College Accounting Study Guide - Useful Information For Accounting Students

College Accounting Study Guide - Useful Information For Accounting StudentsIf you are going to take a college accounting study guide, it is important that you choose one with the right learning materials and with good review materials. This is because the main thing is to get familiar with the concept, concepts and principles before you start your career. You need to know what are the goals of your future career and the different aspects that will influence the financial well being of your family.The main purpose of taking a college accounting study guide is to help you in preparing the financial documents that will be used in your upcoming career. This means that you have to learn how to prepare the documents in a proper manner so that they will be accepted by the financial institutions. These institutions have strict requirements regarding the financial statements, which you will be required to prepare. It is necessary that you must learn how to gather the required information in o rder to prepare the report in a professional manner.However, in order to make it easier for you, there are different types of college accounting study guides available in the market. The ones with them are usually easy to use and they are better in this aspect. However, there are other ones which can be expensive but give you more tips which will help you in the future.One of the most important things that can be learned by a college accounting study guide is the basics of the accountancy. This is necessary because this will also give you a solid foundation for the future. The introduction to the subject is the first thing that is learnt. The material that follows this basic introduction will help you understand the principal parts of the subject.There has been a recent trend in accounting, which has affected the lives of millions of people in the country. It is the financial implications of money and wealth and how it affects the whole economy. As mentioned earlier, the financial i nstitutions depend on the financial documents prepared by their employees and only professionals can prepare these documents. A college accounting study guide can help you in knowing the rules and regulations and you will be able to understand the importance of the financial documents that they prepare.There are many benefits that you will enjoy by following the financial regulations that are set by the government in the country. This includes how the inflation rate affects the value of the currency, the trading rates and other factors that will affect the price of the products. All these can be explained with the help of a college accounting study guide. The way you learn the new concepts and guidelines will determine the growth of your future in the future.Taking a college accounting study guide will help you in preparing the financial documents. You can check the review material after using the manual to determine the quality of the material. The job prospects and future financia l stability can be influenced by the quality of these documents.

How to Find Sample College Essay Questions

How to Find Sample College Essay QuestionsThere are hundreds of sample college essay questions that you can use in order to help you create an essay that will give your school the highest grade possible. The first thing you need to do is find some of these samples so that you will be able to utilize them.- This essay has some grammar mistakes. If this is a non-fiction class, ask the professor to correct these errors for you.- This college essay questions are worded poorly. You can write something that will help your answer the question rather than trying to make it sound good.- This essay asks questions about the student's GPA. You can make it more specific by putting it in the context of an essay about academic standards.- This essay asks questions about grades, study habits, and work habits. The last one will allow you to add things that might show the student's dedication to the study process. They may be more apt to respond to your question if they see something that they have co ntributed to the grade.- The questions listed above are the main ones that you will come across when searching for sample college essay questions. Just choose from them and you will get dozens of different questions to help you write an essay. Once you find the right questions for you, they will help you develop a strong essay that will help you get a high grade.Another way to find sample college essay questions is to look online. There are plenty of sites that offer resources and information for writing an essay. You can also do a search using certain words in the subject line of your email, such as, 'college essay questions' sample college essay questions. 'By using sample college essay questions, you will be able to provide more of a useful answer to the question you are writing for. This is a great way to learn how to write an essay and provides good ideas to think about. And just because you get an answer from a person who did not complete a college degree does not mean that th e answer was bad.

