Wednesday, May 6, 2020

Great Expectation Coursework Free Essays

The first visit Pip had to Miss Havisham’s house frightens and intimidates him ‘the passage were all dark, and that she had left a candle burning.’ Dickens uses dark imagery to show a bit of clue to the audience the kind of person Miss Havisham is and it emphasises the dark side of Miss Havisham. This makes Pip scared because this is because this is different to where he came from, the house was huge. We will write a custom essay sample on Great Expectation Coursework or any similar topic only for you Order Now This shows how different his life is compared to Miss Havisham and Estella and how mysterious the house seems to him and us. Dickens creates a frightening atmosphere by describing the house in a really sinister way, ‘grass was growing in every crevice.’ Dickens has portrayed the house as being uncared for because it tells and shows us that Miss Havisham hasn’t cared for herself so if she can’t do that, she obviously won’t care for her house. It shows how mysterious scary and Miss Havisham is. Dickens describes Pip as ‘half afraid’ towards Miss Havisham and the house. This shows how the reader understands his trepidation. Pip’s social background is much lower compared to Miss Havisham and Estella, his mum and dad are dead, and he lives with his sister and her husband Joe, who is a blacksmith. His sister is worried and afraid Pip will follow in the footstep of her husband and wants him to achieve ‘great expectations’. Pip comes from a poor and low status background, so seeing a house like Miss Havisham’s has different feelings, he feels amazed but at the same time worried. ‘This was very uncomfortable, and I was half afraid.’ Estella treats Pip in a very controlling and rude way. She makes him feel useless and shows him how lower class he is compared to her. She treats him like a dog, always controlling what he does and always saying stuff about how he looks. ‘He is a common labouring boy, and what coarse hand he has.’ This makes Pip start to see who he really is and he begins to worry about how he looks, because before he didn’t really consider himself inferior. Pip also tried to be nice to Estella but every time he tried she never seemed to care or notice. ‘After you miss’ to this she returned ‘don’t be ridiculous boy, I am not going in.’ This is done by Dickens to tell the audience that throughout the novel Pip will go through some adventure and Estella treatment towards him was one of them. It was the beginning. The house would really intimidate Pip because the Satis House compared to his house is like a palace ‘the great front entrance had two chains across it outside.’ Also all of the riches he sees ‘jewels sparkled on her neck.’ This shows a different side of Pip because of his reaction and also to describe what exactly was inside the house and to describe the opposite of Pip’s life. The entrance to the house was mysteriously dark. Pip has also never seen such wealth before, so his expectations changes after his first visit. He becomes ashamed of himself, his background and Joe. When Pip first sees Miss Havisham, his reactions are stunned and shocked. Dickens also writes that he feels Miss Havisham is ‘the strangest lady, he has or will ever see.’ The impression given to the reader is that he is scared and full of anticipation. This shows how odd the house is and how Miss Havisham is a contrast to Pip’s life. When Miss Havisham speaks to Pip, she asks him lots of strange questions which makes her seem impatient ‘call Estella, she repeated, flashing a look at me. You can do that, call Estella at the door.’ She speaks to him like he is a servant, always giving him instructions like she owns him or has power over him. ‘Call Estella, you can do that.’ She also moves her hand around a lot, which makes her appear really arrogant and bossy. ‘With an impatient movement of the fingers of her right hand.’ Pip felt very nervous and anxious before he entered Miss Havisham’s room. Dickens describes him as being ‘half afraid’ and he is scared of the dark. Dickens also presents Pip as being very small and scared. This is to emphasise the strangeness of the house and how Pip is out of place. Dickens uses imagery to describe Miss Havisham as dying or dead, he also describes her as a skeleton, ‘had shrunk to skin and bone.’ The symbolism used is of a dead person. ‘Skeleton seemed to have dark eyes that moved and looked at me.’ Dickens has done this to make the reader shocked because he wants us to feel disgusted and disturbed, and also to infer that she is half dead because of her emotional state. The effect of Miss Havisham’s treatment on Pip is that he starts to notice who he really is ‘I began to consider them a very different pair, her contempt for me was so strong, that it become infectious and I caught it.’ He also begins to feel ashamed of his social life and he sees the differences between himself and Miss Havisham. Miss Havisham also becomes bossy towards Pip and starts to control him using imperatives ‘play, play, play!’ This would make Pip feel useless, insulted and ashamed of his family and probably wished he had a higher status like Miss Havisham and Estella. Estella’s treatment towards Pip would affect him by making him feel depressed and make him think that Estella has power over him. Pip feels very strange towards Estella. He is in love with her but she doesn’t seem to care. She talks to him like a 5 year old boy. ‘Don’t be ridiculous boy.’ This will make Pip feel like he is the servant while Estella is the master. Estella tries really hard to put Pip down and it usually works. ‘Her contempt for me was so strong, that it became infectious and I caught it.’ It was like Estella had a disease and that has been given to Pip. She also calls him names ‘a stupid, clumsy, labouring boy.’ At this point of the story, I think Pip feels ashamed of his family especially Joe. To Pip, Estella was his angel of light, his star. ‘Her light came along the dark passage like a star.’ So without Estella, Pip can’t see, he’s nothing. However, like a star, Estella is cold, hard and out of reach. In the story each of the characters are controlled by one and another. Miss Havisham controls Estella and Estella controls Pip. She wants to get revenge on a male because of what happened with her ex. So she’s using Estella to get revenge ‘well? You can break his heart.’ Estella is controlling Pip because of Miss Havisham also because she is ‘self – possessed’ and too full of herself. Pip is a pawn in their little games. The immediate effects on Pip of his first visit are that he begins to see the differences between himself, Estella and Miss Havisham. ‘I took the opportunity of being alone in the court – yard to look at my coarse hands and my common boots.’ He believes what he has been told by Estella and starts to call himself he exact words. He begins to believe he really is not worth it. This has a long term effects in the novel because he becomes a complete different character who looks down at other people, just like Estella and Miss Havisham. Dickens did this to tell the reader that money can change people’s character and no matter how much you have there is still a place in your heart that remembers who you were before. The long term effect on Pip of his first visit, are that he starts to become ashamed of his family especially Joe. ‘I wished Joe had been rather more genteelly brought up, and then I should have been so too.’ He also starts to hope that he doesn’t end up as a blacksmith like Joe. As the time goes on he becomes a snob. Dickens is showing the negative effects of money/elevation in status. The Satis House is like the opposite of Pip’s life. He lives in a small house and the Satis House is like a palace, compared to his. It can be seen as a symbol for changing Pip’s personality, background and his heart. Also it changes his behaviour from being nice, to becoming a rude boy and full of himself, just like Estella. Pip’s visit to the house, is very important because throughout is childhood he had never really had much fun and also his family hope that he can gain an higher status by going to the Satis House. But for his sister she’s hoping by Pip going there he may become wealthy one day and they/she would have a better life. So everything Miss Havisham instructs him to do, he has to obey her ‘with the fear of my sister’s working me before my eyes, I had a desperate idea of starting round the room in the assumed character of Mr Pumblechook’s chaise – cart.’ In the novel Dickens is trying to say that no matter how wealthy you are or how nice you are money can change people. He is trying to tell us that the low social class people (Pip’s family) were provoked by the amount of wealth they saw, and that intimidated them to want to be rich and rise in status. The reader’s opinion of the effect of Satis House on Pip’s future, is that if he didn’t go to the house, he would be a different character, a different person. So it’s the sister’s fault for most of the way Pip has changed, but also Miss Havisham and Estella’s fault because if he didn’t meet them, he wouldn’t be rude or have knew about so much wealth. He would be happy the way he was. The whole of the novel hinges that Pip will obviously become a snob and that Pip and Estella might not really get together at first but anything could happen after that. How to cite Great Expectation Coursework, Papers

