Critical Thinking Skills, Emotional Intelligence, and Employee Essay

Critical Thinking Skills, Emotional Intelligence, and Employee Engagement - Essay Example The process of critical thinking involves evaluating, analyzing or synthesizing the data that has been gathered through observation, reflection, communication, experience or reasoning (Foundations for Critical Thinking 1). The process is guided by the information gathered, a set of beliefs and the intellectual commitment to apply such skills to shape behavior in an organization. Critical thinking is very applicable in the daily running of the organization and can be applied in decision-making, yielding very positive results. Emotional intelligence, on the other hand, is the ability of to handle one’s emotions and control them, in order to relate well with other people in the organization (Cherry 1). Emotional intelligence entails perceiving emotions, reasoning with them, understanding them and managing the emotions. The concept of emotional intelligence is very essential in the management of an organization. It enables a manager to relate well with the employees, and apply the concept of diversity. A manager who exercises emotional intelligence works with the understanding that, all people are different. Thus, each should be listened to, and understood. Employee engagement is another very pivotal element in the running of the organization. Employee engagement refers to the emotional commitment that the workers of an organization attach to the organization and its aims (Kruse 2). In essence, employee engagement means that the workers care about the services they deliver to an organization. The concept is very relevant to the organization. An engaged employee contributes immensely to the positive growth of the organization. The three concepts of employee engagement, critical thinking and emotional intelligence are almost equally important in an organization. Without each of them, there will be dire consequences for the management of the

Investigating Employee Misconduct Research Paper

Investigating Employee Misconduct - Research Paper Example This research will begin with the statement that employee misconduct is a usual occurrence in many organizations. Employers always hope that cases of employee misconduct will not arise, but they are always proactive in setting a compliance committee.   The compliance department takes the critical responsibility for ensuring that all the employees uphold the ethical values defined by the organization. The compliance committee usually receives reports of employee misconduct. After reception of the reports, the committee focuses on investigating the validity of the reported claims. The committee also involves legal investigators, who bring their professionalism, ensuring that the misconduct claims receive the attention they deserve. Usually, failure to investigate employee misconduct may reflect negatively on the public image of the organization. Therefore, organizations have to conform to the existing legal frameworks while conducting investigations of employee misconduct. Employee m isconduct denotes several acts that contravene the ethical and legal laws that define an organization. Some of the misconducts include: Disclosure of information to the wrong party Misappropriation of assets and resources Unauthorized use of personnel and resources Forging of documents Alteration, mutilation, and concealment of documents Authorization or reception of payment for goods not received Disclosure of information to the wrong party Intentional misstatements Accepting or seeking additional benefits from contractors, vendors, and partners Failure to report misconduct Fraud Different forms of corruption

