Terrorism and Intelligence Failures Essay Example for Free

Terrorism and Intelligence Failures Essay Terrorism by dictionary definition is described as the unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons. Terrorism comes from decades of histories of deep national pride, religious disputes and what is seen as an intrusion upon Islamic holy grounds. Terrorist groups try to gain influence and power in order to affect political change on either a local or an international level. They make this possible through the publicity and fear that is generated by their violent acts. Throughout history terrorist groups have caused much devastation and damage, leaving a huge impact on the world. Terrorism is one of the leading problems in today’s society. The terrorist attack against the United States, on September 11th, 2011, clearly demonstrated the power and strength that terrorist groups possess. The causes of these acts come from the instability, oppression, poverty and political alienation that the citizens of many Islamic-Arab nations face. As a result, the people of Afghanistan and many other Arab nations have generated a deep hatred for the United States going back over a hundred years. The American government and intelligence agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency, now work harder than ever to prevent such horrifying acts of terrorism from re occurring, since they failed in the prevention of 9/11. â€Å"Terrorism is a complex problem: Its origins are diverse; and those who engage in it, even more so† (Reich, 1). The actions of terrorist groups, as well as terrorists as individuals, are complex. One must recognize that there is not only a single explanation for the act of terrorism. The subject is very intricate and involves a huge diversity of causes and reasons that aid in the explanation and understanding of terrorism. In the book, Origins of Terrorism, Walter Reich examines the psychologies, ideologies, theologies, and the states of mind of terrorists in an attempt to better understand the realms of terrorism. Reich does not only work with terrorism studies itself but instead works within the realms of political science, Islam, history and social psychology to gain a more well rounded understanding of terrorism. Through recognizing the knowledge of these realms, Reich and other scholar’s state this information can contribute to the understanding of the ways in which terrorists view the world and behave in it. Terrorism can be explained as an expression of political strategy. Meaning that terrorist behavior is a willing choice made by an organization for specific strategic reasons. These organizations are very radical political groups that determine that terrorism is the best course of action in accomplishing their political goals. â€Å"The practitioners of terrorism often claim that they had no choice but terrorism, and it is indeed true that terrorism often follows the failure of other methods† (Reich, 10). Failure to mobilize support from masses, lacking of utilization of military power, time constraints and unrealistic expectations cause radical political organizations to turn to terrorism. By choosing terrorism, group members and leaders, willingly accept the risks of challenging the government. The origin of terrorism is as old as humans’ willingness to affect politics through the use of violent acts. Terrorism dates back to first-century Palestine when a Jewish group fought and murdered the Romans and their collaborators who ruled over them. Terrorism went on to be classified as a modern phenomenon. In the twentieth century terrorism was associated with the Italian Red Brigades, the Irish Republican army, the Palestine Liberation Organization and Perv’s shining paths among many others. Terrorism moved away from being based on state action and moved further into a larger aspect of attack against existing political orders. The result of this was due to the growing amount of ethnic nationalism within countries. Groups with strong ethnic nationalism were forming throughout the entire world. Then in the late 1960’s international terrorism became a prominent issue. Terrorism progressed from random killings to massive plans of attacks. Hijacking and bombing had become the favored and popular methods of attack. Organized groups had specific political goals that they carried out through theatrical, symbolic acts of violence. As the twenty-first century came around terrorism started becoming very religiously motivated. Groups like Al-Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah come to mind as they justify their acts of violence on Islamic grounds. Terrorism was now not only being used for political reasons but for religious reasons as well. Religiously motivated terrorist groups are the most alarming terrorist threats in today’s world. The rise of Islamic radicalism and militancy began during the 1970’s in the Middle East region of the world. Islamist terrorism is based on the belief that U.S. foreign policy has killed, oppressed and harmed Muslims throughout the Middle East. This belief resulted in a tense relationship between the ‘West’ and the Arab and Muslim nations, creating a great amongst American society. Osama bin Laden was the founder of the most well known Islamic militant organizations called Al-Qaeda. His goal was to remove and end American military presence in the Middle East and Arabian Peninsula, end American support for Israel, return East Timor and Kashmir to Muslim rule and overthrow any Arab regimes that he considered corrupt and insufficiently religious. Al-Qaeda is the most innovative and dangerous terrorist group that has ever existed according the American government and all other countries that have been victims of terrorist acts. It has been known to engage in suicide attacks, kidnappings, hijackings and recruiting new members through the Internet. Al-Qaeda’s operating network consists of a multinational, stateless army, and a radical Sunni Muslim movement calling for Jihad. Jihad is an important religious duty of Muslims that involves the protection and keeping of the Islamic faith. In the book, The Age of Sacred Terror, authors Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon provides essential insight into the thinking of bin Laden and his followers. Benjamin and Simon talks about bin Laden’s first televised interview with Peter Arnett in March 1997. During his interview he complained and stated, â€Å"the truth is that the whole Muslim world is the victim of international terrorism, engineered by America at the United Nations . We are a nation whose sacred symbols have been looted and whose wealth and resources have been plundered.† Bin Laden continued to state, â€Å"If their people do not wish to be harmed inside their very own countries, they should seek to elect governments that are truly representative of them and that can protect their interests† (Benjamin, 147). Bin Laden gave the people of America a clear warning that he is planning an attack and a war against them. Osama bin Laden issued and signed his second fatwa on February 23, 1998, as the leader of Al-Qaeda. A fatwa is a legal pronouncement in Islam, issued by a religious law specialist on a specific issue. Through the issue of bin Laden’s fatwa, he gave the USA an indictment on the Arabian Peninsula, Iraq and the Middle East. He blames America for occupying lands of Islam and intervening in Middle Eastern affairs. Bin Laden’s goal was to get rid of any Americans getting in the way of his radical Sunni movement. By issuing his second fatwa, bin Laden declared was on the West and Israel. Al-Qaeda also released a video later that year declaring war on the United States and the West as well. After bin Laden had declared war, bombings were carried out on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. There was also an attempted bombing of Los Angeles International Airport and then the USS Cole bombing occurred in October 2000. On September 11, 2001, Al-Qaeda attacked the United States once again. This attack not only crushed American ideologies, but also took away the feelings of security that had taken hundreds of years to build. To plan and successfully execute the September 11th attacks, Al-Qaeda terrorists worked for years within the United States using Islamic organizations to coordinate and build their networks. In the book, American Jihad, Steven Emerson tells the story of the terrorists who sought to destroy the United States from the inside. Emerson states, â€Å"Operating in our open society, with freedom of speech and assembly and with only casual oversight from the FB I, the CIA, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the worldwide network of militant Islamic