Quality and Performance Management of MS

Quality and Performance Management of MS Quality is the second of three value components (Finch,Byron J., 2008).The commitment to producing quality in services and products changes process from just producing to producing things customers want. The development of the methods and techniques to manage quality and a culture of employees who want to produce quality is at the heart of any successful business. INTRODUCTION This Chapter contains an insight into what quality and performance management, meeting customers expectations at Marks and Spencer. I will touch on its history and the effect of quality management at the company will be examined. The basis of choosing M S is due to the fact that it is a well established company. More like an institution. Also I work for the company. About MS For 125 years MS has been trusted by customers to offer high quality products at great value. It has grown from a Penny Bazaar stall to become the UKs leading retailer of quality clothing, food and home products. With more than 21 million UK customers, the company is an expanding international force, now in 40 territories. A team of 78,000 people and over 2,000 suppliers form the bedrock of its business, ensuring their brand will continue to offer Quality, Value, Service, Innovation and Trust. These core values are as important today as they ever have been. They are all about doing the right thing which is, quite simply, how they do business (MS, 2009). Michael Mark started the business in 1884 selling items at no more than a penny. The business was subsequently joined by Tom Spencer when the partnership started. The business grew gradually and by 1926 there were about 125 stores. Marks Spencer has been built on the following values: offering customers a selective range of high quality merchandise; encouraging suppliers to maintain high quality standards in production and working environment; store expansion planned for the convenience of customers, with a greater width of product choice; simplified operating procedures; supporting British industry and buying abroad only when new ideas, technology, quality and value are not available in the UK; fostering good human relations with customers, staff, suppliers and the community. (Whitehead, 1994). An insight into quality management Quality is conformance to requirements (Crosby, 1979), with emphasis on zero defects. (Swanson, 1995) however, implied quality management to be the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bear on its ability to satisfy given needs. Implicit in this assumption is a customer with needs and expectations to be satisfied. Quality is a measurable result; quality management improvement is more about the journey than the result. What we do and how we do it determines quality and the actionable elements of quality involve the process rather than the outcome. Good quality reduces the cost of rework, waste, complaints and returns and most importantly, generates satisfied customers (Slack, 2007). Marks and Spencer has what is called a golden rule to always take ownership of helping their customers and also getting feedback about their services. Staffs at Marks and Spencer are expected to adhere to the following three principles when serving customers: acknowledge every customer with a hello or a smile build a relationship by talking and interacting with the customer saying good bye and have good day to customers. Some feedback is done through online surveys and some directly with their customers using survey forms. The result from the survey enables MS to review areas of improvement. I strongly believe that quality of services is MSs competitive edge. The golden rules means treating the customers with courtesy, interacting and engaging with the customers doing the sales with a smile, always helping to pack on the till, asking customers if there is still anything else we can do for them. All these are attributes of good customer services. Good customer service provides the likelihood that the customers would still want to come back. Mr David Williams, an MS customer recently stated It makes a pleasant day for me when a staff of Marks and Spencer says thank you for waiting, attending to their customers when there was a long queue. Consistency with these values make the customers always want to come back which goes a long way in a business. Furthermore, from the companys perspective it also means treating their employees with humanely, with dignity and respect. These in turn encourage the employees to be equally sensitive to the needs and expectations of the customers. If staff feels that their efforts are being rewarded and that future effort will also be rewarded, their quality of work is likely to improve. In this way, total quality can be improved. Moreover, where incremental strategic change is dependent on individual members of staff, acting upon, opportunities and threats, the reward system must be appropriate and motivating (Thompson Martin, 2010). From my experience, I have observed that when staff is not happy, they will not be able to deliver a good service to the customers, which may then affect the business. As an employee of Marks and Spencer, I can objectively say we are highly treated well. Staffs are rewarded in so many ways. Some of the incentives are 20% off any items in the store, promotion opportunities, recognition within the organization and pension scheme. Also the company provide bonuses, flexible working arrangement for all mothers and graduate scheme for new graduates. All these rewards and incentives are motivating factors that enable staff to perform to their utmost level in serving customers in a satisfactory way. Rewards depend upon the success of the Organization as a whole as well as individual, contribution to the success (Thompson Martin, 2010). As an employee of Marks and Spencer, one thing that I have noticed was that when customers visits the store, they have the assurance that they are going to get exceptional services. Marks and Spencer are not trading in service quality gimmicks but also focus on giving what we call exceptional basics i.e. listening very carefully to their customers and giving thoughts to their needs and providing what they really need. For example they offer: three items for the price of two collect by cab for customers if the customer require a cab after shopping sending customers special order to them within three working days v effective and efficient refund policy. Marks and Spencer offers full refund to their customers with their receipt or if has been lost, a credit voucher is issued Marks and Spencer credit card points and vouchers are given to all the card holders on a regular basis which I believe would encourage customers to use their Marks and Spencer credit card to pay