Ethical and moral issues at Phoenix University Essay Example for Free

Ethical and moral issues at Phoenix University Essay The university students are facing many issues in their lives and some of them include depression, stress, relationship difficulties, academic problems, among others. Some of the students are required to learn and at the same time work, integrating these two is not an easy task for them. Some course notes are very difficult to understand and require much discipline in order to assimilate the content. This has therefore resulted to poor academic performance from the part time students. Even though the time spent in class by these students is normally short, they have little time to read and revise. Furthermore, the university examination is the same for all the students, both part time and full time. Treating all the students to be equal is not morally right since most of the full time students are young and can assimilate the theories and concepts with much ease, while the adult students take time to assimilate. This is because the adult students have many responsibilities regarding their families and their job tasks which are crowding their minds and therefore cannot focus properly in their studies. Most of the young students have few responsibilities thereby giving them more time to concentrate on their studies and this leads to good academic results. The class lessons provided by the university usually takes about two hours and can be scheduled to take place in the daytime or at night depending on when the students are available. But in some cases, this does not apply; the academic counselor can change the class schedule to a different day or night without the students consent. Sometimes the instructors may not be available and this therefore forces the academic counselor to shift the class to another time. The academic counselor will inform the students about the class changes, but he or she does not give them an option to refuse or accept. The fact that the counselor can change the class schedule without the students consent is unethical. The changes made may sometimes require the students to change their work schedules or miss the classes. Changing the work schedule may not be possible sometimes since it depends on the job type, there are some jobs which are not flexible thereby leaving the students with no option but to miss the classes. By not attending the class lesson these students are left behind in notes and catching up is really a hard task since the notes usually pile up as they misses more lessons. This therefore may lead to the students failing the final examination since the examination schedule cannot be changed to accommodate them. The university does not allow adult students to skip some courses they have done in the past and this is not ethical. There are some courses a student may have done and passed well in a different college, but this university does not allow them to continue with their studies unless they do these courses again. To repeat a course requires time and money, therefore the students are forced to pay more and to find extra time to attend the classes. Some students may not have the extra time to attend these classes because their time schedules are full of job tasks, family responsibilities and even other class lessons. In addition, there are those who do not have enough money and because of this requirement they cannot enroll into the university. For these poor students, the opportunity for further studies is therefore taken away by this requirement and is given to rich ones. The university has put in place the Learning Teams to help the online distance learning students. These teams are usually composed of three to six adult students and every week these students meet for about five hours in order to discuss and analyze problems in the researches done, case studies, among others. Their courses are usually designed to integrate group and individual activities with the help of an instructor whose role is to give guidance and advice. These learning teams were developed to promote technical and intellectual knowledge, enhance valuable skills in negotiation and teamwork and even to provide a place where new ideas can be developed and utilized (University of Phoenix, 2009). However, when students enroll into the university, they are not told about the Learning Teams and how they work. Most students enroll into the university without a clue about these Learning Teams. They only learn about them when they are already at the university and this has resulted to some ethical problems. These Learning Teams are only located in the United States of America (U. S. A. ) and their meetings are scheduled at specific times. For distance learning students they have become a burden, since time is not universal it varies depending on the location. Some of their meetings occur during the day while in others at night. This can therefore lead to some students sleeping in their workplace while others are forced to go to work late, yet not considering that the job is paying for the studies. Sleeping in the workplace or going to work late has some regrettable consequences, it may lead to the students losing their jobs and therefore not being able to afford the university fees. Without their work some students will be forced to drop out of the university because of fees problems. Furthermore, if they do not drop out they will have other problems such as lack of bus fare, among others, which will be due to insufficient funds for their personal needs. In addition, to participate in the Learning Teams requires books and some students cannot afford to purchase them because they are expensive. Paying the university fees and buying books can be stressful to some people especially when their wages are low and have families to care for. Learning without the required books can lead to poor academic performance from the students since they cannot do their own further learning and even counter check their course notes. Furthermore, for those who can afford they are sometimes required to pay more for shipping expenses since some books are not available in their locality but are found in U.  S. A. The fact that all the books are not provided by the university in the Learning Teams and yet they expect the students to learn and understand like the full time students makes it unethical. It is the obligation of the university to ensure that all the books required for every course are available and accessible online from the library by all the students regardless of where they are. Otherwise, the course should not be provided if the books available are not enough for all the students. The Learning Teams meetings usually last for four to five hours whether in daytime or at night. Sitting in a meeting for five hours continuously is tiresome especially when someone has been working throughout the day or night. Concentrating for long hours on a topic is not an easy task and the fact that you have no other time to learn makes it worse. There are students who read and understand theories and concepts in a very short time period while others take time to understand them. The fact that the students have no option but to take part in these teams is not ethical. They should be given an opportunity to choose between long hours or subsequent short hours since people learn and understand things differently. In addition, they should be allowed to choose whether to participate in these teams or not and if they do participate they should be given a chance to choose their teammates. This is because the university can make the mistake of putting a student into a group composed of students who are under-qualified. For example, a third year student may be grouped with second year students without knowing, only to understand later that his or her teammates are from a lower grade. This mistake can be costly to the student since it will waste his or her time and money and this cannot be recovered. Furthermore, the long sitting hours do not give students enough time to sleep and we understand getting enough sleep is essential for the body. Working for more than eight hours and then attending the meetings for close to five hours, may lead to stress or depression. In addition, the students are required to do research and case studies before attending the scheduled meetings and this needs time in order to collect the data. In taking part in these meetings and doing research, a student is left with very little time to spend with his family and for other social factors which are important to him such as hanging out with friends, taking your family out for a picnic, and many others. Cases of depression and stress have increased in the university and this can be attributed to the coursework overload experienced by the students. The university has put in place a counseling department which is dealing with the students affairs. Students facing academic and psychological problems are therefore required to get counseling or advice from this department. However, the counselors are facing some ethical difficulties in their department. Majority of the students do not trust them because they do not ensure confidentiality in their services. Maintaining confidentiality is a difficult task for these counselors, especially when the parents, relatives, or even friends are looking for some information about a certain student they care about. This has therefore led to very few students using these services since most of them feel their dignity and privacy is not protected and respected. In addition, the counseling department is not composed of counselors from all the cultures at the university. It is therefore not possible for the department to serve all the students effectively since some of the students might be from cultures which are unique and composed of very few people. These students are therefore locked out from accessing the counseling services when facing problems related to their cultures.

