Causes and Effects of Poverty Free Essays

Causes and Effects of Poverty In the U. S. , there have been statistics that show that 15 to 25% of the population is living in poverty. We will write a custom essay sample on Causes and Effects of Poverty or any similar topic only for you Order Now Poverty is known as not being able to provide bare minimum requirements to survive, such as food and shelter. There are many causes that associate with poverty, that could include unemployment rates or people believe that some people are just lazy. The effects of poverty can be substantial. It effects people’s health, environment, and causes deprivations. The unemployment rate is still high today, which means there are people who still live in poverty. Some people are not just lazy; it just seems that it is difficult to find employment right now. Many people that are in poverty are because they did not continue their education after high school and many jobs are requiring degrees. Another reason some people are in poverty, is because they made mistakes in their past and when they try to make their life right they have difficulty finding employment. There are many reasons for poverty, but most of the causes are the unemployment rate. An effect of poverty is malnutrition. Malnutrition during infancy and childhood years can cause many great complications with development. Many children that suffer from malnutrition could have poor immune systems, developmental problems with their nervous system, or even brain damage. Compared to children that are not poor, children in poverty are two to three times more likely to have some sort of mental or physical disability from malnutrition. Children who grow up in poverty are also usually unlikely to finish their education. Many children in poverty are about 75 percent less likely to graduate high school than a child that is not poor. Even if a child that grows up in poverty does graduate high school, they are less likely to continue their education with college. As a matter of fact, less than four percent of children in the lowest quartile of family’s income do not graduate college. In today’s world education is important. Many jobs today will not hire people without an education or even without a college degree. All in all, poverty is a big issue. It has been for a long time, just maybe one day the government will help fix the issue. It is not fair for all the children that live in poverty to suffer because their parents work so hard just to make ends meet. Education is the key to success these days, and we should all make sure our children are aware of that at a young age. Works Cited Chitranshi, Mansi. â€Å"Cause and Effects of Poverty. † Articles Wave (2009). Hill, Lewis E. â€Å"The Institutional Economics of Poverty: An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of Poverty. † Journal of Economic Issues (1998): 279-285. Hunt, Matthew O. The Individual, Society, or Both? A Comparison of Black, Latino, and White Beliefs about the Causes of Poverty. September 1996. Lamson, John. â€Å"Exploring the Ecology of Poverty. † Human Ecology (2009): 4-9. How to cite Causes and Effects of Poverty, Essay examples

Replication Crisis in Social Psychology-Samples for Students

Question: Is There a Replication Crisis in Social Psychology? Answer: Introduction Replication is the practice of repeating of research studies in different situations and subject respondents in order to determine the validity of the study. This is a general practice in research carried out in all disciplines. For the research to be deemed authentic, it is expected that the findings remain the same both in the original research and the replicated version. Recent findings in discrepancy in replicated research findings in social psychology have raised concern. This essay will examine if the levels of discrepancy amount to a crisis of replication in the field of social psychology. Analysis Social psychology is the branch of psychology that deals with human conduct in relation to others. Whereas psychology studies the individual and his/her internal attitudes and motivations, social psychology examines how these personal attributes affect an individuals interaction with others in society. This discipline, like other human sciences, deals with human beings and attempts to study the predictability of human nature (Smith et al, 2014). This in itself is complex because human beings behave differently when in a group as opposed to the behavior they depict when they are alone. Social psychology is an amalgam between sociology and psychology; they both study the context of an individual in the context of society. However, the focus of psychology in this regard is the individual whereas sociology mostly focuses on the society (Smith J A, 2015). In a study carried out by Brian Nosek and the Open Science Collaboration, they found out that out of replications of one hundred correlation and experimental studies published in three psychological journals, only 36% were successful (Anderson et al, 2016). They also found out that social psychology findings were less likely to replicate than those of cognitive psychology by half. These and other findings have sparked a worldwide debate as to whether there is a replication crisis in social psychology. This begs the question as to how thorough the researchers are in their study and whether they sufficiently test their tools of research. Research can be faulted either on the authenticity of the research tools and methodologies used or the skill and experience of the researcher (Tailor et al, 2015). Given