Knowledge -Fluency Personality -Adaptability -Alertness -integrity -Nonconformity Ability -Cooperativeness Popularity -Tact However the trait theory has certain weakness and problems like; the traits are very difficult to define accurately or to understand fully; many exceptional leaders do not possess all identified leadership traits; it cannot be concluded that a person is better or worse as a manager or leader only by possessing one or two traits. It is still questionable whether an individual could have all the traits for being a leader. However despite of many other leadership theories emerged today, trait theory has not been completely disregarded. For example- Recent research study conducted by kouzes and Posner (2007) concluded that Admired Leaders were likely to draw out specific characteristics, whereas 50% or more respondents selected: Honest (88%), Forward looking (71%), Competent (66%) and inspiring (65%). Around 28-47% of respondents selected intelligent, broad minded, straightforward, co-operative, dependable and imaginative as specific characteristics of effective leaders; while less than 25% of people selected ambitious, caring, mature, courageous, loyal, self controlled and independent. However there is no evidence between the correlation of nature and the essential characteristics of leader nor on what an effective leader is. It can be seen as trait of position, or power or knowledge and wisdom. Kotter (1990) suggested the functional approach and focused on the fact that the performance can be improved can be improved by training and the leadership skills can be developed over a period of time and perfected. He also suggested that organisations should not wait for leaders to come by their own rather grow their own by identifying employees which have certain potential to be a good leader. Transactional and Transformational theories have gained popularity for Leadership in Healthcare Organizations out of the various leadership theories available. Transactional leadership theory. Transactional theory of leadership is based on leading people by the virtue of management position held in the organizational hierarchy. It is seen that in this theory leaders identify the needs of the followers and transact with them. Thus this theory is considered as a social exchange process based on the power and reward system. In healthcare organisations this theory is related to the achievement of organizational goals which also includes attending health of local population.( Gopee and Galloway, 2005) According to Bass and Riggio (2006), the transactional theory is based on the leaders who are successful or effective in such a way that they maintain equilibrium and harmony by fulfilling their roles according to the procedures and policies and use incentives to enhance employee loyalty and performance. The transactional leader sets goals, gives direction and uses rewards to strengthen employees behaviour towards meeting or exceeding established goals (McGuire and Kennerly 2006). Although this theory supports status quo and is more predictable but it has also been criticised by various authors as it is lacking vision for future of the healthcare organisation. Thus the transactional theory of leadership has a very narrow focus and the leader can have a high self interest which may eventually lead to disturbance in the organisational structure.(Gopee and Galloway, 2009) Transformational leadership theory Transformational leadership is widely supported leadership approach for healthcare. According to Burnes (1978), transformational leadership is identified as a process where one or more person engage in such a way that leaders and followers raise one another to higher level of motivation and morality. In transformational leadership leaders motivate their followers by transcending their own self interests, elevating their needs and making them aware of the mission of larger entity of the organisation where they belong. (Bass 1995). Transformational leadership is considered superior to the transactional leadership style as the whole workforce is developed as the part of the process whose main function is delivering organisations objective. This can be achieved by fostering identification, going beyond simple leader-follower transaction and developing and intellectually stimulating employees. (Vandenberghe et al. 2002). According to Murphy (2005), transformational leaders are visionary, self-confident, and self-aware in breaking professional boundaries to develop a multidisciplinary team approach towards patient care. Transformational leaders inspire the followers and motivate them to exercise leadership by encouraging their belief that have the potential to achieve high aims. Thus a transformational leader is the catalyst for creating new innovative organisational paradigms (Murphy 2005 :135). The transformational leadership style is described by Markham (1998) as collaborative, consultative and consensus seeking and attributing power to interpersonal skills and personal contact. Thus the transformational leadership allow the followers to develop ideas and aspirations on how things could be better in healthcare settings. It articulates a vision for betterment of the healthcare services and thus allows one to work for raising the standards of care and treatment. Manley (2001) identifies six transformational leadership processes in practice; Ability to develop a shared vision Inspiring and communicating Valuing others Challenging and stimulating Developing trust Enabling Using these processes, transformational leaders assist the people working with them to become empowered and take responsibility of ownership to practice challenges and solutions (Sashkin and Burke 1990). The impact of transformational leadership does not restrict to development of individuals but it can also produce significant changes in practice settings by influencing the organisational culture. One of the main features of the transformational leaders is that they can inspire other people to follow their clear vision and that they demonstrate self-confidence in their ability to articulate the vision and promote change.'