Communicating Through Your Computer :: Technology Internet Chatting Papers

Communicating Through Your Computer I have heard the dangers of meeting people through the new technology of cyberspace. Through the media I have heard events in which females are missing, stalked, or raped for giving away their personal information to strangers through computers. I can recall a situation when I heard about a young teen girl agreeing to meet a male whom she thought was about her age. She agreed to meet him secretly, thinking that she was going to meet her love of her life. She took the bus and headed out east to meet this "prince". To the girl her life did not end like most fairy tales. The "prince" turned out to be the "big bad wolf"- a 42-year old just released from prison for rape and murder. The situation for the girl could have ended in a sad, tragic outcome but was saved by her best friend. The girl's friend informed the police and parents about the missing girl whereabouts. People view that chat rooms are filled with people lurking around hunting down naà ¯ve females for their targets. The stalking does not only occur to females but as well for the males. Now we do not all have pervert people in these chat rooms. Society should also see the positive point of view of what chat rooms do to individuals. The Internet has become a networking tool that has helped the society. One can look up topics, write letters, look up and plan events, shop from your favorite stores, and read or hear the news from your community or worldwide. Within minutes (or even less) one can establish contact with like-minded individuals and discuss interesting (and non-interesting) topics. One can participate in the synchronous communication or as we recognize it as chat rooms. We can communicate with unknown individuals, which can gradually lead into friendship and relationships. As mentioned before synchronous communication is viewed negatively but there is also a positive side. Communicating in chat rooms can lead into friendships or romance, helpful for the individuals who are shy, troubled or disabled. I was lonely and did not have any friends when I moved from home to attend the university. I would go to the library and see students communicate with other individuals through the computer. I was curious to see how one could interact a conversation with others through the chat rooms. I entered through one of the popular web providers- www.

Looking At The Advanced Technology Of Construction Construction Essay

The demand on application of advanced engineering in building industry necessitates uninterrupted employment of new engineering work force and geting of latest machinery. A building house would necessitate a immense investing in order to last in acquiring new occupations. Therefore, really frequently, a building undertaking is managed by a general contractor, which sublet the plants out to different subcontractors so that the general contractor can salvage on building cost to vie in monetary value [ 1 ] Subcontractors are specialist in the executing of a specific occupation, they act as a agents of the production system of the contractor company in providing stuffs, work force, equipment, tools or designs [ 2 ] . Chiang [ 1 ] concludes that farm outing is indispensable to salvage building cost of general contractors to vie on monetary value. Teixeira & A ; Couto [ 3 ] besides agreed that increasing of specialization thorugh subcontracting can help in achieving the undertaking objectives. When the range of work and logical dependences between subcontractor plants are non to the full understand by general contractor and proprietors, it became a critical job to the success of complex and fast-paced undertakings. Cost judicial proceeding and disgruntled clients due to the struggle between general contractor, subcontractors and other undertaking participants would so followed [ 4 ]SubcontractorSubcontractor is a common term used in building. Due to the singularity of each building undertaking, the work force is transeunt, multiple trade are involved, each undertakings are planned and worked in short clip frames, and assortment of stuffs and equipments required, one individual building undertaking is frequently sublet to many subcontractors [ 2 ] , [ 5-12 ] . Subcontractors can lend more than 50 % [ 13 ] , and can be every bit much as 90 % of entire undertaking value to a building procedure [ 5 ] . A building undertaking is awarded to a general contractor or premier contractor or chief contractor or chief contractor, which resorts their work out to specialise outside house to transport out specific undertaking activities. General contractors are responsible for pull offing the undertaking such as contract disposal with clients, undertaking funding, stuff and equipment procuring, and supervising the undertaking advancement [ 14 ] . Harmonizing to Albino & A ; Garavelli [ 13 ] , the general contractor ‘s perfomance are strongly dependent on subcontractors. This statement is reinforced by Mbachu [ 15 ] which stated that the ability of the general contractor and adviser to present the undertaking within clip, quality and cost depends mostly on public presentation of subcontractors. A subcontractor is a building house that contracts with a general contractor to execute some facet of the general contractor ‘s work. In most building undertakings, a critical function is played by subcontractors who are hired to execute specific undertakings on a undertaking. In the usual instance, the general contractor will execute the basic operations and farm out the balance to assorted forte contractors. Subcontracting is used much more extensively on lodging and edifice building undertakings than on technology and industrial undertakings [ 16 ] .Types of SubcontractorsAttempts have been meade to distinguish subcontractors. In Hong Kong, Ng et Al. [ 6 ] classified subcontractors to ( i ) equipment-intensive subcontractors ( who are hired due to their specialized works and equipments ) , and ( two ) labour-intensive subcontractors ( those who are hired as a consequence of their specialized labour resources. Costantino et Al. [ 17 ] revealed that labour-only subcontractor beneficial the subcontractor by cut downing the cost of mobilisation and buying stuff. Furthermore, it besides offers economic advantages to the general contractor by avoiding the mark-up of full subcontracting. Quality jobs and claims may still happen in acquiring the supply of stuff for application of this labour-only subcontractor. Therefore, some general contractors prefer full subcontracting to switch hazard and liability. Partnering relationship between general contractor and subcontractors were proposed to make a win-win state of affairs [ 5 ] , [ 18 ] . Harmonizing to Lee et Al. [ 18 ] , this long-run relationship must be established to avoid adversarial relationship between