that these findings were published in recognized journals, it is likely that they were carried out with tried and tested tools and techniques. The failure to replicate might have arise n due to the failure of the researchers to be thorough in their study. Where research is funded, researchers may be swayed by the monetary incentives to complete their research and may, as a result, rush through the process thereby failing to capture happenings that may alter the result of the study (Sorlie et al, 2015). In many countries, the research budget is mostly strained especially where the concerned authorities do not foresee immediate benefit arising from research. For this reason, researchers mostly work on a limited budget and may not afford to do pilot studies which are vital in testing both the research tools and the study population (Denscombe 2015). Failing on these vital steps definitely interferes with the validity of the results achieved. It is noteworthy that the discourse on replication in social psychology has attracted more public attention as opposed to subjects in other fields like biology or economics. In comparison, it has been proven that aspects of validity and reliability have been the pre-occupation of social psychology for comparatively longer periods (Maxwell et al, 2015). This makes research in this field more sophisticated. The attention it attracts from the general public is therefore expected to be more prominent in comparison to other disciplines (Parker et al, 2015). The research designs in the field of psychology have been tested and used for many years and this gives the regular researcher confidence that the tools are perfect. This presumption is likely to blind the researcher from adherence the required procedures and hence overlook faults in the research that may lead to inaccurate results. Contrary to replication debates that have dominated other fields, social psychology replication discourse has roped in such stalwarts in the field like Susan Flake, John Bargh and Carol Dweck among others. The general feeling that the crisis in this field is dire is thus strengthened by the participation of these scholars. Even in the infant stages of psychology, Popper and Freud had sharp contradictions concerning Freuds falsifiable theory. That spirit of open debate persists even today. Psychological research in any of its sub-branches attracts a lot of attention and public debate (Abelson et al, 2014). Even in the media today we have a host of talk shows that host psychologists that debate various issues that affect society. Human conduct in religion politics, business and career among other facets of human life is bound to interest various players in society. It is therefore obvious that faults and discrepancies that appear in its research will generate more debate than any other field in society. The study of social psychology is therefore quite linked to human nature and obviously whatever is published in this regard enjoys curiosity and suffers public scrutiny. Any study that involves human nature can never claim to have 100% replication. This is because human nature is dynamic and keeps changing as newer interests and motivations confront humanity. The study of social psychology is even more interesting in the sense that it studies the role of institutions in society in relation to the behavior of the individual (Sheriff M., 2015). The forces of globalization and modernity have transformed the role of societal institutions radically that studies that conclusions arrived at must be subjected to further scrutiny with the passage of time (McDougall, 2015). The family institution, which is the most important social institution, has drastically changed in its function and structure today. Whereas family has traditionally played the role of socialization and basic education of an individual, today families are increasingly becoming nuclear and their traditional roles have been taken over by the school and media outlets like facebook and the inte rnet in general. This makes the study of the individual in the context of society more complex. An ordinary individual in society is bombarded by more varied forces that span geographical boundaries across the globe. The individual of yester-year had not to worry about such global forces because his life was confined to the extended family which mostly inhabited a common geographical location. It is also important to note that the researchers are also more likely to succumb to the forces of bias when studying fellow human beings. It is not far-fetched to imagine that a researcher may want to achieve a certain response in research to reinforce his preconceived stereotype about people. Although other researchers too are vulnerable to the evils of bias, a social psychologist faces double tragedy of dealing with the bias of both his subject of study and his own. For this reason, the findings of research may not pass the test of replication. These observations point out to the challenges that researchers in the field of psychology generally face either unintended or deliberately. The pressure, especially among young scholars to Publish or perish partly contributes to this crisis. There is need to rethink the aspect of replication and investigate whether the initial findings were faulty or the repeat findings. There is an inherent assumption that when a research is repeated, more thoroughness is exercised in both the research design and the tools employed. However, overconfident budding researchers may ruin authentic findings generated by their fore-runners in an attempt