organizations has finally been able to coordinate† (Emerson, 3). The idea that terrorists were working within the United States seemed unimaginable, but the attacks of 9/11 proved that it was possible. Bin Laden organized and set up a network of â€Å"cells† in Tucson, Arizona; Brooklyn, New York; Orlando, Florida; Dallas, Texas; Santa Clara, California; Columbia, Missouri; and Herndon, Virginia. He understood that if he recruited U.S. citizens it would help him in his terrorist efforts because they would be allowed to travel freely throughout the world. By having an American passport his followers would not be detected or questioned whether they were a part of or members of a terrorist group. Bin Laden â€Å"made efforts to recruit United States citizens†¦ in order to utilize the American citizens for travel throughout the Western world to deliver messages and engage in financial transactions for the benefit of Al-Qaeda and its affiliated groups and to help carry out operations† (Emerson, 153). Bin Laden was obviously successful in his attack on America, which demonstrated not only to Americans, but also to the rest of the world what great threat terrorism can be to humanity. The success of terrorism depends on the existence of a mass media, which will create and spread the feeling of fear throughout the world. As a result, the attacks of September 11, threw America into a full waged war against terrorism. Military efforts were sent to abroad to Afghanistan and the Bush administration increased domestic efforts in order to prevent future attacks. New ideas and reforms needed to be put in place. American citizens did not understand why the CIA, the biggest intelligence agency in the world, could not prevent such a large scaled terrorist attack from happening. â€Å"The CIA was designed to†¦ â€Å"Connect the dots.† Yet it failed to penetrate sufficiently with human intelligence agents or to fathom analytically with sufficient clarity the Al-Qaeda 9/11 conspiracy that lead to the slaughter of some 3000 individuals on U.S. soil† (Russell, 18). â€Å"The terrorists that intelligence must uncover and track are inert objects; they are living, conniving strategists. They, too, fail frequently and are sometimes caught before they can strike† (Hoge, 146). The intelligence system failed and in order to understand this failure one must understand that the strategic role of intelligence in decision making of foreign policy has been a neglected field of study. The outrage of the intelligence failure forced the Bush administration to fall to political pressure. The administration accepted the 9/11 Commission’s recommendation to the create DNI post. This post was to serve as the president’s chief intelligence advisor and oversee the entire intelligence community, including the CIA. The root cause of the failed penetration of Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 plot, by the CIA, has to do with their failure to marshal the resources that work against Al-Qaeda, which were corresponding with the threat. The CIA did provide the president with a strategic warning about the attacks but it would have been much better if they had access to the Al-Qaeda related information that the FBI had collected. The CIA has also failed to produce spies that are needed to reveal the plans and intentions of America’s enemies. The focus should be put on what can be done to improve intelligence rather than recap evidence of what the CIA did and did not do. Spending more money on intelligence agencies will not necessarily improve American security. Intelligence could be improved by the collection of more important information, the building up of human intelligence throughout the world and recruiting more and better spies. If the American government wants to protect its citizens, property, liberty and interests from attacks of terrorist groups then dramatic reforms need to happen. These reforms would hopefully give the president access to the enemy plans and tactics. â€Å"The systematic failures of American strategic intelligence and the CIA since its inception have been obscured by the political and emotional impulse to examine each and every incident of intelligence failure in isolation and not to put them together into a larger context with other intelligence failures that shared the same root causes† (Russell, 27). Nonetheless, America was in an overall agreement that changes in the American intelligence systems were necessary. The United States Department of Homeland security was created in November 2002 as a new cabinet level agency. This department was responsible for the reorganization of the U.S. federal government. Government bureaucracies dealing with military functions and security were also reorganized. In October 2001, the USA Patriot act was signed into effect reducing the restrictions on law enforcement agencies’ ability to search medical, financial, telephone, e-mail communications and other records. It also eased the restrictions on gathering foreign intelligence within the United States. The Patriot act also gave the Secretary of the Treasury more authority to closely regulate financial transactions, involving foreign persons. Immigration authorities and law enforcement could now detain and deport immigrants that were suspected of being affiliated with acts of terrorism more easily. Author Richard K. Betts suggested, â€Å"The National Security Agency (NSA), the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA), and associated organizations can increase â€Å"technical† collection – satellite and aerial reconnaissance, signals intelligence, communications monitoring – by buying more platforms, devices, and personnel to exploit them† (Hoge, 148). A Terrorist Finance Tracking Program was actually created to in order to monitor the movements of terrorists’ financial resources. However, the New York Times newspaper leaked this information, which ended th e project. The National Security Agency instead set up an electronic surveillance program that studied telecommunication use by suspected and known terrorists. All the laws and reforms that removed restrictions on governmental authority are notionally good for the overall prevention and protection against terrorism. In certain perspectives the removal of governmental restrictions is advantageous to American security. However, political interest groups have stated that because these new laws remove restrictions on governmental authority, they violate the civil liberties of the American citizens. The American Civil Liberties Union filed the first legal challenge against the Patriot Act. It claimed that the Patriot act violates the rights of the First Amendment, Fourth Amendment and the right to due process. It is a violation because the Patriot act grants the government the right to search a person’s private property without having to inform them that they are being investigated. Former Pr esident Bush stated that the Patriot Act helped convict more than two hundred suspects of being involved with acts of terrorism. On the other hand, the figures of the Justice Department show that there have been complaints of abuse of the Act from about 7000 people. The real question one must ask oneself is if the governments’ unknown investigations are worth the price of freedom and protection from terrorism. â€Å"The deaths of 3,000 people on American soil at hands of a ruthless adversary along with the CIA’s profound misreading of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) capabilities are the latest and greatest and in a long string of U.S. intelligence failures† (Russell, 149). The United States government has heavily concentrated on improving intelligence through bureaucratic approaches. Fighting the war on terrorism became a huge challenge for the United States. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 caused enormous devastation and damage to all the citizens of America. September 11 will never be forgotten as it has left a huge impact on the world. Al-Qaeda is a very serious threat to the United States but there will most likely be many more in the next generations to come. â€Å"The United States needs to rectify the substantial shortcomings in human intelligence collection operations if it is to deal successfully with issues of war and peace in the future† (Russell, 168). The protection of America is in the hands of the government and the intelligence agencies. Terrorism will not end on its own, therefore Americans need to be prepared for what the future has to bring. Terrorism has been around for centuries and will probably always be around. The question is how to handle it and keep it in check. There will always be extremists working against the governments in the world.