Lion Financial Services free essay sample

Boatwright knew that technology had significantly advanced since the LFS call centers were originally designed and he was keenly aware that LFS was facing a steady increase in the associated costs of operating these call centers. Boatwright contacted Customer Solutions Group (CSG) in February of 2000 and Andy Carr, CSG’s Chief Operating Officer, was brought in to begin working on the project of providing actionable and specific recommendations that would be designed to improve quality and reduce costs.Carr spent the next several months observing the call center operations, interviewing managers and employees, and analyzing the existing data, training materials and corporate reports. After extensive analysis, Carr was prepared to present his findings and new design for LFS’ call center and operations. Our team supports Carr’s redesign proposal of LFS’ call center and believe the recommendations have merit based on our evaluation.We believe it will be successful in providing LFS with the following outcomes: a consistent and exemplary level of customer service, short time to answer, and reduce annual operating expense by . 5 million (Page 11, Paragraph 4). However, we only make this recommendation so long as Andy and LFS’s management create a thorough implementation plan that addresses business continuity and mitigates risks associated with large process redesign efforts. There are several design changes in Carr’s proposal that garnered our team’s support.The single largest being the elimination of the Boston and New Jersey call centers in favor of a single large call center at the existing Chicago facilities. Complimentary to this change is the reduction of the eight existing agent pools to that of three: Quickline, Customer Service, and Broker Service (See Exhibit 4). In making these design changes Carr implemented two fundamental process design principles. Firstly, by consolidating all call center operations to Chicago, several complex call routing tasks are now combined into a single routing task to the main call center.Secondly, in order to merge the Customer and Broker Quicklines to a single Quickline pool, it will be necessary to create detailed call blueprints and rules of thumb that will allow Quickline agents to utilize multiple versions of the same process in order to excel in processing customer and broker calls. We believe these changes will bring the consistency and quality to the customer experience that the LFS management team will find attractive. The next two design changes recommended by Carr are perfect examples of the design principle to perform the work where it makes sense. First he recommends creating a customer personal identification number (PIN) that the customer will be prompted to enter by the Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system. Upon entry, the system will be able to instantly identify the caller as either a customer or broker, determine the nature of their call, and route the call to the appropriate agent pool.When the call arrives, it will integrate with the agents’ computer system and display the required customer information as well as the reason for their call. This allows them to begin assisting the customer immediately without having to engage in challenge response questions to determine identity and ensures that the correct customer account is properly referenced. The second change is the addition of an optional automated response system that could handle the majority of the most common requests from customers and would be available 24 hours a day.Carr estimated that approximately 20% or 6,000 callers per week would choose to use the automated system, which along with the PIN system will be a significant contribution to the desired reduction in time to answer and overall talk time (Page 10, Paragraph 3). Based on the potential of these changes, we believe they will be a strong selling point of the design change for Boatwright and LFS’s other executive management.The final design change that our team feels will greatly enhance the level of customer satisfaction with LFS’ call center operations is the dramatic reduction of complexity in the overflow routing rules. Previously, the routing rules and staffing were so complex that two-full time employees were required to manage and maintain them (Page 3, Paragraph 3). Carr’s design plan eliminates the overly complex overflow rules and creates one simple â€Å"zero threshold† rule where no call will be held in queue if a qualified or overqualified agent is available (Page 10, Paragraph 4).The zero threshold rule is a perfect example of multiple complicated tasks combined into a simple streamlined task. This simple routing task, as outlined in exhibit 4, demonstrates how a call will be routed up from Quickline, t o Customer Service, and then finally to the Broker Service pool until it finds an available agent. If no available agent can be located, it will queue in the Broker Services pool until one is available (Page 10, Paragraph 5). We feel this has the potential to have a dramatic effect on operating expenses based on two criteria.First, salaries and benefits make up approximately 70% of the call center expense at LFS (Page 3, Paragraph 3). The idea is that by having an optimal overflow strategy, staffing in the call center could be significantly reduced. In general, customer service agents can handle Quickline calls faster than Quickline agents, and broker service agents can handle calls faster than customer agents, and supervisors are able to handle calls faster than the agents they supervise (Page 3, Paragraph 2).Carr is hedging that by continually routing calls up the chain to more experienced agents that call answer times will dramatically reduce. In order to mitigate the potential of calls dwelling in the broker service pool, Carr intends to intentionally overstaff brokerage while the Quickline and customer service pools would be intentionally understaffed relative to the call volume statistics of any gi ven time (Page 10, Paragraph 5). The design changes outlined above will all help achieve the estimated $1. million in operational savings per year, mostly through economies of scale resulting from the call center consolidation and the increased automation and agent productivity. By eliminating the call centers in Boston and New Jersey, LFS should be able to lower its fixed and variable costs associated with handling customer calls. By leveraging their facilities in Chicago they should be able to reduce unnecessary overhead (lease/depreciation, utilities, telecom, IT), staff (management, HR, training), and costs associated with communications between facilities (travel, postage).Simply put, a single large call center is less expensive to operate than one medium and two small sized ones. Our team believes that the design plan as outlined by Carr can be successful, however, we have identified areas where we think some additional attention needs to be paid by the CSG and LFS management teams to ensure it is. We are primarily concerned that Carr may not have considered the impact closing the two call centers will have on LFS’ long-term business continuity strategy.Today, whether by design or not, LFS appears to have a redundant call routing process that does not rely on any one particular call center to be available in order to process calls. The blizzard in February of 2011 that essentially shutdown the city of Chicago could have prevented anyone from being able to make it into LFS’s offices in order to man the call center. Carr’s future state where there is only the Chicago call center will require the creation of contingency plans to ensure customer service is maintained.With 74 branches nationwide one potential option would be to route calls geographically to the local branch that can service the customers accounts. Additionally, we are concerned that there has not been enough focus on implementation strategy. Items that need to be addressed are time frames, expenses involved in system development and integration, as well as an asset disposition plan. A well-defined implementation strategy should also take into consideration the morale of LFS’ employees throughout the consolidation effort.Based on our evaluation, Carr’s proposed design will deliver a consistent and exemplary level of custo mer service, short time to answer, and reduce LFS’ annual operating expense by $1. 5 million. In order to realize these gains LFS’ executive management in the short-term need to focus on building their implementation strategy and developing a change management plan that addresses the issues outlined previously: business continuity, disposition lan for the Boston and New Jersey call centers, and managing employee morale. In the mid-term, LFS needs to execute their strategy and change management plans. They will need to ensure they are committed to the project and assign the proper priority and personnel to have a successful implementation. In the long-term, they should establish procedures to monitor Carr’s recommended quality measures (Page 9) and make any necessary adjustments to maintain agent productivity and quality service.