general contractor and subcontractor. Several types of relationships between general contractor and subcontractor are discussed, competitory relationships and strategic relationships were among them. Comparison theoretical account based on dealing cost for both general contractor and subcontractor are developed severally for each relationship.Multilayer SubcontractingFurther subcontracting by subcontractor, or called multilayer subcontracting/latent subcontractor, let the subcontractor to be less vulnerable to fluctuation in concern, have more flexibleness in work force coordination, and be able to cut down cost of direction [ 7 ] . In Turkish, pattern of farm outing work by subcontractors to secondary subcontractor is widespread [ 19 ] . A survey on 35 general contractors and 56 subcontractor organisations revealed that most of them are willing to sublease their work under overload of work or clip force per unit area. When â€Å" latent † subcontractor happened, the extent of subcontracting is even larger. â€Å" Latent † subcontracting, or multilayer subcontracting is the farther farm outing down the watercourse by subcontractors with or without the cognition or consent of the general contractor or client. This has been alleged to be one of the major causes of hapless building quality and building site safety in Hong Kong [ 1 ] , [ 7 ] . Ekstrom et Al. [ 20 ] argues that payment to the 2nd grade subcontractor/suppliers can be portion of the public presentation measuring when measuring subcontractor.Problems of SubcontractingAbility to pass on and organize the work of subcontractors has been identified as one of the chief conceptual determiners of building undertaking direction competency in China [ 21 ] . Subcontractor failure has been listed as one of the hazard allocated to general contractor in building contracts [ 22 ] . This is supported by El-Sayegh [ 23 ] which stated that subcontracting is hazardous and can take to low quality, delayed completion and insecure pattern. Another hazard created by subcontractor is the possibility of them to transgress contract and difference with the general contractor. Hence, subcontracting has been listed as one of the important factors doing hold United Arab Emirates [ 24 ] , [ 25 ] and Malaysia [ 26 ] , [ 27 ] .PERTINENT STUDIES ON SUBCONTRACTORFocus of research workers goes to either finding the components of farm outing or developing new approaches/techniques to choose and/or manage subcontractors. Subcontractor has become an issue on its ain, separated from selection/management of general contractor by client/consultants due to its complexness. Numerous subcontractor choice and monitoring theoretical account has been proposed [ 4 ] , [ 13 ] , [ 28-30 ] .Choice of SubcontractorMany choice methods of subcontractors has been proposed in the literature. Arslan et Al. [ 28 ] developed a web-based subcontractor rating system ( WEBSES ) to ease the choice of subcontractors. The standards for measuring was identified by calculators of building house in USA based on a database of about 4000 subcontractor houses. Ng & A ; Luu [ 31 ] developed a theoretical account for subcontractor enrollment determination through case-based logical thinking attack. 12 experts were interviewed to supply indispensable stairss needed for distinguishing good and bad subcontractors. The theoretical account developed use each properties ‘ calculated evaluations for designation of fiting instances and similarity mark of each single instances. The historical information of subcontrators can be retrieved and utilize for the current rating. Weighting of all atributes can be easy modified harmonizing to the users penchant, therefore the effectivity of this theoretical account is still really much depends on the experience and cognition of users. Manoharan [ 32 ] proposed a subcontractor choice method utilizing Analytic Hierarchy Process ( AHP ) based on 29 questionnaires collected from contractors involved in building undertakings located at Putrajaya, Malaysia. It is an Adept System to help the chief contractors in doing their determination by utilizing pairwise comparing. The determination shaper will necessitate to do their ain opinion on the comparative importance of each component with regard to the elements at a higher degree. Argument might happen when the opinion of different determination shapers are diverse. As an attempt to cut down the incidents of hold, and other possible jobs that might be originated from the jobs of choosing the incorrect sub-contractor, this survey aims to spread out the sample of survey as suggested by Manoharan [ 32 ] in the attempt of create an more dependable and applicable sub-contractor choice theoretical account.Management of SubcontractorChoosing the right subcontractor does non vouch the success of a building undertaking. Coordination and monitoring of subcontracted work during the building phase is indispensable. Ko et Al. [ 33 ] developed a Sub-contractors Performance Evaluation Model ( SPEM ) by using Evolutionary Fuzzy Neural Inference Model ( EFNIM ) . Subcontractors were evaluated by field overseers harmonizing to the types of subcontract. Different rating factors were adopted for different subcontract to accomplish just rating. Albino & A ; Garavelli [ 13 ] proposed a evaluation system for direction of subcontractor by utilizing nervous web. An application instance related to the rating of possible subcontractors viing for a command has been used to demo the practical execution of this nervous web. In accessing the rival subcontractors, the determination shaper have to see five chief parametric quantities, viz. monetary value decrease, clip decrease, technical/qualitative feature of the command, contractual dependability of the rival, and direction accomplishments of the rival. The web will suggest a suited subcontractor based on old determinations made by the expert. Therefore, illustrations of old determinations need the expert to be inserted into this nervous web. Dainty et Al. [ 34 ] focused on supply concatenation ‘s direction from the position of subcontractor. The function of subcontractors in UK building industry is explored and followed by proposal of a model for turn toing current barriers to provide concatenation integrating.DecisionSubcontractor has become a great topic to all the practicians in building industry due to the common pattern of subleasing building works into smaller bundles in building industry. Effective subcontractor choice and monitoring which can minimise the job would find the success of building companies. Problems of subcontractors, if ignored, can do an huge impact to the building undertaking, and can widen into the operation of the general contractor ‘s administration. Therefore, attending shall be given to the issues of subcontractor, which is the chief participant in about all the building undertakings.