Donnes Holy Sonnet XIV - Batter my heart, three persond God Essays

Donne's Holy Sonnet XIV - Batter my heart, three person'd God Batter my heart, three person'd God; for, you As yet but knocke, breathe, shine, and seeke to mend; That I may rise, and stand, o'erthrow me, 'and bend Your force, to breake, blowe, burn and make me new. I, like an usurpt towne, t'another due, Labor to 'admit you, but Oh, to no end, Reason your viceroy in me, me should defend, But is captiv'd, and proves weake or untrue, Yet dearely'I love you, and would be lov'd faine, But am betroth'd unto your enemy, Divorce me, 'untie, or breake that knot againe Take me to you, imprison me, for I Except you 'enthrall me, never shall be free, Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me. --John Donne The analogous language of romantic passion ("I am my Beloved's and my Beloved is mine" [Song Sol. 2.16, New International Version]) and intellectual paradox ("Whoever will lose his life for my sake will find it" [Matt. 10.39, NIV]) has always seemed natural to those seeking to understand and speak of spiritual mysteries. Even so, John Donne's image of the Divine Rape in the "Holy Sonnet XIV," by which the victim becomes, or remains, chaste is at first startling; we are not accustomed to such spiritual intensity.[1] Previous explications have attempted to downplay this figure; for example, Thomas J. Steele, SJ [The Explicator 29 (1971): 74], maintains that the "sexual meaning" is "a secondary meaning" and "probably not meant to be explicitly affirmed." Moreover, George Knox [The Explicator 15 (1956): 2] writes that the poem does not "require our imagining literally the relation between man and God in heterosexual terms" and that "the traditions of Christian mysticism allow such symbol ism of ... ... as he tears down, possesses as he frees, is as honorable as passionate--that is, in him all paradoxes find their supra-rational resolution, resolution not only presented in the imagery of the closing couplet, but reflected in the sudden tranquillity of the completely regular iambic pentameter. Thus Donne links content to form throughout the "Holy Sonnet XIV." His aesthetic presentation of the relationships "implicit in the ancient theological conceit of the righteous soul's marriage to God"[3] is therefore doubly moving. NOTES 1. John Donne, "Holy Sonnet XIV," John Donne: The Complete English Poems, ed. A. J. Smith (New York: Penguin, 1984) 314-315. 2. William Karrigan, "The Fearful Accommodations of John Donne," John Donne and the Seventeenth-Century Metaphysical Poets, ed. Harold Bloom (New York: Chelsea House, 1986) 44. 3. Karrigan, 40.