( Mullally 2001). Transformational leadership is also compared to that of a leadership style previously called as charismaticleadership which is now out of fashion. For example, people like Hitler, Churchill, Mussolini, Mao Tse Tung and The Reverend Moon have been perceived as charismatic leaders in the past but in todays modern era it will be difficult to call them as transformational leaders. Charismatic leaders are assumed to use their magnetic personalities to attract the followers. They are usually good orators and share their imaginary ideas with followers to create a common purpose. For example-Barack Obama demonstrated this ability during his election campaign and is believed to demonstrate complex ideas in a comprehensible manner to his followers. The concept of transformational leadership and its applications in complex organisations such as healthcare is based on four central components (Bass 1998), (Plesek and Wilson 2001): Idealised influence (charisma) Inspirational motivation Intellectual stimulation Individualised consideration Transformational leadership topic has been debated since the past three decades because the above four components can reflect the potential for causing organisational harm and destruction if the leader in the framework is supported by emotional intelligence (Goleman 2000a) to guide them through the swampy lowlands of organisational life (Schon 1983). According to Manley (2000) the transformational leadership approach is highly beneficial for the healthcare organisations as it has positive effects in the organisational change. An analysis of transformational leadership style in North America has shown qualities of integrity and honesty all strengthen by strong core of moral and ethical values (Bashor 2000). The key principle required in applying the transformational leadership in healthcare organisation needs much openness and honesty in all interactions (Jasper 2005). The use of personal qualities (such as charisma, influencing skills and communication) needs to be equally balanced by high levels of understanding and personal insight. This can be achieved through self perception and feedback from other colleagues. The ability to inspire and motivate depends upon the process of visioning. The leaders should be able to describe their ideas with clarity and details and should explain about the future consequences. To achieve this vision one should start working for the future vision by learning from the past realities and should show a collective effort where everyone has an opportunity to participate in the creation (Fenton 2003). Intellectual stimulation can be achieved by maintaining mental and intellectual alertness and acuity which can be gained by encouraging open criticism and deba te of wide ranging evidence base thus it helps to form the foundation of substantive change. The development of all individual towards their potential is one of the goals of transformational leadership. This can only be achieved by sharing thoughts of power bases in both organisations and interpersonal relationships. (Jumma and Jasper 2005). Thus it is seen that the two leadership approaches i.e. transformational and transactional approach are different from each other. Transactional leadership mainly involves transaction between the managers and their managed people while transformational leadership mainly focuses on various radical changes that can present challenges and growth for all. Comparison of Transformational and Transactional leadership approaches Transformational leadership Transactional leadership Merges own, followers and the organisations goals, desire values into common goal. Generates employee commitment to the vision. Challenges subordinate Rewards informally and personally Is emotional passionate about existing and new ventures Sees home and work on a continuum Aims to maintain equilibrium and status quo Is task-centred and orderly Coaches and fosters sheltered learning Uses extrinsic rewards High self-interest Sees home and work as separate entities. Adapted from- Gallow and Gopee (2009), Leadership and Management in Healthcare, page-59 Limitations of transformational theory: Although transformational leadership skills are highly desirable for effective functioning of an organisation, many management theorists like Bass, Avoliio and Goodheim (1987) think that transformational leadership alone can cause problem in long time. According to them transformational qualities must be coupled with more transactional qualities of day to day managerial role. According to Bass and colleagues, the transformational leader will fail without the traditional management skills. (Marquis and Huston 2009). They believe both sets of characteristics should be present in same person in different proportion. In Johnsons (2005) research he suggested that highly effective managers require both vision as well as specific plan to carry out their plans for achieving goals. Concept of leadership within the British National Health Service The New Labour Government