at the till Marks and Spencer train their staff to take ownership in everything they do. (Thompson Martin, 2010) emphasised on commitment to customers services, quality and continuous Improvement. Its this attention to detail that counts in providing good customer service to the customers. There is nothing more Important to Marks Spencer than their customers and achieving a high quality of service. The company encourages three things i.e., creativity, initiative and attitude. Attitude is one of the key attributes that management at Marks and Spencer imbues on their employees despite the training and skills developed. It is the quality reflection that sets us apart from the competition. Marks and Spencer have improved in their product offerings and looks like they hire people with positive attitude that takes great pride in delivering exceptional service. commented by one of the customers. It is this type of attitude displayed by their employees that leads to innovation and creativity. For example, there was a time a deaf man came into the store for shopping, he wrote all he needed in a sheet of paper. Marks and Spencer already have some employees that help the blind and the deaf for their shopping. After helping him, he was so delighted that he now believes that everybody is treated in the same way without discriminating. Also if a customer likes a particular product which was recommended and is not in store and in order to satisfy the customer, they take total ownership to make sure they make arrangement for more stock to be available for the next visit of the customer in store. Marks and Spencer also track their product through surveys to know how well a particular product is performing. As explained by (Kanji,Gopal K: Asher,Mike, 1996) To understand the process of total quality management (TQM),where all work is seen as process and total quality management is a continuous process of improvement for individuals, groups of people and whole organizations. What makes total quality management different from other management processes is the concentrated focus on continuous improvement. Most of Marks and Spencer customers knows about their quality and are ready to pay more for the value. MS offers all most ever week, just to motivate customers to buy at the stated price of other competitors products like Tesco and Sainsbury just to let customers knows that there price is still the same as others but the quality is different. Marks and Spencer makes these offers to draw customers attention. They have succeeded as shown my consistently increasing their market share. Also there objectives is to exceed their expectation to deliver good quality to their customers and to achieve zero defects. They design their product to try to prevent errors occurring. Though, it is always impossible to prevent mistakes. Knowing the current quality standards of the product or service in your customers hands is the first stage of being able to improve. You can make mistake and you can measure your improvement if you know the base you are starting from. Having the facts necessary to manage the business at all levels and giving that information to everyone so that decisions are based upon fact are the essential aspect of Quality Management (Kanji,Gopal K: Asher,Mike, 1996) Marks and Spencer rarely get formal complaints but when there is any they resolve it with the customer and they always listen to customers complain which at the end customers feels delighted and satisfy. (Kanji,Gopal K: Asher,Mike, 1996) Satisfying agreed customers requirements- relates to internal customers as well external ones it is necessary to achieve successful internal working relations in order to satisfy the needs of the external customers. The key is service recovery; this is why empowerment is so important. (Slack, 2007) Marks and Spencer train their to turn around any negative experiences they may have into positive ones before the customers leaves the store and not to allow the customer to go home not satisfied. Its really worth the effort. Giving exceptional service has always been the motto of Marks and Spencer for years up till now. It is well known to everybody about their good customer services. They also get tremendous feedback from their customers and that is the more reason that most customers always want to come back despite the prices of their products. Older people are also helped with their shopping list by assigning a member of staff to the customer to do the shopping. It gives the customer confidence to know that their shopping is done to their satisfaction. One of MSs customers, Mrs Johnson commented that price is not the determinant factor for shopping at M&S; it is the good customer services and the way staffs attends to me considering I have been shopping here for over 25 years. They are all well mannered, always with a smile on their face, they take ownership and always wanting to help to pack our shopping One of the key tasks of operation management is to ensure that quality goods and services are pr ovided to both internal and external customers (Finch,Byron J., 2008). Marks and Spencer value their customers; queues are monitored and customers are often thanked for waiting and are given the offer to pack their shopping for them. It is more than compensation to acknowledge someone and as a member of staff, I often hear from customers that how grateful and delighted they for the attention that is given to them. The professionalism shown by the MS employees emanated from the training provided and also interacting with customers makes our job more interesting. (Finch,Byron J., 2008) Contends that The best answer to a customers questions can often come only from the employee directly responsible for a good customers services to the customers MS gives customer choice. They have different range for customers, for the older women it is called classic range. This range was developed as result of the survey that was carried out. One of the survey participants, a customer known as Ms. Williams in the survey wrote It fits perfectly ok without any adjustment or complain, I just cannot go anywhere else to buy my clothes than Marks. Another range for the middle age is called Peruna, they are long lasting but very costly. Customers are happy to pay for what they get because of the quality of the finished products and is visible to see said one of their customers. A quality is the degree of fit between customers expectations and customer perception of the product or service. (Slack, 2007) Marks and Spencer respond quickly to customer demand. One key element of quality management is the dependence on empowered teams to document and then streamline processes based on team knowledge and understanding of customer needs and expectation. States customer requirements often fall short