Process of Dealing with Death Essay Example for Free

Process of Dealing with Death Essay When they are gone, we must learn to carry on. In today’s world, there are few things if any at all that last forever; whether it be something bought in a store, or even us human beings everything has an expiration date. Death is not a simple thing to cope with. It takes time to go through the stages of grieving and reach the final point of acceptance. As people, we differ from each other, which means that it may take a week, a month, a year, or even more time for someone to cope with the death of a loved one; it all depends on the person. The stages of grieving after a death in the family vary for everyone but most commonly they tend to include anger/denial, guilt, and the final step in coping with death, acceptance. It is often hard to accept the fact that someone who has always been by your side could suddenly be gone forever. The reality of the situation does not always kick in right away. Some people choose to deny the fact that someone they care about has passed away because they are simply not capable of handling the truth. In some cases, denial combines with anger at the passed loved one because they feel that the person who died left them too early and at a bad time. This was the case when my grandmother (my mom’s mom) passed away a few years ago. My mom was my grandmother’s only daughter that lived here in America therefore they were very close and cherished each other greatly. I have a vivid memory of my grandmother’s deceased body laying on her bed with my mom sitting on a chair next to her and pounding the wall with her fists screaming, â€Å"Why did you leave me, how do you expect me to go on without you?! You can’t be gone, no, this isn’t happening! † It was a hard sight to witness; first off, because of the fact that my grandmother had passed away, that pain on its own was difficult to deal with and to add on top of that my mom was in such an extreme state of denial and anger she would not let anyone near my grandmother. My dad and one of my uncles forcibly took my mom out of the room in order for the funeral home attendants to remove my grandmother’s body. Speaking from personal observations, the time that it takes for people to stop denying the fact that one of their loved ones has passed on, varies depending on the person. After a death in the family, those close to the deceased may experience a sense of regret or guilt for their actions and those of others. Once my grandmother passed away, I had a conference with my school counselor who asked me to tell her about the emotions I was feeling towards my grandmother’s death. One of the emotions I picked out was guilt. I explained that I felt guilty for not having spent enough time with my grandmother, and at that point (thinking like a child) I felt that my grandmother may have passed away because I did something very bad to upset her and she simply did not want to deal with me any longer. My cousin experienced similar feelings. Her emotions were centered more on regretting the times when she had an opportunity to spend time with my grandmother; but she chose to do something else instead. Other people may try to comfort themselves by finding someone to blame for the death of their loved one. Most commonly, this blame is directed at doctors. Even though there may not have been any opportunity for the doctor to heal or revive the dying patient, it helps some people to identify the doctors as the guilty party. The reason why they direct all of their negative emotions to the doctor is because they say, â€Å"It is the doctor’s job to make him/her better; he/she died because the doctor didn’t do everything in his power to make him/her better†. Everyone deals with death differently; some people may feel guilty for their own actions while others tend to look for a figure that they can blame for the death of their loved one. Acceptance is the final step in coping with death. This is the time during which those close to the deceased are able to go through an emotional catharsis. Arriving at this stage is not easy but it pays off because you are finally able to â€Å"let go†. It is important to keep in our memories those near and dear to us, but it is equally as important not to wallow in the past because by doing so, all hope for the future is suffocated. Accepting the fact that someone you love is gone forever is difficult, it is normal to feel filled with emotion. Once the fact that my grandmother had passed finally set inside my understanding I cried for many hours every day. Crying was my way of letting out all of the emotions that I had stored inside of me after witnessing the pain my mom had gone through and losing my grandma. Saying good-bye is not easy, but it is something that must be done. Everyone copes with death differently. It may take longer for some people to realize that even though they may have lost someone who has always been of great importance to them, life must go on. This is why it is important to learn ways in which to deal with the situation and simply make the best of it. Some things can be undone; unfortunately, death is not one of those things. Even though discussing death is not a cheery topic, it is important to not only know but also to understand the different stages of grieving because as humans we cannot run away from death or avoid it. All people have an expiration date on this planet, for some it is sooner than others. Understanding the steps/stages in the grieving process can be beneficial when helping a friend cope with the loss of a close member of their family. By knowing the steps and what they consist of, you will have an understanding of why the person is reacting the way they are. It also makes it much easier for you to guide the grieving individual to the final step of acceptance from which they can return to their everyday life with the understanding that death is part of the human life cycle, and as depressing and difficult as it may be to comprehend it is an inescapable aspect of our human lives.