The Negative Effects of Child Beauty Pageants free essay sample

Beauty pageants have been around in America for decades; however, they have not gained notoriety until the show Toddlers and Tiaras aired on national television. The airing of Toddlers and Tiaras has brought child pageants to the attention of many Americans. Not many people were aware of what took place in beauty pageants, but ever since the show debuted in 2009 there has been an intense controversy about children as young as newborns being entered into pageants. Some people say that pageants raise self-esteem and teach responsibility, whereas others say that pageants are necessary and children should take advantage of their youth. Although pageants teach etiquette and communication skills, ultimately they carry a vastly high risk of potentially damaging the psychological and physical health of the participating children, as well as their development of strong morals. A child that participates in pageants is at risk for developing mental disorders for several reasons. We will write a custom essay sample on The Negative Effects of Child Beauty Pageants or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The children are constantly being compared to each other and given negative criticism. A child, especially a female that is going to pay so much attention to her looks and that knows she is being assessed for it, is very prone to develop eating disorders, such as anorexia or bulimia (Grosaru). Eating disorders start mentally, but once the victim loses control of their thoughts, it is highly likely that it will develop into a physical illness. They are competing solely based on physical beauty; therefore, they are likely to feel inferior about their appearances, which leads to misconceptions about themselves. Beauty pageants unknowingly expose the misconception that to be perfect one must be slim, tan, poised, and facially gifted. When a child steps on the stage to perform in front of the judges, they sense that they must be perfect in order to win, and this perfection is based on a fake and impossible standard to reach. Losing a beauty contest can make a child feel inferior because they lose for things outside of their control, like facial beauty or skin tone. Low self-esteem leads to numerous psychological disorders such as depression or anxiety (Tighe). Depression and anxiety can be fatal if not treated properly at a reasonable time. These children are constantly castigated by the people in their environment causing them to develop self-deceptions that can provoke more serious illnesses. Participation in a beauty pageant requires many sacrifices that endanger the bodily health of the contestant. Through societys eyes, being tan makes a person attractive. Parents take their children to get spray tans before pageants to make them look more appealing. Spray tans are not likely to risk skin cancer because the external layer of skin on our body is dead cells, which give no damage to the skin. Nevertheless, when the child is being spray tanned she is breathing in dihydroxyacetone (DHA), a potential carcinogen because it damages DNA (our genetic code) and causes mutations (Ginsberg). Chemicals such as DHA, are extremely toxic when breathed by children whose lungs have not fully developed. Spray tanning children appear to be harmless as well as advantageous to their success in pageants; however, the deceptive truth is that the chemicals contribute damage to the body in a discreet way. Another major factor that causes a threat to the childrens body is their lack of sleep throughout the pageant, as well as the preparation need for a pageant. Child beauty pageants are time consuming and exhausting; therefore, the children are deprived of sufficient sleep. Cartwright, a registered dietitian and adjunct professor in the University of Arizonas department of nutritional sciences (Blue), attended a child beauty competition with kids as young as 4 months to as old as 15 years old. She witnessed a mass display of emotion along with parents forbidding their kids to rest or take breaks concerned that napping would mess up their childs image (Blue). In the study, the research team from the Bambino Gesu Childrens Hospital in Rome, Italy, found that children with GHD (Growth Hormone Deficiency) got substantially less sleep and lower quality sleep than their normally growing peers. GHD impairs a childs immune system, making the child more vulnerable to illness, as well as weakens the strength of the childs heart and lungs. Children that are deprived of enough sleep are more likely to have stunted growth than children that get enough sleep. Watching their children slowly lose energy due to no rest, parents feed them excessive amounts of sugar and caffeinated drinks to keep them vivacious