Bite Me: A Love Story Chapter 14

14. The Samurai of Jackson Street II Katusumi Okata had lived among the gaijin for forty years. An American art dealer, traveling through Hokkaido in search of woodblock prints from the Edo period, had come into Katusumi's father's workshop, seen the boy's prints, and offered to bring Okata to San Francisco to create prints for his gallery on Jackson Street. The printmaker had lived in this same basement apartment since. He'd once had a wife, Yuriko, but she had been killed in front of him on the street when he was twenty-three, so now he lived alone. The apartment had a concrete floor covered by two grass mats, a table that held his printmaking tools, a two-burner stove, an electric kettle, his swords, a futon, three sets of clothes, an old phonograph, and now, a burned-up white woman. She really didn't go with anything else, no matter how he arranged her. He thought he might make a series of prints of her-her blackened, skeletal form posed about the apartment like some demon wraith from a Shinto nightmare, but the composition wasn't working. He walked up to Chinatown and bought a bouquet of red tulips and put them on the futon beside her, but even with the added color and design element, the picture wasn't working. And she was making his futon smell like burned hair. Okata was not used to company, and he wasn't sure how to keep up his end of the conversation. He had once made friends with two rats who came out of a hole in the brick wall. He had talked to them and fed them on the condition that they not bring any friends, but they hadn't listened and he was forced to mortar up the hole. He figured they didn't speak Japanese. To be fair, however, she wasn't doing very well holding up her side of the conversation, either-lying there like a bog person dipped in creosote, her mouth open as if in a scream of agony. He sat on a stool next to the futon with his sketch pad and a pencil and began to sketch her for a print. He had very much admired the great cape of red curls that streamed out behind her when he'd seen her on the street, and he was sorry that all but a few strands had burned away in the sun. A shame. Perhaps he could draw the red curls in anyway. Make them swirl around the blackened rictus like one of Hokusai's waves. He knew what she was, of course. He was still healing from his encounter with the vampire cats, and it took no little bit of sketching to fill in the details, especially as her fangs were pointing prominently at his ceiling right now and they were far too long and sharp to be those of a normal burned-up white girl. He filled three pages with sketches, experimenting with angles and composition, but on the fourth page he found that a sadness had overcome him that he could not chase away with the moment created in making a drawing. Katusumi retrieved his wakizashi short sword from the stand on his work table, unsheathed it, and knelt by the futon. He bowed deeply, then put the point of the sword on the pad of his left thumb and cut. He held his thumb over her open mouth and the dark blood dripped over her teeth and lips. Would she be like the cats? Savage? A monster? He held the razor-edged wakizashi ready in his right hand, should a demon awake. But if he'd been able to raise his beloved Yuriko, even as a demon, wouldn't he have? All the years that had passed, kendo training, drawing, carving, meditating, walking the streets unafraid, alone, hadn't they all been about that? About making Yuriko live? Or not living without her? When the burned-up girl jerked with a great, rasping intake of breath, cinders cracked off her ribs and peppered the yellow futon and water began to flow from the swordsman's eyes. RIVERA AND CAVUTO Marvin the cadaver dog took them to the Wine Country. There they found Bummer and Lazarus, the Emperor's dogs, guarding a Dumpster in an alley behind an abandoned building. Marvin pawed the Dumpster, and tried to stay on task while the Boston terrier sniffed his junk and the golden retriever looked around, a little embarrassed. Nick Cavuto held the lid, ready to lift it. â€Å"Maybe we should call the Wong kid and see if our sunlight jackets are done, then open it.† â€Å"It's daylight,† said Rivera. â€Å"Even if there are, uh, creatures in there, they'll be immobile.† Rivera still had a very difficult time saying the word â€Å"vampires† out loud. â€Å"Marvin says there's a body in there, we need to look.† Cavuto shrugged, lifted the lid of the Dumpster and braced himself for a wave of rotten meat smell, but there was none. â€Å"Empty.† Bummer barked. Marvin pawed at the side of the Dumpster. Lazarus chuffed, which was dog for, â€Å"Duh. Look behind it.† Rivera looked in. Other than a couple of broken wine bottles and the rice part of a taco combo plate, there was nothing in the Dumpster, yet Marvin still pawed at the steel, which was the signal he had been trained to give when he'd found a corpse. â€Å"Maybe we should give Marvin a biscuit to reset him or something,† said Rivera. â€Å"No corpse, no biscuit, that's the rule,† said Cavuto. â€Å"We all have to live by it.† At the mention of a biscuit both Bummer and Marvin stopped what they were doing, sat, looked dutiful and contrite, and gave Rivera the â€Å"I need and deeply deserve a biscuit† look. Frustrated with what biscuit whores his cohorts were, Lazarus went to the side of the Dumpster and started pawing the space between it and the wall, then tried to stuff his muzzle in behind it. Cavuto shrugged, pulled on a pair of form-fitting mechanics gloves from his jacket pocket, and pulled the cement blocks from under the Dumpster's wheels. Rivera watched in horror as the realization hit that he was probably going to get Dumpster schmutz, or worse, on his expensive Italian suit. â€Å"Man up, Rivera,† Cavuto said. â€Å"There's police work to be done.† â€Å"Shouldn't we call some uniforms in to do it? I mean, we're detectives.† Cavuto stood up and looked at his partner. â€Å"You really believe the movies when James Bond kills thirty guys hand to hand, blows up the secret lair, gets set on fire, then escapes under water and his tux doesn't even get wrinkled, don't you?† â€Å"You can't just buy one of those off the rack,† Rivera said. â€Å"It's a high-tech fabric.† â€Å"Just give me a hand with this thing, would you?† Once the Dumpster was in the middle of the alley, the three dogs more or less dogpiled in front of the boarded-up window, Marvin doing his highly trained, â€Å"There's a dead guy in here, give me a biscuit† paw scrape, Bummer barking like he was announcing the big sale event down at Yap-mart and everything had to go, and Lazarus rolling out a long, doleful howl. â€Å"Probably in there,† said Cavuto. â€Å"Ya think?† said Rivera. Cavuto was able to work his fingers between the sheet of plywood and the window frame and pulled it out. Before he could even set it aside Bummer had leapt through the window into the darkness. Lazarus pawed the windowsill, then leapt after his companion. Marvin, the cadaver dog, backed away, then ruffed twice and tossed his head, which translated to, â€Å"No, I'm good, you guys go ahead, just give me my biscuit. I'll be over here-well, would you look at that-those balls definitely need some tongue attention. No, it's okay, go on without me.† Marvin had a nose that could distinguish as many different odors as the human eye could colors, in the range of sixteen million distinct scents. Unfortunately, his doggie brain had a much more limited vocabulary for giving name to those scents and he processed what he smelled as: dead cats, many, dead humans, many, dead rats, many, poo and wee, many flavors, none fresh, and old guy who needs a shower; none of which would have given him pause. The smell that he couldn't file, that he didn't have a response for, that stopped him at the window, was a new one: dead, but not dead. Undead. It was scary, and licking his balls calmed him and kept his mind off the biscuit that they owed him. Rivera shone his flashlight around the room. The basement appeared empty but for piles of debris and a thick layer of dust and ash over the floor, textured with the paw prints of hundreds of cats. He could see the movement of Bummer and Lazarus just at the edge of the flashlight's beam. They were scratching at a metal door. â€Å"We'll need the crowbar out of the car,† said Rivera. â€Å"You're going in there?† asked Cavuto. â€Å"In that suit?† Rivera nodded. â€Å"There's something down there, one of us has to.† â€Å"You're a goddamn hero, Rivera, that's what you are. A real, dyed in the worsted wool and silk blend hero.† â€Å"Yeah, there's that, and you can't fit through the window.† â€Å"Can too,† said Cavuto. Five minutes later they were both standing in the middle of the basement, fanning their Surefire ballistic flashlights through the dust like they were wielding silent light sabers. Rivera led the way to the steel door that the hounds were going at as if someone had duct taped it to a fox. â€Å"You guys, shut up!† Rivera snapped, and much to his surprise, Bummer and Lazarus fell silent and sat. Rivera looked back at his partner. â€Å"That's spooky.† â€Å"Yeah, and praise Willie Mays that's the only spooky thing going on here.† Cavuto was a deeply religious San Francisco Giants fan and genuflected whenever he passed the bronze statue of Willie Mays outside the ball park. â€Å"Good point,† said Rivera. He tried the door, which didn't budge, but it was clear from the arc plowed into the dust and ashes that it had been opened recently. â€Å"Crowbar,† he said, reaching back. Cavuto handed him the crowbar and at the same time drew his gun from his shoulder holster, a ridiculously large Desert Eagle.50-caliber automatic. â€Å"When did you start carrying that thing again?† â€Å"Right after you said the v-word out loud at Sacred Heart.† â€Å"It won't stop them, you know.† â€Å"It makes me feel better. You want to hold it while I pry the door?† â€Å"If there's a-one of them-in there, they'll be dormant or whatever you call it. It's daytime, they can't attack.† â€Å"Yeah, well, just in case they didn't get the memo.† â€Å"I got it.† Rivera fit the crowbar in the door jamb and threw his weight against it. On the third push, something snapped and the door scraped open an inch. Bummer and Lazarus were up instantly, with their noses in the gap. Rivera looked back at Cavuto, who nodded, and Rivera pulled the door open and stepped away. A pile of shelving and junk blocked the doorway, but Bummer and Lazarus were able to thread their way through it and were in the room, barking in frantic, desperate yelps. Through a gap in the junk, Rivera played the beam of his flashlight around the small storeroom, over barrels, shelving, and piles of dusty clothing. â€Å"Clear,† he said. Cavuto joined him in the doorway. â€Å"Clear, my ass.† The big cop kicked his way through the barricade, holding his flashlight high in one hand and the Desert Eagle trained on a row of barrels on the right side of the room, where Bummer and Lazarus were currently indulging a hurricane-level doggie freakout. Rivera followed his partner into the room, then approached the barrels while Cavuto covered him. Beyond the barking, he heard a faint metal tapping coming from one of the barrels. The barrel was upside-down and had held some kind of solid, the label said something about water-filtering mineral. It was sitting on its lid, which was only partially crimped on. â€Å"Something's in there.† â€Å"Plug your ears,† said Cavuto, cocking the hammer on the Desert Eagle, and aiming for the center of the barrel. â€Å"Are you high? You can't fire that thing in here.† â€Å"Well there's can't and there's shouldn't. I probably shouldn't fire it.† â€Å"Cover me, I'm pushing it over.† Before Cavuto could answer Rivera grabbed the edge of the barrel and shoved with all his might. It was heavy, and fell hard. Bummer and Lazarus rocketed around to the exposed lid and were pawing at it. â€Å"Ready?† said Rivera. â€Å"Go,† said Cavuto. Rivera kicked the edge of the lid and it clanked off, then landed with a dull thud in the thick dust on the floor. Bummer rocketed inside while Lazarus frisked back and forth outside. Rivera drew his weapon and moved to where he could look into the barrel. He was met first by a gray storm of hair, then two crystal blue eyes set in a wide, weathered face. â€Å"Well that was unpleasant,† said the Emperor, around the sloppy bath of dog spit he was receiving from Bummer. â€Å"I'll bet,† said Rivera, lowering his weapon. â€Å"I may require some assistance extricating myself from this container.† â€Å"We can do that,† said Cavuto. Cavuto was fighting back a very bad case of the empathy willies, imagining himself spending a night, maybe longer, upside-down, shoved inside a barrel. He and the Emperor were about the same size. â€Å"You in pain?† â€Å"Oh no, thank you, I lost the feeling in my arms and legs quite some time ago.† â€Å"I'm guessing you didn't get in there on your own, did you?† said Rivera. â€Å"No, this was not my doing,† said the Emperor. â€Å"I was roughly handled, but it appears to have saved my life. There wasn't enough room in the barrel for any of them to become solid. There were hundreds of the fiends around me. But you saw them as you came in, I'm sure.† Rivera shook his head. â€Å"You mean the cats? No, there are tracks everywhere, but the place is empty.† â€Å"Well that's not good,† said the Emperor. â€Å"No, it's not.† Rivera was distracted. He'd been playing his flashlight beam around the room, looking for something to help them get the Emperor out of the barrel. He stopped the beam on a spot by the shelves where the dust hadn't been stirred by their rescue efforts. There, as clearly as if it had been made in plaster of Paris to send home for Mother's Day, was a single human footprint. â€Å"That's not good at all,† he said. From outside the window Marvin barked three times quickly, which Rivera thought was a warning, but translated from dog to: â€Å"Hey, can I get a friggin' biscuit out here, or what?†