Shoeless Joe Essay -- essays research papers

Imagine your fate and future resting in the hands of one man’s judgment. This was actually reality for Shoeless Joe Jackson. Many argue that he was one of the best ever to play the game of baseball and was the greatest natural hitter of all-time. Yet, surprisingly, you will not find him among the familiar faces at the Hall of Fame. He was permanently banned from baseball, as well as seven others, for allegedly helping to throw the 1919 World Series.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Joe Jackson was born on July 16, 1888 in Pickins County, South Carolina. He was the oldest of eight children and grew up the son of a cotton mill worker. He began working in the mill at age thirteen and never learned how to read or write. He played baseball in his spare time, and his exceptional skills landed him in the minor leagues by the age of eighteen. He first entered professional baseball in 1908 with Greenville in the Carolina Association. It was during this same year that he received the nickname â€Å"Shoeless† Joe after he had just bought a new pair of spikes. They wore blisters on his feet and they hurt so badly that he just played in his stocking feet. Although he played only one game without the spikes, he was known as â€Å"Shoeless Joe† from then on (McGee 1).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Shoeless Joe made his major league debut later that year, in 1908, with the Philadelphia Athletics. He only played there a short time before being transferred to the Cleveland Indians. Finally, in 1915 he was sold to Charles Comiskey and the Chicago White Sox. It was here that he played his last few years of professional baseball and his life would be forever changed.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  From the years 1917 to 1919 the Chicago White Sox were by far the dominant team in baseball. It is speculated that they could have â€Å"gone on to become one of the greatest teams in history† (Schwalbe 2). However, despite having the most talented team around, Charles Comiskey paid his players considerably less than any other winning team (Durst 2). Due to the oppression they were under, the player’s morale began to decrease as their need for money increased. They considered going on strike, but were talked out of it by their manager, â€Å"Kid† Gleason. They remained desperate until first baseman Chick Gandil met with a notorious gambler named â€Å"Sport† Sullivan. The White So... ...t up and protect his own reputation. Comiskey’s lawyer acted as Joe’s lawyer also, although he was really only trying to protect Comiskey. In modern day, Joe would have had his own lawyer from the beginning and Landis would have been convicted of contempt of court since he went against the court’s ruling and banished the eight players for life. Joe would not have had to prove his innocence. Instead, someone would have had to prove him guilty. Clearly, this could not have been achieved. There is no evidence that he did anything wrong, and his statistics clearly support the opposite. Alongside, his performance in the 1919 World Series, Joe’s career batting average of .356 is the third best of all-time (CMG 1). On top of this, he led the league in triples eight times and held the throwing record for distance. It is a shame he was never inducted into the Hall of Fame because of one man’s judgment to ban him from the game. Part of Joe’s last words were â€Å"I’m going to meet the greatest umpire of all – and he knows I’m innocent.† (McCroskey 1). He passed away on Decem ber 5, 1951, and will remain, although often disparaged and misunderstood, one of our national pastime’s greatest legends.