to gain prominence in academia (Smeyers et al, 2014). Critics must examine both the findings with a sober eye so as to gain a more balanced understanding of the situation at hand. In 1998, researchers reported that people were much happier when they held a pen with their teeth. This was depicted when they watched cartoons; they found the cartoons funnier when the pens with their teeth as opposed to them holding it with their lips. The import of this is that the forced smile on the mouth perhaps sent signals to the brain and thereby stimulated hormones of happiness. The article of this research was cited nearly 1500 times according to Google Scholar statistics (Brockmann, et al, 2013). However, repeat experiments involving seventeen labs that were independent in which over two thousand participants took part found out that there was no relationship between the position of the mouth and the state of happiness. The lead author of the original research expressed shock at the findings and raised pertinent concerns including the fact that the participants were filmed during the repeat exercise and their consciousness in being examined may have interfered with their emotions and by extension, the research findings. Such is the volatility of carrying out social research; so many factors affect the final results of the research done. There have also been concerns about the selection process involved in identifying the experiments to be replicated. So far there has not been record of proper random selection process while selecting cases. With the absence of such information, there have arisen fears that the choice of replicated cases was strongly biased against those researches that the involved people thought to least likely to pass the test (Cook, 2014). This thinking even complicates matters and spreads the notion that social psychology research findings cannot be fully trusted. Psychology students and young professionals getting into psychological research are likely to have their morale lowered by these sentiments. Professionals in this field need to take deliberate public education regarding the special circumstances that a social psychological researcher has to work under so that the public at large can appreciate the benefits such scholars bring in our social milieu. Such campaigns could help prospective researchers in this field to increase their efforts at refining their research designs and tools to arrive at findings that are appreciative of the volatile nature of this discipline (Jenkins, 2014). The ongoing discussion does not imply that it is difficult to achieve replication in social psychology. The infamous Milgram experiment that concluded that participants were so loyal to authority that they were willing to electrocute an innocent person on being given orders was replicated a century later. This was despite the research taking place in different contexts of history and participants. First conducted in the early 60s based on the conduct of Nazi underlings, it was repeated in a different context and surprisingly yielded the same results (Begue L., et al, 2015) This proves that social psychological research can be scientific regardless of time lag and contexts. However, it is possible that scholars trying to reproduce the Milgram experiment would achieve different results today. However, the dynamic nature of human beings, which is the subject of all research in social psychology, should not be an excuse for shoddy research by concerned researchers. Every individual who undertakes research should know that he has a duty towards society to exercise professionalism and thoroughness in his research endeavors. Given the interest that the replication debate has generated, it will be prudent for respected researchers in this field to guide future discourse regarding the discipline. They could in this respect establish structures that guide publication of research findings especially in popular journals. This will limit undue criticisms especially from uninformed social media commentators who may have no idea about the possible damage they may cause especially among young researchers in this field. With this in mind, the chaff and the wheat, figuratively speaking, will be distinguished with regard to criticism. Conclusion There is no actual crisis of replication in social science research. The major criticisms that have been observed in research findings stem from the proximity it has to human existence. Although all disciplines study human existence in various contexts, none touches the heart of life like social psychology. As such studies in this field will touch on human attitudes and motivations in relation to the social processes like socialization, marriage, work among others. It is clear to all that the nature of these processes keeps mutating based of factors responsible for human progress. It will therefore be unreasonable to expect research findings about motives on work during the historic era to apply in modern times; nature of work has changed and even social structures taken new shapes. With such understanding, it will become obvious that the replication crisis being observed in social psychology is not unique to the discipline but is prevalent across varied disciplines. References Abelson, R. P., Frey, K. P., Gregg, A. P. (2014).Experiments with people: Revelations from social psychology. Psychology Press. Anderson, C. J., Bahnk, ., Barnett-Cowan, M., Bosco, F. A., Chandler, J., Chartier, C. R., ... Della Penna, N. (2016). Response to comment on estimating the reproducibility of psychological science.Science,351(6277), 