Suicide Methods and Essay. Belonging

Essay. Belonging is a fundamental part for all individuals in which we strive for acceptance and security through others. Understanding is a main part of feeling like you belonging. Individuals belong when they fell connected to others and the world. However to do this they must first have an understanding and acceptance of self which will nourish their sense of belonging. A lack of understanding of the concept of belonging and yourself leads to preventing your identity, relationships, acceptance and ultimately belonging.The concept of the understanding of belonging is shown in the text – Swallow the air by Tara Jane Winch. In Swallow the Air, persona May Gibson shows a lack of understanding in her and therefore feels she does not belong. As soon as her mum commits suicide at the beginning of the novel May has trouble belonging, â€Å"When mum left I stopped being Aboriginal I stopped feeling like I belonged. Anywhere†. May has lost her security in her culture and ident ity. Costa the curry will tell u too link this back to understanding nourishes belongingThe name of the first chapter ‘swallow the air’ demonstrates May’s loss of belonging. The title is a metaphor of her disconnection to others, the community and her sense of belonging. She is not physically drowning in water she is drowning in pain and sorrow. However by the end of the novel, the final chapter called ‘home’ signifies May’s attitude has changed dramatically. â€Å"I know what the word really means, home. † The word home is a universal term of belonging it represents that she has once again found ‘family’ and within that comfort.

Final assessment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Final assessment - Essay Example Due to the rise in cyber attacks and more reliance on eCommerce, the confidence of customers online has been compromised. Quantium reported that Australia’s online sales fell at a diminishing rate, largely caused by ever increasing eCommerce frauds. For example, the growth of Australia’s online sales was 31% in 2010 with fraud rate at 0.6%. However, the online growth rate dropped to 22% in 2012 when fraud rate increased to 0.8% (Demery, 2013). Furthermore, according to CyberSouce (2012) 13th online fraud report, the total online revenue loss due to fraud was estimated at $3.4 billion in 2011. It can be seen that eCommerce fraud has a significant negative impact on online business and this is therefore a cause of concern. Moreover, McAfee as a security vendor, reported that 33% of Australian businesses were involved in a security incident in 2009, which meant a loss of an average $34.000 in revenue and $37.000 for fixing the bug (Timson, 2009). In order to avoid a large proportion of sales being lost due to fraud, Ausmart is in need of a well-developed and secured online network. New Paragraph In many business communities, most of the major transactions are performed online. Online business has become as important and maybe even more important than basic commerce done outside the channel of online arena. Banking transations are done by busy people online as they don’t have the time or the place to go to the banks and perform the transactions by themselves. Credit card purchases, shopping, ordering food, paying bills, performing business transaction, buying books and even paying college fees. People online are now doing all these transactions and therefore eCommerce’s importance has grown and risen significantly in the last 10 years. Owing to this phenomenon, it is imperative for the eCommerce industry to safeguard its business online and to make sure that hackers do not get access to the credit and debit card information of the users. Also, it is crucial that hackers do not block any event and all the transactions carried out online have a safety network, which makes them happen seamlessly. New data collated from about 2 million Australian credit and debit cards reveals the popular suburbs in which e-commerce fraud has been attempted, using internet-connected computers. E-commerce fraud involves a criminal using a stolen credit or debit card to buy goods online. Ecommerce crime is on the rise in Australia and the rest of the world and the hacker community has been very successful at targeting various business enterprises. Ausmart has been trying hard to develop a strong firewalled network and this has taken a significant energy and time from their pursuits. It must be noticed that they have been trying to cope with such threats for a long time and knowing that hackers have been targeting them hwihc has hampered their business negatively, focusing on E-Commerce and making the business as hacker free as they can i s the number one priority right now. Reflections It can be seen from the above paragraphs that eCommerce is significant to the development of business and it is paramount to have a strong cyber security for all the business transactions in order to avid any kind of cyber attacks or malpractices by the hackers which in turn may jeopardize profit margins for the business community.

HEALTH PROMOTION AND THE DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH Article

HEALTH PROMOTION AND THE DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH - Article Example Realistically, health promotion requires one to focus on issues that affect their health lives and how they can effectively change them to influence a healthy life (Hartford, 2012). For example, if a person is unemployed, change in their location of residence will not take much effect in addressing their immediate problem. Healthy child development is a long term process that starts long before birth, and it determines the health and well-being of the child throughout his or her life. Healthy living of a child through all development stages is fundamental to the child’s thriving and the child is positioned to reach his or her potential adulthood (Hartford, 2012). Evidently, in the writing, Social determinants of health: The Canadian facts by Mikkonen and Raphael, maltreatment during infancy and early childhood have shown negative child development, affecting the brain and cognitive development. It all affects academic achievement, and these factors have proven to be destructiv e through jeopardizing the future performance of the child. Repercussions of negative impacts such as child abuse and neglect are manifested into adulthood and adolescence physically, intellectually and psychologically (Mikkonen & Raphael, 2010). The capacity and deliverance of a child depends substantially on the environment or surrounding where he or she is raised (Hartford, 2012). Extensive research bodies confirm brain development, school readiness, subsequent learning and future adults’ health are substantially influenced by early experience. Health determinants are those factors that shape the health of a child and are characterized by the social and economic factors ranging from the activities they do, including play to how they are treated through their child hood. Such factor influence the child’s potential of the future and should be addressed with accordingly (Kozier, 2009). Health promotion, on the other hand, deals with the ways how a child will grow in a conducive environment for a better future by taking exert control over determinants of health and here by improving their health (World Health Organization, 2011). Nurses play a fundamental role in health promotion; their role branches out to caring for fit people, as well as the ill (Mikkonen & Raphael, 2010). Acting as ambassadors of health promotion through preserving of wellness to reduce the number of times a child has to seek health-care services as established by a seminal article of Donaldson and Crowley, nurses’ role in providing information for better living has proven to be one of the key agendas in health promotion; education, as well as availability to the clients, has proven effective. Long-term relation with mothers by working even in their homes has encouraged mothers to take advantage of their strength and achieve their goals (Public Health Agency of Canada, 2010). Nurses act as advisers to mothers from child birth to parenthood (Hartford, 2012). Their suppor t, through deliverance of healthy babies to becoming confident parents and encouragement to pursue a better future for themselves and their children, has proven most effective. Such roles manifest themselves like: Helping mothers practice preventive health procedures and good parental skills. These include diet improvement and reduction of stimuli and other drugs for instance

Research proposal LBSRE2002 Research Methods for Business Literature review

Research proposal LBSRE2002 Research Methods for Business - Literature review Example This study will venture to assess the qualifications of three candidates for branch manager in a new office being set up in UK Company using the 360-degree feedback. Specifically, the following research questions will be addressed: 1. What is the profile of the three candidates in terms of the variables: gender, age, civil status, educational attainment, and experience as manager? 2. What is the profile of the raters in terms of the variables: gender, age, civil status, educational attainment, position, and years of service with the company? 3. What is the level of qualification of each candidate in each of the following behavioural areas of management: leading change, leading people, results-driven characteristics, business acumen, and building coalitions / communications? 4. Are there significant differences in the assessment of the manager qualifications in each area of the three candidates when the respondents are grouped according to each profile variable? 5. Is there a signific ant difference in the assessment of the manager qualifications among the three candidates? 6. Did the personal rating of each candidate significantly differ with the overall assessment of the raters? 7. What are the greatest strengths and weaknesses of each candidate? 2.0. Justification for Research Topic and Background (300) The primary justification for the research topic are the emerging issues in the UK company where management believes that they do not have sufficient evidence to come up with a sound judgment regarding the choice for the best candidate. To further confound their woes, a meeting among top level management and the middle level managers ended in a deadlock as to which candidate is best qualified to take the helm as manager of the new branch office being set up within a year’s time. A look at each candidate’s profile and track record in the company showed that the candidates’ qualifications are comparable. Top management believes that candidate s 1 or 3 would be an ideal choice, whereas the middle managers thought that candidate 2 will be the best choice. Top level management is, however, honest enough to admit that they based their nod for candidate 1 or 3 on gut feel. Middle managers confessed that they do not really know candidate 2 very well, but have experienced several altercations with both candidates 1 and 3 on separate instances. Hence, their choice for candidate 2 might have been somehow affected by bias against the other two. Being known to be a business student, one top level manager requested this researcher for some suggestions regarding the aforementioned issues. Without hesitation, and driven by the fact that the new branch office entail management development, 360-degree feedback was the first thing that crossed this researcher’s mind. The suggestion was well-taken and this researcher was asked to help in the conduct of the procedure. The researcher obliged to accept the challenge as an opportunity to put to use a concept learned in business school and to assist a friend who is immersed in the industry. This researcher lost no time in gathering preliminary information. It was learned that the three candidates currently hold middle manager positions in three departments with a comparable number of subordinates, but candidate three handles more employees in the supervisory positions. All three candidates usually deal with many of the company’

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Statisitcs results - Statistics Project Example On the other hand, a mean of 2.1452 with a standard deviation of 1.34099 and standard error of the mean of 0.17031 were the statistics for the non-witnesses with respect to the prescribed punishment. Figures one and two are error bar graphs for guilt rating and punishment rating respectively. An evaluation of the dependent variables reveals that they are continuous. The two categorical groups that make up the independent variables are guilt rating and punishment value. There is also no relationship between the observations of the two groups which means that they are independent of each other. The data had no significant outliers that could reduce the validity of the results. Based on the Levenes test, it was proved that the variances were homogeneous. In this assignment we will analyze the pooled data which we collected last week Please analyze the group data from Experiment II using SPSS. Include data inspection, description, and a one-way ANOVA with supporting graphs (error bar groups are best) showing confidence intervals. Save your data file. Save your output file. Send both to me as attachments.