IKEA Marketing Analysis

IKEA Marketing Analysis The purpose of marketing is making sure that the effort of separate parts of the company, such as research, selling, sales promotion, and after sale service are working as closely together as possible. To understand such dual rule successfully their need to be a clean understanding of organisational responsibility and a clear program showing deters timing. In my academic session, I wish to analyse the market research of IEKA which is one of the largest and superior furniture store in the UK. The IKEA concept builds on a relationship with the consumer. Nine key messages are used within the IKEA marketing communication to build this relationship and give an understanding of how we can fulfil our customers needs. They have managed to make their products and services more popular based not only on price but by creating a unique shopping experience for the customers. The purpose of this study is to provide a better understanding of the IKEA experience. Definition of marketing: Marketing is a complex series of process by which demand for goods and services is identified, supplied, anticipated or manipulated by a producer. While new often regarded as part of the responsibility of every aspect of the business and indeed every employee it realize heavily on such functions as advertising, marketing, research and new product development. There are huge number of definitions are provided by different persons and institutes such as. *According to Philip Kotler satisfying needs and wants through an exchange process *The Chartered Institute of Marketing define marketing as The management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements profitably Compare between the definitions: The given definitions by Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) and Philip Kokler are not same. They provide their Meaning of marketing in the different way. If we analyse their speech we can fine the compare of the definition. There are some comparisons in my point of view: a. The main differences between the definitions are changing of the customer need and want which are mentioned in the Philip definition CIM did not give any idea about it. b. On the other hand, Chartered Institute of Marketing Definition with benefit process but Philip Kotler did not focus any theory of benefit. c. Besides that Kotler ignore the identification and anticipating what customer will need in the future but CIM was effort that will be happened in the customer view. In fine, it is clear from the above discussion that, CIM provides its definition is more elaborately then the Philip Kotler proved. But both of the definitions are depend on marketing approach. Characteristics of marketing oriented organisation: The main structure of marketing oriented organisation is the always deal to the customer and try to bit their competitors. They try to attract and empress the customer to improve their sale. There are various types of characteristics is appear in the market oriented organisation. But five important feathers are mentioned bellow: The organisation consider to the customer first. What product customer wants and how product should developed for customer satisfaction. The needs of the customer have got a great importance in the market oriented business. A market oriented business identifies the needs of the customer and will start the process of production of that service or goods which will fulfil the customer needs. In todays business environment, the company gives much importance to the consumer and will try to identify the needs and wants of the customer. Another feather, structure and culture of these organisations are easy and flexible because they can change this structure according to the situation. One most important issue is long-term process. This is a valuable process because any business sometime passes critical moment and then it automatically overcome crisis so if they got long-term target they may not be affected by this way. Last but not least character is stockholder. They give priority to stockholder before making decision because they bear profit and loss of the company. IEKA is a market oriented organisation because all of the above mentioned character are found in the IKEA. They always try to the keep satisfied customer by the providing good product and service. Element of marketing concept: The marketing concept is The achievement of corporate goals through meeting and exceeding customer needs better than the competition. There are three types of marketing concept such as: Customer orientation. Integrated effort and Goal achievement. Customer orientation: Customer orientation means supply best customer service for gaining their satisfaction. It is less important to provide customer convenience then the customer satisfaction. The selling theory is based on the belief that customers need to be persuaded to buy through aggressive selling and promotions. Integrated effort: Company have to improve both internal and external capacity which is important element of marketing. External means customer need, staff motivation, and production. Many individuals within the organisation have a responsibility for creating value not just staff and a marketing orientation requires that an organisation draws upon and integrate its human and physical resources effectively and adapt them to meet customer needs. Goal achievement: Every company must be believed the universal truth role is customer satisfaction for gaining supreme success. Communicating successfully with customers is about supporting the product you are trying to sell. In the market, high levels of promotional support are required for the product to be recognised. Marketing approach: http://kona.kontera.com/javascript/lib/imgs/grey_loader.gif Marketing approach is the process by which companies determine what products and service may by satisfy to consumer, and the strategy to use in sales, communication, and business development. It is also an integrated method which is can build up strong relationship with customer. Every company expense lots of money for marketing purpose. To get success of the business in the competive world company apply different marketing approach for improving sales. There is some of the effective cost and benefit point of marketing approach: Cost: Making a proper marketing structure for attracting customer. To improve the quality of products those are manufacture by the company. Develop the service method. Creating strong relationships with customer, supplier and distributor. Benefit: Almost all of the company stand on profit. Without profit any company cannot survive long time, so main marketing approach should be profitable. One most important point of benefit is gaining customer loyalty. So that customer can realize that the products and service are actually well. Another valuable benefit is achieving reputation. Only by the customer Satisfaction Company can achieve this benefit. Micro environmental factor of IKEA: The word of Micro means small or limited something. But in the business section, micro environmental element means some of the internal factors which are directly control or effect on the business. The micro environmental factors of the company are customer, suppler, and its stockholder those are strongly related each other. So company can directly affected by these element or factors. If the supplier of IEKA do not provide good manner to customer or do not give them proper service customer may divert to another company because it is competitive market as a result the stockholder do not wish to invest capital because company became profitless. But the customer of IEKA are always satisfied because its service and product. The relationship between supplier and stockholder of IKEA excellent that is why they were effort to gain success. Another important factor of IKEA is staff, they are always tried to keep customer happy by providing their best service. Macro environmental factor of IKEA: The word of Macro means bigger or unlimited something. But in the Business world, macro environmental factor means some of the external issue which are indirectly leads or control on the company. The macro environmental factors are national and international economy, politics, society, and technology. The factor of macro environment do not affect on the company it first effect to the country and then society and finally company. We know that IKEA is a worldwide company which deal more than 29 countries. In the recent world economic recession destroys most of companies are going to be baseless but IEKA does effecting by this crises. Because IKEA always sales sale worldwide design product which impress to the customer. Market segmentation: The analysis of buyer or potential buyer in a given market along various dimensions. These usually include demographers like age, sex, and socio-economic status, buying patterns with respect to price and quality and personality factors like conservatism radicalism, need for achievement or need for affiliation. The objective is to divide a market into segments comprising similar kind of people so that marketing efforts eon be targeted more precisely and the most effectively approach used with each segment for specific form of market segmentation. The concept of IKEA that people are famous for working hard, living on small means and using their heads to make the best possible use of the limited resources they have. This way of doing things is at the heart of the IKEA approach to keeping prices low. But quality is not compromised for the sake of cost. Sweden has an international reputation for safety and quality you can rely on, and IKEA retailers take pride in offering the right qualit y in all