Corporate Governance And Firms Performance Finance Essay - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 12 Words: 3537 Downloads: 2 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Finance Essay Type Narrative essay Did you like this example? Corporate governance is a recent concept that encompasses many issues like internal control, rights and relation with stakeholders, social responsibility of the business, structure and role of the management committee, management transparency (refers to the disclosure of all reliable and relevant information) and accountability (refers to broader corporate objectives to manage the socio-economic resources efficiency) and the like. It also entails planning and strategic development of the company, day-to-day operation, and knowledge of the market and the sound understanding of the business itself. Precisely speaking, corporate governance is all about corporate practices to meet the corporate objectives. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Corporate Governance And Firms Performance Finance Essay" essay for you Create order According to Byrnes et al. (2003), after the high profile scandals of Enron, WorldCom etc. corporate governance is imputed in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. This paper will try to find out the impact of corporate governance on firm performance. This paper will also try to show that better use of corporate governance help the firm to perform in an optimum level and if it is right better governed firm will have better performance than worse governed firm. Jensen and Meckling (1976); Fama and Jensen (1983); Shleifer and Vishny (1997) cited that, incentive has been given to the managers to confiscate the assets of the firm by taking profitable projects but this is much beneficiary to the managers than maximizing shareholders wealth. According to Shleifer and Vishny (1997), effective corporate governance control the awards given by the stakeholders and creditors and increase the profitability of the firm by investing in a positive net present value projects. Brown and Caylor (2004) argued that, regulators and governance advocates argue that in most of the cases stock price goes down because of poor governance and if this is right the market price of the well governed firm should be relatively high than poor governed firms. On the other hand by considering cash flow hypothesis Jensen (1986), says that shareholders expects cash flow via dividend payout but large free cash flow through dividend decrease the liquidity condition of the firm a nd this disables the firm to invest in the profitable projects and lower the profitability. Arnott and Asness (2003) finds that, better governed firm give more cash in dividend payout which also can be considered as firm performance. Moreover Bowen, Rajgopal, Venkatachalam (2008) found that, corporate governance also can be found from the accounting discretion, firm with weaker governance structure generally produce report with poorer future performance. According to Gompers, Ishii, and Metrick (2003), studying the impact of corporate governance on firm performance finds that, strong shareholders rights and returns of the firm outperform on risk-adjusted basis. This result indicates that corporate governance also can be measured or constructed from publicly available data. According to Klein, Shapiro and Young (2005), there are not any clear evidence that can suggest that better corporate governance will enhance the firms performance. One alternative way to measure firm performance is measuring the performance of companies with shareholders rights. Core, Guay and Rusticus (2004) said that, in current decade share returns of companies are strongly related with shareholders right companies with poor shareholders rights do not over perform in their performance. The companies which maintain strong shareholders right may not exhibited superior return on their performance. On the other hand, if the firms risk adjustment not done properly, corporate governance may correlate with unrecognizable risk factor(s). One other thing is that the relation between corporate governance and firm performance might be increase distrust about causality explanation. In most countries the common mechanism for determining collective action problems among shareholders partial ownership and control is given to the hand of large shareholders. In this situation two important forms of corporate governance need to be considered by the firm. First, there may be conflict among the shareholders with management against small investors; and secondly, the liquidity from secondary market will decrease. To boost the liquidity crisis of the stock market corporate law is enforced and which limits the power of the large shareholders of the company and also limit the violence of the minority shareholders. In this system generally the firms depends on the board of directors to maintaining and functioning the actions of the shareholders. Sometimes the actions of the board of directors become ineffective. Where the minority shareholders get better protection the interest of the mangers also become an issue of prudence. Finally, the primary goal of the corporate govern ance is to control the regulation of activity the shareholders and managers and made a check and balance to protect the interest of both shareholders and mangers. This paper will try to find out how corporate governance can help the firm to accelerate their performance. For doing so there lies a need for developing a measure to scale corporate governance practice of the firm and to allocate a governance score for each firm then calculation of the financial and economic performance by using governance score will become possible. This paper will also conduct a cross sectional analysis to relate firms performance with their corporate governance practices. Keywords Corporate Governance, Firm performance, Corporate Governance and Firm Performance. Problem of the study This paper will develop to find out the following problems: How corporate governance impact on firms performance? Why firms performance is influenced by corporate governance? When corporate governance influence firms performance? Aims The aim of this paper is to find the influence of corporate governance over firms performance. Objective of the study This research will be conduct to fulfill the following objectives To measure the industry wise corporate governance practices. To find the impact of corporate governance with the firm performance. To measure the degree of performance influenced by corporate governance. To find out the major indicators of corporate governance. To find out the best practices of corporate governance. Literature Review The concept corporate governance actually gives an insight regarding the code of conduct of the companys business. Corporate Governance is the process by which companies are governed and held accountable to their owners. Corporate Governance is the whole system of managing and controlling a company. Many view corporate governance in the light of the long-run value creation of shareholders. Corporate Governance is the enhancement of the long-term shareholder value while at the same time protecting the interest of other shareholders. From this view, corporate governance focuses on structure and rules of the board of directors; the independent audit committee and control management. So, corporate governance is a pervasive concept, which basically tells about the corporate practices. This is such a concept encompassing the relations and rights of shareholders with the board and other stakeholders; effective risk management; management transparency and accountability to the stakeholders g roup and overall corporate practices that aims at meeting the corporate goals. OECD set few principles of corporate governance, which have been adopted by the member countries of the OCED. These principles are available in the web site: www.oecd.org. In summary, they include the following elements: The rights of shareholders: These include a set of rights including secure ownership of their shares, the rights to full disclosure of information, voting rights, participation in decisions on sale or modification of corporate assets including mergers and new share issues. The Equitable Treatment of Shareholders: Here the OCED is concerned with protecting minority shareholders rights by setting up systems that keep insiders, including managers and directors, from taking advantage of their roles. The Role of Stakeholders