E-Commerce Business Model Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

E-Commerce Business Model - Assignment Example The main objective of the e-commerce organisation is to attract online customers and to increase the sales (SportsDirect, 2013). The following image will show screen-print of SportsDirect: SportsDirect follows Business-to-Consumer (B2C) business model. There are significant differences between Business-to-Business (B2B) and Business-to-Consumer (B2C) customers. Concerning B2C customers, it involves business transactions between organisations and customers. The basic concept behind this business model is that e-retailers can sell the products to the customers through various tools such as internet shops or telemarketing. On the other hand, in B2B business model, both purchasers and sellers are business organisations. The purchasing procedure in B2C and B2B is also dissimilar. In B2C, the purchasing method is simple where customers use their credit or debit cards along with providing other necessary information in order to make a sale. Conversely, in B2B business model, the payment can be done through invoice, especially for bulk purchases (Barkley & et. al., 2007). There is substantially more stake in sales opportunities in B2B websites in comparison to B2C websites. However, it can be observed that several B2B websites had faced bad customer experiences than B2C websites. Majority of B2B websites focus on designing websites for themselves rather than for the suitability of customers. Thus, this attitude creates a hindrance in the way of potential customers who use internet in order to discover organisations which can satisfy their requirements. However, it is worth mentioning that internet had significantly altered the relationship between organisations and customers where majority of interactions are demand oriented (BusinessWire, 2006). The quick development of collaborative internet services has resulted in a continually increasing number of e-commerce websites. With the increase in e-commerce

Youth Justice in the UK Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Youth Justice in the UK - Essay Example The essay "Youth Justice in the UK" discusses the following issue - the commitment to effective practice, in itself highly desirable, has frequently been accompanied by an unwarranted certainty about 'what works' allowing little space for debate. There are various factors that contribute towards explaining this statement.Every individual is unique and forms their own assumptions based on their perceptions. Many of the youth are not very clear about life and its consequences, for the main reason of being young, and their perception of life is quite different from a matured adult. Wrong perceptions snowball into various conflicts and contradictions which easily leads them towards crime. According to Laurie Mullins, â€Å"Perception is the root of all organizational behavior; any situation can be analyzed in terms of its perceptual connotations†.Another major cause for leading the youth astray is alcohol and drug abuse. The youth are not in a position to understand the dangers be hind this and are slowly sucked into a kind of trap that the find very difficult to come out of. As they go deeper, they stop at nothing to satisfy this need. They engage in robbery, petty thefts in the beginning but later on move into much bigger crimes such as extortion and murder. The modern day ‘binge drinking culture’ has spawned an acceleration of crime. While most people in the UK, drink within safety limits, but unfortunately the youth are not so serious about this.

Article review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 9

Review - Article Example Both the international comparative and German Cranfield surveys give a clear overview of the current human resource practices in German (Festing, 2012). German faces challenges such as recruitment due to a demographic change, which in addition to low unemployment rates led to inadequately qualified personnel. Hence, most major companies use active employer branding while smaller ones use selected employer branding practices with an aim of attracting candidates. German uses a formal selection of the workforce such as psychological or legal writing less often as compared to other countries. After a semistructured interview of applicants, the required number for the position are picked based on their curricula vitae (Festing, 2012). The elected body representing the interest of employees may be the cause of the lack of formal selection methods. The work council neglects the use of the devices. Although the German companies tend to show a consistency in the use of carefully local selection procedures based on work experience, educational training, and internship report. It clearly brings out the employment system in Germany (Festing, 2012). Most of the companies in German use extensive staff development and long-term career planning which include technical capability and functional proficiency as central values. It influences the retention of most employees resulting in a steady job security making dismissal very carefully. Because of the job security, the company wins most employees who work for many years. Regarding compensations, the amounts vary according to the individual monthly earnings. The wages and salaries of most of the German workers, however, results from tariff agreements from collective bargaining. In the international comparison of HR practices as per the Granfield network in 2011, most of financial participation and performance-related pay are frequently used in United States than in Germany. German mainly majors in the use

The Role and Meaning of Jesus Miracles Essay Example for Free

The Role and Meaning of Jesus Miracles Essay Abstract: Jesus has done so many miracles during His life in this Earth. There were hundreds of miracles which served as an eye opener for those people who do not believe in Him. Through those miracles, their spiritual eyes were opened and their ears have heard of the truth that Jesus was the one sent by God to save Humanity and that He deserves all praises and adoration. The miracles also showed that anything is possible with Jesus. There is nothing in which He cannot do. There is none for He can do and accomplish all things if He wants it to happen. The Role and Meaning of Jesus Miracles Jesus ministry started when he was already 33 years old. But even if it started that late, He still has accomplished so many things that brought great changes in the lives of those unbelieving individuals. He did many miraculous things that have made the Israelites and the Pharisees stand in awe of it. Jesus did those miracles to show His Great Power, His Healing Touch and His Great love. His Glory was manifested through his miraculous deeds. Even though, many opposed to what He is doing because according to them it was unlawful, but still it did not stop Him from doing good for the others. Still, He continued doing what is right and what God has planned for the human beings. Many were Jesus’ opponents that time; those were the Sadducees and the Pharisees. They were the great hypocrites of all time. The judged Jesus according to what their selfish hearts and minds dictates. They insulted the greatness and the power of Jesus. They would not believe that Jesus was the mighty King that was promised to save their land. What they perceive was a baby born in a kingdom, born with a crown and sceptre with all the treasures and gold’s of his kingdom. But these were all wrong. God’s plan was different. What he did was to send the Saviour Jesus in this world in the hands of ordinary people, a carpenter and an ordinary woman. What Jesus’ only want is for us to have an abundant health and prosperous life. He does not want us to suffer inequities. He loves us so much that He is willing to do all things just for us, to the extent that He died on the cross just for us. For the redemption and payment for our sins. But before He died and was crucified, He left us with many miraculous things which brought great impacts on our being. One of those many miracles was, Jesus Heals a Crippled Man. In this story, Jesus was on Capernaum when while teaching, their were four men who came near him and brought with them a cripple man. They saw that there many people gathered, so they decided to make a hole in the roof where Jesus was preaching and there they let the crippled man see and be healed by Jesus. Jesus was amazed by the faith of those people who accompanied the cripple man and as well the cripple man himself. Then Jesus commanded the man to stand up and pick up his mat, when the crippled man did it, he was amazed because he can finally walk. Jesus also said to his friends that their sins were already forgiven because of their great faith, many reacted with this. They say, that Jesus does not have any right to forgive only God do. Jesus then told him, that He has every right to say it because He is the Son of God. One time, He also healed a man but this time with a cripple hand. It was during Sabbath, and many Pharisees condemned Jesus for healing during Sabbath, they it is unlawful. For Jesus, it does not matter if it is during Sabbath or not, as long as someone is healed and made good. Days or important dates do not matter as long as you are doing well for others. In this miracle Jesus showed that Great faith is needed for us to be saved and healed. Nothing is more important than having faith. Faith is the substance of things we are expecting and hoping while we do not see those things yet. We have great faith that things will happen, if we are sick, we should have faith in Jesus, that He will heal and cure us from all our sickness. All we have to hold is just faith, even little faith can do great things, it can already move giant mountains and clear our way. Jesus desires to see that faith within us; He cannot do what He wants in our lives, like salvation, healing and prosperity if we do not have that great faith within out hearts. A faith that never waivers, that never ceases or stops but a faith that is firm, that will stand the test of time even great trial, circumstance and travails will come on our way. Jesus desires for us great things in life, that is first we should be saved by His blood and we should believe in Him, that He is the healer and the Messiah which God sent in this Earth for us. Jesus heals a sick woman and made alive a dying girl. In this event, Jesus was at the shore in Galilee when Jairus approached Him and asked His help because his daughter is about to die already. Jesus the immediately responded and went with him. But while Jesus was on His way, He noticed that someone touched His cloak. When He looked around He saw a woman. The women then plead Jesus to heal her because she was having hemorrhage for 12 years already. Immediately, Jesus healed her by just speaking His word. Jesus promised her that all the days of her life; she will be in freedom from diseases and pain. But while Jesus was healing her, many people came into them and told the bad news that Jairus’ daughter already died. They all worried and fret about this. Upon hearing this, Jesus told and encourages Jairus to just believe and have faith to God. When they reached home, Jesus immediately touched the dead girl and utter words of life which was â€Å"Talitha, Koum† meaning, â€Å"little girl get up!† Then immediately the girl was made alive again. Upon seeing this, many were again amazed by what He did. Again, because of their great faith, Jesus has able to manifest His love and did miracle for them. The bleeding woman trusted Jesus so much that she took every chance just to get the attention of Jesus for her to be healed. In the case of Jairus, in the very first place he already sought Jesus help and even if the news came that his daughter already died, Jairus still has the faith and hope to Jesus that He will be able to heal and make alive again his daughter. And Jairus was not wrong. Indeed Jesus touched his daughter and she was made alive again. In these two miracles that Jesus again was made known as an ever healing one. Faith was still the main ingredient why Jesus manifested His Healing and miraculous power to the bleeding woman and to Jairus as well. Jesus heals a Man who was deaf and could hardly talk. In this miracle, a man who was deaf and has a big difficulty in talking was brought by the people believing that He will be healed also by Jesus as what He did to other people. They told Jesus to just touch him. And so, the man was healed. He was then able to hear very clearly and say words with no difficulty anymore. Because of their belief that Jesus was able the man was healed. Upon seeing the miracle happened, they praised Jesus. They said that Jesus is good and that He is such a great one for He has healed many people with all kinds of diseases already. Jesus heals the boy. In this miracle, Jesus handled a boy who was possessed by a demon. Jesus, at first, was upset because they did not immediately brought the boy to her. Jesus asked the condition of the child and then the man who brought the child to Him, asked Jesus if He could help and upon hearing this Jesus immediately reacted. He asked why does those man question if He can, do not they know that anything is possible with Him. He is the Messiah and the Great Mighty God; therefore everything will be done and accomplished by Him. So, Jesus drove away the demon inside the boy’s body. When the disciples saw this, they asked God why they could not do it themselves, then Jesus answered that what they only lack is prayer and faith. Those are just some of the many miracles that Jesus has performed during the three years of his ministry. There are still many of them that showed how great Jesus is. How He healed those people who were seeking Him with all their hearts with great faith, believing that Jesus will be able to free them from all their sickness. The miracles of Jesus manifest His goodness and His everlasting love and concern for us. He does not want us to suffer from anything but give us freedom spiritually and physically. Through the miracles He did, many people came to know and accept Him as Saviour and Redeemer. Doing those miracles was one way of Jesus to tell us that all things are possible if we only just believe and have faith in Him. Jesus came to this world to show how great his love for us is. Jesus even laid down His own life for us through His crucifixion in the Cross. Therefore, because of His goodness; He deserves all our praises and our faith. References: 1. Mark 2: 1-12. Holy Bible New King James Version. Thomas Nelson Publishers. 2. Mark 7: 31-37. Holy Bible Contemporary English Version, Global Edition. 3. Matthew 8: 1-4. Holy Bible Contemporary English Version, Global Edition. 4. Youth Bible. Holy Bible Contemporary English Version, Global Edition. Pages 861-871.