situations. There are two common product of IEKA bellow which is available in market I am going to analyse market segmentation. DVD CD furniture: This is very essential product for every persons daily life thats way most of the Company want to manufacture this product. We know that before manufacture product IKEA always try to understand which raw materials are environmental healthy and all ages accept it. Starting to the demographical view of the customer, children whose age fewer than 18 they will choose this product for its design comfort. Young men choose the IKEAS DVD CD furniture because the low price then other brand. Some of the large family want to buy this product thinking about its raw materials which make it heavy and sustainable price. In t he geographically views, the urban people will use DVD CD furniture than the country side people. Another status of customer social-economy, the poor people may not unable to buy DVD or CD so they no need to buy this furniture. In this case rich a middle class people can effort to buy this product. Table lamp: The important Product of IKEA which is used people in every category. There is huge colour and shade of table lamp is available in the super market. That is why all generated people chose this product. If we segment this product than we can say the children may be prefer it as a variety of colour. Most of the young people will attract to use it for decorating room with verity of size. In case of old generation they will prefer this product for price because it is low price than other company. Geographically, urban area will be more business proper than the rural area. Another impotent factor for family groups is environmental friendly and sustainable price. Target Marketing: Target marketing involves breaking a market into segments and then concentrating your marketing efforts on one or a few key segments. Target marketing can be the key to a small businesss success. The beauty of target marketing is that it makes the promotion, pricing and distribution of your products and/or services easier and more cost-effective. Target marketing provides a focus to all of your marketing activities. There are five target strategy described below: Identifying competitors: Once you have identified your target market, then you need to understand who your competitors are. The more knowledge you have about you competitors, the more equipped you will be to market and sell your services effectively to their clients. The knowledge you have about your competitors and how you use that knowledge will be either to your advantage or disadvantage, depending on how you market your services. Advertising Avenues: The key to telling your story in the marketplace is to advertise effectively. Conduct necessary research to ascertain where your customers are reading about the latest trends in the marketplace, and ensure your advertising methods meet your customers where they are. Direct mail, email, fax blasts, trade magazine advertising, radio, TV, collateral pieces, and trade shows are some of the many examples that companies can use to advertise themselves effectively. Marketing Campaign and Strategy Develop a marketing strategy that will carry your message to the streets and support your sales teams selling efforts. An effective marketing campaign both brings leads and enables your sales representatives to sell to more qualified leads proactively. Sit down and determine the message that will bring the biggest impact to your target customers, and develop an effective, long-term marketing campaign that will carry that message to the marketplace. Product Knowledge Understanding your own products and the value they bring to the marketplace is critical to developing effective marketing practices. Your product line is your best offense when facing your competition, so it is critical that your marketing department positions your products to their best selling advantage. Your marketing department needs to make sure that the key benefits of your product or service line are well-known to the sales department, and that they are the focus of all marketing campaigns. Industry Knowledge Understanding your industry is critical to marketing effectively to the marketplace. Staying on top of industry trends will enable you to create newer, fresher products that hit the market more quickly and impact-fully than your competitors. Also, knowing the resources to use such as trade magazines, industry-focused websites, trade forums, and industry experts will help you most effectively keep abreast of all that is going on in the industry. Behaviour of buyer: An important part of the marketing process is to understand why a customer or buyer makes a purchase. Without such an understanding, businesses find it hard to respond to the customers needs and wants. For a marketing manager, the challenge is to understand how customers might respond to the different elements of the marketing mix that are presented to them. If management can understand these customer responses better than the competition, then it is a potentially significant source of competitive advantage. Research helps find the real reasons why we buy what we buy. This requires time, money and expertise. Surprisingly many other organisations dont really know exactly why their customers buy or dont buy from them. Yet understanding customers is at the heart of marketing. Once the reasons why people buy or dont buy are discovered, the marketing mix can be changed to suit the buyers needs and wants. HOW CUSTOMER BUY: The psychology of each individual considers the product or service on offer in relation to their own culture, attitude, previous learning, and personal perception. The consumer then decides whether or not to purchase, where to purchase, the brand that he or she prefers, and other choices. A customers approach to purchasing a product or service is influenced by their situation whether they have money and how important, frequent, risky or urgent the purchase is to them in their situation. Imagine the difference between someone with plenty of money who can afford to make a mistake when buying as opposed to someone who has scraped her last few pounds together. They might both be buying the same product but their financial situation suggests that their approach to buying will be very different. Customers make more of an effort, and become more involved, if the purchase is relatively important to them particularly if they have no previous experience of buying such a product or service. Product developing: Before starting this point we should know what is product? Well, if anything able to fulfil customer need with fully satisfying which they buy for specific reason this is called product. The major quality or feather of product is tangibility. Off course, intangible anything not counts as a product such as reputation of company because it is one kind of service. One important way, to make product developed is brand and design. But product and brand is not same thing. A product is made by factory while brand is something which customer buys for consumption. So to develop the product factory should improve the quality and design of brand that people buy. Therefore, the management of product and brand should be aware about marketing process. It is not easy way to achieve customer loyalty and high market sale without product development. It is also not possible if brand and quality of product are not accepted by customer. IEKA got it high market and customer loyalty in the world not only by its quality and brand but also its marketing policy. Product distribution: Distribution is an important section of marketing. It can increase sales by providing proper way of distribution with achieving customer satisfaction. There are distributions Factors which make customer comfort: Market factors. Producer factors. Product factors. Market factors: An important market factor is buyer behaviour how do buyers want to purchase the product? Do they prefer to buy from retailers, locally, via mail order or perhaps over the Internet? Another important factor is buyer needs Information and servicing of product. Intermediaries are often best placed to provide servicing rather than the original producer for example in the case of motor cars. The willingness of channel intermediaries to market product is also a factor. Retailers in particular invest heavily in properties, shop fitting etc. They may decide not to support a particular product if it requires too much investment (e.g. training, display equipment, warehousing).Another important factor is intermediary cost. Intermediaries typically charge a mark-up or commission for participating in the channel. This might be deemed unacceptably high for the ultimate producer business. Producer Factors: A key question is whether the producer has the resources to perform the functions of the channel? For example a producer may not have the resources to recruit, train and equip a sales team. If so, the only option may be to use agents and/or other distributors. Many channel intermediaries focus heavily on the customer interface as a way of creating competitive advantage and cementing the relationship with their supplying producers. If a manufacturer sells via a retailer, they effective lose control over the final consumer price, since the retailer sets the price and any relevant discounts or promotional offers. Similarly, there is no guarantee for a producer that their products are actually been stocked by the retailer. Direct distribution gives a producer much more control over these issues. Product factor: Large complex products are often supplied direct to customers (e.g. complex medical equipment sold to hospitals). By contrast perishable