in Corporate Governance: the OCED recognizes that there are other stakeholders in companies in addition to stakeholders. Banks, bondholders and workers for example are important stakeholders in the way in which companies perform and make decisions. Disclosure and Transparency: The OCED also lays out a number of provisions for the disclosure and communication and key facts about the company ranging from financial details to governance structures including the board of directors and their remuneration. The Responsibilities to the Board: The guidelines provide a great deal of detail about the functions of the board in protecting the company, its shareholders, and its stakeholders. These include concerns about corporate strategy, risk, executive compensation and performance, as well as accounting and reporting systems. John, K. et.al. (1998) conducted a study to relate Corporate Governance with managerial risk-taking. The study showed how the investor protection environment affects corporate managers incentives to take value-enhancing risks. It suggested that the manager chooses higher perk consumption when investor protection is low and vice versa. Lower investor protection is associated with conservative investment policy and least firm growth. Finally the authors suggested that the corporate risk-taking and firm growth rates are positively related to the quality of investor protection (whether the investment generated by the firm is used is a safe and secured way). This situation indicates that a risk-taking firms growth rate is higher than the less risk-taking firm so find out the concerns towards the investors it is necessary to calculate that whether the firm is taking much risk for increasing its growth, which may arise adverse situation for the investor by decreasing the protection of the i nvestment. According to John and Senbet (1998), a common belief is that boards of directors are become more independent as the number of outsider director increases. Though, Fosberg (1989), found no relation of firm performance with the outsider directors, he rather emphasis on other variables like SGA expenses, sales, return on equity and number of employees. Hermalin and Wrisbach (1991) also dont find any association between the number of independent directors and firm performance. In 2002 Bhagat and Black became unable to find any relationship between the numbers of outsider directors. But in contrast Baysinger and Butler (1985) and Rosenstein and Wyatt (1990) find rewards for the firm for appointing outsider directors. Anderson, Mansi and Reeb (2004) showed that, the cost of debt is inversely related with the independence of the board of directors. According to Brickley, Coles and Terry (1994), there are a positive linkage between the number of outsider directors and stock market response. Bhagat and Bolton (2007) argued that, better governance can be measured by GIM and BCF indices, stock owned by the board of directors, performance of CEO etc. Lipton and Lorsch (1992); Jensen (1993) argued in their evidence that, it is believed by some people that limiting the board size of the firm will have impact in the performance of the firm because increase number of the board members will increase the monitoring, communication and decision making ability. On the other hand Yermack (1996) found an inverse relationship between board size and profitability, asset utilization and Tobins Q. Board of director plays a vital role in the firm performance. As they divide their duties and responsibilities so increase in the number of directors make the responsibilities and duties more narrowed, so if the number of director increases the firms performance should be increased. On other side if the firm appoint experienced CEO or director in the firm it have a positive impact on the stock price of the firm which reflects the practice of good corporate governance has a positive impact on firms performance. According to Bhagat and Bolton (2008), Corporate governance has the authority to make any modification or change in any important decisions including investment policy, management compensation policy, boards decision etc. so it becomes easier for the firm to monitor and implement their activities efficiently by practicing good corporate governance this will help the firm to increase its overall performance. A negative relationship has been found by Klein (2002), between audit committee independence and earnings management. Whereas Anderson et al. (2004) documented that firm with self-governing audit committee has low debt financing costs. Frankel, Johnson and Johnson (2002) show an inverse relationship with the firm earnings management and the independence of the audit committee. On the other hand, Ashbaugh, Lafond and Mayhew (2003) and Larcker and Richardson (2004) show disagreement about the inverse relationship between firm earnings management and independence of the auditor in th eir evidence. Bhagat and Bolton (2008) provided some evidence to associate the relationship between audits related governance factors and firm performance: Audit committee those are solely independent are positively related with dividend yield but not related with firms operating performance or valuation; Annual meetings held by the firm are not related with the performance; Consulting fees and audit fees paid to the auditors are negatively related with the firms performance measurement; Company policy for rotating auditors are positively related with the return on equity but not related with any other performance factors. As audit committee plays an important role for establishing and implementing firms investment policy, compensation policy and other management decision the role of audit committee influence the firms performance. The performance of audit committee can vary due to various factors such as audit fees, independence of the committee etc. as Bhagat and Bolton (2008) finds several audit related governance factors but this area needs further research to find out the exact situation. Gompers, Ishii, and Metrick (2003) introduced a corporate governance measure which is equal weighted index of 24 corporate governance factors, these factors are gathered by the Investor Responsibility Research Center (IRRC), those are, classified boards, golden parachutes, poison pills, cumulative voting supermajority rules for selecting and approving managers. Whereas, Brown and Caylor (2004) created their corporate governance index through the use of Institutional Shareholder Service (ISS) data. Hermalin and Weisbach (1998, 2003); Bhagat, Carey and Elson (1999); Brickley, Coles and Jarrell (1997) states that, board independence, stock ownership of board members and whether CEO and Chairman are individual person etc. are considered as a importance characteristics of corporate governance. Brown and Caylor (2004) identified 52 factors for considering corporate governance practice of the firms where Gompers, Ishii, and Metrick (2003) considers 24 factors for measuring corporate charter position and board characteristics. According to Bhagat and Bolton (2008) management compensation features, board characteristics, and corporate charter position creates the personality of firms corporate governance while creating the corporate governance index these factors need to be weighted otherwise it will become unable to give optimum result. If the weight are not equally weighted the relationship between the corporate governance and firm performance will give an unrealistic result with incorrect inferences between the relation of corporate governance and firm performance. While selecting the factors for creating the governance score it must be consider that the factors need to be available for all kinds of firms from different industry, otherwise the result may become bias. On the other hand if the researcher did not find weighted average the outcome of the study becomes questionable so for making the evidence more reliable it is necessary to find out the weighted average o f the governance score. Some variables of measuring corporate governance can be motivated by incentive-based economic models of managerial behavior. This model can fall into two categories. First one is agency model, in this model the interest of managers are take into action as a result it becomes costly for the shareholders. In this model shareholders become unable to observe the behavior of the managers directly, but sometimes ownership are given to the managers to reduce this type of action and use the resources for the best interest of