included leadership as the part of their modernisation of the NHS and has been enshrined in the work of the NHS Leadership Centre, created in 2001as a part of NHS Modernisation Agency (The NHS Plan, DH 2000). The centre launched the NHS Leadership Qualities Framework in 2002 (NHS Leadership centre 2003) the components of this framework contains 15 qualities organised in 3 clusters of setting direction, personal and delivering the service. Components of NHS Leadership Qualities Framework Setting direction Personal qualities Delivering the service Broad scanning Intellectual flexibility Seizing the future Political astuteness Drive for results Self belief Self awareness Self management Drive for achievement Personal integrity Empowering others Holding to account Leading change through people Effective and strategic influencing Collaborative working These qualities reflect the values and beliefs intrinsic within the Governments political stance. Here the emphasis is on personal attributes and qualities as opposed to that of traditional source of authority and power or target driven incentives derived from business culture (Jumaa 2005). These qualities are considered as a set of key characteristics, attitudes and behaviours that a leader must possess in order to deliver the NHS plan; Setting the standard for leadership in NHS Assessing and developing high performance in leadership Integrating leadership across the service and related agency Individual and organisational assessment Adapting leadership to suit changing context. Case studies to demonstrate effectiveness of leadership theories. Case study 1. To measure the effectiveness of the new leadership framework in NHS, healthcare commission (now-Care Quality Commission) conducted a NHS staff survey. It was conducted in October 2003 and is probably the largest workforce survey in world. Total 572 organisations took part and around 203,911 NHS employees responded to the survey questionnaire. (www.cqc.org.uk) Results were produced before Healthcare Commission Executive Anna Walker. According to the survey more than 200,000 staff people told they liked working with NHS. Most of them were satisfied with their jobs but some part of the staff reported poorer work-life balance and higher level of work related stress. Thus healthcare commission urged NHS organisations to investigate and address these issues and try to get solution for it through more effective leadership approach. The fifth annual national survey of NHS staff was conducted between October and December 2007. In this survey 156,000 employees from all 391 NHS trusts in England responded to a questionnaire asking about their views and experience of working with the NHS. The aim of this survey was to look at the attitudes and experience of NHS staff so that the employers can review their own staff and take necessary action. The results of the survey showed that job satisfaction remained high among most of the staff. 75% of staff was satisfied or very satisfied as well as satisfaction with the amount of responsibility. While in terms of staff engagement mixed results were seen. Around only 23% i.e. less than quarter of staff agreed that senior managers involve staff in important decisions and only 22% agreed that communication between staff and senior management is effective. While only 26% of staff were satisfied, or very satisfied with the extent to which trust values their work. This was the sing le most common reason given by those thinking of leaving their jobs. Along with this 8% of staff said they had experienced some discrimination at work in the previous 12 months. About 3% said they had been discriminated against their ethnic background. Thus it can be concluded from the above two studies that the NHS staff were generally satisfied with their jobs. However there were some areas where significant action is needed for improvement. The NHS should also make some effective plans to value staff and engage them successfully in important decisions-making. While NHS should also do more in order to improve the communication between staff and senior management. Case study 2. The Healthcare Commission also conducted 5 surveys in 2004 to find out patients overall experience about the new NHS. The questionnaires and methodology were designed by the NHS Surveys Advice Centre at Picker institute Europe. About 850 eligible people were identified from each trust that took part. A total of 568 NHS organisations and 312,348 patients took part. The response rate for the patients varied from 63% for the adult in patient survey and 42% for the mental health survey. Results were published in first week of august 2004 and the Commission reported that patients gave positive opinions about the high quality care they received at the NHS. Majority of patients said they have trust and confidence in the clinical staff. They are listened to and treated with lot of dignity. Thus a great improvement in communication between the NHS staff and patients was seen and people were allowed to give their own suggestions regarding the facilities they would like to see as an improvement for the organisation. (Jasper and Jumaa 2005) Case study 3. The following case study is based on my experience of working at a Multinational Pharmaceutical company, Zydus-Cadila healthcare limited, India. It is an innovative global pharmaceutical company that discovers, manufacture and markets a wide range of healthcare products. It produces products like Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) to formulations like tablets, capsules, syrups etc Along with this it