of defining customer needs and expectations (Swanson, 1995) If a product was not in store. Marks and Spencer take responsibility to make sure they find an alternative way to get the product and send it to the customer address just for meeting the customers expectation and to make sure they satisfy customer demand. Dimensions of Quality (Finch,Byron J., 2008) identified eight product quality dimensions and five service quality dimensions which consist of the followings: Performance relates to the perceived characteristics of the product. Features the additional or secondary capabilities of a product or service. Reliability ÂÂ ­- measures the dependency and how consistently it achieves the promises given about the product/service. Durability deals how long the product/service last for. Serviceability usually deals with after sales in terms of repairs guarantees and complaints resolution. Aesthetics deals with the appearance and style of the product/service. Response the relationship between the product/service provider and the customer. Reputation deals with the perception of customers on the company. In addition to the above (Finch,Byron J., 2008)also identified five dimensions of service quality which includes: Reliability in terms of the company keeping to its promises. Responsiveness deals with how promptly the company responds to their customer needs. Assurance dealing with trust and confidence between the customers and employees. Empathy deals with how employees are sensitive to the needs of the customers. Tangibles showing care and attentions with respect to the physical facilities and written materials available at the company. Marks and Spencer provides both products and service to their customers and fully conforms to all the service/product quality dimensions mentioned above. This I believe has led to the consistent domination of market share in the retail industry by MS. Cost of Quality Cost of quality relates to the cost associated with assuring quality of the product/services in addition to costs incurred in correcting defective items. (Finch,Byron J., 2008) explained cost of quality as the cost associated with maintaining and sustaining goods/services which can be categorised into primarily internal and external failure costs, prevention cost and appraisal costs. All of these costs are identifiable with MS. An example of external failure i.e. cost incurred after transfer of ownership to customers at MS are the returns made by customers when something goes wrong with the items purchased at the store when replacement would need to be made in additional to employee time involved in dealing with the defective product. Internal failure cost i.e. costs that may arise due to inadequacy of quality before transfer of ownership to customers occurs at MS when inspection staff have noticed a defection in a product line and had to be withdrawn before reaching the floor level. All the costs associated with this defective product including production and distribution costs aggregates to the internal failure costs. The appraisal costs are those cost associated with meeting quality specification which may include inspection, testing and sampling. At MS this category of quality cost are incurred before the products are distributed to various stores. Usually the quality audits are carried taking samples from millions of product items to ensure they meet quality specification. (Finch,Byron J., 2008) stated that a frequent cause of poor quality is the failure of system that are intended to maintain quality. Hence organisations need to ensure their quality system is audited to ensure that they meet their quality requirements and thereby reduce their appraisal cost. The cost associated to reducing appraisal costs can be categorised as prevention costs. Some these costs includes cost of training, improving the process, quality planning activities. Where more effor ts are put in prevention, it should have an impact in reducing the other category of quality costs. However, as can be seen from figure1 below, quality cost increases as quality problems gets to customers. Figure 1 (Finch,Byron J., 2008) Cost of quality Prevention Internal failure External failure Cost of quality from Prevention to external failure Total Quality Management As defined by (Chartered Institute of Management Accountant, 2002), TQM is a programme that ensures that goods or services supplied are of the highest quality. However, (Feigenbaum, 1986) defined TQM as an effective system for integrating the quality development, quality maintenance and quality improvement efforts of the various groups in an organisation so as to enable production and service at the most economical levels which allows a full customer satisfaction. TQM as a process must encompass everyone in the organisation and with full commitment of senior management. (Finch,Byron J., 2008) put forward that TQM is based on three principles: customer focus continuous process improvement and total involvement. With customer focus, the customer defines what quality is. A distinction is required between what is known as internal customers that are employees within the organisation and external customers who buys the products or services. Each employee in the organisation should have a well defined customer so that there is what is known as supplier-customer relationship extending from the internal customers to the final consumer who consumes the product. For instance in MS an output from a staff (internal supplier) then becomes and input for another staff (internal customer). This chain feeds itself into the final consumer. If the process is broken i.e. the supplier-customer relationship and the quality needs of the internal customer is not met, it is bound to affect the ultimate consumer. Continuous process improvement is about reducing or eliminating variability from quality processes. Outcomes from processes should be predictable and when this is not the case it may become difficult to consistently meet customer expectations. Continuous process improvement at MS has a very low variability if all any. Continuous process improvement is part of MS Plan A which is quality management plan that contains a comprehensive set of objectives that governs how MS does business. The plan came into existence in January 2007 and commits to changing one hundred things over five years. Plan A is makes a real change to the environment, customers, employees and people working in the MSs supply chains. Through Plan A, MS have introduced products and services to help customers live in a sustainably way, continued contribution to local communities and with additional profit generated ploughed back into the business. MS engages every one of its 21 million customers by building Plan A quali ties into all of its products and helping customers