Sunday, May 3, 2020

The Brotherhoods in the Invisible Man free essay sample

The Brotherhood in the Invisible Man Brotherhoods are associations, usually of men, that unite for common purposes. The members in the brotherhood typically respect one another, defend one another, and cooperate to obtain specific goals. The American Federation of Labor (AFL) was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States, whose goal is to create better employment opportunities for workers. Kappa Sigma and Sigma Chi are two of the largest university fraternities in the country and whose similar values are leadership, service, and scholarship. In the novel, the narrator rarely speaks of his family, except for his grandfather who continues to appear throughout the text, thus there is a large absence of family. Brotherhood is a notion in Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, where the narrator joins a brotherhood to create bonds with other men like him. In the novel, the narrator encounters three brotherhoods that prove self-serving organizations that prey on the Black community. The narrator comes into contact with three man-led brotherhoods with very distinct ideologies. The first brotherhood the narrator encounters is led by a West Indian man by the name of Ras, the Exhorter. Ras the Exhorter supports a specific, black-centered worldview. He feels deeply rooted for black segregation and power. Ras believes in returning to his roots as a black man and has a hatred for the white man. Perhaps Ras is modeled off of Marcus Garvey, a political figure of the 1950s who believed in returning to Africa and his roots. Brother Jack, the opposite of Ras, is another leader the narrator meets and joins his Brotherhood. The Brotherhood practices to an ideology based on that of American communist groups in the 1930s. Their ideology is centered on the Marxist theory of history which holds that those of lower social status must submit themselves to the unavoidable class struggles on the path to equality (Marx: Theory of History). The last leader of a brotherhood is led by Rinehart. Rinehart’s brotherhood is not as distinct in political awareness of the community as Ras or Brother Jack, but the clear difference in Rinehart’s brotherhood is appearance or identity. Rinehart represents a conception of identity, the idea that a person’s identity can change completely depending on where one is and with whom one interacts. Brother jack and Ras, the Exhorter tend to have brotherhoods formally organized with platforms, speeches made, and events, whereas Rinehart’s brotherhood is hidden and cannot be easily detected. While adventuring Harlem, the narrator encounters the various personalities that make up the three leaders of the brotherhoods. Ras, the Exhorter is first viewed when the narrator enters the city but becomes a much stronger force once the narrator has joined the Brotherhood and stands in opposition to Ras. Ras is inspiring because he has a message that blacks want to listen to, the unity of race. On the other hand, he is terrifying, because his methods are violent. He is perceived not as a visionary but as a dangerous militant, irrational, ridiculous figure. â€Å"†¦knowing that Ras was not funny, or not only funny, but dangerous as well, wrong but justified, crazy and yet coldly sane†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Invisible Man p. 426). Brother Jack gains the narrator’s trust by being kind and compassionate at first, offering him a ton of opportunities like money, a job, and the chance to represent his community. â€Å"He gave the impression that he understood much and spoke out of knowledge far deeper than appeared on the surface of his words† (p. 223). The narrator is aware of Brother Jack’s strange confidence in following him and addressing him in the restaurant. While eating, Brother Jack buys the narrator dessert and proposes the narrator a chance to join the Brotherhood. There are many strings attached to the benefits that the narrator obtains through working for the Brotherhood. Brother Jack demands that the narrator renounce his past, focus on the collective, and use abstract jargon and ideology in his speeches. â€Å"Our discipline demands therefore that we [Brotherhood] talk to no one and that we avoid situations in which information might be given away unwittingly. So you must put aside your past† (p. 234). The last leader Rinehart does not physically appear in the novel however the narrator learns about his different personas when he disguises himself and is taken to be Rinehart. By wearing dark green shades and a big hat for a disguise, people in the streets recognize him as the man Rinehart. Through their perceptions of him, the narrator sees how Rinehart has taken on the conflicting identities of a lover, hipster, runner, pimp, briber, and Reverend. â€Å"He was a broad man, a man of parts who got around. Rinehart the rounder. † (p. 376). Rinehart appears to be especially devious and deceptive, in reality; he has simply learned to adapt to his environment. Two of the three leaders offer the narrator lifestyles that would help him gain some recognition or benefits like Brother Jack and his brotherhood or Rinehart and the ability of disguise. Ras doesn’t necessarily offer a lifestyle to the narrator, and instead they become fast enemies. The narrator develops different relationships with the leaders of the three brotherhoods. Each of the leaders develops either a friendship or becomes an enemy except Rinehart who is neither to the narrator. Ras is the main black opponent to the Brotherhood whom the narrator has to deal with in Harlem. He calls the narrator a traitor for not militantly supporting his race against the white establishment. â€Å"I ahm no black educated fool who t’inks everything between black mahn and white mahn can be settled with some blahsted lies in some bloody books written by the white mahn in the first place† (p. 284). Throughout the novel, the tension between the narrator