throughout the whole pageant. Frequent consumption of such components in children puts their health at risk. Caffeine causes a childs body to excrete nutrients such as caffeine and magnesium in their urine. When this happens too often, a childs body does not have the nutrients it needs to produce strong bones (Wonderly). When children consume caffeine, it contributes to the lack of nutrients to develop a strong body structure. Parents who feed their pageant child pure sugar and energy drinks ignore the future consequences of their childs health, and only focus on the situation at hand. Pixie Sticks and energy boosting drinks such as Mountain Dew or Red Bull, are commonly used pageant drugs to aid children to stay energetic and alert. These, among many others, indicate the clear deleterious effects engendered by the parents of beauty pageant children; this proverbial dark side of child beauty pageants cause critics to question whether any prospective gains are worth the tremendous cost to the child. Figure 1: Child Beauty Pageants Controversy On an online survey, the question Do you think the values that child beauty pageants are beneficial or harmful to the participant? was asked. Out of 15 people, 2 said that pageants are beneficial and 13 said they were harmful. Lee, Ahram. Child Beauty Pageant Controversy. Survey. www. facebook.  com. Publisher, 6 Mar. 2013. Web. 8 Mar. 2013 Children who frequently participate in pageants involuntarily develop different values of the way of life due to their surroundings. In figure 1, the number of people who said that beauty pageants teach harmful values outweighed the number of people who said that beauty pageants teach beneficial values. The looking-glass self is a collaborative process that says that people unfold images of themselves based on what they think others view them as. Individuals opinions of themselves consistently change as their perceptions of how others view them shift (Thomas). According to the looking-glass self, if a child beauty pageant contestant is constantly told to that she is perfect, beautiful, and the best, eventually she will result in thinking that she is perfect, beautiful and the best. Those kinds of children will become more demanding and disrespectful because they create their own sense of superiority above others. Toddlers and Tiaras star Eden Wood, age 6, threw a tantrum at the Allure Fashion Week Lounge in New York when she could not get her teeth whitened, the New York Post reported Thursday (Toddlers and Tiaras). It is not ethical for six-year old toddlers to be asking to get their teeth whitened. Eden is a very well-known and adored pageant star, consequently she takes advantage of her place in the pageant world by demanding things not suitable for her age and throwing fits when she does not get what she desires. Children that are always being uplifted and admired become full of themselves and disregard any respect that should be given to others. Eden Wood, age 7, referred directly to a grown woman as gurl and interrogated Wendy Williams about her wig and if it was superficial or not (Gorgan). As childrens experience in the pageant world expands, they develop greater risks for learning inappropriate and unethical morals which will create problems when they have to interact and compromise with different people who possess different values. Teaching children how to expose themselves at a high maturity level, beauty pageants exploit a large amount of sexuality to their child participants. In the situation that a child with a more revealing outfit, than the other children have, wins the Ultimate Grand Supreme title, immediately the rest of the children will start to question why they didnt win the title. Once the kids realize that the more sexual appeal they give to the judges, the more they have a chance of winning, some will make an effort to imitate the gestures, facial expressions and tricks that they have been shown (Kaeser). The children begin to process that to be successful in anything, one must reveal herself in a superficial and sexual way; they become narrow minded and grow up into adolescence falsely thinking that there is only one important thing in this world: physical attractiveness. Some have said that beauty contests are good for children because they boost confidence, teach how to present themself and interact with different people, but as demonstrated in this paper, the risks are simply too high and outweigh those benefits. Child participation in beauty pageants is morally wrong because it twists the childrens malleable minds into troublesome issues that have the potential to endanger the safety of them and their family. Pageants promote unethical behavior that leads to unintentional psychological and corporeal defects that may be imperishable.