to develop their own Plan A eco-plans. MS has integrated its Plan A from being a Plan to How We Do Business by integrating it into processes and giving its workforce the skills, tools and motivation required to make a difference. (MS, 2009) I believe that it is the commitment from management and the active involvement of employees in developing and implementing their quality objectives Plan A that have contributed to the success of the company. To continue to sustain the level of confidence of quality assurance, managers need to ensure that everyone consistently adhere to their standards and ensured it is continuously measured and monitored. Where necessary corrective action should be taken as advocated by (Deming, 1982) to use of the Shewharts PDCA cycle (Plan-Do-Check-Act), as an approach to process analysis. This cycle inevitably leads to redesign and improvement in quality. Tools for solving quality problems There are several processes available for quality improvement including DMAIC(Design, Measure, Analyse, Improve and Control) and DMADV (Define, Measure, Analyse, Design and Verify) of Six Sigma improvement projects. DMAIC is used for existing processes where performance is below what is expected while DMADV is for developing new products/service in order to meet the desired quality level. Also there is the PDCA cycle as illustrated by (Finch,Byron J., 2008) where he identified seven steps to quality improvement summarised as follows: Figure 2 PDCA Quality Improvement tool (Finch,Byron J., 2008) Most organisations including MS can improve their quality by implementing any of the available quality improvement processes. Any process used need to be supported by applying appropriate tools for each step. There are various tools and techniques that can be applied as illustrated in figure 3 below Analytical tools Mostly used Frequently used Idea Generation Tools Consensus tools Process Definition Data Collection Analysing Cause effect Analysing displaying data Planning tools Meeting management tools Benchmarking Questionnaires PLAN Problem identification Analysis of current situation Analysis root causes CHECK Selection planning of solution Check result ACT Standardise Conclusion / next cycle Figure 3 Quality Improvement Tools Technique Matrix (Swanson, 1995) In using the above tools and techniques, analysts should list activities to be carried out and the expected output/results of each step. Though not prescriptive in nature employees or analysts can be flexible with the tools they apply depending on the situation theyre faced. The quality improvement models identified above provides an iterative steps but do not provide how the steps are to be prosecuted but there are tools that will aid the accomplishments of the steps identified within the quality improvement model. These tools as identified by (Swanson, 1995) are not exhaustive but majority of them have been converted into a matrix as illustrated in figure 4 below. Idea Generation Tools Consensus tools Process Definition Data Collection Analysing Cause effect Analysing displaying data Planning tools Meeting management tools Benchmarking Questionnaires Figure 4 Tools and techniques matrix Quality Awards and Quality Standards Many customers are quality assured knowing a business has quality award accreditation. It provides the customer with the confidence that they are buying quality product or quality service. In many cases businesses use quality award as marketing tool which are visible in their marketing and promotion. In some cases some businesses can afford to charge at a premium as a result of quality accreditation. A quality award enables a business or organisation to conform to certain specified standard. A standard that must be consistently adhered to and where a business conducts its business internationally, it may well be a requirement to have and internationally recognised quality standard accreditation. Two internationally recognised standards are the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award and the International Standards Organisation. The ISO is one of the most world-acclaimed quality standard award/accreditation is the ISO quality standards amongst others. According to (International Stand ards Organisation Discover ISO, 2010) the objectives of the standards where implemented, are to enable products/services to be more efficient, safer and cleaner; trade facilitation; assist governments with technical foundation for legislation in health safety; sharing of good management practice; safeguarding of consumers and making life simpler. With the insistence of having ISO quality standard in place, it ensures that certified company have the capacity, capability and infrastructure available to produce quality products/services. (Finch,Byron J., 2008). There are various other specific awards depending on the industry. Marks and Spencer especially in the last couple of years have had several awards in recognition of its performance when compared to its competitors in the industry. Some of these awards include are listed below. Awards Position Environmental Investigation Agencys Supermarket refrigeration table Winner Cosmopolitan Magazine Awards Winner of Most Ethical retailer Carbon Trust standard Certification Pesticide Action Network UK supermarket pesticide league table Winner Ethisphere Worlds Most Ethical Companies Top 100 Consumer Focus Green to the Core supermarket league table Joint Winner Greener Package Awards Retail Leadership Award RSPCA Good Business Awards Fashion Commitment Award Letsrecycle.com Awards High Street Recycling Champion 2009 International Wine Challenge Awards Environmental Initiative of the year Forest Footprint Disclosure Project Best General Retail Sector Performer Business in the Community 2009 Corporate Responsibility Index Platinum performer The Independent Green Awards 2010 Best Supermarket ENDS Carbon 2009 Brand Emissions Leader Figure 5 MS Awards (Marks and Spencer, 2010) Conclusion Most organisations including MS strive to continue to satisfy or meet their customer requirements. MS over years have consistently developed and sell quality products to their consumers. This is reflected as they continue to dominate their industry and the fact that consumers believes that whatever they purchase from MS, it is essentially a quality item. Total Quality Management is a continuous process and must have the contribution of everyone in the organisation from the corporate leadership right down to the shop floor staff in order for the organisation to continue to meet their responsibility in delivering quality. Organisations with quality standards and awards must continually review their processes and find a way to continue to improve in order to maintain their market share and most importantly their profitability and competitiveness.