and Ras intensifies until Ras wants to kill him. â€Å"Hang him up to teach the black people a lesson, and theer be no more traitors. No more Uncle Toms! Hang him up theer with them blahsted dummies† (p. 421). The narrator develops various relationships with Brother Jack when he joins the Brotherhood. Brother Jack approaches the narrator first as a friend that could be loyal when they first meet in the restaurant. Throughout the novel, the narrator’s relationship shifts from friend-friend, leader-follower, father-son, brother-brother, and finally human-machine with Brother Jack as the former in each of the relationships. The leader-follower relationship is first realized when the narrator analyzes Brother Jack after observing his behavior around the other members. Brother Jack very authoritative, the others always respectful. He must be a powerful man, I thought, not a clown at all† (p. 236). The father-son relationship occurs when the narrator gives his first speech as a new member of the Brotherhood. â€Å"He stood up front beside a microphone, his feet planted solidly on the dirty canvas-covered platform, looking from side to side; his posture dignified and benign, like a bemused father, listening to the performance of his adoring children† (p. 257). Before the narrator is made a member of the Brotherhood, there is a scene where the narrator is surrounded by the members and is initiated into the group. â€Å"I was swept into the large room and introduced by my new name. Everyone smiled and seemed eager to meet me†¦All grasped me warmly by the hand† (p. 236). During this scene, the narrator and Brother Jack are considered brothers, or as equals. The last relationship, human-machine, occurs when Brother Jack uses the narrator to help the brotherhood create destruction in Harlem. Rinehart plays as a disguise for the narrator near the end of the novel, when the narrator is fleeing from Ras and his group. The narrator never truly meets Rinehart, but instead uses Rinehart as a mask to learn more about the community. â€Å"I was both depressed and fascinated. I wanted to know Rinehart and yet, I thought, I’m upset because I don’t have to know him, that simply becoming aware of his existence, being mistaken for him, is enough to convince me that Rinehart is real† (p. 376). At first, the narrator feels that Rinehart’s adaptability in the community enables a kind of freedom, but he quickly realizes that Rinehart’s fluidity also represents a complete loss of individual selfhood. In the end, the liquidity of Rinehart’s identity is one of the forces that compel the narrator to discover his own more solid identity. The narrator rarely truly develops a personal relationship with the leaders of the brotherhood. Only two, Brother Jack and Rinehart offer a small shield of protection or light to temporarily stand in to allow the narrator to express thoughts, however not his true genuine ideas. In the novel Invisible Man, the three brotherhoods devise strategies in manipulating the community to obtain benefits best fit for their organization. Ras, the Exhorter uses the appeal of emotion to help rally people for campaign. The narrator finds this method irrational and annoying because Ras is able to gather up people better than the Brotherhood. â€Å"†¦when I first came to Harlem one of the first things that impressed me was a man making a speech from a ladder. He spoke very violently and with an accent, but he had an enthusiastic audience†¦Why can’t we carry our program to the street the same way† (p. 276). Ras also uses violence to get his point across whereas the Brotherhood uses logic and reason in their approach. The Brotherhood defines history as a force shaped by the peoples will, when actually the Brotherhood defines the peoples will and thereby shapes history. There is a strict hierarchical organization of the Brotherhood, its central committee, is the principal definer and mover of history with the lower committees as puppets or pawns. On the surface, it seems to reflect the peoples desires, but truly it is but a means of asserting the committees power over the people. According to Jack, the narrator was speaking not for his private interests in mind but as a response to what the people wanted. â€Å"At any rate, through our very position in the vanguard we must do and say the things necessary to get the greatest number of the people to move toward what is their own good† (p. 381). Somebody has to provide a scientific understanding of this determining force, however, and such a role is conveniently fulfilled by the Brotherhood itself. Although Rinehart is depicted as a con-artist who takes advantage of the people of Harlem, he does so in such a way as to take advantage of everyone in Harlem. Not just the blacks and not just the whites, by playing on the ideas of what they are able to see and what they remain blind to Rinehart dresses according to their needs or environment. â€Å"Was that also what Rinehart was, a principle of hope for which they gladly paid† (p. 382). The Brotherhood supposedly advocates nonviolence and focuses on integration and cooperation where both whites and blacks will be able to work together for the good of society as a whole, especially the poor and oppressed. In contrast, Rass followers advocate freedom and equality even if it means fighting for these rights. The Brotherhood focuses on issues of both race and class, whereas Rass followers emphasize race as the deciding factor. By the narrator making him blind and invisible in the persona of Rinehart, he is finally able to see the reality of how both whites and blacks on their various sides have been working collectively to keep the black people and culture in their place. Rinehart seems to be a mixture of the concepts of Ras and the Brotherhood, yet Rinehart doesn’t allow for his community to come to destruction at the end of the novel. Although Rinehart stands for chaos, his world is full of fluidity in identity that it can represent possibility.