the shareholders. This problem is cited by Grossman and Hart in 1983. Another model is adverse situation model; this model is motivated by the hypothesis of differential ability which also cannot be observed by the firms shareholders. In this model the power of managers is control to reduce the use of cash flow for the private benefit or managers personal information cannot be used to control the firms cash flow. This model is provided by Mayerson (1987). From the above situation it is clear that sometimes corporate governance is controlled by the relationship between managers and shareholders and in this case managers behaviors and ability are directly associated with the firms performance. Berle and Means (1932), find the impact of the cost of the shareholders ownership, they found a positive relationship with ownership structure and firm performance. However, Demsetz (1983) argued that, if we scrutinize the success factors of the public companies with diffused share ownership we will see clear offsetting benefits of the shareholders. Other factors that may impact of the firm performance are performance based compensation and insider information which should be determined through ownership. For example, if the performance of the firm increase the value of the stock and the managers owned some ownership, it will increase the value of their ownership this incentive will help the firm to preserve the interest of both shareholders and managers by boosting the performance of the firm. Hypothesis This research will focus on following hypothesis: H1: Company with good Corporate Governance has a better operating performance. H2: Company with poor Corporate Governance has a poor operating performance. Methodology of the study Research method To fulfill the objectives of this paper and find out the relationship of corporate governance with firm performance both qualitative and quantitative method of research will be used. The main objective of this paper is to find out the relationship between corporate governance and firm performance and to find out the degree of influence of corporate governance on the firm performance to find out this evidences researcher need to go through an exploratory research. Some case studies also will be analyzed and discussed to find out the actual position and this will make this research more realistic. This paper will try to develop a governance measure (governance score) to find out the degree of corporate governance practiced and also identify some factors to measure the performance of the firm and score them with a relevant range. Governance score will be composite measure of about 50 factors which will encircling on several corporate governance categories like audit committee, board of directors, executive and directors compensation, compensation policy for the managers, industry, progressive practices, directors education, charter/ bylaws etc. Then researcher will do a cross sectional analysis between governance score and firm performance score. For measuring operating performance Tobins Q, GIM, return on equity, profit margin, sales growth, and other financial measurements will be used. Data collection This paper will create a summary metric of the governance score to measure the strength of the firms governance. Researcher will collect data related with corporate governance and firm performance from the annual report and publicly available information sources mostly researcher will depend on the secondary sources for preparing this report; though researcher will try to collect data from the reliable sources like stock exchange, annual report, magazine etc. This paper will take a large number of individual firms as my sample for this studies thus it will reflect real phenomena. This paper will take data for measuring firm performance for the 2009 fiscal year end. Sampling The population for this report will be listed companies in the London stock exchange. The researcher will take at least fifty companies as sample from five different industries they are automobiles and parts, banks, beverages, food producers, and electronic and electrical equipment. The companies will be chosen randomly. Scope of the study This paper will try to find out how good corporate governance practices impact on the firm performance. This paper will contribute on the literature on the following way: first, the role of the board of the directors plays on the performance of the firm. For example: the numbers of independent directors or dependent director can play a role in the governance and also contribute on the performance of the firm. This may varied from industry to industry so researcher will took a descriptive analysis on the following matter, for collecting the evidence on the following matter GIM, and Tobins Q will play a great role. This paper will also find out the variables that may impact on the performance related with this topic. Secondly, researcher will try to find out the better incentive policy given to the manager stock option or cash dividend which will be more effective to protect the right of the stockholder as well as boosting the performance of the firm. The performance of the firm can be measured in various ways this paper will focus on the financial performance and the right of the stockholder in measuring the performance of the firm. Thirdly, this paper will come with the functioning of the audit committee; audit committee plays a vital role on the both in the corporate governance practices of the firma and the firm performance. Compensation given to the internal and external audit committee also has impact on the firm performance do find out these impacts an explanatory research will be conducted. Finally, researcher will come with the degree of corporate governance practices with the firm performance. This paper will find out extent of the impact of the corporate governance with the firm performance. Concluding remarks Corporate governance plays a vital role to balance between the economic and social goals and between individual and communal goals. The governance framework is very much important to boosting up the performance of the firm and to protect the interest of the stockholders. Because it ensures the efficient use of resources, make the management accountable and ensures the best benefit of all the parties. As a result corporate governance has impact on the overall performance of the firm because it control most of the performance factors and the good practices of corporate governance will allow the firm to protect the interest of the stockholders. Time table: Task Start Date Duration in Days End Date Analyze objectives 10/01/2011 8 17/01/2011 Introduction 18/01/2011 14 31/01/2011 Literature Review 01/02/2011 28 28/02/2011 Methodology 01/03/2011 15 15/03/2011 Data source 16/03/2011 14 30/03/2011 Data collection 31/03/2011 08 07/04/2011 Evaluation 08/04/2011 07 14/04/2011 Edit 15/04/2011 05 19/04/2011 Final documents 20/04/2011 05 24/04/2011 Binding 25/04/2011 03 27/04/2011

Trends in Japanese Baby Names

Baby names are like a mirror that reflects the times. Lets have a look at the transitions in popular baby names and recent trends. Royal Influence Since the royal family is popular and well respected in Japan, it has certain influences. The Western calendar is widely known and used in Japan, but the name of the era (gengou) is still used to date official documents. The year in which an Emperor ascended to the throne would be the first year of a new era, and it continues until his death. The current gengou is Heisei (the year 2006 is Heisei 18), and it was changed from Showa when Emperor Akihito succeeds to the throne in 1989. That year, the kanji character Ã¥ ¹ ³hei) or æˆ Ã‚  (sei) was very popular to use in a name. After Empress Michiko married to Emperor Akihito in 1959, many newborn baby girls were named Michiko. The year princess Kiko married prince Fumihito (1990), and Crown princess Masako married Crown prince Naruhito (1993), many parents named their baby after the princess or used one of the kanji characters. In 2001, Crown Prince Naruhito and Crown Princess Masako had a baby girl and she was named Princess Aiko. Aiko is written with the kanji characters for loveæ„› and childÃ¥ ­ , and refers to a person who loves others. Although the popularity of the name Aiko has always been steady, its popularity grew after the princesss birth.   Popular Kanji Characters The recent popular kanji character for a boys names is ç ¿â€ (to soar). The names including this character are  Ã§ ¿â€,  Ã¥ ¤ §Ã§ ¿â€,  Ã§ ¿â€Ã¥ ¤ ª,  Ã¦ µ ·Ã§ ¿â€,  Ã§ ¿â€Ã§Å"Ÿ,  Ã§ ¿â€Ã¥ ¤ §Ã‚  and so on.  