Kimberly Clark Proctor Gamble Diaper Wars Essay

Competition in the diaper industry raged on as Kimberly-Clark (KC) strived to stay ahead of its main competitor, Proctor and Gamble (P&G). By the end of 1989, KC’s Huggies controlled 32% of the market share—the highest of any single product competing in the diaper market. Now facing significant financial constraints, the leader in personal care products endeavored to create product improvements that would hold market share and outperform Proctor and Gamble’s Pampers. External Analysis One political force affecting KC and the diaper industry is Congress and eleven states introducing legislation taxing, regulating or banning the sale of disposable diapers. Because disposable diapers were not biodegradable, environmentalists were concerned about millions of diapers saturating landfills and possibly contaminating groundwater. Environmentalists lobbied for diapers to be taxed or banned to prevent further environmental degradation. If laws were passed taxing or banning disposable diapers, consumers would stop buying Huggies and resort back to cloth. Possible legal restrictions severely threatened the future of the disposable diaper. A second political factor affecting Kimberly-Clark and the diaper industry is ease of entry to European and Japanese markets. Neither Japan nor European countries imposed political sanctions and foreign regulations preventing KC from entering their markets. A final example of political/legal forces affecting the diaper industry and KC is P&G unlawfully monopolizing the diaper market and violating anti-trust laws. In 1989, Pampers (Proctor and Gamble’s premium diaper line) and Luv’s (Proctor and Gamble’s mid-price diapers) together controlled 49% of the diaper market. P&G’s violation of anti-trust laws could prevent KC from having an equal opportunity to gain market share and every percentage of market share lost would cost KC $6-10 million in profit. Because diapers accounted for 37% of Kimberly-Clark’s net income, P&G’s monopolization could significantly impact KC’s future. An economic factor affecting Kimberly-Clark and the diaper industry is the increase in disposable income by women working outside their homes. The increase in disposable income allows KC and its competitors to successfully sell disposable diapers at premium prices. There are several social/cultural forces affecting KC and the diaper industry, as previously mentioned, there was an increase in consumer activism. Environmentalists and environmentally concerned customers expressed concerns over disposable diapers’ potential health risks for sanitation workers and groundwater pollutants. Also, disposable diapers received harsh criticism for not being biodegradable. Landfills contained approximately 4-5.5 billion pounds of discarded diapers—nearly five percent of total volume. Environmentalists were determined to stop further pollution, which seemed inevitably detrimental to KC and other diaper manufacturers. Another social/cultural force was an aging population. Fortunately for KC, there is a positive relationship between the number of elderly persons and the need for incontinence products. According to statisticians, 31 million North Americans were over age 65 and 10% had incontinence issues. Because Kimberly-Clark has extensive knowledge in producing diapers, feminine products, toilet paper and other paper products, they could easily create diapers for adults. A third social/cultural force is the extended amount of time children spent in diapers. The diaper extension led KC to introduce Pull-Ups, which targeted toddlers being potty-trained. Other social/cultural forces include a decrease in family size and more mothers working outside the home (mentioned above). A technological force affecting Kimberly-Clark and the diaper industry was the introduction of super-thin technology. Super-thin technology was created by using polyacrylate, a powder crystal that absorbs 50 times its weight in liquid. The introduction of super-thin technology created more shelf space for Huggies and reduced shipping costs (more diapers fit in a truck). A second technological factor is industry spending on R&D. P&G and KC spent approximately $110 million annually on Research and Development. As previously mentioned, every percent of market share gained equals $6-10 million in profit. Kimberly-Clark and its competitors worked to create breakthrough inventions that would steal customers away from Proctor and Gamble. A third technological force affecting KC and the diaper industry is patent protection. Due to heightened competiveness in the industry, P&G and KC took strenuous efforts to protect their technology from competitors. KC and P&G were extremely suspicious of one another and frequently sued over use of proprietary technologies (gains from lawsuits were negligible). Some of the political/legal, economic, social/cultural and technological forces are similar in other parts of the world. For example, a social/cultural force in Japan and Western European countries is the changing role of women. Like North America, the number of Japanese and Western European women working outside the home increased. Unlike Western and Japanese women, Southern Europe had few mothers working outside the home. A social/cultural trend in Japan that is frequent diaper changes. Japanese parents change their children twice as often as North Americans. Also, Japanese avoided the use of non-biodegradable plastics. Forces that drive industry competition are threat of new entrants, rivalry among existing firms, threat of substitute products or services, bargaining power of buyers and bargaining power of suppliers. The most important forces are rivalry among existing firms and threat of new entrants. The five forces are discussed separately below. Some factors that affect the threat of new entrants are product