1037-1037. Bgue, L., Beauvois, J. L., Courbet, D., Oberl, D., Lepage, J., Duke, A. A. (2015). Personality predicts obedience in a Milgram paradigm.Journal of Personality,83(3), 299-306. Brockmann, H., Delhey, J. (Eds.). (2013).Human Happiness and the Pursuit of Maximization: Is More Always Better?. Springer Science Business Media. Cook, B. G. (2014). A call for examining replication and bias in special education research.Remedial and Special Education,35(4), 233-246. Denscombe, M. (2014).The good research guide: for small-scale social research projects. McGraw-Hill Education (UK). Jenkins, R. (2014).Social identity. Routledge. Maxwell, S. E., Lau, M. Y., Howard, G. S. (2015). Is psychology suffering from a replication crisis? What does failure to replicate really mean?.American Psychologist,70(6), 487. McDougall, W. (2015).An introduction to social psychology. Psychology Press. Parker, I., Shotter, J. (Eds.). (2015).Deconstructing social psychology(Vol. 21). Psychology Press. Sherif, M. (2015).Group conflict and co-operation: Their social psychology(Vol. 29). Psychology Press. McDougall, W. (2015).An introduction to social psychology. Psychology Press. Smeyers, P., De Ruyter, D. J., Waghid, Y., Strand, T. (2014). Publish yet perish: On the pitfalls of philosophy of education in an age of impact factors.Studies in Philosophy and Education,33(6), 647-666. Smith, E. R., Mackie, D. M., Claypool, H. M. (2014).Social psychology. Psychology Press. Smith, J. A. (Ed.). (2015).Qualitative psychology: A practical guide to research methods. Sage. Sorlie, P. D., Sholinsky, P. D., Lauer, M. S. (2015). Reinvestment in Government-Funded Research. Taylor, S. J., Bogdan, R., DeVault, M. (2015).Introduction to qualitative research methods: A guidebook and resource. John Wiley Sons.

The Frequent Shopper Program Essay Example

The Frequent Shopper Program Paper The Frequent Shopper Program for Kudler fine foods has three last main projects to talk about. These subjects are Quality assurance process and procedures to ensure the functionality and performance requirements are met. Testing procedures to ensure the application is operational at all levels including program, network, systems, and interfaces. The last main project to talk about is Implementation steps and procedures necessary to achieve operational status. After these topics, this will conclude our session for the Frequent Shopper Program for Kudler Fine Foods. Quality Kudler Fine Foods has one important topic to talk about and this is Quality. Kudler Fine Foods initiating for the program in quality to track the shopping habits at the individual shopper’s level. Shopper purchase habits will help Kudler Fine Foods improve their processes. This will also help improve their offerings to best offer the values of all the valued shoppers. Most people are worried about price and not the quality. Price is not the primary differentiating factor for Kudler consumers; these consumers are focused on quality and finding specialized items. Therefore, rather than providing everyday discounts to the customers for their purchase frequency like lower end markets, Kudler has partnered with a loyalty points program to provide customers with points which can be redeemed for high end gift items, airline first-class upgrades, or other specialty foods (Kudler Fine Foods, 2010). Incentive is one of the two frequent shopper programs that Kudler evaluated as a partner for their new program. One of the most impressive features of this system was the software’s ability to create a personalized rewards certificate and provide the customer with a number of rewards choices. We will write a custom essay sample on The Frequent Shopper Program specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on The Frequent Shopper Program specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on The Frequent Shopper Program specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer Testing Process The testing process that is already in place for the tracking of the cash register accounts, the Frequent Shopper Program for Kudler fine foods combined a couple of great solutions for the tracking system. Just by seeing how the Frequent Shopper Program for Kudler fine foods is combining all their customers’ personal records into just one area. This new software uses this function in a manner that is highly dependable, protected, and convenient. IT staff and any administration that has tasks with the organization must be familiar with the system of this version. This must be confirmed that each every single location is prepared with desktop computers using Windows OS and Internet Explorer with server components written in Java. After this preliminary coding procedure is one hundred percent, Kudler fine foods will perform an exact testing using actual company cards by operating these sales in all three locations. Points awarding will be logged and stored, and the process will be repeated as to establish frequent shoppers during test these phases. Two months of conscientious examination of cash incentives and redeemable store points offered based on test purchases should indicated if the program was a success. Once testing is complete and the numbers add up as intended, installation will be in progress and should only take a certain amount of time with successful tests. Each company will maintain whole documents regarding the system in only certain locations, preferably in computerized and hardcopy layouts. The cashiers will gather all this information, but as the system will be computerized there will not be a need