also manufactures various animal health products and cosmeceuticals. Headquarter of the company is located in Ahmedabad, India. It also has its offices spread across four continents and different countries including USA, Europe, Japan, Brazil, South Africa and 25 other emerging markets. They employ around 10,000 employees worldwide and have one of the best Research and Development centre for drug research. The motto of the group is Improving peoples lives through innovation. I had an opportunity to work there as a trainee for my under graduation internship for a duration of 6 months. My role included looking after the process involved in operation of different departments like production, packaging, storage, marketing and submitting daily report to the manager. The whole company was perfectly organised and the management was distributed in a systematic manner depending on the type of department. There were different mangers according to the department like for Human-Resource department, Production department, Quality-control department, RD (Research and development) department and the Marketing department. Each of the department had a head person above them under whose guidance all mangers used to work. According to me, the leadership approach in this organisation contained both transactional as well as transformational concepts of leadership theories. The manager under whom I used to work was a transactional leader. He was very particular about the work. Right from the first day of my training I found him a bit eccentric. He was not at all friendly with all of us working under him. He used to assign each of us a particular work for a day. For example- On the first day of my training I was told to go and check the ware house of the company where the finished goods were stored and to write the Standard Operating Procedure for dispensing the goods. Following his instructions we all went and did our report writing work. He came for a visit within 3 hours, gathered all of us and started asking questions about what we observed. Those who were unable to answer his question were scolded. He gave us first warning about our work and said those who will complete their work early and accuratel y will have the additional benefit i.e. they will be allowed to go home 1 hour early. This thing worked as an incentive amongst all of us and thus we became more enthusiastic towards our work. Slowly over a time it was realised that the way he was leading us was different from others. For him the sole purpose was getting the work done from us in such a way that each one of us feels excited about work. He was very professional at work while very jovial and friendly at home. He was totally task oriented and orderly person. He never accepted any ideas or suggestions from any of the followers. Thus he was more of a transactional type manager. The other type of manager under whom we were working is completely opposite of the above mentioned manager. He was our marketing department manager. He was a true example of transformational leader. The way he used to lead us was truly inspirational. He used to explain us the complete process before handling any work. He was very supportive at work and had a vision for companys success. His communication and motivation skills were excellent. Right from the first day of my training under him we liked working with him. He always welcomed new ideas and suggestions for marketing. He was very much focused about his vision and always strives hard to achieve it. He had good interactions with everybody in the team and always used to motivate us. He used to look at everybodys work personally and if he will notice any mistake in our work would teach how to correct it on the spot only. He used to ask for the feedback about his new ideas from each of us and correct himself if the feedback was no t satisfactory. This shows his eagerness to work with the team which created positive effects on each of the team members. He was never after rewards from the company. His only aim was taking companys sales to the epitome of success. He was fully dedicated to the company and worked with whole heartedness. Thus all of us used to work with great enthusiasm under his leadership. So he can be described as a perfect example of transformational leader. Hence the company Zydus-Cadila Healthcare limited has a mixture of transformational and transactional leaders which ultimately results in the success of company. Conclusion The essay here explains about various leadership theories in healthcare and its effectiveness by the use of some case studies. Healthcare organizations are complex in nature. It requires a well balanced management and leadership approaches to effectively run the organisation. Each individual in organisation should share their knowledge with others. This synergy among workers is the key part for generation of new ideas and concepts for the organisation. Many leadership theories have been developed since past and still it is continuously adapting a new change for the effective leadership theory. Considering leadership in healthcare it is seen from the example of NHS in the UK that the combination of both transactional and transformational leadership theory may be the most efficacious for an organisation. Thus the healthcare managers require leadership theories and put them in practice to make it work effectively. However, according to Grint (2005:105), one of the top secrets of leaders hip is not a list of innate skills and competences, or how much charisma you havebut whether you have a capacity to learn from you followers.