Theory Contributions for Modern Psychology Development

Theory Contributions for Modern Psychology Development Contribution of different approaches to psychology for the development of modern psychology Charunya Rajakaruna Different approaches to psychology contributed immensely for the development of modern psychology. Psychology is a large area of study with its branches in many other fields. Modern definition of psychology is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes. However the study of psychology existed even during the times of ancient civilizations, under a philosophical line of study. Now it is a modern science that has matured in diverse ways throughout the years. Many approaches of psychology and schools of thought lead to the development of modern psychology. Primeval people had many different theories about mental illnesses. These psychological problems were viewed as punishments from god, possession by demon or as caused by spiritual mystic forces. The birth of modern science led to the emergence of modern psychology in the 1800s. Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920), a German scientist, opened the first experimental psychology laboratory in Leipzig in 1879, paving the way for a scientific turn in the history of psychology. As it established psychology as a science separate from biology and philosophy, arguments over definition and interpretation of the mind and behavior appeared (cite).This resulted in various schools of thought arising during this period. Schools of thought are various aspects of assessing human behavior. Psychologists use a range of viewpoints when assessing how humans behave or think. These are approaches or perspectives of psychology. These perspectives or schools of thought help psychologists to approach different problems, find new solutions or treatments for psychological problems and analyze behavior of people. The first scientific and systematic school of thought, emerged from Wundt’s work, was structuralism. It focused on the structure or the basic elements mind, consciousness, sensations and ideas. The procedure used in structuralism was ‘introspection’. According to Wundt psychology is the study of ‘immediate experiences’. A student of Wundt, Edward B. Tichener, formally established structuralism, even though later on he diverted from Wundt’s ideas. Structuralism was an important milestone in the development of psychology because it was the first proper school of thought in psychology and because of its influence on experimental psychology. Founded by William James, functionalism came up as a counterpose to structuralism. This approach focused on the purpose of the mind rather than the ‘structure’. And how people adapt to their environment. ‘The Principles of Psychology’ (1890) by James was viewed by many as the first textbook of modern psychology. Functionalism had an impact on educational psychology in regard to John Dewey’s theories. Furthermore it influenced on various aspects of modern psychology such as evolutionary psychology, behaviorism, educational psychology and Industrial or organizational psychology. Criticisms of structuralism gave way to another approach in the field of psychology. Wertheimer, Kohler and Koffka’s gestalt approach emphasized that the ‘whole’ is more than the sum of its parts. Gestalt psychology influenced on perception and learning. Mario Polito, an Italian psychologist said ‘Gestalt theory is focused on the experience of contact that occurs on the here now. It considers with interest the space of teachers as well as students (Gelph n.d.). Criticisms of structuralism, functionalism and gestalt theory brought forward behaviorism. Based mostly on the work of Ivan Pavlov’s work, behaviorism was proposed by John B. Watson. According to Pavlov, behavior is learned- ‘conditioned’. Watson argued psychology should study observable behavior, not internal events (consciousness). The concept of ‘tabula rasa’- one’s mind is a blank state when born- arose under this approach. Behaviorism had a major impact on development of modern psychology. Gender role development, behavioral therapy, scientific method, aversion therapy, moral development, phobias are only some of the areas in modern psychology that have been influenced by this approach (McLeod 2007). Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytical approach stood opposed to Watson’s behaviorism, emphasizing on the importance of unconscious motives and early childhood experiences. Under psychoanalytical approach Freud presented the structure of personality (Id, Ego and Superego), defense mechanisms and psychosexual stages of personality development. And he introduced ‘free association’ as a form of therapy. This approach has made many contributions towards the growth of other psychotherapies. â€Å"SigmundFreud, in his influential theory of the unconscious, gave a new direction to psychology and laid the groundwork for the psychoanalytic model. Freudian theory took psychology into such fields as education, anthropology, and medicine, and Freudian research methods became the foundations of clinical psychology† (The Colombia electronic encyclopedia 2012). These differences of opinions between the schools of thought had led to many vehement debates among early psychologists. But these schools of thought or historical approaches contributed greatly for the development of modern psychology and guided the way to the modern or contemporary perspectives of psychology. Modern or contemporary perspectives are the main approaches used in todays field of psychology. Most of them were guided by the historical approaches mentioned earlier. One of the modern approaches is the psychodynamic perspective. It is a modern version of psychoanalysis. Although this rooted from Freud’s psychoanalytical theory, psychodynamic approach focused more on ‘self-psychology’ and the discovery of other motivations behind behaviors rather than sexual motivations. Neo-Freudians like Carl Jung diverted from Freud’s ideas and developed concepts of collective unconscious and archetypes. Anna Freud further expanded the theory of defense mechanisms. The attachment theory, transference, resistance and trauma are being studied by other psychologists and merged with their hypotheses and procedures of treatments (American psychoanalytic association n.d.) Behavioral perspective is another approach used in psychological field today and focuses on overt behavior. B. F. Skinner’s work made behavioral approach important in the modern psychology. Two main processes of people learning has been introduced by this approach: classical conditioning and operant conditioning. In clinical psychology, behavior therapy and behavior modification play a major role in the treatment of abnormal behavior. Another main approach of psychology is the humanistic approach. This approach rejects behaviorism and argued that humans have their own ‘free will’ and that people had control over their lives. Psychologist such as Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow introduced concepts such as self-actualization and ‘ideal self’. Today humanistic approach is utilized in areas such as person centered therapy, education, motivation. This perspective shifted the focus of behavior to the individual / whole person rather than the unconscious mind, genes, observable behavior. Biological perspective or biopsychology is another approach of psychology which has contributed immensely to the growth of psychology. Biopsychology emphasizes on biological events such as nervous system, hormones and genetics in relation to behavior. Biological approach has become increasingly important in psychology with the invention of various apparatus for mapping of the brain. The field of neuropsychology bloomed under this approach. One of the major modern approaches of psychology is cognitive perspective. It focuses on the processes of the mind,.mainly researching on memory, intelligence, perception, problem solving, and learning. Cognitive psychology, derived from Wundt’s structuralism, has been integrated into various other subfields of psychology such as social psychology , personality psychology , abnormal psychology and developmental psychology (Boundless n.d.) As a relatively new approach of psychology evolutionary perspective focuses on inherited tendencies shaped by evolution. Charles Darwin’s theories of evolution has been incorporated in this approach. Evolutionary perspective can help interpret dysfunctional behaviors such as anorexia (McLeod 2007) There are various approaches of psychology giving different viewpoints in explaining human behavior. None of the perspectives are greater or more suitable than the other. Earlier psychologist viewed psychological problems only in one way of approach. But nowadays psychologists tend to incorporate more than single approach in finding suitable solution to a problem. Today psychology is a modern science. And for the field of psychology to become what it is today the contribution of different approaches of psychology has been immense. List of references McLeod, S. A. (2007). Behaviorist Approach [online]. Available from http://www.simplypsychology.org/behaviorism.html> Gelph, C. (n.d). Gestalt psychology [online]. Available from www.slideshare.net/christiangelph/gestalt-psychology-15849804> American Psychoanalytic association (n.d.). Contributions of psychoanalysis [online]. Available fromhttp://www.apsa.org/About_Psychoanalysis/Contributions_of_Psychoanalysis.aspx> The Colombia Electronic Encyclopedia (2012). Psychoanalytical approach [online]. Available from http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/science/psychology.html> McLeod, S. A. (2007). Evolutionary Approach [online]. Available from http://www.simplypsychology.org/Evolutionary psychology.html> Boundless (n.d.). Cognitive perspective e[online]. Available fromhttps://www.boundless.com/psychology/the-science-of-psychology/history-of-psychology/cognitive-perspective/>

Capital Punishment Essay -- essays research papers fc

Capital Punishment   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What does capital punishment do for our society? Does it really do anything to better our society, or is it just a way for our government to deal with the irregularities that accompany any ill-perfect society? Presented here are facts about the death penalty that will let you decide whether or not capital punishment is needed. There is a possibility of error when the death penalty is used upon a convicted criminal. Many times, a person who is accused of a crime, and put to death because of this crime has been later proved to be innocent due to additional evidence. But since the person accused of the crime has had his life taken from them, there is no chance to tell them that the government made a mistake and to let that person go and live out the rest of their life. The government must continue on knowing that they have killed an innocent person and the person they wished to kill, was still free. There is no fail-safe solution to prevent innocent people from being executed. Our judicial system is made up of human beings, and we human beings are prone to mistakes. Some of these mistakes are irreversible. There is also a racial bias when the death penalty is carried out. â€Å"Since the resumption of executions in the early 1980's, 40 percent of those executed have been black.† And more often than not blacks were more often executed than were whites without having their conviction reviewed by any higher court. The cost of carr... Capital Punishment Essay -- essays research papers fc Capital Punishment   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What does capital punishment do for our society? Does it really do anything to better our society, or is it just a way for our government to deal with the irregularities that accompany any ill-perfect society? Presented here are facts about the death penalty that will let you decide whether or not capital punishment is needed. There is a possibility of error when the death penalty is used upon a convicted criminal. Many times, a person who is accused of a crime, and put to death because of this crime has been later proved to be innocent due to additional evidence. But since the person accused of the crime has had his life taken from them, there is no chance to tell them that the government made a mistake and to let that person go and live out the rest of their life. The government must continue on knowing that they have killed an innocent person and the person they wished to kill, was still free. There is no fail-safe solution to prevent innocent people from being executed. Our judicial system is made up of human beings, and we human beings are prone to mistakes. Some of these mistakes are irreversible. There is also a racial bias when the death penalty is carried out. â€Å"Since the resumption of executions in the early 1980's, 40 percent of those executed have been black.† And more often than not blacks were more often executed than were whites without having their conviction reviewed by any higher court. The cost of carr...