Other popular kanji for boys are Ã¥ ¤ ªÃ‚  (great) and Ã¥ ¤ §Ã‚  (big). The kanji character for ç ¾Å½Ã‚  (beauty)  is always popular for girls names. In 2005 it is especially popular, even more so than other popular kanji such as 愛  (love), å„ ªÃ‚  (gentle) or èŠ ±Ã‚  (flower).  Ã§ ¾Å½Ã¥â€™ ²,  Ã§ ¾Å½Ã§ ¾ ½,  Ã§ ¾Å½Ã¥â€ž ªÃ‚  andç ¾Å½Ã¦Å"ˆÂ  are listed in  the top 10 names for girls. Hiragana Names Most names are written in  kanji. However, some names dont have kanji characters and are simply written in  hiragana  or  katakana. Katakana names are rarely used in Japan today. Hiragana is mainly used for female names because of its soft impression. A hiragana name is one of the most recent trends.  Ã£ â€¢Ã£  Ã£â€šâ€°Ã‚  (Sakura),  Ã£ â€œÃ£ â€œÃ£â€š Ã‚  (Kokoro),  Ã£  ²Ã£  ªÃ£ Å¸(Hinata),  Ã£  ²Ã£ â€¹Ã£â€šÅ Ã‚  (Hikari) and  Ã£  »Ã£  ®Ã£ â€¹Ã‚  (Honoka) are popular girls names written in hiragana. Modern Trends Popular boys names have endings such as ~to, ~ki, and ~ta. Haruto, Yuuto, Yuuki, Souta, Kouki, Haruki, Yuuta,  and Kaito are included in the top 10 boys names (by reading). In 2005, names that have the image of summer and ocean are popular for boys. Among of them are  Ã¦â€¹â€œÃ¦ µ ·,  Ã¦ µ ·Ã¦â€"â€", or  Ã¥ ¤ ªÃ©â„¢ ½.  Western or exotic sounding names are trendy for girls. Girls names with two syllables are also a recent trend.  The top 3 girls names by reading  are Hina, Yui, and Miyu. In the past, it was very common and traditional to use the kanji character ko  (a child) at the end of female names. Empress Michiko, Crown Princess Masako, Princess Kiko, and Yoko Ono, all end with ko (Ã¥ ­ ). If you have a few female Japanese friends, you will probably notice this pattern. In fact, more than 80% of my female relatives and girlfriends have ko at the end of their names. However, this might not be true for the next generation. There are only three names including ko in the recent 100 popular names for girls. They are Nanako (è Å"々å ­ )and Riko (莉å ­ ,  Ã§ â€ Ã¥ ­ ). Instead of ko at the end, using ka or na is the recent trend. Haruka, Hina, Honoka, Momoka, Ayaka, Yuuna, and Haruna for example. Increasing Diversity There used to be certain patterns for names. From the 10s to the mid-70s, there was little change in naming patterns. Today there is no set pattern and baby names have greater diversity. Boys Names Rank 1915 1925 1935 1945 1955 1 Kiyoshi Kiyoshi Hiroshi Masaru Takashi 2 Saburou Shigeru Kiyoshi Isamu Makoto 3 Shigeru Isamu Isamu Susumu Shigeru 4 Masao Saburou Minoru Kiyoshi Osamu 5 Tadashi Hiroshi Susumu Katsutoshi Yutaka Rank 1965 1975 1985 1995 2000 1 Makoto Makoto Daisuke Takuya Shou 2 Hiroshi Daisuke Takuya Kenta Shouta 3 Osamu Manabu Naoki Shouta Daiki 4 Naoki Tsuyoshi Kenta Tsubasa Yuuto 5 Tetsuya Naoki Kazuya Daiki Takumi Girls Names Rank 1915 1925 1935 1945 1955 1 Chiyo Sachiko Kazuko Kazuko Youko 2 Chiyoko Fumiko Sachiko Sachiko Keiko 3 Fumiko Miyoko Setsuko Youko Kyouko 4 Shizuko Hisako Hiroko Setsuko Sachiko 5 Kiyo Yoshiko Hisako Hiroko Kazuko Rank 1965 1975 1985 1995 2000 1 Akemi Kumiko Ai Misaki Sakura 2 Mayumi Yuuko Mai Ai Yuuka 3 Yumiko Mayumi Mami Haruka Misaki 4 Keiko Tomoko Megumi Kana Natsuki 5 Kumiko Youko Kaori Mai Nanami Individuality in Spelling There are thousands of kanji to choose from for a name, even the same name can usually be written in many different kanji combinations (some have more than 50 combinations). Japanese baby names might have more variety than baby names in any other languages.

Technology, Blessing Or Curse Beyond The Age Of Consumerism

Week 4 Title: 1: Group’s project assignment: Introduction to International Aid: 2: Project Plan topic proposal, Technology, Blessing or Curse Beyond the age of Consumerism. 1: Introduction to International Aid: International aid is an act of good favour which one country gives support and reinforcements to foreign countries. The purpose and goal is to include economic development, increasing government accountability, improved healthcare, proper sanitation water, education and creditability. Such international aid also includes extra support to natural disasters and crises. These free flows of aid from those countries are critical for many struggling nations. As for today’s context, global poverty poses a challenge to the security, wealth, and morals of Australia. Currently, nearly 40% of the world s population, approximately 2.7 billion people live in poverty, struggling to survive on less than $2 per day. The Australian Government’s aid program has been put in place to promote it’s national interests through committing towards the economic development and to prevent a nation from poverty. The aid program will contribute to Australia’s broader economic diplomacy efforts to deliver greater prosperity for Australia, our region, and globally. The Government is devoted to an effective and organised aid program with a strong culture of performance and accountability. Therefore, through a stronger prominence on encouraging economic growth; such as the private sectorShow MoreRelated8 stages of social development6628 Words   |  27 Pagesa motive that drives the social change and essential preconditions for that change to occur. The motive must be powerful enough to overcome obstructions that impede that change from occurring. Development also requires resources such as capital, technology, and supporting infrastructure. Development is the result of societys capacity to organize human energies and productive resources to meet challenges and opportunities. Society passes through well-defined stages in the course of its development

MFS system free essay sample

Basically, culture of MFS is focused on teamwork and community so that MFS manages their employees very fair and its compensation system also reflects this characteristic. For sustaining this team –based culture of MFS, which don’t prefer star(anti star culture), MFS assesses their employees to the ways that not only fund-performance(performance factor) but also contribution to the investment, and contribution to MFS overall(community factor). The portion of performance factor is 60% but community factors are 40%. It is not easy to ignore such a huge portion. In this system, as a result, it cannot be possible to make a good assessments and high rewords without the effort for increasing community factor. So employees have to consider both performance factor and community factors. They should interact with their coworkers frequently, share information they have, and participate in several groups enthusiastically. When MFS recruit new employees, it considers applicants’ feature related with community factors because they don’t want to lose its employee just â€Å"high pay level† of competitor companies offering to the employee. MFS want to leave its employee not for pay level but other things such as team work cultures, individual development circumstance in MFS, and fitness between firm’s value and its employees. They assume that the employee who want to get high pay level could have possibility to turnover MFS when other company offer high pay level compared with MFS. Considering this kind of system, factor that can motivate employees is behavior which can contribute to the community. As an example, organization citizen’s action is that kind of behavior. The action can improve coworkers’ efficiency and job atmosphere so it increase whole performance of organization indirectly. In addition, share their skills( ), related with organization citizen’s action but little bit different, are another way to contribute to company. It is more related with performance factor but in the process of sharing skills, employees took part in that process can communicate with each other and can make good relationship between skill giver and taker. 