differentiation, capital requirements, access to distribution channels and economies of scale. Kimberly-Clark sought to differentiate itself from competitors through extensive advertising. It used coupons, commercials and product placement to convince customers that Huggies are the best diapers. It used product placement by showing customers that even baby Elizabeth in â€Å"Baby Boom† wears Huggies diapers. Successful advertising campaigns created a high barrier of entry to new firms hoping to enter the market. Another factor that prevented new competition from entering the market is high capital requirement. The machines used to produce diapers cost between $2-4 million and were several feet long. New firms that lacked capital to purchase machines would automatically be barred from competition. Access to distribution channels also affected the threat of new entrants. Retailers created their own mid-priced/lower market diapers and were often reluctant to give shelf space to competing firms (in the mid/low price segment). Retailers’ ability to earn profit margins on their own products outweighed revenue from firms purchasing shelf space. A final factor that prevented new entrants is economies of scale. Large companies, such as KC and P&G, created similar products and could take advantage of existing distribution channels, resources and facilities. Overall, threat of new entrants in favorable. Factors affecting rivalry among existing firms include the number of competitors, rate of industry growth, capacity, fixed costs, product or service characteristics and height of exit barriers. The number of firms competing in the diaper industry is relatively low. P&G and KC are the only firms competing in the premium diaper market and control 81% of market share. Other firms and retailers compete in the lower price segment; however, they target a different audience than premium diaper manufacturers. A second factor contributing to rivalry among existing firms is rate of industry growth. Because birthrate is declining, there is little market share to be gained. Therefore, market share cannot be gained unless taken away from competitors. Rivalry among competition is unfavorable. A third factor affecting rivalry is capacity. Kimberly-Clark and its competitors must operate their plants at full capacity to lower unit costs. They also have regional plants in multiple locations to reduce transportation costs. Another factor affecting rivalry is the amount of fixed costs. Diapers are expensive to produce, market and sell, as previously mentioned, machines cost between $2-4 million. Height of exit barriers also influences rivalry. Exit barriers are low. Throughout Huggies’s existence, many firms have entered and left the diaper market. For example, Johnson & Johnson, Borden, Scott and International Paper all unsuccessfully created diapers. Some factors that contribute to threat of substitute products or services are cloth diapers and two piece diaper systems. Increased environmental concerns led some customers to choose to dress their babies in cloth diapers as opposed to disposable. Initially, cloth diapers were seen as more environmentally friendly do to their reusable nature. Cloth diapers posed a serious threat to disposable diapers until KC and P&G convinced customers that cloth was more detrimental to the environment (laundering cloth diapers created ten times more water pollution). Another substitute for disposable diapers is the two-piece diapers created by Fischer-Price and Gerber. Threat of substitute products or services is somewhat unfavorable for firms in the diaper industry. Bargaining power of buyers was influenced by the buyers’ ability to integrate backwards, margins from diaper sales and brand-names. Many of the retailers that sold Kimberly-Clark’s diapers also created their own lines sold at lower prices. Another factor contributing to the bargaining power of buyers is the low profit-margins retailers made off diaper sales. Over one-third of KC’s revenue came from diaper sales. Brand loyalty decreased the bargaining power of buyers. Parents with young children may only shop at places that sell the kind of diapers their baby wears. If the retailer chooses not to sell diapers, it could lose business. Bargaining power of buyers is unfavorable for the diaper industry. Bargaining power of suppliers is affected by inability to integrate forward and technology. As previously mentioned, super-thin technology was achieved by using polyacrylate. Unfortunately for KC and P&G, only one firm, Cellanese, had a license to make polyacrylate in the United States. Substitutes for polyacrylate were not readily available, so Kimberly-Clark and its competitors were dependent upon a single firm for super-thin technology. Cellanese had significant supplier power over its buyers. It could control price increases and business deals. Although Cellanese could make polyacrylate, they did not have the ability to integrate forward. Cellanese was a chemical firm and diaper production was not one of its competencies. Inability for supplier to integrate forward is favorable for KC. The bargaining power of suppliers is unfavorable for firms in the diaper industry. When evaluating the external environment, it is important for firms to recognize opportunities and threats. Some opportunities are a large un-served mid-price market, changing demographics and priorities of North American women, Japanese markets, expansion into Southern Europe, aging population and new technology. Threats include Japanese companies consider global expansion, rising environmental concerns, saturated disposable diaper market and declining birthrate. Each opportunity and threat’s application to Kimberly-Clark is described below. Seventy-five percent of new mothers in the 1980 are working outside the home. Families began to value time over money and were more willing to pay