Consumer Goods :: miscellaneous

Consumer Goods A few years ago I was walking around my old hometown, Portland, Oregon. I walked past a basketball court full of teens wearing Ambercrombie shirts and Nike shoes. "Bro, why don't you get some of these cool clothes, rather than that boring and odd shirt you have on? one of them said to me. "No, thanks. I like what I have on." I wasn't going to let them persuade me to waste my money on expensive popular clothing when I already liked what I was wearing. As you can see by my experience, many Americans, especially high school students, shop to "look cool" by wearing popular clothing. They emphasize wearing the right type of clothes. For instance, an adolescent clothing addict named Delia Cleveland believed "clothes made the woman and everything else was secondary" (193). Teenagers buy the right clothes so they'll be popular. In high schools today, many students are seen with an "Ambercrombie & Fitch" label or shirt bearing the name of the company. That's because they "repeatedly rank it near the top in terms of coolness." (Cave 199). By wearing the A&F clothes, people see them as "cool" and therefore respect them. However, it's not always about wearing a certain company's clothes to look cool; it can be about wearing the right color clothes or buying caps that show a logo of a sports team. Why do teenagers make such a big deal out of wearing the right kinds of clothes? A big reason is the fact that many of them go to rough high schools, so they have to wear the right type of clothes, because if they don't, they might get picked on. I have had many friends in this situation. This can make them get used to wearing popular clothing, and then they really start doing it, possibly even to show off their clothes. Luckily I've never had to go to high school (I was homeschooled), so I haven't had to go through with looking cool by wearing popular clothing. IN my opinion, clothes are clothes, and it doesn't make any difference what they look like. But in America today, often that's not the case. Another reason people buy what they buy is because the media influences them greatly, with symbols and rule-breaking strategies. On the telvision today I often see commercials influencing the viewer to buy a prodcut, one way or the other.

Primate Virtues: A Cross-species Study of Morality Essay -- Nietzsche

Primate Virtues: A Cross-species Study of Morality In his 1881 book, Daybreak, Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, We do not regard the animals as moral beings. But do you suppose the animals regard us as moral beings? –An animal which could speak said, ‘Humanity is a prejudice of which we animals at least are free’.[1] This passage expresses Nietzsche’s belief that animals do not judge human actions as morally good or bad. Only humans think in moral terms, Nietzsche believes –a prejudice of which â€Å"animals at least are free†. That is, animals do not believe in morality; and modern philosophers, as well as behavioral biologists, would have to agree. Nobody suspects their dog of trying to maximize utility, follow categorical imperatives, or do penance for his sins. Moral agency is uniquely human in this respect; only we maintain that our actions have some greater—moral—significance. Ethical theories try to provide us with a coherent and rational account of precisely this moral aspect of human thought and action. But no matter how coherent and rational a given moral system may be, if it becomes too detached from our regular deliberations and actions, we do not consider it a correct account of our normal moral reasoning. But what exactly constitutes this â€Å"normal moral reasoning† that humans allegedly possess? In this paper, I argue that human â€Å"moral reasoning† is actually a normal biological phenomenon that we share with the rest of the animal community, most noticeably with our closest primate relatives. I demonstrate this by using the standards provided by a normative moral theory to evaluate the actions of one of our animal relatives –Pan Troglodytes, or the African chimpanzee, illustrating the fact that these ... .... Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. 1986. (p. 378). [7] Aristotle. The Nicomachean Ethics. Trans. David Ross. Revised by J. L. Ackrill and J.O. Urmson. Oxford / New York: Oxford University Press. (p. 64). [8] Ibid. p. 70. [9] Ibid. p. 69. [10] Ibid. p. 35. [11] See Pears, David. â€Å"Aristotle’s Analysis of Courage†. Midwest Studies in Philosophy 3: 273-285. 1978. [12] See â€Å"Modern Moral Philosophy†, esp. p. 354. [13] Mackie, John. â€Å"A Refutation of Morals†. In 20th Century Ethical Theory. Ed. Steven M. Cahn and Joram G. Haber. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. 1946. [14] See Regal, Philip J. The Anatomy of Judgment. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 1990. [15] â€Å"A Refutation of Morals†, p. 146. [16] Ibid. p. 146.