2. What are the potential problems and major challenges created by the MFS performance evaluation system? What are your suggestions for managing these problems and challenges? It is very nature that assessment system based on community factors is subjective. Subjective assessment is difficult to deal with ‘contribution to performance’ it is also problem when the situation of 360 diverse assessment because to get higher grade, employees too much focus on relationship factor so their efforts are diluted. Of course community factor is important but 40% of assessment portions are too much. In terms of employees’ point of view MFS assessment system can decrease motivation of performance factor. The evidence is there are no employees to do their work just 5 minutes after office time. That is because MFS don’t give extra payment to employees performance related effort so they don’t want to work hard enough to reach their maximum ability. In addition, low penalty of low performance is another problem MFS compensation system contained. Of course, in long term point of view and considering MFS culture, MFS want to find out low estimated stocks or asset to invest. In that point, short term performance is not that important but it could cause reducing ability because employees don’t afraid of being fired as reason of fool performance in the short term period. At last, basically all human want to receive appropriate reword when they achieve something valuable. But MFS don’t offer its employee even if the employees make remarkable performance so the employees are hard to have attachment to their work. In terms of supervisors’ point of view No objective indicates for assessment mean that supervisors consider more various possibilities when they assess their subordinate. And time and effort are also more required. As a result, supervisors are in trouble because of the reduced time for their own tasks so they couldn’t put their best efforts on the task. (Supervisors feel tired after assessment process) it is kind of waste to the MFS. Suggestion To exchange the balance of assessment system is one of the way to enhance efficiency of MFS. Setting the portion of performance factor 60% to 70% and reduce the portion of community factor 40% to 30%. 30% is not ignorable score to the employees so they would still do community friendly behavior for 30% but they more focus on performance factor to achieve high assessment score. In addition, they diversify their subjective assessment tool ‘Free-writing’ to ‘check-list ‘. When making check-list, we can extract some important and valuable issues on the previous Free-writings from their employees, then including the issues on the check-list. It can make supervisor less tired because supervisor don’t need to consider very specific information about employees. 3. Do you think that MFS will be successful in using their system for their hedge fund managers? If not, why not? If so, upon what will their success depend? The system based on performance is needed. High risk-high return is feature of hedge fund so MFS should control the risk. For that, loyalty of employee is most important factor and thy way to increase employee’s loyalty is giving them certain satisfactory compensation because if employee makes huge profit from their task but firm doesn’t give him compensation, that make employee miserable. As time goes by, the employee feels uncomfortable through the gap between their performance and compensation level. At this situation, the way for motivating employee should be exist. If not, MFS system accelerates turnover rate of hedge department employee. MFS just have team based culture. But it is not fit in the hedge fund business. So it must change their motivation tool for the new business. However, to give additional bonus is not allowed to its culture. Regarding it, I want to recommend â€Å"Hall of fame†( ) for their employees. When certain employee achieves remarkable performance in hedge fund, MFS register his name on the company bulletin board. That makes him proud himself. But the period of on the bulletin board should be short for the rest of other employees. The reason is that too long period of it makes other employees’ feeling inferior. The purpose is just not to make stars but to motivate someone who is very good. But this strategy is mainly focus on the person who has very strong need in the growth desire. (According to the theory of ERG) However, employees’ desire is belong to the existence desire, it is very hard to deal with the employees.

Uganda Juice Industry Essay Example

Uganda Juice Industry Paper Overview Agriculture and agricultural output are very Important to the Uganda economy. The agricultural Industry Is the largest employer of Ganglands with 75% of the population earning a living from the industry. Food and agricultural raw materials account for 40% of the total exports from Uganda. Additionally, the sector contributes 22. 7% to the Uganda GAP. The large contribution of agricultural products to the Uganda economy has led the government to promote value addition as a means of increasing the value of exports. According to the Uganda Investment Authority (IA), the emend for Agendas organic products Is higher than the supply. This Imbalance presents a high opportunity for export of organic fruit Juice from Uganda. Fruits and farm produce are wasted or sold at very low prices during peak seasons due to inadequate storage facilities and lack of effective processing or preservation techniques, leading to high wastage levels. Juice production not only serves to add value to agricultural export but also serve as a way to prevent wastage of excess fruits. The Juice industry has an opportunity to contribute to the Uganda economy y Increasing the value of the country exports and simultaneously preventing wastage of fruits so high in demand, and creating jobs for Uganda. Industry The Juice making industry in Uganda consists primarily of companies that produce natural fruit juices and companies that produce varying degrees of a mixture of fruit concentrate, fruit flavoring, sugar, and water. Natural Juices in the Uganda market are fruit drinks that consist primarily of Juice extracted fruit flesh or pulp. We will write a custom essay sample on Uganda Juice Industry specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Uganda Juice Industry specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Uganda Juice Industry specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer The table below shows the two sectors and the Ingredients for their Julies_ Industry Sector Description/Contents Flavored Juices Mixture of fruit juice concentrate, water and sugar Mixture of fruit puree, water, and sugar Mixture of flavoring, water, coloring, and preservatives Fruit Juices Juice extracted from flesh or pulp of fruit. The natural fruit Juices are targeted towards the upper and middle Income segment of the population while the fruit flavored Juices are marketed towards children and the low income segment of the population. The flavored Juice companies are distributed across the country while the natural fruit juice companies tend to be concentrated in the greater Kampala region. A key distinguishing factor of the fruit juice Industry In Uganda Is that companies that make the flavored Juice drinks generally tend to be concentrated In the Informal sector. These companies are usually small, employing between one to six people. The mixing of the flavored juices usually occurs in one of the entrepreneurs homes. The juices are then packed in polythene bags and distributed and sold through roadside kiosks and street vendors. The flavored juice companies are often not able to break into the formal sector because they lack capital to meet the operational and production requirements set y Uganda National Bureau of Standards (NUBS) for Juice producers. The natural luck producers tenant to De larger organizations employing Trot Detente twenty to two hundred people. The Juices are made in factories and then distributed to grocery stores, schools and other vendors. There are a lot of natural Juices that are imported into Uganda. The table below shows the major players in the Uganda Juice market. It is important to note that a lot of the flavored Juice manufacturers are captured in this table because of the informal nature of those companies. Juice Industry Value Chain and Main Processes Fruit Production Fruit production is the responsibility of farmers. In the Uganda market farmers can be classified in two groups: Small scale farmers The majority Uganda farmers fall into this category. These farmers are distributed across the country and grow fruits on relatively small plots (a few acres). Small scale farming is also characterized by a low use of fertilizers, pesticides, and other improved farming techniques. As a result, they suffer from low and unreliable production. In addition the harvesting methods employed by these farmers often lead to damaged and bruised fruits. Commercial Large scale farms The commercial fruit farms own very large areas of land. They use mechanized and technologically advanced processes to cultivate the land for fruit production and as a result are able to obtain very high quality fruits and high yields. Fruit Transportation