Letter to the reader Essay

To The Readers In my portfolio I will be writing about varies of things such as Georgia 411 Interest Inventory, My Career Choice, Autobiographical Incident Essay, and Persuasive Essay & Narrative Essay. In these essays you will get different types of emotions from me. Let me break down what it is that I will be writing about in the essays. First in my Georgia 411 Interest Inventory essay it’ll be about what type of learner am I? And what types of careers match your skills. Â  Secondly in my Career Choice essay I’ll be writing about a college/career dedicated to the future career I choose. The main point of this essay will be to research my career choice and create a plan of action including the amount of education required and prepare myself to be able to interview for the position in the future. Now my third essay is about an Autobiographical Incident that impacted my life in some way. How did the incident affect me? What were some thoughts during the experience? What are my thoughts on it now? This essay is something that means a lot to me because it impacted my life in so many ways. It was kind of hard trying to type up this paper without crying but it was well worth it in the end; because it brought back memories that I tried to forget. Fourthly, my essay is a Persuasive Essay it’ll be written to convince someone to adopt my beliefs on a topic. Â  Most of all lastly, my last essay is a Narrative Essay a fictional story of my very own. I do hope you all enjoy what I created in my portfolio.

Operations Management Case Studies Essay

1. Introduction This report focuses on the case studies of the Levi Jeans workers and the California Auto Club reengineering customer service. It looks at operations management as a source for gaining a competitive advantage and overcoming potential problems experienced within and organisation or workplace. The questions to be reviewed are as follows: Jeans Therapy – Levi’s factory worker are assigned to teams, and morale takes a hit: 1. What went wrong with Levi’s move to teams in their plants?; 2. What could Levi’s have done differently to avert the problems?; 3. Devise a team incentive plan that you think might work; and 4. Do you think the need to move jeans production offshore was inevitable? Could Levi’s have done anything to avert the problem of increasing labour costs? A California Auto Club reengineering customer service: 1. Discuss the customer service process at CSAA and discuss the different phases of the reengineering effort; 2. What tools from the operations consulting tool kit were applied here? Which other ones would be of value here? Explain; and 3. Discuss process enablers’ role developing the new design. 2. What went wrong with Levi’s move to teams in their plants? In order to respond to both change and complexity, most organisations are turning to new, more adaptive ways of doing their work, such as flatter organisational structures, more team orientated environments and greater support from technology. 2.1 Scientific management It is fair to say that pre-introduction of the new teamwork system, Levi’s had in place the ideals of scientific management. Around the turn of the Twentieth Century, Frederick Winslow Taylor had developed a set of ideas designed to get employees in manufacturing industries to produce more output. Taylor’s objective was to attain high productivity by eliminating inefficient motions in human labour. Hence he divided work process into the smallest elements or motions based on ‘time and motion studies’, separated intellectual and manual work, searched for the ‘first class’ employee, who would then be trained and specialised on specific tasks, and provided them with good tools and paid elevated incentives for their high-quality performance. Taylor and his disciples cited the search for efficiency, ‘one best way’ to do a job, as justification for such changes. Because scientific management consultants claimed they understood the â€Å"natural laws† of human behaviour and endurance, they argued that the implementation of scientific management would benefit both workers and society at-large. Nevertheless, skilled workers and their unions often vociferously protested these changes because such practices made their work monotonous and also trespassed upon what they perceived as their traditional prerogative to manage their own time on the job. 2.2 Implementation of teams In 1992, Levi’s abandoned its old piecework system, under which a worker repeatedly performed a single, specialised task and was paid according to  the total amount of work he or she completed. The new system would adopt groups of 10 to 35 to share tasks in the hope of higher organisational performance being gained from empowered individuals working together to contribute the best of their knowledge, skills and capabilities. While it was thought the new ‘teamwork’ system would be more humane, safe and profitable, the negative affect it had on employees and managers ultimately led to the closing down of the U.S. plants. The new system managed to cause conflict amongst employees, damaged morale and triggered corrosive infighting. Furthermore, many employees complained of shrinking pay packets and increasing workloads. What also could have contributed to the breakdown of the system could have included; individual opinions, were employees can face the struggle between competition over cooperation; establishing responsibilities, employees not assessing each others expectations and connecting them with goals; and misunderstanding, while it was essential for a team to have good communication skills, non-communication promotes confusion. 