products (such as frozen food, meat, bread) require relatively short distribution channels ideally suited to using intermediaries such as retailers. Price setting process: From the ancient time it was controversial section to setting price of the appropriate product. According to Shapiro and Jackson, every company should follow one of the three methods for price setting such as cost oriented, competitors oriented, and marketing oriented. In generally company set price of the considering the cost of product manufacturing and marketing which up to reach consumer hand. These costs depend on quality of product, label, and distribution and so on. For marketers selling through resellers the pricing decision is complicated by resellers need to earn a profit and the marketers need to have some control over the products price to the final customer. In these cases setting price involves more than only worrying about what the direct customer is willing pay since the marketer must also evaluate pricing to indirect customers. Another important way of price setting is competitors oriented which is the faction of the present world. In the Competitors oriented process need to compare with other company and always try to increase sale anyway. But most of the customer does not like these criteria because they think about quality and brand not price. In case of IKEA, It follows the marketing oriented and cost oriented process because it is a renowned and worldwide company. They no need to competition with other because it manufactured its own brand so that they thing about the manufactured cost and increasing sale. Promotion activity: One important p among the 4p is promotion. In general way, Promotion actually means improving interpersonal capacity. But in the business world, this word used to gaining business prosperity as a reputation company like IEKE, TESCO, TOYOTA, etc. Normally a company can change situation by achieving promotion in various way like sowing public relationship with customer, improving personal selling, advertising and many others way. Personal selling is important way to improve individual customer relationship. Besides sale persons are important rule for the company because all of the action depends on them. IEKA Provide range of promotion activity for improving sales which lead it to gain company rank or promotion. In recent, From 10 to 24 March 2010, IKEA develops an interesting event in four important metro stations in Paris. Furniture collections are currently displayed in high-traffic spots, giving the potential customers a chance to interact with the brand by checking out the product s. The subway walls are also filled with prints that showcase IKEA interiors. What a creative way to do advertising! Moreover, this action completely changes the way the Paris subway station look and creates a cool atmosphere. Marketing mix: The marketing mix is probably the most important marketing term. It describes the basic, tactical components element of a marketing plan. In generally known, as the Four Ps , the marketing mix elements are price, place product, and promotion. Price: IKEAs Price strategy is completely based on cost oriented. Across the markets where it currently has a presence, products are sold at low prices. Prices are 30 to 45% lower than competing products which is a crucial technique of IEKA. Price variations are only a result of fluctuations in exchange rates. This penetration pricing enables IKEA to gain significant market share in the world. Low prices are a result of large-quantity purchasing, low-cost logistics, store location in suburban areas and a DIY approach to marketing. IKEA also benefits from economies of scale and healthy supplier-firm relationships. IKEA enters into long-term contracts, provides leased equipment and technical support in exchange for exclusive, low-cost manufacturing from suppliers. For new markets, IKEA should retain its price-image to maintain the brands positioning. Product: The value chain of IKEA is unique in that customers are also suppliers and suppliers are also customers. There are valuables transactions between the supplier and IKEA and on to the customer which help them to each stage. One another important criteria of the IKEA, is Product differentiation that exists in the value-added dimension. But sometimes IKEAs consumers are treated as presumes with most of its products requiring assembly after purchase. While this is well accepted in areas where IKEA now operates, it may be a point of consideration when entering new markets. Should IKEA encounter a market where DIY is not favoured, IKEA may include the cost of the service to the products price. Place: The third market mix criteria are place or location. In this case all of the IKEAs stores are located in suburban areas. This is a factor in the achievement of IKEAs low pricing. While it may appear as a disadvantage, this fits IKEAs target market of customers willing to transport their own purchases and requiring less assistance in assembly. Promotion: IKEA Have proposed variety of option to providing promoting in the purpose of encouraging people one of them is Work At Home promotion aimed at boosting sales of home office-related merchandise. Realizing the potential of our online database, the decision was made to utilize electronic mail as the primary medium of communication with the public, which required that we identify and utilize the optimum e-mail list management solution. Expended marketing mix: We already discuss about marketing mix which is consist 4p (Price, Product, Place, and Promotion). But without 4p there are more 3p such as People, process, and Physical evidence. Basically, these 3p used to service related industry or organisation. And these are also intangible product which is not appearing in physically like, reputation of company and achieving promotion. The main target of this marketing to making consumer satisfy by providing best service not quality of product. The consumers of the marketing can be segmented into different way. There are 3p below those are providing service to the consumer: People: People mean staff of the organisation that helps to the customer directly. Peoples are important factor in the consumer market of organisation for gaining success. The provide service into the different market segmented organisation. Process: Process is one kind of technique and mechanical strategy of the marketing these are help consumer by given them essential modern facility. For example, more of the cash point provides service to the consumer here people get money instantly. Physical evidence: another most important element is Physical strength that means help to the consumer in the field label. We know that some of the companys work in field like, day labour, Driver, and mailing, packaging here need physical strength to achieve customer satisfaction. Consumer in every age and category want to service physically from the organisation. Different between product and service: The most important distinguish between the product and service is tangibility. Product is a tangible element in any kind of organisation or industry while service show is fully opposite scenery of the organisation which is intangible and appear less just only evaluate by the consumer satisfaction. Another characteristic of product is fixed measurable but service not measurable at any time. Because if a customer have bought any product yesterday and now today he/she want to buy again, at is possible to get same product but in case of service it is almost impossible to get same service from the organisation he may get better or poor once because it is intellectual habit. On the other hand, in term of consumer every organisation evaluates its consumer in the same eye it does not differ into poor and rich consumer. This is the way of marketing. Although market segmentation divide consumer by the demography and geographically. So consumers are less difference than the difference between p roduct and service. Different between international and domestic market: International market means researching market according to the international view of people. While domestic market only analyse the own countrys marketing where it situated. It is sophisticated discussion to find out that why and how international and domestic market is not same. It will be crystal to us if we PEST (Political, Economical, socio-cultural, and technical) analyse in the current world business. In the political factor, one country does not give permeation to enter another country easily for business purpose thinking about it domestic business may lose. We know that the economical status of all country in the world not same that is why the developed country does not wise to business with poor country. Another important factor is culture, religion, and society these are not same in the world so it is main obstacle in the international market. For example, the Bangladeshi people take tea or coffee after meal while British people like drink or alcohol. But now a days, in the technological arena which attract people to involve international business. In case of IKEA how it gain international market, this was only because of IKEAs worldwide service. Conclusion: As mentioned in the case study, UKs furniture market is very brightness. So in the view of increasing share market, IKEA needs to focus on positioning itself as the one stop centre for all home furnishing needs. IKEA should have target their marketing effort on middle-upper, educated segment of UKs people, as they are the one that will be more open to accept new ideas and concept that has to offer. Also IKEA should different itself, focus on the experience it offers to shopper, not just the low price products.