for considerable training. Implementation During any system implementation, there are three features that continuously work in tandem with each other and which must be carefully measured and appraised at various stages of the development. These factors are cost, schedule, and performance for the Frequent Shopper Program for Kudler fine foods. Some of these factors may be worked on while the others may be adaptable. Usually at this same relationship described as cost, schedule, and quality is used instead of performance. If a project team changes any one of these factors, the other two will without doubt be affected as well. The common graphical description of this implementation Is a triangle where each side of the triangle represents one of these factors at each corner? Basically, this means if one corner is missing this wouldn’t form a triangle. Conclusion To conclude our session for the Frequent Shopper Program involved with Kudler Fine Foods, Quality, Testing Process, and Implementation are three major subjects discussed in our organization. References Apollo Group, Inc. (2010). BSA375CourseNotes. pdf. Retrieved March 1, 2010, from http://mycampus. hoenix. edu/secure/resources/resource. asp Apollo Group Inc. (2010). Kudler Fine Foods. Marketing Overview. Retrieved March 1, 2010. BSA/375 – Fundamentals of Business Systems Development. https://ecampus. phoenix. edu/secure/aapd/CIST/VOP/Business/Kudler/Sales/KudlerSM001. htm Apollo Group Inc. (2010). Kudler Fine Foods. Information Technology. March 1, 2010. BSA/375 – Fundamentals of Business Systems Development. https://ecampus. phoenix. edu/secure/aapd/CIST/VOP/Business/Kudler/IT/KudlerITDatabases001. htm

Free Essays on Nanotechnology

Nanotechnology Nanotechnology is actually a fairly new idea. This may not seem like any big deal in terms of ethics, but just like any type of scientific advancement there are positives and negatives. Of course the ethical issues don’t stem out of just the fact that this is a new kind of science. It branches off of â€Å"what will this new scientific technology be used for?† For example, Embryonic Stem Cell research. It’s not the research that’s bad it’s how they get the cells. There are half a dozen, maybe more, different places to get the same type of cells without taking the life of that unborn child. The term, Nanotechnology, was first introduced back in the mid 1970’s by a Japanese researcher named Norio Taniguchi to mean â€Å"†¦precision machinery with tolerance of a micrometer or less† (Kilner 55-56). In the 1986 book by Eric Drexler, Engines of Creation, he brought the word and it’s concept in to the public’s thought. In Layman’s terms the basic idea of Nanotechnology is to make little tiny atomic size robots that can be called upon to do whatever we want them to do. Similar to having a little computer and telling it carry out an assigned task like empty the recycle bin, or something of that sort. Or in this case telling the little robot to float around in a persons body and switch out a section of DNA so that the person’s eyes are green instead of brown. Just so we know how small this a strand of DNA is 2.3 nanometers wide or if you divided a meter stick into 1 billion sections it would be 2.3 sections wide. In many of the sciences with Nanotechnology being no exception to the rules the ethical issues are much further behind the actual research that is taking place. For some reason the research of hazards with this technology are also far behind. But isn’t that just typical of scientists? I mean here’s a group of scientists, some of the smartest men in their field of study and they ... Free Essays on Nanotechnology Free Essays on Nanotechnology Nanotechnology Nanotechnology is actually a fairly new idea. This may not seem like any big deal in terms of ethics, but just like any type of scientific advancement there are positives and negatives. Of course the ethical issues don’t stem out of just the fact that this is a new kind of science. It branches off of â€Å"what will this new scientific technology be used for?† For example, Embryonic Stem Cell research. It’s not the research that’s bad it’s how they get the cells. There are half a dozen, maybe more, different places to get the same type of cells without taking the life of that unborn child. The term, Nanotechnology, was first introduced back in the mid 1970’s by a Japanese researcher named Norio Taniguchi to mean â€Å"†¦precision machinery with tolerance of a micrometer or less† (Kilner 55-56). In the 1986 book by Eric Drexler, Engines of Creation, he brought the word and it’s concept in to the public’s thought. In Layman’s terms the basic idea of Nanotechnology is to make little tiny atomic size robots that can be called upon to do whatever we want them to do. Similar to having a little computer and telling it carry out an assigned task like empty the recycle bin, or something of that sort. Or in this case telling the little robot to float around in a persons body and switch out a section of DNA so that the person’s eyes are green instead of brown. Just so we know how small this a strand of DNA is 2.3 nanometers wide or if you divided a meter stick into 1 billion sections it would be 2.3 sections wide. In many of the sciences with Nanotechnology being no exception to the rules the ethical issues are much further behind the actual research that is taking place. For some reason the research of hazards with this technology are also far behind. But isn’t that just typical of scientists? I mean here’s a group of scientists, some of the smartest men in their field of study and they ...