3. What could Levi’s have done differently to avert the problems? In 1993 Levi’s hired a consulting firm to analyse the problems, concluding the company should start from scratch and include all parties in redesign of pay structures and work processes. In hindsight, it is simple to say that Levi’s should not have phased out the old system as it seemed to be working. Having said this, with the introduction of the new system, there could have been greater emphasis placed on getting it right. What could Levi’s had done better? According to Keogh (2003), motivation is one of the most loaded nouns in the English language. It has an intrinsic negative, as well as positive, connotation and its trigger is different for each individual. In a corporate context, well-motivated employees can enhance a company. Those with poor motivation can generate serious workplace problems. 3.1 Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs In the late 1960’s, Abraham Maslow developed a hierarchical theory of human needs. He set up a hierarchical theory of needs in which all the basic needs are at the bottom, and the needs concerned with man’s highest potential are at the top. The hierarchic theory is often represented as a pyramid, with the larger, lower levels representing the lower needs, and the upper point representing the need for self-actualisation. Each level of the pyramid is dependent on the previous level. For example, a person does not feel the second need until the demands of the first have been satisfied. Employees in any organisation, let alone Levi’s, need rewards. Working long hours and spending much time away from their families takes its toll and rewarding employees represents an end to the means. The first reward, which Levi’s could have undertaken, relates to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. That is, employees feel rewarded with a high amount of self-esteem and a feeling of accomplishment for a job well done. This also ties in with self-actualisation as the employees have endured the many hardships in an industry notorious for low wages and lousy working conditions. Both of these needs are part of Maslow’s higher order need because they encompass more than just basic survival. 3.2 Frederick Herzberg motivator-hygiene theory In the late 1950s, Frederick Herzberg, considered by many to be a pioneer in motivation theory, interviewed a group of employees to find out what made them satisfied and dissatisfied on the job. Based on his findings, Herzberg constructed a two-dimensional paradigm of factors affecting people’s attitudes about work. He concluded that such factors as company policy, supervision, interpersonal relations, working conditions, and salary are hygiene factors rather than motivators. According to the theory, the absence of hygiene factors can create job dissatisfaction, but their presence does not motivate or create satisfaction. In contrast, he determined from the data that the motivators  were elements that enriched a person’s job; he found five factors in particular that were strong determiners of job satisfaction: achievement, recognition, the work itself, responsibility, and advancement. These motivators (satisfiers) were associated with long-term positive effects in job performance while the hygiene factors (dissatisfiers) consistently produced only short-term changes in job attitudes and performance, which quickly fell back to its previous level. If Levi’s took on the theories of Herzberg, whether in the old or new system, employees more than likely would have embraced change. From the outset, management, could have ensured employees were happy in their environment, by providing incentives, such as, bonus pay to highlight all of their hard work. As a result, the employees feel they have a sense of job security. 4. Devise a team incentive plan that you think might work. An incentive is something that tends to stimulate or spur individual or group action. Incentives (money, treats, certificates, extra privileges, etc.) are external ways of motivating group work. They can be used selectively to build a sense of internal motivation within the group. This is accomplished through another behaviour modification principal paired association (Tracey, 1999). Incentives make group members â€Å"feel good†, and these rewards follow a major accomplishment, then sooner or later the accomplishment itself will lead to a very positive feeling. This, in a nutshell, is the longer term justification for selectively using external incentives. In the case of Levi’s in is of my opinion that the need for affiliation is a basic motivator of work groups. Belonging to a special group, should have been highlighted, and having the time and resources to hang out with that group is very motivating and engaging, rather than monotonous work. Consequently, providing team incentives that allow group members the opportunity to mix is a very effective strategy in motivating group work  (Andrews, 1999). Either incorporating the gain sharing or lump-sum bonuses and individual bonuses would suffice to help morale and productivity. Refer to appendix A. 5. Do you think the need to move jeans production offshore was inevitable? Could Levi’s have done anything to avert the problem of increasing labour costs? By early 1997, the writing was on the wall for Levi’s as their flagship men’s denim jean had fallen to 26% of the market share from a high of 48% in 1990. In contemporary business, world companies need to be innovate in order to survive. Innovation is strongly advocated and treasured throughout the whole process of production. But scientific management hardly pays any attention to innovation. Instead, it focuses on dividing the job into small tasks, increasing the volume of output and then speeding up the rate of output. Was innovation for Levi’s to produce their product in foreign plants? 