The Existence of Black Holes Essays -- Concept Essays

The Existence of Black Holes I have always had an interest in science, especially in the sciences regarding outer space. When I was younger I was always fascinated with rockets, and especially in stars. I have often regretted not pursuing this interest at its infancy. I do remember going to the Planetarium, and studying about a topic that I had seen talked about on television. The topic was black holes, and back then all that they knew was that they were black. The idea of a space in the universe that is completely void of light was difficult to imagine. Recently, I have learned more about this topic and a science call cosmology. I had never even heard of this field of science before I was introduced to a scientist by the name of Stephen Hawking. The introduction was very informal. In fact, I have never even seen him. My first introduction to Stephen's theories came when I read a popular book that Stephen wrote called A Brief History of Time, in this book he attempts to explain some of his most complicated theor ies. These include the topics of black holes, imaginary time, and the origin of the universe. Stephen is the front runner in his field. Many of his peers consider his to be the greatest mind since Einstein. (Stone, 27) One of Stephen's areas of specialty that interests me is the topic of small mass exploded in the grandest explosion in history. Scientists today say that ever since the Big Bang the universe has been expanding at the speed of light. Stephen's theory is that eventually the universe will reach an outer limit and will then implode on itself at the speed of light. (A Brief History of Time, 76) The ideas that Stephen has about the lifetime of our universe are very complicated. I will not even pretend to c... ...se and everything in it at one time consisted in a very small mass. This mass contained an incredible amount of energy. The theory is that the Stephen's work in this field regarding blackholes, and imaginary time is unsurpassed by anyone and is truly remarkable. Bibliography Hawking, Stephen. A Brief History of Time. New York: Bantam Books, 1988. Hawking, Stephen. A Reader's Guide to a Brief History of Time. New York: Bantam Books 1992. Hawking, Stephen. Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays. New York: Bantam Books, 1994. Hawking Stephen. An Essay On Time. New York: Bantam Books, 1992. Penrose, Roger. A Thesis on Relativity. New York: Bantam Books, 1990. Stone, Gene. A Reader's Companion to A Brief History of Time. New York: Bantam Books, 1992. Thorne, Kip. A Thesis on Quantum Mechanics. London: Oxford Publishing, 1989.

Islamic Economy in Saudi Arabian Companies Essay -- Economics

1. Saudi Companies Fund A. The institution of SAMA could not be a profit-making institution, it had to conform to Islamic law. SAMA has from time to time financed one-half of government debt. From 1962 to 1983, the governments earning grew in surplus, and all the debt was repaid. Whenever the government needed SAMA bolstered government reserves. B. In 1966 a major banking control law clarified and strengthened SAMA's role in regulating the banking system. Foreign banks submitted application for license. SAMA sent its recommendation to the ministry of finance. The ministry set conditions for granting licenses to foreign banks. C. Saudi companies introduced a great deal of regulation abiding with Sharia law. This law also defined requirements against deposits. There were several restriction to abide by SAMA's implementation of monetary policy. 2. The Saudi financial system A. The Saudi financial system had three autonomous government institutions. They were the pension fund, the general organization of Saudi insurance, and Saudi fund for development. These government instit...

Harry Elmer Barnes :: essays research papers

In 1952, Harry Elmer Barnes wrote a timely article, "How 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' Trends Threaten American Peace, Freedom, and Prosperity" as the final chapter of the classic revisionist anthology, Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace. Barnes analyzed George Orwell's classic novel as a work of prophecy and sounded the alarm to reverse the "1984" trends prevalent in the America of his day. Barnes argued that propagandists and "court historians" were fashioning a present, based on a falsified and inaccurate telling of the past, that was designed to meet Establishment desires to participate in world wars. Ironically,Barnes' article was omitted from the first edition the collection.(1) Barnes may be best remembered as the author of the generally accepted definition of "revisionism," "Revisionism means nothing more or less than the effort to correct the historical record in the light of a more complete collection of historical facts, a more calm political atmosphere, and a more objective attitude." (2) Barnes had discovered that a more nearly accurate version of the history of the First World War was only possible after the fighting had ended and the emotional excesses had lessened. He was unable to predict that similar corrections of Allied propaganda and popularized conceptions of the methods of warfare in the Second World War would meet even sterner resistance. Today - half a century after the conclusion of the Second World War - it would be fair to expect a less emotional environment, one in which historians, researchers and writers were free to examine the actual causes of the war as well as the atrocities committed by both sides in the conflict. However, those and other topics are more forbidden than ever with the greatest taboo surrounding analysis of the fate of Europe's Jews and others in what has come to be known as the Holocaust. In 1950, three years prior to Barnes' article concerning "1984" trends another author, Ray Bradbury, set out a foreboding vision of the future in a short story titled, "The Fireman." Later, Bradbury's story would be renamed Fahrenheit 451 after the temperature at which paper burns. Fahrenheit 451 describes a horrific future in which millions of books are banned and firemen set fires instead of extinguishing them. In order to maintain a society of brainwashed, "happy" people, the firemen kick down doors and burn the hated volumes along with the homes that housed them. Barnes would never have suspected how fast the world would progress from the "1984" trends he identified to the trends Bradbury identified in Fahrenheit 451(3).