The capital punishment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

The capital punishment - Essay Example The capital punishment is retribution; therefore, it should be practiced in the U.S despite claims by that it has no efficacy in deterring crime. The capital punishment is no doubt the most effective way to deter a criminal from committing further crimes since death deprives of human ability. Death penalty puts a stop to a murder’s criminal activity. The cost of taking care of a life sentence convict is much less the cost of the death sentence (Evan Mandery 204). Texas is one of the states that comprise the U.S with an excellent example to the practice of the capital punishment. On 2 July, in the year 2007, legislators in Texas mandated the death penalty for traffic offences among them failure to obey seat belt laws, speeding and driving without a license. This legislation stipulates seizure and sale of offender’s assets by the state to raise revenue for road construction and maintenance following execution. The legislation plays a vital role in raising taxes for the state. The capital punishment is economically significant to the U.S. On a rough approximate the U.S spends $25,000 to maintain a single prisoner. Imprisonment of criminals adds a burden to the U.S budget. The practice of a retroactive application of the capital punishment in the prison system might be the gateway to achieving a cost cut on the government’s expenditure on maintaining criminals. The death punishment is not only effective in deterring crimes but also promoting economic growth (Evan Mandery 368).

Demand and price elasticity of demand Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Demand and price elasticity of demand - Essay Example In the case of Bordeaux, the consumers had proposed a low wine price. This implies that reducing the price of the wine will make the commodity be more affordable to the consumers (Sheffrin, B. 2003). This would increase the demand of the product thus increasing its supply. Increase in the supply of Bordeaux wine would increase the number of sales. Price elasticity of a commodities demand involves a measure that is used in economies in showing the elasticity responsiveness of the quantity of the product that is demanded towards a change in the product’s price. In this respect, it provides the percentage change of the quantity of the product that is demanded to follow a response to a change in the price. Price elasticity can be considered to be negative despite the fact that analysis would always ignore the negative sign leading to ambiguity (Peters, K. 2006). A positive price elasticity of demand occurs in a case where the products do not satisfy the law of demand. In this resp ect, the demand of the wine would be said to be inelastic when the price elasticity of demand (PED) is below one. This implies that the price changes have a significantly smaller effect on the amount of wine that is demanded. On the other hand, the demand of Bordeaux wine would be said to be elastic whenever the price elasticity of is more than one. This means that the changes in the commodities price would greatly influence the amount of the wine that is demanded. In the case of Bordeaux wine, the demand of the product could be said to be elastic. This is so because the demand of this wine is strongly affected by changes in price. Therefore, increasing the price of the product would reduce the demand of the product where as reducing the price of the product would have an effect of increasing demand of the product (Knugman, R. 2005). It is for this reason that the merchants who were contacted through The Times argue that they could only accept the wine when the price of the wine is reduced to about ?95 in 2008 for the best brands compared with the ?318 in 2007 vintage (Sage, A. & Pavia, W. 2009). These investors argue out that when the price of wine is higher than the proposed one, there would be no customers. This is a clear indication that the demand of Bordeaux wine was elastic. Part B. The amount of the wine demanded is normally a strong component of its price. A case study done to find out the quantity of the wine demanded at various price levels with all the other factors kept constant, would result into the table 1. Table 1. Demand schedule. year price Average price quantity 2002 95 95 170 133 700 2003 192 192 253 223 500 2004 141 145 190 159 600 2005 472 480 622 523 300 2006 450 450 622 536 200 2007 318 318 466 392 400 Graph 1. The graph represents the quantity of the wine that is demanded as the variable that is Independent (x-axis) and the price as the variable that is dependent (y-axis). According to the law of demand the quantity of the product tha t is demanded will always move towards the opposite price direction. This is observed in the graph above through the downward demand curve slope. When one moves along the curve, a change in the price of the wine would result into a change in the quantity that is demanded. Whenever there exists a change in the influencing factor besides price there could be a shift in the demand curve either towards the right or the left,