The Olympus Scandal

The Olympus Scandal Hot Potatoes and Flying Funds Summary This paper describes the case of Olympus, a Japanese manufacturer of optic equipment, at which in early 2012 a scandal was uncovered which was soon dubbed to be one of the largest loss-concealment schemes of Japan. In the 1990’s, Olympus incurred significant losses on financial investments made. These were subsequently hidden with the aid of investment companies by shifting the investments around. In the 2000’s, these losses were to be repaid by paying exorbitant merger and acquisition fees to these investment companies.After newly-appointed CEO Michael Woodford blew the whistle on these frauds, the company got into trouble. Our research into the events leading to this scandal, as well as an observation of the internal control environment led to some interesting insights regarding possible improvements Olympus might implement. However, we also note that a collusion of board members cannot be prevented by any leve l of internal control, and a renewal of the entire board might be appropriate in order to establish proper internal control within the Olympus Corporation. Table of ContentsTable of Contents2 Chapter 13 1. 1Description of the organization of Olympus3 Organization3 Strategic Analysis3 Management Structure4 1. 2The Olympus Scandal5 Background6 Tobashi Schemes6 Whistleblower7 Legal Actions9 1. 3Analysis of the events9 Chapter 211 2. 1Evaluation of and recommendations for the control environment11 Organizational Structure11 Board of Directors and Audit Committee12 Management Philosophy and Operating Style13 Assignment of Authority and Responsibility15 Human Resource Policy and Practices16 Integrity and Ethical Values17 Commitment and Compliance18 . 2Recommendations for control activities19 Chapter 320 3. 1Conclusion20 Literature Used21 Appendix23 Chapter 1 1. 1Description of the organization of Olympus The organization which we will be discussing in this paper is Olympus, which is a Jap anese company specialized in optical and digital products. Most people will know Olympus from the cameras they make, but they produce a lot more different type of products. This chapter will cover the background of Olympus and a strategic analysis of the company. Organization Olympus was established in 1919 in Tokyo, Japan.At first they specialized in microscopes and thermometers, but in 1936 they introduced their very first camera, the so-called Pen. It is this product for which they are well-known to the public. Nonetheless, it is not their primary product. Olympus is extremely specialized in microscopes and optics. Most of these are used in professional environments, like research centers and hospitals. This links also to another specialty product of Olympus, namely medical equipment. Olympus is an important manufacturer of endoscopic, ultrasound and disinfection equipment.These medical instruments are used worldwide (Olympus Corporation, 2012b). Olympus is even market leader in the endoscopy market, with a market share of almost 70%. Of the net sales of Olympus, 42% are from the medical systems segments. According to the annual report, Olympus operates worldwide, with about 46% of the 2011 fiscal sales from Japan. Other main areas are North America (21,5%), Asia (not including Japan) with 11,5% and Europe with 18,2% (Olympus Corporation, 2011a). Strategic Analysis It is clear that Olympus is a multi-business entity which follows a related diversification strategy.They operate in several markets, namely ‘medical’, ‘life science and industrial’, ‘imaging’ and ‘information and communication’. All these areas require a lot of research and development, but there sure are operational synergies between these markets. Logically, the lenses they use in cameras are also very useful for the medical equipment. In the Annual Report of 2011, Olympus states that the two businesses it wants to focus on most are the †˜endoscopes’ and ‘surgical and endotherapy devices’. Olympus is already market leader in the first category, creating unique, high-resolution equipment.For the second category Olympus is still broadening its market share. An important step in this process was the acquisition of Gyrus, plc in 2005. Later on we will see that the acquisition of this U. S. endoscope company has played a very important role in the fraudulent activities of Olympus. In 2011, Olympus had about 34,391 employees. This number had been decreasing for a while, since in 2009 they had 36,503 employees. But not only the number of employees has decreased in the last few years. Net sales declined in 2011 to ? 847,105 million (about $10,589 million).Operating income declined to ? 35,360 million, about $442 million (Olympus Corporation, 2011a). The development of the results of Olympus in the past few years are shown in these three graphs below: [pic] Figure 1: Olympus Financial Results (Source: Ol ympus Annual Report 2011) Management Structure In the Annual Report of 2011, it is stated that Olympus values an appropriate corporate governance structure from a global perspective. They adopted a corporate structure with an auditor system based in the Japanese Corporation Law.The corporate governance systems consists of a Board of Directors of 15 members, which audits and supervises the performance of directors, and a Board of Auditors consisting of 4 members, which are independent from the Board of Directors and audit the performance of the directors. Two external auditors are members of the Board of Auditors, and also of the Special Committee, which gives advice to the Board of Directors. An interesting fact about the composition of the Board of Directors is that is has always fully consisted of Japanese directors, until April 2011, when the first non-Japanese director was appointed.Because there are a few important and recurring people in this scandal, it is important to know t heir names and position in the company. Tsuyoshi Kikukawa – Chairman of the Board of Directors and CEO Michael Woodford – President of the Board of Directors and COO Hisashi Mori – Director, Executive Vice President Hideo Yamada – Standing Corporate Auditor This is how the positions of the main actors were halfway April 2011, right before the suspicions of the fraud would rise (Olympus Corporation, 2011a). The management structure of Olympus can be visualized as follows: [pic]Figure 2: Olympus Management Structure (Source: Olympus Annual Report 2011) In the Corporate Governance Structure Chart above, some aspects of the Internal Control System can be found. We will discuss this explicitly in Chapter 4. But for now it is enough to know that Olympus has a CSR Commission chaired by the president to set up and evaluate targets with regard to CSR activities. They also have an internal employee code of behavior the so-called Olympus International Standards, and they established a Compliance Department which in case of compliance problems has to report the problems to the Board of Directors and the Board of Auditors.For the Risk management system, the company has established a Risk Management Committee which helps to decide on risk management policies and the evaluation, verification and procedural standards to respond to such risks. In order to reduce the risk of takeovers, they have introduced a plan to prevent large-scale purchases of the company’s shares. The anti-takeover measures are advised on and evaluated by the Special Committee, existing of the two outside auditors and one outside director (Olympus Corporation, 2011a). 1. 2The Olympus ScandalThe scandal surrounding Olympus became known on October 14th, 2011, when Micheal Woodford was fired as the CEO of Olympus. He had been the CEO of Olympus for only two weeks. He was the first non-Japanese person to become a member of the Board. In a press statement, Olympus announced t hat they had fired Woodford because of differences in management style. But according to Woodford, that was not the actual reason. He stated that Olympus had fired him because he questioned some prior acquisitions. This was not something of the most recent years, in fact, the scandal even goes back to the nineties. BackgroundIt all started in the beginning of the nineties. A decade earlier, the dollar was almost worth ? 250 (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 2012). Due to this undervalued yen Olympus suffered from an enormous operating loss, as imported resources were incredibly expensive. To solve the problem of the extremely undervalued yen, a few countries decided devaluate, and after the implementation of the Plaza Accord in 1987, a dollar was worth about ? 121. The Japanese export market was still expanding, though one can wonder whether it even was a real market, it was actually more a bubble.In the final four years of the 1980’s the stock prices tripled . Many Japanese companies, like Olympus, used speculative investments to boost their income, which was very welcome because of the declining income from normal business due to declining exports. These risky investments worked until 1990, when the Japanese markets collapsed. In that year, Olympus decided to cover the loss of ? 100 billion ($730 million). The reason why such an enormous loss could be hidden was because of the accounting rules in Japan around that time. Investments could be carried at costs.Olympus simply did not write down on the investment, which was worth nothing anymore. They hoped that they could make up for the losses by doing more risky investments. But after a few years, instead of making up for it, the losses only got worse. And then in 1997, the accounting rules changed. Investments had to be marked to market and Olympus now actively had to do something to solve the problem of the losses. And it is this very moment when the real fraudulent practices of Olympu s started, to cover the losses of the last decade of the twentieth century.Tobashi Schemes It was much more difficult now to hide the losses for the public. Hideo Yamada, in that time a former full-time auditing officer at Olympus, was the chief of Olympus’ general affairs and financial department. He consulted, together with his subordinate Hisashi Mori, two officials of an consultancy firm. Together they decided to hide the losses with a Tobashi scheme. They transferred Olympus’ losses to some funds they had established right before March 1998 at the Cayman Islands, named Quick Progress and Central Forest.These companies were not consolidated with the Olympus’ financial statements, so such assets transferred there would not show up on Olympus’ balance sheets. By moving the assets for only short amounts of time, right before the financial year ended, they managed to keep these assets hidden for several years, including the losses they were incurring on t hem. Additionally, rumors are that Olympus reported several non-existing foreign bank accounts in order to conceal it’s usage of fake transactions. Additionally, several of these loss-incurring investments were moved to Axes America and it’s Cayman Islands-based subsidiary AXAM Invest Ltd.Signs of the fraud came to light when Olympus wanted to pay back these losses to AXAM by hiring them as consultants for the takeover of Gyrus. For this takeover, AXAM was paid an exorbitant fee totaling $687 million. This consisted $67 million in cash and another $177 million in preferred shares, which Olympus repurchased two months later for $620 million. This repurchase of shares also increased the goodwill on Olympus’ balance sheet by $435 million (Woodford, 2011). Gyrus was not the only dubious acquisition of Olympus.Throughout the years they had acquired many companies, most of the time for a very high price or by paying exorbitant fees to consultants. Another example is t he acquisition of Altis, Humalabo and News Chef. Between May 2006 and April 2008 Olympus acquired the majority controlling interest in these three companies. They paid approximately $773 million for the companies (? 73,419 million). The purchases were completed in April 2008. In the same fiscal year, ending in March 2009, the investment in these three companies was written down as follows: [pic]Figure 3: Altis, Humalabo and News Chef impairments (source: Letter from Woodford to Olympus Board, 2011) So the total investment in Altis, Humalabo and News Chef was almost $800 million, but within a year is was written down with almost $600 million to only 25% of the original value. This is of course an extraordinary goodwill impairment for such a short amount of time (Woodford, 2011). Whistleblower In April 2011, Michael Woodford became the first ever non-Japanese president and Chief Operating Officer (COO). October 1st 2011 he also became CEO of Olympus, replacing Kikukawa in that positio n.But within two weeks, October 14th, he was fired as CEO of the company. The Japanese Board stated that is was because of the differences in management style, that Woodford as an Englishman could not really understand the Japanese business culture. Woodford himself stated that the story told by the board was not true. According to him he was fired because of the fact that he investigated the M&A fees of several acquisitions, especially the acquisition of Gyrus (Voigt, K. , January 2012). Woodford started questioning some of the M&A fees paid after he read an article in FACTA on July 30th about a dubious acquisition by Olympus, namelyGyrus. Upon this he contacted Kikukawa and Mori and demanded answers about the fees paid. He wrote several letters, explaining his concerns about the governance issues, but he never got any real answers. He threatened to resign if he did not get an explanation about the M&A fees. Little later, he was named the new CEO of the company. Understanding quick ly that this promotion was only done to silence him, he hired PwC to investigate the fees without informing the board about this investigation. After the report of PwC was completed, Woodford sent the report to the Olympus Board and to Ernst&Young, auditors of Olympus.On an emergency board meeting on October 14th he was dismissed (Bacani, 2011). The directors of Olympus denied the accusations of Woodford for a few weeks, even blaming him for the decline of the stock price. On October 26 Kikukawa resigns as CEO and president, and he is replaced by Shuichi Takayama. In the week of 6 November 2011 president Takayama made public that he had been informed by the now-dismissed Mori about the cover-up schemes. He explained that he had known absolutely nothing about these schemes and that Kikukawa, Mori and Yamada were not responsible for the initial losses, but had only tried to hide the losses.Yamada, the auditor of Olympus, had resigned a week earlier. One week after Woodfords firing, on October 21st, the stock price of Olympus had fallen from $32 to $16. The chart below makes clear that the stock price would drop much further. In the week of 6 November, when Olympus admitted the fraud, the stock price declines to $6. 3 per share. The scandal caused the stock price to drop with almost 80% (Yahoo Finance, 2012). [pic] Figure 4: Olympus Stock Price (Source: Yahoo Finance) Legal Actions Of course, these types of fraud with such an impact cannot go unpunished.In February 2012, seven men were arrested for the fraud, including Kikukawa, Mori and Yamada (CNN Voigt, February 2012). They were arrested on suspicion of filing false financial statements to cover up the enormous losses from the past in 2006 and 2007. Kikukawa is seen as the main suspect in this case. Separately from these accusations, the company Olympus as an entity is also charged for the falsification of the financial statements. Later on, four of the seven men were rearrested for falsification in other year s, namely 2009, 2010 and 2011 (Hasegawa, 2012).Japanese lawyers have said that the executives can face up to ten years in prison or a fine of about $125,000. If found guilty, the firm faces a fine of almost $9 million. The trial of the Olympus officers has not started yet, so it cannot be said what the final judgment will be (Reuters, 2012). On April 20th 2012, investors approved of a complete new Board of Directors, hoping that the company now can start with rebuilding its image and shareholders’ trust, and that they can finally leave these rumorous years behind (Olympus Corporation, 2012). 