Let’s Be Lefties For a Day

The discussion of the importance of understanding cultural, ethnic, and gender differences by managers and professionals in a business setting begins with defining the key terms. Diversity is defined as â€Å"real or perceived differences among people that affect their interactions and relationships â€Å"(Bell, 2007). According to Week 1 lecture (SOCS 350, 2013), cultural diversity is defined as: â€Å"the existence of a wide variety of cultures and subcultures represented within a community†. This is evident in most work settings across the world. So how do I understand the importance and differences brought to the table by all of the different individuals? In our textbook Diversity in Organizations, it talks about Taylor Cox and Stacy Blake’s research studies on understanding diversity in the workplace. Their studies and explanations have been used in many textbooks and news regarding diversity. They explain how effective management of diversity can benefit organizations in the area of cost, resource acquisition, marketing, creativity, problem solving, and system flexibility. I agree that diversity can bring so much to a workplace. A personal experience of mine occurred at the community hospital near my hometown. The hospital had a predominantly low-income, African American population that used the emergency room. I was a young Caucasian woman who quickly became charge nurse for the night shift. During busy times, which occurs quite often in emergency rooms, I would be yelled at and even called racist if a white person was called back to a room first. I was lucky enough to have the benefit of the mayor of the predominantly African American community work as a LPN in the emergency room with me. He was an older African American, well known throughout the community, and very well respected. I could send him out to talk to unhappy patients because they took better to him, probably due to having the same ethnic/cultural background. He then explained things again and for some reason it was most often taken better, and proved I was not being racist and these are the policies that I followed. In the workplace though, especially a hospital setting, it is extremely beneficial to have all cultural backgrounds employed. Every patient that comes in is not going to be of the same ethnic or cultural background as you and sometimes like in my example it is easier to relate to someone with the same ethnicity. It is a beneficial skill for employees to understand different cultures to communicate effectively. Cox and Blake also proposed that â€Å"an organization’s reputation for valuing all types of workers will also affect its ability to market to different types of consumers. Consumers who appreciate fair treatment for everyone will be more likely to patronize an organization known to value diversity and to treat all workers fairly†. I truly believe that is accurate, and is shown to be proven accurate at my hospital. In our example in class using the ball and sock experiment, I learned how diverse America is. People do things a little bit different, and that is what makes us a culturally diverse country. Just because you do something right-handed and I do it left-handed does not mean I am doing it wrong. I am left-handed, and yes I have become ambidextrous also because of the predominantly right-handed population. This just shows me that people are able to adapt to change, and not one certain way, color, gender, race, age is better than another. There are numerous benefits to valuing diversity, especially in a business setting. With each unique combination of gender, ethnic background, culture, and life experiences, each person brings different sets of strengths, skills, and approaches to problems. I believe all businesses can benefit from a diverse body of talent bringing fresh ideas, perspectives, and views to the workplace.