Marks & Spencer Retailing Strategy Essay

1. Introduction In this essay, in scope of the subject Organizational Management I, we will study the case of one of UK’s leading retailers that is Marks & Spencer. We are proposed to answer 3 given questions regarding the firm, specifically its strategy. Not only will we answer these given questions, we intend to further develop the concept of corporate strategy taught in class and relate it to M&S case in order to better understand it. During this case study we will also explore the history of this company, explaining the firm’s organization problem, the crisis that happened within the firm and also it’s strategies to overcome this crisis. We are also going to focus on the brand and in the ranges that M&S has available in the clothing market. There will be presented in this report aspects such as the market segments that M&S products ranges serve, the order winners and qualifiers for them and, finally, the different logistics performance objectives for the different ranges. Operations Management I 2. Development 2.1. History Marks & Spencer (M&S) is one of UK’s leading retailers with over 21 million people visiting their stores per week. M&S offer stylish, high-quality, great value clothing and home products, as well as outstanding quality food and financial services. The company was started in 1884, when Michael Marks (a Russian-born Police refugee) opened a stall at Leeds Kirkgate Market. M&S have over 700 UK stores and currently the firm finds itself in the process of expanding its business internationally: the company is already present in over 43 countries. Marks & Spencer employees over 78,000 people in the UK and abroad (as M&S site has published). 2.2. Marks & Spencer pre reorganization Focusing in clothing segment, M&S presented severe problems in their strategy department and, consequently, in their development and survival, due to massive mistakes. Seeing that M&S is a retailer type of firm, meaning that they only sell products, they don’t produce them: one of their main problems was the supply chain from the source to the consumer. This route was very expensive because they had a lot of suppliers, mostly at the UK. Overall, the company had several problems about the supply chain, like: All these problems made their supply chain really slow and time-consuming, not evaluating the suppliers nicely, not having a good balance between quantity and mix. Meanwhile, the marketing section had some issues too. They weren’t able to predict sales, they only made two sales seasons (while the others made four) and their product development was very slow and expensive. This enterprise only had one brand – St. Michaels – leaving few options of choice to the customer, being the only target women between 35 to 55 years old. This brand was focused on classic style clothes and some times out of fashion. Operations Management I In short, the notorious problems in the company were: 2.2.1. Crisis All these problems triggered the 1998 crisis, where Luc Vandevelde came as 4th CEO and responsible to change the company with some strategic measures. 2.3. Marks & Spencer after reorganization 2.3.1. Strategy changes To create, choose and implement their strategy, all the companies should have in consideration external and internal factors, social responsibility and the values of the company. On one hand, the internal factors explain the strengths and weaknesses of the company. On the other Operations Management I hand, the external factor relates the opportunities and the threats of the company, showing how that it influences the activity. These two are important in strategy creation, only if they are aligned with social responsible and company values. Marks & Spencer relied on its strong points (e.g. quality), trying to improve their weaknesses (e.g. slow response system). As stated above, the company also had high regard for social responsibility, as well as the company’s values. To implement strategy changes, we need to considerate these five philosophies: M&S ï‚ · The Total Quality Management is, as the name implies, oriented to increase the quality in the processes of the organization, by creating quality consistency; ï‚ · Just in time is a production management system that determines that nothing should be produced, transported or purchased before the exact time; ï‚ · Simultaneous Engineering acts on the development of products and is based on the use of engineering processes, manufactures, among other ones; ï‚ · The Compression Management is about to reduce processes time cycles; ï‚ · Reengineering helps manage through the increased efficiency and effectiveness. M&S based their strategy mainly on the first four points above. 2.3.2. Brand Nowadays, market segmentation is an absolute requirement for the market realities. Market Segmentation is related with a marketing concept and its objective is to enhance a company’s ability to understand and know its core customers as well as whom its core customers will be in the future. Most segments are formed by looking at certain characteristics such as demographic, geographic, and physiological, amongst others. These segments help the marketer identify very important consumption patterns. Therefore, the customers are treated accordingly to the firms view regarding what the customers wants or needs and its (the firms) ability to reach those needs in a profitable way. In Mark & Spencer specific case, it uses mostly a demographic segmentation to select its targets market for its products, targeting the customers by age, income, social class and lifestyle. There are 3 different ranges of M&S for Autumn 2001, including The Perfect and Classic Collection, The Autograph and pe r una. 2.3.2.1 The Perfect and Classic Collection Marketers are progressively more concerned in the outcome of the consumers lifestyle on demand. The market segments serve at this range, targets of those consumers who have busy lifestyles, therefore intend to save time and feel opportune when buying. This segment is for those customers that find themselves on a more price-orientated basis where they look for value at the lowest price. This is why, this range is targeted more on the middle social class and it’s a timeless collection (and not just the latest fashion) on any body size of both female and male customers. 2.3.2.2. The Autograph This range is a more specific, fashion-orientated designed for more mature upper class consumers who seek the â€Å"good life†. The collection in this range is designed by some of the best designers in the business, names such as Julien Macdonald, Philip Treacy and Sonja Nuttall. They have the capability to acquire it with a high street prices which are sold only in luxurious department stores. This range will normally target on those customers who prefer quality and the best design rather than the actual cost of the product. This range is targeted on female customers who have a keen sense of fashion, therefore it isn’t design for all ages nor all types of women. Per Una has concentrated its costumers to an age group between 25 and 35 with sizes from 8 to 18 (UK sizes) since the women that find themselves within these criteria nowadays do not want to be behind the latest fashion trends. They seek out fresh/new fashion and dress smartly and more importantly differently from another, therefore existing the Limited Edition, with that exact purpose. per una offers a better design and price to target young and middle-class women. 2.4. Order winners and qualifiers The different ranges that Marks & Spencer have available in the market presents competitive characteristics that make a costumer feel interested to buy a specific product. There are order qualifiers and order winners for these different ranges: The Perfect and Classic Collection (that we assumed that serve essentially the same range segment), The Autograph and the per una. The first order that we mentioned makes reference to the competitive aspects of a product that allows it to be considered by the costumers. On the other hand, order winners relates to the competitive characteristics that makes a product be chose by the interested in a specific product. Therefore, for the three ranges that M&S has available in the market and by the document we were presented to, we found some order qualifiers and winners for them. To The Perfect and Classic Collection we realized that size availability is a very important aspect to the costumers, which means that this factor is an order qualifier. In fact, there is a costumer that answered (to the questions that were made to her) that when â€Å"larger sizes have sold out† she gets â€Å"annoyed†. Thereby, some customers will have to go look in other stores to find what they need. About the order winners, in this range, costumers identify quality, price and variety of colors are three important aspects as they get interested in a product. Briefly, the item must be value for money and cannot require specialist washing as it has to wash well. In reference to The Autograph range, as it is defined to bring â€Å"cutting-edge design†, it is easy to understand that the most important order qualifier is the exclusive design of a certain item: the costumers want to buy a cloth that is â€Å"one of a kind†. Quality is the order winners in this range. When clients are looking for this products, they do not give so much importance to the price. Finally, the per una, a high-quality range, the attractive competitive aspect is the same as in The Autograph range: exclusity of design. The order qualifier is the rarity of a product and is difference . However, the segment of the market that looks for per una has a more concern about the price and, consequently, gives more importance to the value of a certain product. Even they care about the quality (as it must be well made and expected to last), the order winner in this range is the price that they are up to pay for the item. 2.5. Logistics performance objectives The planning and control of the organization will allow it to coordinate all the different operations that the organization has. It will grantee that all the materials are in the right place at the right time (just-in-time). Managers must control the operations to make sure that all runs like planned and finds the consumer needs. M&S changed the way to work with their suppliers and it provided a new approach to the market, principally the segment of clothes where they have done massive adjustments to get better performances. They created new divisions, and we will talk about those changes. Logistical department intends the enterprise to adapt itself to the market, so they created a new distribution of products by store and category. In other words, The Perfect and Classic ranges are located in almost all M&S stores because it is a product for the middle class, â€Å"for core customers†, with a low and viable price. The Autograph range, is into selected stores for the reason that its high prices can’t beat the most competitive brands in the common market and, finally, the per una collection is also in selected stores – despite its competitive price it’s a series that is very uncommon to find because the production has no repeats and so there is no piece like the other. This decision , to enter in the fashion business with a bigger offer then before, led the company to improve and presented a more efficient distribution of their products to the customers. In an organized way, each one of these brands according to their objective went to a shop strategically placed near to the right target. Like this they would have a faster response to the market resulting in the increase of the competitiveness of M&S. 3. Conclusion Marks & Spencer had several problems with the development of their company, having a huge crisis in 1998. To overcome this crisis, the company made some changes in their strategy in order to return to success. Changes in the supply chain, the marketing department and the increase of sub-brands, for example, led to: the increasing of quality, transparency, flexibility and the response of production cycle, elimination of duplication and gaining of more costumers. Nowadays, the company has a faster supply line, a more efficient marketing department and a huge variety of products, covering a larger number of customers which led to, generally, a better performance of the company. 4. Bibliography 1. CHASE, Richard B.; JACOBS, F. Robert; AQUILANO, Nicholas J.; Operations Management for Competitive Advantage; McGraw-Hill Irwin, 11th edition. 2. http://corporate.marksandspencer.com/aboutus/company_overview