L.L. Bean Item forecasting case study Essays

L.L. Bean Item forecasting case study Essays L.L. Bean Item forecasting case study Paper L.L. Bean Item forecasting case study Paper Essay Topic: The Bean Eaters Harvard Business School 9-893-003 Rev. September 7, 1993 L. L. Bean, Inc. Item Forecasting and Inventory Management When you order an item from an L. L. Bean catalog and were out of stock, Im the guy to blame. And if we end up liquidating a bunch of womens wool cashmere blazers, its my fault. No one understands how tough it is. Mark Fasold, Vice President† Inventory Management, was describing the challenge of item forecasting at L. L. Bean. Forecasting demand at the aggregate level is a piece of cake†if were running short of expectations, we Just dip deeper into our customer list and send out some more atalogs. But we have to decide how many chamois shirts and how many chino trousers to buy, and if were too high on one and too low on the other, its no solace to know that we were exactly right on the average. Top management understands this in principle, but they are understandably disturbed that errors at the item level are so large. In a catalog business like ours, you really capture demand. Thats the good news. The bad news is, you learn what a lousy Job youre doing trying to match demand with supply. Its not like that in a department store, say, where a customer ay come in looking for a dress shirt and lets the display of available shirts generate the demand for a particular item. Or if a customer has some particular item in mind but its not available, he or she may Just walk out of the store. In a department store you never know the real demand or the consequences of understocking. But in our business every sale is generated by a customer demanding a particular item, either by mail or by phone. If we havent got it, and the customer cancels the order, we know it. Rol Fessenden, Manager†Inventory Systems, added: We know that forecast errors are inevitable. Competition, the economy, weather are all factors. But demand at the item level is also affected by customer behavior, which is very hard to predict, or even to explain in retrospect. Every so often some item takes off and becomes a runaway, far exceeding our demand forecasts. Once in a while we can detect the trend early on and, with a cooperative vendor, get more product manufactured in a hurry and chase demand; most of the time, however, the runaways leave us Just turning customers away. And for every runaway, theres a dog item that sells way below expectations and that you couldnt even give away to customers. Annual costs of lost sales and backorders were conservatively estimated to be $11 million; costs associated with having too much of the wrong inventory were an additional $10 million. This case was prepared by Professor Arthur Schleifer, Jr. as the basis for class discussion rather than to illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of an administrative situation. Copyright 1992 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. To order copies or request permission to reproduce materials, call 1-800-545-7685, write Harvard Business School Publishing, Boston, MA 02163, or go to ttp://www. hbsp. harvard. edu. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, used in a spreadsheet, or transmitted in any form or by any means†electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise†without the permission of Harvard Business School. 893-003 L. L. Bean Background In 1912 Leon Leonwood Bean invented the Maine Hunting Shoe (a combination of lightweight leather uppers and rubber bottoms). He obtained a list of nonresident Maine hunting license holders, prepared a descriptive mail-order circular, set up hop in his brothers basement in Freeport, Maine, and started a nationwide mail- order business. The inauguration of the U. S. Post Offices domestic parcel post service in that year provided a means of delivering orders to customers. When L. L. Bean died in 1967, at the age of 94, sales had reached $4. 75 million, his company employed 200 people, and an annual catalog was distributed to a mailing list of 600,000 people. L. L. s Golden Rule had been Sell good merchandise at a reasonable profit, treat your customers like human beings, and theyll always come back for more. When Leon Gorman, L. L. s grandson, succeeded him as president in 1967, he sought to expand and modernize the business without deviating from his grandfathers Golden Rule. By 1991, L. L. Bean, Inc. as a major cataloger, manufacturer, and retailer in the outdoor sporting specialty field: Catalog sales in 1990 were $528 million, with an additional $71 million in sales from the companys 50,000 square-foot retail store in Freeport. Twenty-two different catalogs (often referred to as books by company employees)†114 million pieces in all†were mailed that year. There were six million active customers. The mail-order business had been giving way to tele phone orders after the company installed nationwide 800 service in 1986. By 1991, 80% of all orders came in by telephone. Major direct- mail competitors included Lands End, Eddie Bauer, Talbots, and Orvis. A 1991 Consumer Reports survey on customer satisfaction with mail-order companies found L. L. Bean heading the list for overall satisfaction in every category for which they offered merchandise. In explaining why L. L. Bean had not expanded its retail operations beyond the one store in Freeport, Leon Gorman contrasted the direct- arketing (catalog) and retail businesses. The two approaches require very different kinds of management. Mail-order marketers are very analytic, quantitatively oriented. Retailers have to be creative, promotional, pizzazzy, merchandise-oriented. Its tough to assemble one management team that can handle both functions. 