1. 3Analysis of the eventsAlready in 1986, the then-CEO said to press that â€Å"in difficult times, companies will have to use financial engineering in order to make a profit†, referring to the use of Tobashi-schemes to hide incurred losses or even inflate profits. In the Japanese investment climate at the time, there was little regulation on this â€Å"flying away† of loss es incurred on bad investments, and it was in fact even popular in the ‘80’s, with certain production companies come to be nicknamed banks because their financial incomes exceeded their operational incomes (Dymski & Isenberg, 2002).This was made possible by the so-called zaitech (literally: financial engineering) system which was caused by the extremely low interest rates and high accessibility of credit, which made it easy for companies to raise money to invest in speculative market activities. This led to an upward spiral of increasing stock prices, enabling companies to obtain more capital, perform more risky investments, which again led to a increase in stock value enabling the companies to report more (speculative) profits, which closes the circle by increasing the company value and enabling them to obtain more capital (Haramis, 2007).Another factor contributing in this was that a lot of these securities issued were convertible bonds. Japanese investors customarily did not take into account the possible dilution of shares caused by convertible bonds, and thus the emission of convertible bonds did not cause a decline in the price of shares (Smith, 1994). Even if the zaitech would lead to a loss, the system of Tobashi would make it possible for firms to hide the losses. With Tobashi, the investment houses could reimburse the losses to their clients in loan-like constructions which would eventually need to be repaid.These loans often involved moving the loss-giving assets into special purpose vehicles (SPV’s). These SPV’s had non-synchronous financial year-ends, allowing the losses to be kept off the books by moving around the assets. The feeling of being unable to lose was also reinforced by investors. This is described as follows:â€Å"[†¦] the Banking Bureau instructed firms to postpone the introduction of lower cost accounting until April 1, 1988. Because of this, companies did not need to write down the loss and life-ins urance companies did not have to sell stocks in mass quantities.In this way, the MOF succeeded in preventing share prices from declining. After that, stock prices surged remarkably. This was because these measures by the MOF to contain the markets made investors believe that the ministry would never let stock prices slump. † (Kamikawa, February 2010) It was not until the end of 1989 that the Japanese government interceded in this bubble by raising the interest rates, which ultimately led to the collapse of the zaitech-bubble and eventually even the 1990’s recession in Japan (Smith, 1994). Olympus partook in this as well in the 1999’s by hiding the ? 0bn ($241mln) losses incurred while investing in a venture capital fund in 1999 owned by investment house Nomura. One of the owners of Nomura was Nobumasa Yokoo. This loss never showed up in the financial statements, but was uncovered during investigation by external audit firm PwC, which was hired by whistle-blowing director Woodford. ‘Coincidentally’, Yokoo was also shareholder in 3 companies (News Chef, Altis and Humbalabo) which Olympus acquired in the 2007 – 2010 period for ? 73. 4bn. Only 6 months later, these were impaired by ? 55. bn (75%) because â€Å"the business prospect diverged from the assumption at the time of investment†. Investigation into these investments is yet to be launched officially, but suspicions are that this is also another attempt at repayment for a Tobashi scheme. Chapter 2 2. 1Evaluation/recommendations for the control environment The control environment is an essential part and basis for the internal control system within a company. A firm may have enhanced control activities and monitoring procedures but without properly established control environment all the control component would be futile.In 1992 COSO released their Internal Control – Integrated Framework, which states that control environment â€Å"sets the tone of an org anization, influencing the control consciousness of its people† (COSO, 1992), provides foundation for other components of internal control. Control environment includes integrity and ethical values, commitment and competence of the company’s personnel, Board of Directors and Audit Committee participation, management philosophy and operating style, organizational structure and human resource policies, assignment of authority and responsibility by management.In 2004 COSO published Enterprise Risk Management – Integrated Framework, which expands on internal control and focuses more on enterprise risk management. Framework contains definition of internal environment, which â€Å"encompasses the tone of an organization, and sets the basis for how risk is viewed and addresses by an entity’s people† (COSO, 2004). We will address the elements of the control environment and internal environment to the Olympus case under investigation using the seven principl es for control environments as guidance (Streng, 2011).Alongside an evaluation addressing these elements, we will give our recommendations for improving them. Organizational Structure Evaluation The Olympus Corporate Strategic Plan slogan which is actively promoted within the company is â€Å"Advancing to the Next Stage of Globalization† (Olympus Corporation, 2010). Based on this slogan the company rejuvenated its management structure in April 2011 by introducing new management rules, restructuring information-related operations and administration, shifting focus to overseas operations and reviewing the cost structure.These changes can suggest the considerable flexibility of the organization in following the chosen strategy. The overall organization structure described in the part about â€Å"The Board of Directors and Audit Committee† seems quite elaborate for such kind of company as Olympus. Information about the key managers’ responsibility cannot be found in the public sources; therefore we cannot evaluate how adequate they are and whether managers have a proper understanding of them.Nevertheless, this organizational structure which seems to be thoroughly established did not prevent the fraud, because of the involvement of almost all top officials in it – 19 people were sued in covering-up losses and some of them are still the part of the firm’s management (Buerk, 2012) Recommendations The basics of internal controls are all there in Olympus, with collusion being the main reason why the fraud could continue for so long without any detection. The new management rules which were implemented in 2011 were a good start, were it not for that the board did not follow the newly implemented rules themselves.Best would be to completely remove any ties between the internal auditors and the board, so that the internal auditors can audit the board more effectively and without interference by executives. In a construction like this, th e internal audit department would only have their responsibility to the general meeting of shareholders, preventing possible future collusion. Board of Directors and Audit Committee Evaluation The corporate governance structure of Olympus consists of two organs.The first of these is the Board of directors, which meets frequently and is tasked with supervising and auditing the performance of executives and internal auditors. The second is the Board of auditors, tasked with the audit of the performance of the executives and advising the board of directors. The division between executive and non-executive directors is an important internal control procedure in enhancing the separation of duties for monitoring and decision-making, and should increase independence between the board and management.The general meeting of shareholders has the final decision on the appointing of directors, internal and external auditors and remuneration, ensuring a separation of duties. The remuneration of d irectors is based on their performance, which is measured by the balance score card (BSC) system on the degree to which the goals are achieved in four dimensions (financial, customer service, business operation process, growth potential). Concerning the knowledge and expertise of directors, we can conclude that, based on the publicly available information, the directors of the company are highly qualified and experienced.Also this conclusion can be confirmed by the resumes of the directors, who have all been involved with the company for a significant number of years, often a majority of their lifetime. This can however also be a weakness, because they may miss a fresh view on the company. The Olympus scandal showed existence of strong ties and cooperation between the Board of directors, banks, investment bankers and accounting firms in conducting fraud and their attempts to hide it (Yasu, 2012). Proper control environment should include directors who are independent from management , trade partners and other parties (Maitland, 2012).Recommendations In the case of Olympus the chairman of the board of directors was the same man as the CEO. We think this is a part of getting a huge scandal like this one. The Board of directors should determine whether or not the CEO is independent in character and in judgment (Financial Reporting Council, 2010). But in Olympus, the chairman of the board would therefore be required to evaluate himself on his own independence, character and judgment. Seeing as this is impossible the UK CG code proscribes a segregation of duties between these two positions.Even though this would not directly apply to Olympus operating under Japanese law, it is very probable that the Japanese CG code also sports at least an advice for this. Thus we would recommend for Olympus to have two different independent people fulfilling these functions. Furthermore we think that the people within the board and people with other top functions were too long hold ing the same position at the company. This makes the board less independent and will make the chance of fraudulent actions higher, even when some executive people left they came back at the company in another function like Kikukawa did.Kikukawa was first the CEO and president of the board, and returned as an auditing officer after his dismissal. This led him to be able to review his own work as CEO. We recommend that Olympus reassigns its board members and that people within this board should not have other important functions for at least several years. The UKCG Code advises for board members not to stay on for longer than 9 years (Financial Reporting Council, 2010). This makes it harder to perform fraudulent actions because people can't rely on the new people to participate in the fraud. This will also more often give shareholder control over the actions of the board.Additionally, they cannot get â€Å"rusted into habits†. However, as the entire board, including non-executi ves, and the internal auditors were involved in the fraud scheme, we have doubts whether any amount of internal control could have prevented this fraud. Management Philosophy and Operating Style Evaluation In this section we will pay attention to the management philosophy, including risk attitude and management approaches. The Olympus Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Report 2011 gives us insight into which management insights considers the most important for the company.It is stated that for the company the main focus is not on the profit but on the â€Å"win-win relationships† with stakeholders based on mutual trust. Management philosophy in the company is based on â€Å"Social IN† through which company incorporate social values into the company’s activities. (Olympus Corporation, 2011b) The CSR Concept of the Olympus Group establishes the ways in which the company can make its contribution to society (through business and other voluntary activities) and s tates the company’s duties responsibilities to society through compliance with laws, regulations and business ethics.Olympus not only states their views on how the business should be conducted but also communicates them but means of policies. For example, to act on behalf of the customer the company established Protection Policy; with respect to human rights the Human Rights and Labor Policy was implemented. These policies and philosophies are incorporated in the daily business activities. All the means and processes mentioned above create an impression that the Olympus Company has a strong attitude towards corporate values and uses strictly stated procedures to bring them into everyday business life.Olympus established a system of committees to employ more comprehensive approach towards risks and to analyze, evaluate and manage them (see Figure 2: Olympus Risk Management System on the next page), such as a Risk Management Committee (to decide on the risk management policies and on proper responses for the risks faced by company, chaired by the president), a Risk Management Bureau (to collect and evaluate information regarding risks, to develop counter measures and ensure their effectiveness) and a Business Continuity Plan (to ensure devotion to its management policy in emergency cases, to be prepared to such cases).Recommendations However, despite all these internal controls, the fraud still managed to occur and persist through collusion of the board of directors. Not any amount of internal controls would be able to prevent such a fraud, as the board can always override these controls. This can especially be seen in Figure 6, where the president is depicted as the Risk Management Leader, all the while it was the president who was the center point of the fraud. However, one can limit the options for fraud by non-executive management significantly.The processes and policies established by Olympus already give a good head start, but key to success of them is support by management. Not in word, but also in deed. Every in-house department and affiliate company should establish its own risk management structure and all the uncovered significant risks should be immediately reported to the president and Risk Management Committee. [pic] Figure 6: Olympus Risk Management System (Source: Olympus CSR Report 2011) Assignment of Authority and Responsibility EvaluationThe company established a thorough corporate governance system with stringent monitoring, auditing, evaluating and reporting responsibilities. There are various committee structures ensuring compliance and effective internal controls in all the business activities and a lot of attention is paid to compliance with norms, laws and regulations. The Boards of directors plays an important role in establishing of company strategy, making decisions about main management issues and monitoring the fulfillment of decisions made and strategies established, while leaving the day-to-day manage ment to the company managers.A special Committee, consisting of outside directors and auditors, takes advisory responsibility concerning the most important deals. Public sources do not provide information about the employee job descriptions, therefore in it hard to evaluate thoroughly appropriateness of the responsibility assignment. The firm documents also do not contain the information regarding the number of people with respect to data processing and accounting functions, which also does not allow us to get a better grasp on the actual situation within the company. RecommendationsThe company already has developed a thorough corporate governance system with stringent responsibilities. There are still some recommendations like competency controls. This is a formal control since it verifies whether organizational activities are conducted in conformity with applicable procedures and requirements (Vaassen, Meuwissen, & Schelleman, 2009). So these controls can be