Essay --

Classroom Engagement Teaching and Learning Parent or Community Involvement Student Social or Emotional Support Philosopher Socrates Socrates created a method called â€Å"The Socratic Method† that made people think critically and outside the box. This is a method that is being used in education and in everyday life. Socrates educated his students how to think. He pointed out the errors in people’s thoughts and understanding of life and society. Socrates believed that questioning was an excellent way to gain understanding and knowledge. Parents would ask questions until they were answered correctly. By asking questions children will gain knowledge and become more social. Philosopher Plato Plato believed that a teacher must know his/her subject as well as the limit of their knowledge. Plato teachings were based on philosophy. He taught moral philosophy and despised natural philosophy. Plato believed that knowledge had no practice use Plato believed that parents should provide positive models for children so they can imitate. Children will get ideas and imitate as they grow older Plat...

Dietary Guidelines For North Americans And Suggestions For Food Choice :: essays research papers fc

Dietary Guidelines for North Americans and Suggestions for Food Choices In today's society nearly everyone follows some kind of dietary guidelines. Whether it is in the goal of losing weight, gaining weight or just simply to maintain it, people are jumping onto the dietary band-wagon. A diet is basically to take food according to rule, a mode of living in reference to nourishment. There are various types of diets that one can follow; a high or low calorie diet, low fat diets, diets modified in protein, minerals, water, and carbohydrates, and so the list goes on. Many business enterprises base their entire corporations into the field of weight loss. Many of these diet programs are merely fads that lure desperate people in with their guarantees to lose so many pounds or inches in an " x " amount of time. There are also many pills that one can take, but they are not always safe and can be very damaging in the long run. It is not all people that are on weight loss programs though. Many athletes are on strict programs to gain weight. However this kind of desired weight is not measured in fat but in muscle mass. Many muscle and fitness magazines will feature advertisements and articles for such gains in body mass. Advertisements for diets can sometimes be very dangerous though. Pretty well all the people used in these particular ads are slim and beautiful and it can therefor be very misinterpreting to someone who is overweight. The pressure of being fit can lead to very damaging disorders such as anorexia and bulimia. These two very serious conditions affect a very large amount of women and men in North America these days and can be quite lethal if not cured. So it is important to be careful not to do any physical or psychological harm to one self when trying to lose weight. When embarking into any kind of diet it is extremely important that one gets the sufficient amount of nutrients from their food and/or supplements. A proper diet must consist of more than simply a glass of water and a piece of fruit per meal. One must have a certain daily intake of specific vitamins and minerals to stay in good health. If one were to follow the RDA's (recommended daily allowance) guidelines, one has to be sure that the food that is consumed contains the proper amount of nutrients that is so suggested. A lot of the foods that we consume today do not contain the amount of vitamins and minerals that the U.

One Man, One Vote? Essay -- essays research papers

One Man, One Vote?   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Joseph Farkas thinks that every vote cast should equal every other vote. He feels that many people are voting without knowing why they are voting for a certain person or why they aren't voting for another. He says that a vote cast by a person with no or very little knowledge in the election should not count as much as a vote cast by a person who knows alot about the election. The people who care about who has an important role in the government should have a bigger say in who is going to have that important role. The votes cast by a person who doesn't really know why they are voting for someone should not equal as much as an election educated person.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I do not think that this is a good idea at all. It would not encourage people to learn more about the election but keep them away from the voting area. It will probably make people not want to vote because many of them would think that their vote will not mean as much to the election. It would make the people who are familiar with the candidates want to vote because they would have a bigger say in who gets elected. It would be very hard to decide who know what about the running candidates and issues that are being addressed. They would have to give some kind of multiple-choice question test that you had to fill out while voting. It would take a long time for each person to vote and I think that would make people less encouraged to come and vote. Sin... One Man, One Vote? Essay -- essays research papers One Man, One Vote?   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Joseph Farkas thinks that every vote cast should equal every other vote. He feels that many people are voting without knowing why they are voting for a certain person or why they aren't voting for another. He says that a vote cast by a person with no or very little knowledge in the election should not count as much as a vote cast by a person who knows alot about the election. The people who care about who has an important role in the government should have a bigger say in who is going to have that important role. The votes cast by a person who doesn't really know why they are voting for someone should not equal as much as an election educated person.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I do not think that this is a good idea at all. It would not encourage people to learn more about the election but keep them away from the voting area. It will probably make people not want to vote because many of them would think that their vote will not mean as much to the election. It would make the people who are familiar with the candidates want to vote because they would have a bigger say in who gets elected. It would be very hard to decide who know what about the running candidates and issues that are being addressed. They would have to give some kind of multiple-choice question test that you had to fill out while voting. It would take a long time for each person to vote and I think that would make people less encouraged to come and vote. Sin...