Friday, March 27, 2020

Metadata and Tools in American Express

American express plays a major role in helping merchants to buy and sell their goods and services. It provides advanced payment services to its client’s travel and expense management solutions for all sizes of businesses.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Metadata and Tools in American Express specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More American express processes millions of transactions due to the high number of members around the world. It also assists small enterprise owners in purchasing and controlling their finances. American express also operates one of the largest travel networks for consumers and businesses. Metadata is organized information that describes, explains and locates data, and even makes data retrieval easier (Smiraglia, 2005). The data could be information about a company’s physical data, technical and business processes. One of the importances of metadata is to ensure consistency in definit ions. Metadata constitutes data that helps in differentiating terms such as a client, and a customer. Meta data also helps in ensuring the clarity of relationships. Meta data is essential in ensuring consistency when identifying the relationships between entities stored in a database. Meta data also ensures the clarity of data lineage. Metadata maintains the storage of information in the correct formats, location and steward. It is important for a large company such as American express to have a reliable system of data storage. With its large number of users, it is important that the company implements a data storage system that will help in effective data storage, retrieval and manipulation. With slightly over 104 million active card users, 63,500 employees and assets worth $153 dollars, the company needs to have an effective and efficient data storage system. American express has embraced the use of advanced technology, whereby, consumers pay for products online, a process that en hances speed and convenience. Develop a high-level plan that describes the steps you would use to create enterprise-level metadata The first step that will be taken to ensure easier creation of metadata is to gather enough information before beginning the project. It is important to consider getting reliable data storage resources that can accommodate all data, which is likely to multiply and consume large disk space.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More It is also important to understand the data with regard to aspects of its intended purpose, its validity, resources used to create it, what it represents and how it will be presented (Smiraglia, 2005). The second step in creating the metadata is to review other examples of metadata that have been successful. This is conducted by examining how well other companies store their data and utilize the metadata system. This factor helps in determining the most appropriate strategy for the company (Smiraglia, 2005). The next step will involve selecting the most appropriate and easily available resources. The resources to be used should have a user friendly interface to enhance easy usability of the system. This will be important in reducing the time taken to enter values in their respective fields. It will be advisable to first use data resources that are easily available while entering the data, so as to enhance accuracy. The final step after entering the data is to parse the records. The parsing process reviews all the values and structures of the record with an aim of ensuring accuracy. This is done by identifying all existing errors in the metadata. It is important to run the parsing process over and over again until no errors are identified. Develop examples of metadata specific to the context of your chosen organization that would demonstrate how the metadata stack would be useful within context of a particul ar implementation The implementation of metadata will play a major role in the data storage and management of American express. American express needs to store huge amounts of data related to the clients’ details as well as all other transactions. All the information about the registered consumers and clients is stored in the company’s database. When a new client signs up to be a card holder, he or she provides all his or her basic information, which is then stored in the database. All the transaction information that is carried out using the active cards is stored in the company’s database. This data requires to be organized in a consistent way. If the metadata is implemented, it will help in differentiating between terminologies which are close to having the same meaning. The metadata will also play the role of identifying the relationships between the data stored in the database. This will identify the relationship between entities entered using different wor ds, but that have the same meaning. If the metadata is implemented at American express, it will allow room for manipulating the data while making changes, deleting the data or correctly formatting the data (Caplan, 2003).Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Metadata and Tools in American Express specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Another benefit that the American express will have from the implementation of metadata and proper information management is that it will have additional and quicker time to advertise new products in the market. Additionally, there will be smooth product data integration in case of changes in the company because data all data will be presented together (Caplan, 2003). Additionally, the company will have a clear view of its performance; hence, it will be able to easily monitor changes in the market. Analyze the role of ETL tools in the overall master data management project Master data managem ent is the process of creating and managing data. Here, the organization must have a master copy that is referred to as the master data (Loshin, 2010). The master data mostly comprises of information about clients, employees and products. The importance of master data management is because it offers one copy of data that is accurate and clearly defined. In the absence of a master data, there is a possibility of having other copies of data that are not consistent with each other (Gordon, 2003). To ensure the privacy of data stored, the organization should hire reliable personnel to handle it. Some of the tools required for the implementation of master data management include ETL tools, data quality tools, data profiling tools, database, web server, messaging server, test management server and the work flow tool (Loshin, 2010). The ETL tool is used in the data integration section of the master data management implementation to alternate, standardize and transfer data to the master dat a management hub. Most of the master data management vendors have the ETL tool integrated into the application while others have the ETL tool presented as a separate application (Gordon, 2003). Outline factors that would play a role in the selection of appropriate tools that would contribute to the success of a master data management project within the context of your chosen organization As stated before, there are various tools that are integrated in the creation of master data management projects. Different master data management vendors utilize different types of tools. There are a number of factors that organizations are required to consider while making a choice on the master data management integration tool to use.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More One of the factors companies need to consider includes the factors that will be affected by the implementation of that tool. In the case of American express, ETL is the best choice of integration tool because all the data is loaded in to one hub where it can only be accessed by authorized personnel. This is important in ensuring data security and privacy (Gordon, 2003). Another factor that companies should consider in choosing a master data management integration tool is the size of the company. The integration tools preferred for small companies may differ from those chosen for large companies. Large multinational companies such as American express will go for the high standing MDM vendors in the market since they have a wider experience in handling data management challenges (Loshin, 2010). Companies should also consider their background and past experiences so as to determine their performance in the market. For smaller sized companies, the choice of the vendor may depend on thei r suitability. Higher standing MDM vendors are likely to charge higher prices as compared to the lower vendors in the market. It is important for the company to assess the vendor’s prices in the market to determine whether they can afford the services (Dubov, 2007). Larger multinational organizations such as American express are not likely to consider the prices in the market, as they focus more on the quality of the services being provided (Loshin, 2010). Another factor that should be considered is the probability of change in the management of the company. The management determines how data is managed, and how the attributes are added. In the case of change in management, the tools to be used should have the ability to store the history of data (Dubov, 2007). The final factor that should be considered when choosing the MDM vendor is the availability of a data backup system. A large multinational company such as American express must have a reliable data backup. References C aplan, P. (2003). Metadata Fundamentals: For All Librarians: Chicago: American Library Association. Dubov, L. (2007). Master Data Management and Customer Data Integration for a Global Enterprise: New York: Morgan Kaufmann. Gordon, K. (2003). Principles of Data Management: Facilitating Information Sharing: London: The Chartered Institute. Loshin, D. (2010). Master Data Management. Massachusetts: Morgan Kaufmann. Smiraglia, P. (2005). Metadata: A Cataloger’s Primer. London: Routledge. This essay on Metadata and Tools in American Express was written and submitted by user Sara L. to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.