1 Product Lines L. L. Beans product line was classified hierarchically (see Exhibit 1). At the highest level of aggregation were Merchandise Groups: mens and womens accessories, mens and womens apparel, mens and womens footwear, camping equipment, etc. Within each Group were Demand Centers; for instance, womens apparel had as Demand Centers knit shirts, sweaters, pants, skirts, Jackets and pullovers, etc. Each Demand Center was further broken down into Item Sequences; for example, womens sweaters consisted of Midnight Mesa Handknit Cardigans, Indian Point Pullovers, Lambswool Turtlenecks, and about twenty other products. Item Sequences were further broken down into individual items, distinguished primarily by color; it was at this item level that forecasts had to be issued and, ultimately, purchase commitments had to be made. About 6,000 items appeared in one or another of the catalogs that were issued in the course of a year. 1 L. L. Bean, Inc. Corporate Strategy, Harvard Business School Case (581-159), 1981. 21tems were further broken down by size into stock-keeping units, or SWs. This was done by applying standard size-distribution breakdowns. Although an inappropriate distribution could lead to excessive inventory of some sizes and stockouts of others, management concern was directed to the item level, since there was no evidence of a better system than assuming that the distribut ion of demand by size would behave in the uture as it had in the past, and would be indistinguishable from one item to another. Items were also classified into three seasonal categories (spring, fall, and all year), and into two additional categories (new or never out) that described whether the item was a recent or more permanent member of the companys offerings, and consequently characterized the amount of historical demand data available for the item. The Bean Catalogs The major catalogs†spring, summer, fall, and Christmas†each came out in several versions. A full catalog, running from 116 to 152 pages, went to Beans regular ustomers. A smaller prospect catalog was circulated to potential customers; it contained primarily a subset of items from the full catalog. (Bean identified such prospect customers in a variety of ways, for example, through the purchase of mailing lists, or by recording recipients of gifts from other Bean customers. ) In addition, a number of specialty catalogs†Spring Weekend, Summer Camp, Fly Fishing, etc. † presented items that were unique to that catalog, as well as some items found in the major catalogs. There was some overlap in circulation: the best ustomers received almost all the catalogs, and those customers known, through past purchasing behavior, to be interested in various specialties might receive an appropriate specialty catalog in addition to the seasonal full catalogs. Item Forecasting Each catalog had a gestation period of about nine months, and its creation involved merchandising, design, product, and inventory specialists. For example, the initial conceptualization for the Fall, 1991 season began in October, 1990. Preliminary forecasts of total sales for each catalog were made in December. Product managers eveloped preliminary item forecasts by book in the December, 1990 to March, 1991 time frame. Layout and pagination of the books began in January, 1991. Initial commitments to vendors were made in January and February. In the subsequent months, as the catalogs took shape, item forecasts were repeatedly revised and finally frozen by May 1. By early July a black-and-white version of the layout was available internally. At this point, the product managers handed off their product line to the inventory managers. The completed Fall 1991 catalogs were in the hands of customers around August 1 . As the catalog generated demand, inventory managers decided on additional commitments to vendors, scheduled replenishments, handled backorders, etc. This catalog remained active through January, 1992; inventory left over at that time might be liquidated, marked down and sold through special L. L. Bean promotions, or carried over to the next year. Scott Sklar was a buyer for mens shirts. He described the forecasting process as follows: Four or five of us†my inventory buyer, some product people, and I†meet to forecast shirt sales by book. We start by ranking various items in terms of expected ollar sales. Then we actually assign dollars in accordance with the ranking. Theres discussion, arguments, complaints. People invent rules of thumb. I say invent, because there arent any good rules of thumb. We set this up on an Excel spreadsheet. We look at the book forecast and make adjustments accordingly. We look at the total of forecasted shirt sales and check it for reality. Does it feel good? Does it make sense? We do it book by book, item by item, and thats how we get an item level forecast. Of course, when we add a new item, we have to make a Judgment: will this item enerate incremental demand, and if not, from what items is it going to steal demand? And then those items need to be adjusted accordingly. 