Leadership in a time of complexity

Introduction A true and effective leader reacts to critical incidents especially in times of stress  and challenge. He sets an example and is clear about the â€Å"rules of the road† and then adheres to them along the journey. Clarity, consensus and intensity are three essential factors for aligning values of leaders with those of the followers. The importance of shared values is that they channel and focus people’s energies and commitments. Leadership during a Crisis Leadership in critical times was clearly seen in the Hurricane Katrina which hit the Gulf Coast. The U.S. government agencies tasked with relief and rehabilitation operations seem to remain in limbo.   One of which is Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which reportedly delivered a mere 15 percent of the travel trailers and mobile homes that it hurriedly purchased for temporary housing. The Chicago Tribune reported that FEMA ordered 125,000 travel trailers or mobile homes after Katrina struck in order to provide housing for the estimated 600,000 people who have been displaced by that storm and Hurricane Rita, which hit eastern Texas and western Louisiana three weeks later. However, FEMA was only able to install 18,834 travel trailers in Louisiana and Mississippi and 494 more mobile homes in the two states.[1] Repercussions of the Hurricane There were also reports that a year before Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, information technology utilized by the Homeland Security Department to support disaster management was so disconnected and inadequate that it was necessary for employees to develop ad hoc alternatives to supplement them. This was revealed by DHS' inspector general in a derisive report. Conclusion Thus, to point our fingers to a single cause or leadership may be overly simplistic.   The slow and inefficient disaster response may properly be viewed as the effect of various factors, including, but not exclusively, the inadequacies of the FEMA officials.[2]   All these spread far and wide, up to the very top of the government and down to the local government officials. It is sad that there was no strong leadership to have prevented this disaster. In sum, we conclude that leaders do not achieve success by themselves. Exemplary leaders enlist the support and assistance of all those who must make the project work. They involve, in some way, those who must live with the results, and they make it possible for others to do good work. BIBLIOGRAPHY Martin, A. Hitches Show in FEMA Trailer Plan. The Chicago Tribune. Retrieved May 19. 2007 at: Memo: FEMA had problems before Katrina. USA Today. Retrieved May 19. 2007 at: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/executive/2005-10-17-fema-memos_x.htm ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; [1] Martin, A. Hitches Show in FEMA Trailer Plan. The Chicago Tribune. Retrieved May 19. 2007 at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0511060220nov06,1,4411564.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed [2] Memo: FEMA had problems before Katrina. USA Today. Retrieved May 19. 2007 at: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/executive/2005-10-17-fema-memos_x.htm ; ;

The Effects of Evolving Technology on Business Industries

The only thing in this world that is constant is change. This is a pretty well known saying which existed as long as I can remember. Looking back 50 years and more from today, I can recall how we used to tackle in class about how people have lived centuries ago. Globalization is the result of humans’ endless search for improvements and technological innovations. It is an integration of economy, labor and technology all over the world, even across international borders. This movement has increased the flow of capital, goods, competition and labor across borders which, in turn, had deeply changed the true meaning of citizenship. Today, the upsurge of developments in technology has an undeniable effect on how organizations function within and with other institutions. For an organization, its success and failure greatly depends on how the organization was structured to work. The drive to improve peoples living pattern is still the same drive or factor which triggers international firms to globalize their operations and with that, today’s latest technology makes the company’s and consumers life easier It enable companies to reduce cost by using powerful equipment and machineries while consumers can have easier access to the newest products in the market. The evolution of a new technology poses both threats and opportunities within the industry dynamics and alters the competitive forces. Industry leaders face the possibility of losing their number one spot and being replaced by new entrants and underdogs (because barriers to entry may be lowered). Therefore, technology transformations may provide major shifts in industry dynamics. Depending on its organizational capabilities, it may be good or bad to make drastic adjustments to the existing organization when a disruptive innovation occurs. Disruptive change occurs so intermittently that there is no routine response to them. How to adjust its new product development process depends on the organizations capabilities. Capabilities are its resources, processes (how they transform resources to products), and corporate values. While resources are adaptable to change, processes are not as flexible, and values are even less flexible. Therefore, when a disruptive technological change takes place, a company must look to its capabilities. If the change requires a tremendous amount of financial resources that the company does not have, then they obviously cannot invest in the change, on the flipside, if a large capital firm faces the same change, the investment in the disruptive technology may be so small that it is not worth their more valuable time. The same scenario goes for processes and values. Large firms may be so large, that altering their processes to suit a change may be too burdensome whereas smaller firms may have a much easier time making adjustments in their processes. In addition, it is more likely that a smaller firm’s values may be more flexible for disruptive change than large companies whose longstanding values are not easily adaptable. To overcome the natural inertial found in most large organizations, managers may create new structures within the organization where new processes can be developed. This involves taking out employees with the required capabilities and drawing a new boundary around them. When the organization’s values may not be compatible with the new processes, firms may create a whole new business venture which is wholly owned by the firm but located in a new location with the people and other resources necessary to create an environment conducive to the new process. And last, when a firm doesn’t have the supporting values, resources or processes for sustaining a new process, it may acquire another firm which does. Several factors may impact particular stages in the evolution of a new technology. For example, technological advances, changes in what consumers want or need, and changes in regulations may trigger a technology evolution. In addition, industry transformations often feed of environmental changes. However this necessary transformation, once triggered, does not actually begin until managers notice this need and act upon it. Once acting, managers seek to experiment, and this experimentation deeply impacts the industry as it helps shape what the new industry structure will be. Consequently, as experiments fail, the number of firms in the industry generally is cut in half, but occasionally may increase. An industry’s response to a new technology determines when and how the technological transformation will occur. Without managerial insight and decision making related to the technology, the current industry structure will persist. Managers are essentially the ones investing in these new technologies and they choose how and when to market them to the public, and therefore have ultimately the initial control over the transformation. If the industry as a whole does not respond favorably to the technology, they may not choose to invest and market it, therefore stunting its evolution. On the contrary, if they respond favorably, it helps accelerate the evolution of the transformation. If the industry as a whole is indecisive meaning some favor some do not and some are on the fence, the transformation may only see moderate growth, and depending on which direction opinions are swayed (for or against the technology), the transformation may be completed or the evolution may never meet its peak. One of the first innovations of technology was the mainframe system and it was during the 1960’s that computers and such started to impart in organizations and firms. The classic ways of hierarchal management systems started to disintegrate during these times. Through technological