used to prevent unauth orized employees gaining access to certain areas or assets they should not supposed to have access to. For these competency controls to work correctly strict procedures and requirements have to be well formulated and established.We therefore recommend Olympus to have strict procedures and have competence controls using these procedures. For responsibility we think it is important for Olympus to have clear function descriptions in which the responsibilities for that particular function are described. Human Resource Policy and Practices Evaluation The Olympus Corporate Social Responsibility Report 2011 states that human resource management systems are based on the belief that a company’s performance consists not only of its business results but also of the growth gained by each individual employee.The company established a thorough Human Rights and Labor policy stressing the most important issues in this area and developed a CSR Educational Cube (see right) to raise awareness o f compliance, CSR initiatives and enhance communication within the organization. The company introduced various initiatives concerning HRM including internal job-seeking, individual career planning, skill development, newly appointed executives trainings, occupational safety programs, physical and mental health consultations, and a so-called ‘Welfare Cafeteria Plan’.All of these activities serve the goals of enhancing employees performance and their commitment to the company. Concerning the reward systems, there are established procedures for annual paid holidays and bonuses. Company CSR Report states that salaries and bonuses reflect each individual’s activities and contributions; the bonus funds are linked to business results. Company also use a so-called Advanced Technician/Engineer Incentive System to ensure improvements of the technical and practical skills of engineers and serve the innovation basis for the company activities (Olympus Corporation, 2011b).Re commendations Vaassen et al, 2009, p. 203, Describes that Human resource management processes generally consists of recruiting and selecting employees, educating and training employees, assigning tasks to employees, evaluating employee performance, employee remuneration and employee termination. Some of these aspects can be found at Olympus but not all yet. An recommendation on this part is that for each employee there is a personnel file available.This file will consist of data of the employee right before starting at the company such as address, number and contract information, but it is also important to keep this file updated with the employee performance, evaluation, payroll and career advancements. Also when the employee participates in education and training programs this needs to be included. This file needs to be available to managers because managers can use this file to assign tasks to their employees. Another recommendation to Olympus is to evaluate their employees on a regular basis.This evaluation needs to provide feedback to the employee about their job effectiveness and career guidance, because this will motivate the employees. This evaluation needs to be done by the functional manager together with the human resources manager. Then finally it is important for Olympus to have procedures in place for terminating dysfunctional employees. When during the evaluations turns out that the employee is not performing as it should be, there needs to be a plan for improvement made by the superior of the employee and the human resource manager.This plan needs to be communicated to the employee. After this the two officers needs to monitor the employee to see if there is improvement. Integrity and Ethical Values Evaluation The Olympus scandal, and even more the scale of it, points out that ethical values are very important for companies. It is not enough to just have a code of conduct or an ethics committee. The company should also live to the ethical guide lines. And if even the directors do not behave ethically, how could they expect the employees to behave ethically? In theory Olympus has done a good job on the ethical part.They have got several codes on ethical behavior and moral values and there is a committee about this. But just the existence is not enough. It is clear that there was no correct ‘tone at the top’. It could be recommended to start at the top of the company, because once the directors show moral and ethical behavior and give guidance to what is right and wrong, the employees might act the same. Recommendations Part of the board of directors was replaced, but several key figures are still in place after the scandal, even though it is known that they were (or should have been) aware of the fraud going on right in front of them.We would therefore recommend that the remaining directors are also replaced, which would give a good signal to both shareholders and employees alike that it’s time for a fre sh start. It is also important that the attitude to mistakes or misbehavior is reasonable. Of course, the effects of a mistake may be huge, but the reaction to it must be reasonable. Otherwise, people will try to hide their mistakes. Especially in a business culture like the one in Japan, this may be very hard to implement, because it is considered discrediting the company if one makes mistakes or causes significant losses.As such there must be clear and reasonable consequences to misbehavior or overriding established controls in order to diminish the amount of secrecy around losses, mistakes or ethical misbehavior. Furthermore, the code of conduct and the ethical and moral values should be known and implemented. Not only the employees, but especially the directors should be aware of it and behave as demanded, to set an example and prevent scandals like this. Commitment and Compliance Evaluation Overall Olympus developed a thorough approach for recruitment and promotion.They establi shed company Human Rights and a Labor Policy and requires from all the employees high commitment to company values. To promote the company values, Olympus holds meetings with their employees and gives trainings to the employees. This can be seen in the Corporate Social Responsibility Report of 2011 which contains methods for developing a culture based on putting the customer first. To achieve this Olympus has chosen to instill the attitude of thinking from the perspective of the customer in every employee by providing special courses at all the levels in the company including newcomers.So Olympus facilitates skill development (Olympus college, Advanced Engineer Incentive System) to equip their employees with the skills they need to work successfully. At the company group level a Safety & Health and a Ethical Conduct Promotion Committee was established to enhance safety & health and to reduce ethical problems for all the employees within the group. Recommendation Olympus already does a lot to promote their company values as described above. Also by meetings with the employees the commitment will be better.For commitment it is also important to have good guidance by superiors, therefore our recommendations on this part are similar to the ones of human resource policies. Something that can be added in this part is that the education programs employees can perform are specially for those employees, so the programs needs to fit with the employee and their career changes. This will make the employee more committed to the company. 2. 2Recommendations for control activitiesIn this paragraph we will assume that all the recommendations for the control environment has been taken into account and that Olympus has implemented those recommendations. Now we will look at recommendations for the control activities. We first need to know what control activities are. According to Streng, 2011, p. 49: † Control activities are the formal policies and procedures that help an organization ensure that objectives are being achieved and are achievable. The scandal started with speculative investments which caused a loss of $730 million.Therefore Olympus should implement control activities to ensure that this cannot happen again. First of all the company should not invest in investments that are riskier (too speculative) than they prefer. They have to decide for themselves what their risk appetite is and cut out the investments that are too risky. To make sure that such investments will be left out, Olympus needs a risk assessment report for the investment. This report needs to be approved by the management which will make the investment, but also by the higher management of the company.This will make the chance of big losses smaller. Thereby comes the fact that segregation of duties is important. The scandal was caused because higher management approved or even initiated very risky investments, so there must be someone independent to check on the investment s. After having the investment approved the investment still needs to be monitored on a frequent basis. This is because there is still a chance of a loss or that the it actually was a wrong investment. Results of the monitoring activities also need to be communicated to the higher management so that they can intervene if necessary.The decision to intervene needs to be made by someone that is independent of the investment department, so that this decision will not be influenced. Than the auditor needs to check if there are risk assessment reports for the investments which Olympus decided to invest in and also that the higher management approved of these investments. Further the auditor needs to check if monitoring is done frequently and have to look at the decisions made by higher management on the basis of the monitoring activities.So for instance if these decisions are made by a independent person. We also like to advise Olympus to have strict procedures for when to abandon an inve stment, so that it will not be possible that after a loss incurred the investment stays in the portfolio in the hope that this investment will become profitable in the future and actually becomes more loss making. Furthermore it is important that Olympus only has employees in the investment department that are capable of making the right decisions and have the right knowledge of how to monitor and when to intervene.In order to do so, Olympus must have strict recruiting policies and offer education and training to their personnel. Only then they can be sure, to a certain level, that their investors are capable of investing, know what they are doing and what risk they can take. With the continuous stream of new, complex financial products it is very important that the employees of Olympus are highly educated and have up to date knowledge. Apart from the investment department, every employee of Olympus should be aware of the Code of Ethics, including the management.Finally, it is impor tant that there is an effectively working control IT system. A proper working system should be able to detect extraordinary high fees paid to e. g. consultants, extreme impairments on recently acquired companies and the transfer of money or losses to recently set up funds in dubious places (one has to admit that funds on the Cayman Islands should have raised some questions immediately). Once a proper IT control system is implemented it should be very hard for the directors to act as secretive as they did during the scandal. Chapter 3 3. 1ConclusionThe Olympus scandal became one of the largest loss-concealment schemes in Japan, routed back in the 1990’s. We conducted our research regarding this scandal starting from the company's history and organizational issues. Then we gave insight into the scandal itself, followed by the investigation and statements of recommendations for control environment and control activities. The control environment in the Olympus company was forming and developing throughout the years of the company's existence and various control activities were established. Nevertheless, it was not enough to prevent fraudulent actions.Therefore based on our research the following procedures can be recommended regarding the control environment: revision of the company’s organizational structure to guarantee auditor’s independence, reassignment of all board members involved in the scandal, implementation of procedures to ensure â€Å"real† compliance with corporate policies at all levels, enhancement of HRM policies and practices to ensure high qualification and commitment of personnel. Moreover, strict procedures, control activities and regular monitoring over investments should be developed within the company, to eliminate chances of such fraudulent situation in the future.A good ethics lesson can be learnt from the Olympus case. Collusion within the company's top officers could hardly be prevented by internal control me chanisms. Therefore the Olympus scandal is a very representative example for the regulators to direct their efforts. Also it is a great confirmation of the fact that integrity and high ethical values should be followed and embodied by all the employees of the company, from the workers and engineers to the president and chairman. Literature Used Bacani, C. (2011, October 24). The Olympus Scandal: When a Foreign CEO Rebels.Retrieved May 9, 2012, from CFOInnovationAsia: http://www. cfoinnovation. com Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. (2012, May 1). Japan / U. S. Foreign Exchange Rate. Retrieved May 9, 2012, from Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis: http://research. stlouisfed. org Buerk, R. (2012, February 16). Former Olympus Chairman Arrested in Accounting Probe. Retrieved May 9, 2012, from BBC News: http://www. bbc. co. uk COSO. (2004). Enterprise Risk Management – Integrated Framework. New York: AICPA. COSO. (1992). Internal Control – Integrated Framework . New York: AICPA. Dymski, G. , & Isenberg, D. 2002). 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Retrieved May 9, 2012, from Bloomberg: http://www. bloomberg. com Appendix Appendix IOlympus Timeline Appendix IIOlympus Corporate Governance Facts Main facts about the Boards of Directors (BD): †¢ 15 members (incl uding 3 outside directors) Meets once per month to make decisions about the business strategy and other current management issues and to control over the fulfillment of decisions made and strategies established †¢ Outside directors taking part in the BD meetings as members of the Special Committee[1] †¢ Executive Management Committee is formed at the company to facilitate President and COO decision making (meets 3 times per month) †¢ The term of office of directors has been set to 1 year to enhance their accountability (their performance is assessed annually) †¢ To enhance eligibility and expertise inside directors participate in seminars outside the company Main facts about the Board of Auditors: 4 auditors (including 2 outside auditors) †¢ meets 1 time per month †¢ audit management’s daily activities (for instance, director performance) †¢ participate in important company meetings (including BD meetings), they share their opinion concernin g the questions under the discussion with executive officers, subsidiary’s auditors, Internal Audit Department and accounting auditors †¢ The Board of Auditors shares its views with the President four times per year and with all other directors (excluding outside directors) and executive officers once a year. †¢ Outside auditors participate in the Board of Directors meetings as members of Special Committee.They give the company advices concerning the questions of large-scale acquisition of shares (over 20 %). Outside auditors have possibilities to visit the plants and research centers to deepen their knowledge about the company. ———————– [1] Japanese Corporate Law does not require companies with auditor have outside director within the Board of Directors. Olympus appointed Rikiya Fujita (doctor of medicine), Masanobu Chiba (career as a director of Nikkei Inc. and its group companies) and Junichi Hayashi (career as director of investment consulting company) ———————– Figure 5: Zaitech Bubble Figure 7: CSR Educational Cube (Source: Olympus CSR Report 2011)