Revision Of The Critique Of Hardin’S “Lifeboat Ethics”

Revision of the Critique of Hardin’s â€Å"Lifeboat Ethics†: The Case against Helping the Poor Garrett Hardin was a controversial ecologist who believed that overpopulation was going to bring a downfall to a world of limited resources. Each nation was compared to a lifeboat with the rich being inside the boat and the poor in the water, drowning (Hardin, 561). He wrote the â€Å"Lifeboat Ethics† in 1974 when Ethiopia was having a starvation problem. Hardin’s opinion about the situation was that sending aid to Ethiopia was only making the problem worse and by feeding the people would aid overpopulation; the root to the problem. Hardin’s thesis developed from the notion that the rich should do nothing to help the poor. He believed that one†¦show more content†¦He believed this led to ratchet system. In other words, the food aid sent to poor countries would prevent the famine from decreasing the numbers in the population and preventing the famine from making the population more manageable. In nature, over-population is self-correcting through famine and disease; therefore a lot of suffering in the process. Our efforts to stop the suffering is what breaks the natural cycle (Hardin). This was the most controversial point made by Hardin. Hardin’s third point was clearly made, â€Å"shutting the door† on allowing immigrants to come to other nations is another way to solve overpopulation. He believed the resources in a nation belonged to the natives of the nation and therefore should not go to those that immigrate into the nation. Hardin’s thoughts on this point was that allowing immigrants to come into America would cause America to go deeper into poverty. Finally, Hardin’s last point was to draw the line that would prevent other immigrants from coming into our nation at this point. Hardin’s thought is that we can’t remove the immigrants that are already here, but an imag inary line can be drawn to prevent more immigrants from coming into the nation and this will continue to create more overpopulating. With considering all the points made by Hardin, it is clear that his purpose for writing â€Å"Lifeboat of Ethics† was to inform and educate society on the detrimental effects