3 Barbara Hamaluk, a buyer for mens knit shirts, observed that the sum of the item forecasts for a catalog was often at variance with the dollar target for that book. Usually this roll-up comes in on the high side, so you try to reduce forecasts on certain items. Or you can Just say, if were too high by 10%, well Just slash everything across the board by 10%. We really ought to have an intermediate level of forecasts t the Demand Center level, reconcile item forecasts with Demand Center forecasts, and the latter with the book forecast. Production Commitments The typical producti on lead time for most domestic orders was eight to twelve weeks. (Of course, deliveries against a commitment could be scheduled to conform to the anticipated pattern of in-season demand. With some vendors who cooperated with L. L. Beans Quick Response initiative, it was possible, after observing some early- season demand, to place a second order, which would be delivered in sufficient time to meet late-season demand. However, with many domestic and most offshore vendors, lead times were sufficiently long so that it was impractical to place a second commitment order in the course of the season. (In the remainder of this case, then, discussion will be limited to these one-shot commitments. The commitments were generally not equal in size to the forecasts, but were determined in two steps as follows: First, historical forecast errors (expressed as AIF ratios the ratio of actual demand to forecast demand) were computed for each item in the previous year, and the frequency distribution o f these errors was compiled cross items. 3 The frequency distribution of past forecast errors was then used as a probability distribution for the as yet unrealized future forecast errors. For example, if 50% of the forecast errors for new items in the past year had been between 0. and 1. 6, then it would be assumed that with probability 0. 5, the forecast error for any new item in the current year also would fall between 0. 7 and 1. 6. So in such a case, if the frozen forecast for a particular item were 1,000 units, it was then assumed that with probability 0. 5, actual demand for that item would end up being between 700 nd 1,600 units. Next, each items commitment quantity was determined by balancing the individual items contribution margin if demanded against its liquidation cost (or value) if not demanded. Suppose, for example, that an item cost Bean $1 5, would regularly sell for $30, and could be sold at liquidation for $10. The gain for selling a marginal unit would be $30 15 = $15; the loss for failing to sell the marginal unit would be the cost less the liquidation value, i. e. $15 10 = $5. Accordingly, the optimal order size should be the 0. 75 fractile of the items probability distribution of demand. Suppose the 0. 75 fractile of the distribution of forecast errors was 1. 3, and the frozen forecast for that item was for 1,000 units. Then the 0. 75 fractile of the demand distribution would be 1,000 x 1. = 1,300, and Bean would make a commitment for 1,300 units. Rol Fessenden expressed concern that the methodology treated the errors associated with all never out items as equally representative of the forecast errors that might be anticipated for the forecast demand of any never out item (and similarly for new items). mioud think that the error distribution for some of our buyers might be ighter than for other buyers, or that the distribution for womens sweaters might have more dispersion than the distribution for mens footwear, but we cant find any real differences. Also, Im not entirely convinced that we go about estimating contribution margin and liquidation cost correctly. Mark Fasold was worried about the wide dispersion in forecast errors, both for never outs and new items. He was also concerned about the implications of the methodology: If the cost 3This was done separately for new items and for never outs; not surprisingly, the historical error istribution of never outs had less dispersion than that of new items. No other way of segmenting items had revealed significantly different distributions of forecast errors. 4 associated with understocking exceeds the cost of overstocking, which is the usual case here, we end up committing to more than the frozen forecast. And for new items, about which we obviously know very little, the excess over the frozen forecast is even greater than for never outs. The buyers are understandably upset when we commit to more than they forecast; they perceive us as going way out on a limb for new items. Exhibit 1 5

Guanxi, Cultural Antecedents and Trust Building in Chinese Business Research Paper