premium prices for quality diapers. Also, the decrease in family size increased the amount of money that could be spent on diapers. This is an opportunity because it allowed KC to successfully sell Huggies at premium prices. A third opportunity for Kimberly-Clark is Japanese markets. Selling Huggies in Japanese markets is an opportunity because they had not reached the same level of maturity as North American markets. Also, as previously mentioned, Japanese babies use twice as many diapers than Americans. The Japanese market was comparable in size to the North American market. Expansion into Southern Europe is an opportunity for growth due to the low penetration levels and unsophisticated competitors. In 1989, there was no large European industry leader. KC has the potential to become the leading diaper distributer in Europe if they execut e successful marketing campaigns. An aging population is an opportunity for KC to increase its incontinence product sales. Sales for 1990 were estimated to exceed $1 billion due to the increase in people over age 65. In the future, the incontinence market is projected to become more profitable than diapers. A final opportunity for Kimberly-Clark is new technology. Utilizing and taking advantage of new technology is an opportunity because it allows KC to outperform P&G and regain market share. A threat that affects Kimberly-Clark is Japanese companies consider global expansion. Japanese expanding globally would hurt KC because Japanese diaper technology is years ahead of North American. Japanese companies, specifically KAO and Unicharm, create biodegradable diapers. Due to recent environmental concerns, KC would lose market share to Japanese companies if they penetrate the North American market. Rising environmental concerns are a threat to Kimberly-Clark because environmentalists feared potential health risks for sanitation workers and ground water contamination. They were lobbying to ban disposable diapers and pushing for consumers to use cloth diapers instead. Kimberly-Clark could lose customers to environmentally-friendly diapers if they do not create a biodegradable diaper. Another threat to KC is a saturated disposable diaper market. A saturated disposable diaper market is a threat to KC due to little growth in the diaper industry. The only market share to be gained must be taken away from competitors. A final threat to KC and the diaper industry is the declining birthrate. A declining birthrate and decrease in family size is positively related to a decrease in diaper sales.

Health, Safety or Security Concerns Arising from a Specific Incident or Emergency Essay

The main concern that may arise when dealing with abuse is communication. This becomes a major concern as if a student’s has a hearing or speech impairment, it can mean that they may not be able to communicate how they feel about the subject, or express it correctly. In my poster I minimised this barrier by suggesting suitable responses to the situation. Ensure that staff talk to the student in a place where they feel comfortable. Staff should use good listening skills and write down appropriate notes to hand on to relevant people. After ensure that staff members go to their child protection officers to deal with the situation properly. This is important so that they can take appropriate steps to ensure the child is safe and the situation is dealt with correctly. The second concern that may arise when dealing with abuse is that the student may not tell staff members how they feel as they might feel scared if something happens if they tell- losing the dependency on an abusing carer especially if this is a key person the student communicate with. This could become a risk when working with any of my students that have a disability. I minimised this by on my poster giving staff advice on how to approach this. When talking to students its important that you make them feel comfortable and build a trusting relationship, there’s a better chance of them opening up their true feelings. However this may not be the case as the student may have learnt from their care or wider experience to just be compliant and live with it. The final concern that may arise when dealing with suspected abuse is the way the staff deals with it. They may have a lack of awareness of working with disabled students. A child with Down’s syndrome may act out in a specific way and staff may assume that this is because of their disability. Assumptions are sometimes be made about disabled children e. g. their mood, injury or behaviour. This can result in indicators of possible abuse being mistakenly attributed to the child’s impairment. However; their behaviour may be the only way for them to express how they actually feel. In my poster I minimized this by highlighting types of abuse and indicators that staff an look out for if they suspect abuse. For example an indicator for physical abuse is unbelievable excuses i. e. I walked into a lamp post. However, not all the signs mentioned mean that the student is being abused, but it’s about using your sense to know if it feels right or not. Intruders in the college The main concern that may arise when dealing with intruders in the college is getting hold of personal information. This is a major concern for any school or college and is important that they are stopped. If intruders do enter the premises they could get hold of personal information about students and staff. In my poster I have highlighted this and given advice on how to stop this from occurring if someone unauthorized enters the building. Computes should be password locked when they are not being used and any confidential paper work should be put into cabinets which are locked. Staff should ensure that all members staff are aware of this rule and if any computers are not locked to do so. By having this simple security measure in place, if