The three stages of Change Management

The three stages of Change Management We live in the age of change. The implication of this statement, is not that changes only happen in our time, but, is that changes in the recent few decades have been comparatively more frequent and exert relatively major influences on every aspect of human life. In fact, changes command so much attention that, in recent years, the spotlight has been on how to manage change: Change Management. Change management, according to definition from BNET Business Dictionary (n.d.) is the coordination of a structured period of transition from situation A to situation B in order to achieve lasting change within an organization. Change management in the organizational context is the study of change, how to exercise change, how to cope with change and the necessity of change to ensure sustainability. Management of change is a complex subject of study; attention has to be paid in regards to the continuity of change, i.e. there are 2 types of change namely incremental change (minor change, adaptation, modification) and discontinuous change (revolutionary change, transformational change). Organizations experience consistent cycles of change in which periods of incremental change are punctuated by intervals of discontinuous change (Nadler and Tushman 1995, cited in Hayes 2002, p. 5). This cycle is referred to as punctuated equilibrium by Romanelli and Tushman in 1994 (cited in Hayes 2002, p. 5). Academics and scholars have, throughout time, developed various theories on change management. One of the famous thinker in the field of change management, Lewin (1951, cited in Campbell and Craig 2008, p. 512) introduced the force-field model which describes the state of change in an organization as the equilibrium between the force that push for change and the restraining force that struggles to keep the status quo unchanged. Additionally, Kotter (1995, cited in Huczynski and Buchanan 2007, p. 604) proposes 8 steps to organizational transformation: Establish a sense of urgency Form a guiding coalition Create a vision Communicate the vision Empower people to act on the vision Create short-term wins Consolidate improvements to produce further change Institutionalize new approaches Kurt Lewin in 1951 (cited in Kinicki and Kreitner 2008, p. 402) also introduced a 3-stage model for change. What are the 3 stages? Unfreezing: In a nutshell it means that to change, an organization first need to have the desire for change. Organization needs to be unhappy with the old behaviour. Changing: Moving to the desired state of change. Refreezing: Stabilize and normalize the changed state. Mentioned above are few of the theories that students studying Organizational Behaviour will find familiar. Kurt Lewins models for change remain largely applicable even in the 21st century as successful change always depends on striking a balance between change implementation and managing resistance to change. Besides, the 3-stage model correctly illustrated the process of change; the difference now being the increasing speed of the change cycle as organizational environment becomes more volatile. In my humble opinion however, Kotters 8-step model is an over-simplified interpretation of the process of change. The fundamental assumption that change happens in logical sequence and that managers are all rational beings are in themselves impractical as changes often involve unpredictable irregularities and managers do not always follow the book. Realistically, decisions made by managers are seldom rational. When organizations try to put into action change plans, it is almost always certain that the effort will be met with resistance. Resistance to change comes in one form or another. To borrow the words of Fronda and Moriceau (2008), there are 3 forms of resistance: revolt, withdrawal (alienation from work) and discreet resistance (low morale, low productivity and high absenteeism). On resistance towards change, we started off with a rather negative perception in the last paragraph. However, this is not necessarily so, resistance is detrimental only when it is not delicately handled, downplayed or ignored. Waddell and Sohal (1998) in their journal article titled Resistance: a constructive tool for change management states that resistance to change shows that it is nonsensical to assume right away that all change is beneficial; that it is human nature to doubt the outcome of change. Furthermore they argued that resistance to change ensures a balance between organizations desire for change and its practical need of stability and constancy (Waddell and Sohal 1998). The crucial question remained: How can management adopt the right strategy so as to be successful in change initiation? Many people have this huge misconception about the existence of the mythical best strategy for change. In my opinion, it is downright absurd to conclude that there is one best strategy to be used for all change initiatives; each organization is affected by its distinct external and internal factors when implementing change. After a