change, globalizing the operations of an international company could put up a plantation where they can reduce their labor cost. Not denying the fact that different people from different countries have different tastes, international companies could also personalize their products according to the consumers or markets preferences without eliminating their standards and trademark. Before, information control was basically handled by those in managerial positions in a linear manner according to rank. With these systems of technology, information was handled as such that company transparency is relatively existent for those who can get hold of certain information. The onslaught of developments in technology has triggered organizational structure alterations. These changes can be illustrated by considering two key variables: the location of information and the location of decision rights in the organization (Brynjolfsson E. and H. Mendelsson). With the innovative technological systems today, important information can now possibly be available to all employees or workers in an organization at all level. Before, information handling and privilege was limited to the persons that directly handle them. Now, the responsibility of handling information is left to information technologists or technicians. The technicians then put data or information into databases which are accessible to all components of the organization For example, an organization can have a website, regularly maintained and updated by professional information technologists. Here, employees, managers and customers alike, can log on to the website and access whatever information they needed. Furthermore, having websites is also a great advantage since helpful feedbacks are easier to get from both customers and employees. The growing need for technology innovations paves way to strengthening certain industries in a corporate world; like data management services, computer engineers, information technologists, software designers or engineers and so on and so forth. Although there are still organizations or companies that are hesitant to use information technology, a growing number of organizations are opening to the possibility of restructuring their organizations to accommodate the privileges of using the modern information systems of today. Seeing as technology innovation not only saves time and money; it is also efficient and very flexible with respect to the organization that opts to infuse it in their existing structure. Not only does it revolutionize an organization from within. Through the substantially used World Wide Web, organizations can communicate and cooperate with other organizations in a faster, more efficient and cheaper way. Today, with the use of virtual offices, it is possible to close deals and agreements from participating people around the world without physically meeting each other. Nowadays, as more organizations focus on the importance of information flow, organizational structures continue to change into more complex systems.   As a result, there is also a continuous drive to make more improvements and advancement in the field of technological innovation. Nowadays, laptop and desktop have been swamped by new connectivity options. There are various of USB devices like Digital cameras, iPods, PDAs, FireWire, thumb drives and MP3 players; with current technologies such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and infrared (IrDA). With all these growing popularity of mobile gadgetry facilitating flexible working, evidently employees could work on the move. Endpoint systems today are easily available. They are user friendly and normally come with more than one feature. With all these conveniences, it also means that employees could be carrying around large amounts of sensitive information unaware of the potential risks. Not only can confidential data be lost, employees could also unwittingly introduce malware onto the network while uploading work from portable devices. However, together with this mobility in work, come various viruses which will bust your files as well as your gadgets. The influence of technology made a very big impact in the lives of people of today’s generation as well as totally changes the definitions of some of the world’s necessity, comfort and luxury. Whether it is a thing or a hobby, the identification of these classes has been change as time goes by. A car which was once called a luxury has been changed overtime and has now become a necessity. Televisions which was once only owned by royal families and other prominent people has now become a household item of which it already has become a necessity for it is where people get ideas of what is happening around them. Even though cars and televisions made living mush more accessible than before, the public is increasingly concerned about global warming and the negative environmental impacts of vehicles. (Clean Cars Alliance) Simple living as it is, our grandfather’s grandfather would ride on horses, plant trees and vegetables, raise cows, pigs and chicken, living under one roof with a family, sitting warm in front of the fireplace. These are the few comforts that men used to acquire. Back then, when a person owns a car, another home, have jewelries, it has been said that the person had lived luxuriously. But today, when technologies have changed, some of the past decades luxuries had become today’s necessities such as cars, cellular phones, different gadgets. Not only material things are affected but also of a man’s way of living. In, conclusion technology impacts should be seen as they truly are and not covered up by the media or industry, and even if they are individuals should be educated enough to realize the positives and negatives. If a company wishes to pursue becoming the industry technological standard, they must first be aware of the competitive strategies they can adopt to increase the probability of success. First, it is important to understand the need for a strong installed base. The installed base is the amount of customers/users of a particular piece of equipment or product that is necessary for the technology. Increasing the installed base for the technology is key, because a large installed base means there will most likely be a greater availability and widespread use of compatible products/software/applications. If the installed base for your technology is large and there is a large availability of applications or widespread use of compatible products, then your technology is another step closer to becoming the standard. With that, your technology is more valuable to consumers since they can use it in more places. A greater installed base, more available compatible products and providing greater value to the consumers leads to greater demand for the technology. As this continuous cycle keeps increasing the demand for your technology, it is well on its way to becoming the industry standard. A manager should ask several questions. First, it is important to know if a technology standard is needed or even desired in the industry. Second, it is important to perform market research to learn what customers want or need, this will help make the technology the standard if it satisfies the customer. Third, it is important to understand the market as a whole paying particular to competitors. Pursuing a technology standard makes sense for a firm when there is no current standard and one is desired by the industry. In addition, for some companies, becoming the industry standard may be essential in maintaining their leadership position and ensuring their existence in the long run.   There are different avenues that one can receive formal and informal education dealing with technological literacy, but there is always room for improvement, much like with technology itself. Going back to the saying that the only thing in this world that is constant is change, we understand that change is inevitable. And just like the billiard balls, it is change which moves people to experiment and innovate, making the world more comfortable and luxurious, yet complicated. Change, constant as it is, has the power to move, improve and change lives. Where men once lives only with necessities, change have been able to make men of today experience luxuries and comforts by making it today’s necessities. With this, the luxuries of the past has been a need of today, making the luxurious living from the past a more simple and yet more challenging living of today REFERENCES Brynjolfsson E. and H. Mendelsson.â€Å"Information Systems and the Organization of Modern Enterprise†. Center for Coordination Science. June 1993. Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Center for Coordination Science. 19 December 2006 Clean Cars Alliance. 23 November 2006 < http://www.cfenv.org/air/cars/index.htm> â€Å"Organizational Structure†.Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. 18 April 2006. Wikimedia Foundation Inc. 19 November 2006 .