Garment Worker

Abstract: Garments sector is the life blood of Bangladesh as the agricultural land has there been turned to a country of garments industries. Employment in the Ready-made garment sector in Bangladesh provides workers with economic benefits and some empowerment. More than 3. 2 millions people are working in this sector and about 5000 garments factories are scattered across the country. 78 per cent of our foreign earnings come from this sector. So it will not be an overstatement to say that, we earn our bread from garments industries. The study attempts to explore the present socio-economic status of the garments workers.The study based mainly on economic and social status of 100 garments workers from Rampura and Badda areas of Dhaka City. It was found that the socio-economic condition of the Garments workers is not in a lofty stage. Amongst the workers about 70 per cent are women, who work dawn to dusk even up to late night when their wages are not in the satisfactory level. They cann ot afford their foods, cloths, housing, medicines, and educations of their wards as they are ill paid. On the contrary, their children are deprived from their care; they suffer from malnutrition and unhygienic complexities. They have no time or scope for recreation.During the study it was found that, worldwide economic meltdown has affected RMG sector of Bangladesh as some workers have lost their jobs and trend of works have been declined. At the end of the study, some recommendations were placed to improve the present conditions of the garments workers as well as garments sector of the country. The owners must treat the workers with respect. They should care about their lives and they must keep in mind that they are human beings. They have families, parents and children,† said Nazma Akhter, president of Combined Garment Workers Federation. â€Å"Is there anybody to really pay any heed to our words? â€Å"

A Rumi of One’s Own Essay

Several years ago Kabir Helminski, a sheikh of the Mevlevi Order of Sufism, received a call from Madonna’s producer, who wanted to hire his troupe of whirling dervishes for a music video inspired by the 13th-century Persian poet Rumi. Helminski read the script, learned that a guy would be lying on top of Madonna while she sang â€Å"Let’s get unconscious, honey,† and wrote a polite letter declining the request. He also sent a package of books so that the singer might get a better sense of Rumi’s teachings. Like many Persian literary scholars, Helminski, who runs the Threshold Society, a Sufi study center in California, has had little success in convincing Americans that Rumi is about more than transcendent sex. (Madonna later recited Rumi’s poems on a CD, A Gift of Love, along with Goldie Hawn and Martin Sheen.) One of the five best-selling poets in America, Rumi, who was born 800 years ago in what is now part of Afghanistan, has become famous for his ability to convey mystical passion: his lovers are frequently merging into one, forgetting who they are, and crying out in pain. Yet his religious work—one book is popularly called the â€Å"Koran in Persian†Ã¢â‚¬â€is often ignored. To uncover and celebrate his heritage, UNESCO has declared 2007 the Year of Rumi; conferences about his work are being held in Istanbul, Kabul, Tehran, Dushanbe, and Ann Arbor. One of the featured speakers in Ann Arbor this fall will be Coleman Barks, an American poet who is largely responsible for Rumi’s American popularity as well as his reputation as an erotic soul-healer. Born in Tennessee, Barks freely admits to not knowing Persian (scholars call his best-selling works from the translations of others â€Å"re-Englishings†). While his poems are far more elegant and accessible than any previous English renditions, they tend to turn holy scenes into moments of sexual passion. Sometimes he takes out references to God and replaces them with â€Å"love.† As he explained in the introduction to his 2001 collection of poems, The Soul of Rumi, â€Å"I avoid God-words, not altogether, but wherever I can, because they seem to take away the freshness of experience and p ut it inside a specific system.† But Rumi, who spent most of his adult life in Konya, Turkey, based his life and poetry around that system. The son of an Islamic preacher, he prayed five times a day, made pilgrimages to Mecca, and memorized the Koran. Under the influence of an older dervish, Shams of Tabriz, he devoted his life to Sufism, an ancient, mystical branch of Islam. Sufis are less concerned with the codes and rituals of Islam than with making direct contact with God; as one scholar puts it, â€Å"Sufism is the core of the religion, the nut without the shell.