Guanxi, Cultural Antecedents and Trust Building in Chinese Business Markets - Research Paper Example The focus in this paper is on the concept of Guanxi, central to the Chinese society. The literal translations of this term could mean 'connections' and 'relationships', but both these translated terms cannot describe the deeper meaning and implications that it actually stands for.The concept of guanxi is no longer confined to China and is accepted in the West also. Guanxi has been defined in different ways depending on the various perspectives. The Chinese construct considers guanxi as a very specific personal connection between two different people. This connection is exemplified by an inherent psychological contract that needs to be followed. The social norms include being committed, maintaining loyalty and ensuring that the relationship is maintained over a long term. Guanxi also has the key characteristics of trust for the parties involved that is developed through long term interactions, reciprocity and self-disclosure.In literal sense, guanxi means connection. When it comes to relationships, this term either refers to the connection between the parties that are involved, or to the connected parties.There are different stages of guanxi - either existent or non-existent, either good or bad, distant or close, deep or superficial and so on. Guanxi can exist between two or more individuals or even between organizations or different networks.It is also necessary to know that guanxi is function in the different spheres of human life, such as the families, friends, and professional groups, political and business. The term guanxi is used along with different verbs to give it different connotations and meanings. For example, if the phrase 'pull guanxi' is used, then it means the set of actions that indicate initiating and establishing a connection. Similarly, if the phrases ‘walk guanxi' would mean using the established connections to achieve any purpose that needs to be achieved.Similarly, the term has been used in other verb forms such as building, developi ng, breaking etc. According to Gold et al, (2002), guanxi can be described as part of China's national character. Over the years, Guanxi has played a very important role in the business relationships in China. If the businesses are Guanxi based, then, there would be a higher probability to reduce uncertainty, reduce the transaction costs, and lower the search costs as trusted suppliers are already known. Guanxi based business relationships also add to strong sense of connectedness (Tung and Worm, 2001). Even while dealing with foreign investors, Guanxi helps in reducing the uncertainty associated with doing business with outsiders. This is because Guanxi helps in establishing informal relationships that can guard against any opportunistic behaviour on

Uncertainty and Risks in Entrepreneurship Essay

Uncertainty and Risks in Entrepreneurship - Essay Example When operating a small business enterprise it is imperative to reflect on the factors that influence both the internal and external environments of the business. The failure to observe the internal and external environments will render the functioning of a business system useless. This is because the small business enterprise will occasionally face obstacles in the daily operations and management. This paper discusses how the ability to cope with uncertainty and to take risks affects the operating environment of a small business enterprise. Small business enterprises nowadays are on the rise. Individuals have developed the urge of operating businesses that will bring them extra cash to cater for their ever-increasing needs. However, operation and management of any small business enterprise is not an easy task, as it requires an individual with skills, attributes, determination and disciple. It is imperative for an individual operating a business enterprise, to have the above elements since they will help when the time of facing the internal and external environment comes. In essence, taking risks and coping with uncertainty are matters that are associated with the internal and external environment of a small business enterprise. ... Managers cope with uncertainty in a reactive manner by developing adaptive strategies to counter the effect. This is so since they are beyond the immediate control of the business enterprise. As much as uncertainty is beyond the control of an individual, business enterprise, it still influences the daily operations and management of a business enterprise. Examples of uncertainties are external factors such as the economy, government policies and demographics. In most occasions, uncertainty affects a business enterprise negatively. Individuals who have taken the management role in any small business enterprise should apply a positive management attitude when coping with uncertainties. Uncertainty is unpredictable and unexpected, and that is why only the individuals with management skills and positive attitudes can have the ability to cope with uncertainty. A manager may think that he, or she has everything pertaining to a business enterprise in control, but uncertainties in the form o f government policies, competition, economical shifts and demographical changes can prove wrong a manager’s initial judgment (Gigerenzer 2008: 34). The first factor that can be a great uncertainty is government policy. It is likely that at times, the government can come up with an unexpected policy that will ultimately affect the operations of a business enterprise. A skillful manager is expected to develop coping strategies that will end up minimizing the disadvantages while maximizing the advantages, which are part the uncertainty that has been brought by the government policy. For example, government policy can entail increasing or decreasing taxes on a commodity that the business enterprise in question is selling.