an intruder does enter it will make it more difficult for him/her to access this information. However if these steps are ot taken it can means that confidential information could be used in a negative way towards students such as blackmail. The second concern that may arise when dealing with intruders in the college is how staff and students will respond if they think or see someone suspicious is in the building. When working with disabled students, some of them may not know if someone suspicious or how to react do them. The poster can help staff to tell students how to respond to people coming in to their college that they do not know. By giving simple steps, with heading makes it easier to read. Also I have given- ‘do not’ of how not to respond in a situation such as don’t not confront the intruder, as it can cause further danger to the student or staff members. The final concern that may arise when dealing with intruders in the college is if you get an intruders that is armed with a weapon- this could either be a gun or a knife. There are many situations that you could be in, that you could unsure how to respond. In my poster I state 3 different situations that you could be when a hostile intruder enters. By giving them each scenario and steps to take breaks it down and makes it easier to understand. When mentioning these steps I give prioties to make the students safe. This is important when working with students with disability ad they might know how to react to this situation, so ensuring that staff know the correct procedures can help keep the students stay calm. D2: justify responses to a particular incident or emergency in a health and social care setting In the second part of this report I am going to justify my responses to the incident I have discussed in P4 and M3. Intruders The safety of children and young people is important when working in any health and social care setting. I am working with students from the entry & foundation with special education needs. My first priority would be to make sure they are safe. the reason why this was my first priority is because that students are most important . – according to the information in the health and social care textbook , level 3. (Authors: Beryl Stretch & Mary Whitehouse) – if an intruder does gain entry, your priority is to keep yourself and the people you care for safe. Property can be replaced- people cannot. It was particularly important to priotise this response for my students with special needs as they might not know how to respond if an intruders does enter their space or maybe cannot escape by themselves- if they had a physicals or visual impairment. This is why it is important for me to ensure tat all my students are safe. This action reduces future harm occurring again in Entry and foundation because the students may learnt from my response the situation. Health and safety act at work Once I have ensured that all my students are safe, I would make sure I informed security or the site manager. The laws place certain responsibilities on both employers and employees. For Example- According to health and safety act; it is up to the employer to provide a safe place in which to work, but the employee also has to show reasonable care for his or her own safety. As the employee the next step I would take would be to ensure that the students are safe, and I would make my site manager or security aware of the incident or intruder into the college. This would mean that they could implement actions to help reduce further risk for any further things happening within the environment.

Interpreting The Matrix through Descartes’s Philosophy Essay

Many ancient philosophers, including Plato, explored metaphysics in relation to reality before Descartes’s in-depth questioning of the subject. However, Descartes’s views on mind/body dualism differ greatly from Plato’s. As Marleen Rozemond (author of Descartess Dualism) points out, Plato believes that the body is simply a vessel for the soul to use, while Descartes provides proof that the body and soul are interconnected (172). One does not simply use the other; though they are separate, the mind affects the body and the body affects the mind. Cartesian dualism tells us that although the whole mind seems to be united to the whole body, I recognize that if a foot or arm or any other part of the body is cut off, nothing has thereby been†¦show more content†¦Descartes states that: Once the foundations of a building are undermined, anything built on them collapses of its own accord; so I will go straight for the basic principles on which all my former beliefs rested. Whatever I have up till now accepted as most true I have acquired either from the senses or through the senses. But from time to time I have found that the senses deceive, and it is prudent never to trust completely those who have deceived us even once. (384) Through questioning the knowledge he had always believed to be true, Descartes comes to realize that many of his basic beliefs were founded on sensual knowledge. This leads him to question his very existence, and eventually to search for unconditional proof of his existence Christopher Falzon, philosophy lecturer and author of Philosophy Goes to the Movies and Philosophy and The Matrix, points out that The Matrix employs Cartesian-style skepticism in its attempt to inundate the viewer in this cyber-world (â€Å"Philosophy and the Matrix† 99). This is seen in Neo’s choice between the red pill and blue pill in The Matrix, which can be likened to Descartes’s employment of the acid test. Neo, a computer hacker, is told that a man named Morpheus can tell him the meaning of ‘the Matrix,’ a term that Neo has encountered several times. Upon meeting Morpheus, Neo is given a choice: he can take a blue pill which will make him forget about his quest to discover the meaning of ‘the Matrix,’ or he can