† Still, the traditional Islamic texts are central to the faith. â€Å"I am the slave of the Qur’an and dust under the feet of Muhammad,† Rumi writes. â€Å"Anyone who claims otherwise is no friend of mine.† Rumi put forth an alarming quantity of writing—about 70,000 verses in 25 years—which affords translators the luxury of leaving out poems that might alienate the average American reader. In the introduction to his 2003 Rumi: The Book of Love,Barks jokes that his previous book of translations â€Å"achieved the cultural status of an empty Diet Coke can.† He gives the language a Southern hominess and an almost childlike simplicity: Love comes sailing through and I scream. Love sits beside me like a private supply of itself. Love puts away the instruments and takes off the silk robes. Our nakedness   together changes me completely. Starting with 50-year-old prose translations by the British scholar A.J. Arberry, Barks takes liberties to make Rumi’s language more accessible and universal. Occasionally this results in more than subtle changes in meaning. In one mistake, documented by the independent scholar Ibrahim Gamard, Barks mistranslates the word â€Å"blind† as â€Å"blond† due to a typo in Arberry’s version—inadvertently turning a scene about the abandonment of those who don’t know God (â€Å"Bright-hearted companions, haste, despite all the blind ones, to home, to home!†) into a part about resisting sexual lures (â€Å"I know it’s tempting to stay and meet these blonde women†). In Rumi’s time, it’s hard to imagine that there were many women with yellow hair; there wasn’t even a word for it. Barks’s wholesome soulfulness should be credited for bringing Rumi’s work to popularity, but in the process he leaves behind perhaps the most important part of the poems. â€Å"Rumi is not a great poet in spite of Islam,† says William Chittick, a Sufi literature scholar at Stony Brook University. â€Å"He’s a great poet because of Islam. It’s because he lived his religion fully that he became this great expositor on beauty and love.† There’s a sense in Rumi’s poems that he is at his emotional limits, simultaneously ecstatic and exhausted. His faith seems desperate, and almost tangible. Such devotion is striking because it’s inspired by God, not by the promise of sex as it sometimes appears in the translations. â€Å"He was the most important religious figure of his day,† says Jawid Mojaddedi, an Afghan-born Rumi scholar at Rutgers, whose translation of Book Two of Rumi’s Masnavi came out this month. â€Å"And yet people are shocked to find out Rumi was Muslim; they assume he must have spent his life persecuted for his beliefs, hiding in some cave in Afghanistan. We talk of clash of civilizations, and yet there’s this link that needs to be spelled out.† (Rumi’s success in America has actually boosted his popularity, Mojaddedi says, in parts of the Middle East.) But for many readers, Rumi’s Persian background has little bearing on the force of his poems. He has come to embody a kind of free-for-all American spirituality that has as much to do with Walt Whitman as Muhammad. Rumi’s work has become so universal that it can mean anything; readers use the poems for recreational self-discovery, finding in the lines whatever they wish. â€Å"It’s impossible to take Rumi out of context,† says Shahram Shiva, a Rumi translator and performance poet who regularly gives readings of Rumi’s poems, often in yoga studios. â€Å"Great art doesn’t need context,† he says. â€Å"The best thing for Beethoven’s popularity was when they put a disco beat behind Symphony no. 5.† Shiva recites Rumi to the accompaniment of flute, piccolo, piano, conch shell, and harmonica and belts out the lines in a deep, sultry Broadway voice. â€Å"Rumi’s one of the great creative beings on this planet,† he says, â€Å"a mixture of Mozart and Francis [of] Assisi, with a little Galileo thrown in, and maybe some Shakespeare and Dante.† In his most anthologized poems Rumi comes off as a saintly Tony Robbins, urging people to break barriers, stop worrying, touch the sky, make love, never surrender. It’s as if publishers worry that reading poetry is such a fragile enterprise that too much weight and context and not enough sex will scare everyone away. Helminski, who used to run a publishing company that put out Barks’s early books, noticed a consistent sensibility in the lines readers were requesting permission to quote: those suggesting that there’s no conventional morality, no such thing as ethical failure. The number one requested line was â€Å"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing / there is a field. I’ll meet you there.† â€Å"Our culture is so shame-ridden that when someone comes along and says, ‘You’re OK,’ it’s a great relief,† says Helminski. â€Å"Americans still have an adolescent relationship with Rumi. It will take some maturing before we move beyond the clichà ©s.†