Once the fruits reach maturity and are harvested they may go to the fresh fruit market, in order to be consumed fresh, or squeezed freshly at home to be consumed as Juice, or it may enter the processing industry, in order to obtain Juice or other by products. Transporters are responsible for getting fruit from the farms to any of actions discussed above. In Uganda there is an abundance of fruit transportation companies, fruit traders, whose sole business is collecting fruits from firms and delivering them to stores, exporters, and food processors. In other cases one will find that many companies have vertically integrated fruit transportation into their businesses. It is not uncommon to find food processors, exporters and wholesalers who buy directly from farmers and manage the transportation of the fruit themselves. Fruit Processing The fruit processors are responsible for converting the fruits into Juice and other by rodents. Fruit Juice processing consists of extraction, filtration, iteration, bastardization and packaging. The fruits are sorted, washed and prepared for extraction. There are several methods of extracting Juice, depending on the type of fruit. The filtration phase involves the isolation of the pulp from the Juice. The third process of iteration is performed to remove the dissolved oxygen. It is done by spraying the Juice into the vacuum chamber or allowing it to flow over a series of baffles (a device for checking or impeding the flow of gases) while subject to a high scum. Oxygen reacts with the Vitamin C causing deterioration of Juice flavor as a result of other chemical reactions. Bastardization is a sterilization process which slows microbial growth in the Juice. Bastardization involves heating the Juice too specific temperature for a definite length of time, and then cooling it immediately. In the packaging stage clean containers are filled with hot Juice from the pastries. They are then immediately sealed and rapidly cooled. Once packaging is complete ten products are ready to De leverage to ten market. Julie Outlanders Distributors are responsible for delivering the packages Juices from the producer to the retail outlets and in some cases directly to consumers. Like fruit transportation, distribution is another area that is often integrated into the Juice producers business. Fruit Juice is often distributed through wholesalers and exporters. Sales The sales outlets are locations where consumers go to purchase the fruit. In the Uganda context they are primarily retail outlets. The retail outlets that I encountered are: Grocery Stores Gas-Station Convenience Stores Kiosks Street Vendors Customer The fruit Juice industry in Uganda serves both the institutional and household consumers. Suppliers Suppliers to the industry differ for each of the sectors that were defined earlier in this paper. The primary suppliers for the natural Juices are fruit farmers and fruit traders. Suppliers for the flavored Juice sector are the importers of fruit flavors and retailers who sell fruit Juice concentrates. The main supply related challenges for flavored drink producers occur because the main ingredients for their Juices are not produced locally and are imported. The ineffective customs handling of exports often lead to shortages (and associated price hikes) in the supply of concentrates and fruit flavoring. Other than the increase in input prices, the producer may also experience quality/taste degradation. For example a producer may use a particular brand of concentrate in its production process, when the concentrate becomes unavailable the producer now has a choice of shutting down production till the concentrate becomes available or using a different brand of concentrate. A different brand of concentrate results in the product tasting different. For the flavored Juice sector, suppliers are able to exert significant power over the Juice producers because of the producers need to maintain consistent taste for their products. A retailer or importer may choose to raise prices for a unique concentrate or flavor. Fruit Juice companies may chose to buy directly from farmers and incur the cost of transportation from the farmer to their factories or they chose to deal with fruit traders deliver directly to the factory. When dealing directly with farmers the Juice companies are able to extract profits from the farmers but lose some of this advantage to the cost of transportation. With a lot of the farmers being distributed across the country, transportation costs to the Kampala region (where most Juice companies are located) can be quite significant. The following table shows the locations of different fruit farmers. The traders are not able to exert any supplier power on Juice producers because of the large number of traders and relative homogeneity of the service provided. Fruit Location (districts) Pineapple Mask, Kananga, Lower, Waking, Munson, Mumping, Gangs, Kamala Mango Local variety: Lower, Mask, Mumping, Waking, Buddha, Gangs, Kamala, Gull, Lira; improved variety: Massing Passion fruit Yellow variety: Sorority, Mumping; hybrid variety: Mask, Waking, Mumping, Amanita, Sorority; purple variety: Eases, Mask, Mumping, Amanita, Waking Orange Jinni, Kalmia, Gangs, Kamala, Pallid, Kim, Cabinetmaker, sort, serer Barriers to Entry The flavored Juice sector is characterized by very low capital requirements. The low capital requirements combined with the lack of regulatory enforcement ensure that barriers to entry and exit in the flavored Juice sector are very low. Additionally consumers of Juices in this sector are very price sensitive and not concerned about rand loyalty. Entry barriers for the fruit Juice sector are much higher than that of the flavored Juice sector. The reason is because the entry requirements into this sector require high capital investments. In addition to the high capital investments, brand equity may be difficult to build because of customer loyalty to existing brands. Rivalry among existing firms It is difficult to document the number of firms in the Uganda Juice industry because of the ease of entry and exit into flavored Juice sector and because a lot of the firms in the sector operate informally and are unregistered. The table below shows the list of Juice companies selling within the Uganda Market. Company Name Production Sector LEMMA Food (U) Ltd. Domestic Joanna Foods LLC Domestic Fruit Brittany Food Products Domestic Seven Falls Limited PIP Domestic House of Eden (U) Ltd. Domestic Flavored Fruit Both K Enterprises Domestic Flavored Del Monte Foreign Fruit Engage Foreign Fruit Highlands Foreign Flavored Sheehan Foreign Fruit Apparel Agro Foreign Both Shark Group Foreign Fruit Dimes Foreign Fruit Rain Foreign Fruit Martini Kenya Ltd. Foreign Fruit Kettle Foods Kenya Foreign Flavored AY Main National Juice Refreshments Co. (LLC) Foreign Fruit Ribbon Foreign Fruit CERES Foreign Fruit I estimate that there are over a 100 Juice makers who operate informally. The flavored Juice sector is very competitive. Market leaders tend to securing supply contracts for primary and secondary school cafeterias. Compared to the flavored juice sector, there are fewer numbers of companies (all are registered) who compete within the fruit Juice sector. Britannic (makers of Splash Juices) appears to be the market leader based on volumes carried in retail outlets . Despite the few number of coal natural Juice producers, competition is fierce within this sector as there are a lot of imported Juices on the market. There is very little competition between the flavored and a fruit Juice sector as the consumer base for each sector is highly segmented. Mall Players Ana contacts A complete directory of business contacts is attached in the appendix. Industry Fit The table below shows the level of fit for the Juice industry subsection for the common characteristics that PIP is seeking across countries: Priority Characteristic Rationale Natural Juice Companies Fit Flavored Juice Companies Fit Required Many different small firms with 5- 50 employees each Small and medium but not micro enterprises, which will not be big enough to have the same management/labor issues Required Employs relatively low-income or unskilled/semi-skilled workers Want to make sure that Job creation would not be limited to the highly educated or wealthy Preferable A significant role in the Uganda economy, either in terms of employment or GAP Preferable High geographic density of firms To insure that future mentoring interventions will be logistically feasible and affordable