Friday, March 6, 2020

Quantitative easing - Emphasis

Quantitative easing Quantitative easing Look out for the latest innocent-sounding financial buzz-phrase that hides some very big news indeed. This one sounds more benign than sub-prime loans. Yet its effects could be just as far reaching, if not more so. That phrase is quantitative easing. It may sound like the lesson you forgot in physics class, as Gerard Baker of The Times has put it. But its actually what governments do when theyve run out of options. It means, essentially, printing more money. Its what the Japanese central bank did when its economy went belly-up in 2001. (It had already driven interest rates close to zero.) As we write, UK business secretary Lord Mandelson is strongly denying that quantitative easing is even on the agenda. But the US Federal Reserve has already decided to do it, in order to buy up long-term debt. The theory is this lowers the interest rates on these assets, so that loans in general become cheaper and money starts to move around the economy again. A cynic might say that the jargon is there to hide whats really going on, just as collateral damage sounds better than killing innocent civilians. Whether thats true or not, youre likely to hear it more and more soon: when we searched on Google for the (exact) phrase we got well over three hundred thousand results.

Wednesday, February 19, 2020

How did religion and socio-economic factors challenges to reform under Essay

How did religion and socio-economic factors challenges to reform under the Qajars in Iran from the mid-19th to early 20th century - Essay Example This paper will discuss the manner in which religion and socio-economic factors challenged reform under the Qajars in Iran from the mid-19th to early 20th century. In any society, religion is an important aspect especially in development and reforms issues. In the Iranian society, between the periods of mid-19th century and early 20th century, reformation occurred in terms of nationality, identity, politics and the constitution. In these reformations, religion was an important aspect. Islam was the main and most famous religion in Iran and reflected the definite economic trends and the changes in class interests, property relations and social tendencies. Islam was an integral part of leadership, political, economic and social lives of people in Iran at this time. Thus, it influenced the type of reformation that occurred in the country. During the Qajar dynasty in Iran, the political leadership and governance of the country was a weak centralized regime that had strong provincial tribal forces and an independent religious establishment (Lapidus, 2002:65). European conquests, cultural influence and economic expedition made the state and society weak and encouraged constitutional revolution. However, Islam opposed the reformations that were introduced by the Europeans especially because the reforms were seen as a conflict of religious interest between Christianity from Europe and Islam that had existed in Iran for a good while. For instance, Europeans wanted women to be educated similarly to men, something that Islam was against because according to its customs, women were not the same as men, were not allowed to get an education but remain at home, and serve their families (Nomani & Behdad, 2006:127). The fact that the Qajars wanted to maintain a tenuous suzerainty enhanced the power of the religious establishments. The independence of the religious establishment hit the Qajars hard. The Ulama of Iran had a strong

Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Summaries of the articles Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Summaries of the articles - Article Example The course that I am doing is purely about marketing. It involves who businesses should correctly market themselves in order to achieve the competitive advantage. The factors that affect the business environment are the same things that appear in my course. Therefore, this article is relevant in helping me confirm the things that I have learnt about the business environment. Understanding these factors from a different source is significant to allowing me to better understand the course or simply how marketing works. I learnt the variables, which form the environment of marketing strategy planning. I now comprehend why company goals are significant in directing marketing strategy planning. I also now see how the resources of a business influence the search for opportunities. I also know how the diverse forms of competitive situations influence strategy planning. Finally, I understand how the technological and economic environment can influence strategy