User Centered Design Essay Example for Free

User Centered Design Essay The Liveperson website communicate their purpose very well because the website shows important elements that a website needs to make the website efficient. There are five key elements in order to that may be identified: The Liveperson website shows their company brandmark on the upper-left corner of the website in a normal size very easy to see by the human eye. In the same way the website has in the middle of the page an explicit tagline that reads: â€Å" Liveperson creates meaningful, realtime customer connections that help businesses increase conversions and improve consumers experience,† which summarizes what the company does. Also, the website shows in the middle of the page a photo slider, with their news and more important services to offer. Then, the website shows at the top and at the bottom of the page the main navigation bar, which includes links to other information found on the website. To finalize this point, the home page is different from the other pages on the site but maintains the same font, color palette and design, making the website very consistent. Communicating Information about the company. The second point of this analysis talks about the communicating of information about the company. The website communicate very well their information too. As the first point, the website shows many of the important elements of this point, which makes a website efficient. Among this point we have: The website homepage has a link called â€Å"About Liveperson,† which includes information elements such as: â€Å"our culture, our partner, investor relations, careers and contacts us.† In the same way, at the end of the website we can see the same link with the same information elements. Then, the website has in their main navigation bar a press room link, used for press purposes, showing the most important company headlines. Also, the website, has a privacy policy link at the bottom of the homepage, which include the privacy policy of the company, but does not include internal company information. Content Writing. The writing content of the website is very effective and doesn’t use clever phrases and marketing lingo, making the writing content very readable and easy to understand. Also, all the writing content is written in sentence case and uses a consistent capitalization. Archives and Accessing Past Content. The website doesn’t have an access to past content. Links. The links work perfectly, are different one from each other, and are very scannable. Also the site doesn’t use the word â€Å"link† to indicate links on the page. Navigation. The primary navigation is located in a highly noticeable place, grouping items for the same category link, and doesn’t use made-up words for category navigation choices. Search. The website doesn’t have a search box. Tools and task shortcuts. The website offer direct access to high priority tasks. It includes a chat room, that offers the opportunity to chat with a company representative. Graphic and animations. The website shows the graphic elements in an appropriate way. For example, it shows graphics with real content and displays them ina good size, avoiding watermarks and animation of critical elements of the page such as logo or tag line. Graphic Design. In the graphic design part, the website is very consistent, using the same color palette and two different fonts which works very well. Additionally, the background color and the font color make a highly contrast, making the content very readable and not over loaded for the human eye. The most critical elements of the website are very visible, using their brandmark in a judicious way. The website is presented in vertical scrolling. UI Widgets. The website shows widgets for print and to connect to social network sites such as facebook, twitter, youtube, google, and linkedln. Window Titles. In the windows titles, the website includes a short description of the site, and the windows titles on the website are less than eight words. URLs. The URL is shown in a good way, showing as http://www.liveperson.com. News and Press releases. The News and Press releases section shows the headlines in a succinct and descriptive way. It includes a summary of the headline story, and at the bottom of the story shows a link that reads, â€Å"For more information visit www.websitename.com,† to show the complete story headline. Pop up windows and staging pages. The website only allows one pop up window for the chat room. The chat room pop up window appears once, then users have the opportunity to close or leave open. Advertising. The website only make advertises of their products, making the website more professional. Welcomes. The website doesn’t use welcome messages on the site. Credits. The website doesn’t have a credit link, which makes references to the designers of the website. It only shows the awards that the site has won in the Press releases link. Page Reload and Refresh. The website doesn’t refresh the pages automatically. Customization. The website doesn’t offer customizations. Gathering Customer Data. The website only gather customer data in the chat room section. Fostering community. The website offers a link called customer community, which allows users to post in a blog comments and questions. Dates and Times. The website doesn’t show date and time. Stock Quotes and Displaying Numbers. The website doesn’t show stock quotes and or display numbers. Align decimal points when showing columns of numbers. The website doesn’t show columns of numbers.