routine of extensive reading, I found the contingency approach to change advocated by Dunphy and Stace (2001, cited in Huczynski and Buchanan, p. 603) most viable. The Dunphy-Stace contingency approach to change implementation The table content outlines the different strategies that managers can employ under different circumstances to implementing changes. Participative change management, despite being touted by a number of academics in the field of change management as the best solutions to change, does not always work. This is because participation and involvement in change process, from formulation to implementation, is extremely time-consuming, even more so when consensus fails to be reached. Thus when organizations are put under situations where the need for change is so critical that it is change or die, managers will be better off exercising decisiveness and dictatorial decision-making. Ideally, however, it is always best to involve employees in planning and carrying out change to minimize resistance and ensure cooperation. My view is echoed in the journal article by Stanleigh (2008) titled Effecting successful change management initiatives, in which he states 6 reasons why change initiatives fail: Not engaging all employees Managing change only at the executive level Telling people they have to change, were in a crisis Sending staffs on a change program and expecting change to occur Not honouring the past Not giving time for staffs to vent first and then change Not to be forgotten is the role of constructive conversation. Efforts to bring about change often fail because the change agent failed to listen. Jabri, Adrian and Boje (2008) in their article comment on change agents: [c]hange agents want to change the organization; indeed, they have been trained to change it. Change agents may even know what the organization needs. Many change agents have been trained to think about how to communicate the change in ways that people will accept it. That training reflects a caring for the audience, even as it limits the audiences participation. The audience is mere spectator to the change, rather than witness to it. In order to change successfully, an effective, two-way communication between managers and employees must be in place. Managers must learn to listen to the voices of the employees because the employees possess hands-on knowledge which might not be readily available to someone in managerial position. Conversation enables the contribution of every employee to be fully appreciated and integrated into the grand plan of change. Summing up my argument in the previous paragraphs, to be able to adopt a clearly defined strategy for the successful initiation of change, management needs to evaluate current situation, the necessity for change, and the urgency for the change. Management then needs to decide on a suitable approach based on the model proposed by Dexter Dunphy and Doug Stace (2001). Whenever possible, managers should maximize stakeholders participation in the change process. Moreover, from planning to implementation of change, managers should never overlook the importance of conversation. The management as the change agent needs to learn to listen. Throughout history we can see a large number of organizations that have made attempts to change. Some of these organizations succeeded; some, unfortunately, failed. By adopting the right strategies, we observe that organizations can manage their change successfully. One recent example is the effort by Dell Inc. to reduce the power consumption of its approximately 50000 computers during non-operational hours. In light of the increasing cost of energy, or more specifically, electricity, Dell Inc. has decided to put into action an overhaul of its power management. To formulate a company-wide power management plan, Jay Taylor, the senior engineer global strategist at Dell, brought together several departments at Dell, including product, facilities management, CTO and IT groups. These stakeholders all contributed their expertise in their respective fields to assist in the planning. By coordinating the skills of its employees in different fields, and pairing this effort with the latest tec hnology, Dell managed to come up with a very efficient power management plan which resulted in 40% reduction in computer-related energy cost, translating to US$ 1.8 million savings annually. The inspiring part of the whole initiative is that Dell managed to implement the power management plan and achieve cost-saving without hampering its day-to-day operation, thanks to its skillful handling of available expertise and effective co-ordinations between stakeholders from different fields. As a conclusion, change management plays an essential role in ensuring organizations survival. To achieve competitive advantage and sustainability in this turbulent period of economy, organization needs to be able to adapt to the external environment rapidly and routinely by constantly learning. It is therefore imperative for leaders and managers alike to have a thorough understanding of the nature, theories and practice of change management.