5.1 Globalisation Globalisation – is the movement of goods, services and money capital or investment across international boundaries and in this way becomes a predominately economic phenomenon sweeping the world. Throughout which, what were formerly national companies become international conglomerates. Hence, countries are no longer seen as independent and closed sovereign states, but as part of one big economy. Primarily this shift in thinking is driven by corporate America’s insatiable appetite to open new frontiers in emerging countries, and claim a monopoly on the source and distribution of products. All of which in short is because they are searching for more profit at a lower cost. Globalisation is also heavily backed by international consumerism, which is seen as the dominant ‘religion’ of the era, which means that the fruits of this global production are rapidly sought after and indeed hungrily consumed. Initially this flood of products into the local markets of major economies causes prices to decrease. Whilst this lower cost to consumers contributes to a higher standard of living, it is short lived. Globalisation also brings the world closer to a central economy. In their endless search for greater profits they turn to the less wealthy, such as many of the Asian countries, i.e. Thailand, Taiwan and Vietnam. A large number of the poorer (or developing) countries now have rapidly rising employment rates . This is mainly due to the fact that with a lower standard of living in these countries people are prepared to work for significantly less, and still produce the same product. 5.2 Averting increasing labour costs It is inevitable that in any organisation of Levi’s magnitude experiencing a drop in market share, that downsizing be a result because of it. Nowadays, markets have become far more global and dynamic, and the business environment turns more and more complicated and competitive. Employers and employees are faced with plenty of new opportunities and challenges. Also, manufacturing and information technology is getting more sophisticated speedily. To avert increasing labour costs, Levi’s did introduce more employee involvement, thus creating an environment in which people have an impact on decisions and actions that affect their jobs. This could have been a stayer, if not for the toffee- nosed managers. In a team-oriented environment, employees contribute to the overall success of the organisation, working with fellow members to produce results. This may have cut out some mangers, thus reducing escalating costs of consulting firms. However, whilst it’s true that the implementation of self-managing practices in the work place has achieved significant progress in terms of motivation, we must remember that there are always two sides to every story, and bottom line is that many of the U.S. plant were not performing and many workers  felt held back. 6. Discuss the customer service process at CSAA and discuss the different phases of the reengineering effort. CSAA were seeking ways in which to make operations better and more efficient. Gregory A. Smith, vice president and general manager of insurance operations, himself said that â€Å"it was obvious that the old ways of doing business wouldn’t work in the future, and that we needed to make some fundamental changes.† How was CSAA going to implement change to their outdated customer service strategy? 6.1 Pre reengineering effort Before the implementation of the reengineering effort CSAA had seemed like a trusted member of the family to its many members. But under its own admission, and for a need to improve operations, the business process at CSAA needed to go under the microscope. At the time of the old regime, the processes undertaken would not have differed much to many of the large corporations around the world. Addressing customers over the phone, whenever customers needed to rent a car, booking airline tickets, making insurance claims or just general enquiries seemed to be the norm. How they went about this though, as we look at it now, gave the impression of archaic times. With regard to how all claims, bookings, renewals and so on were made, by putting pen to paper, often service consultants needed liberation from a paper-intensive and error-prone work environment. Another problem faced by CSAA was that whenever members phoned in and made an enquiry, many of the consultants would refer their problems to other consultants until there was a resolution. Executive president himself saying, about the system, â€Å"That’s not service – that’s a pinball effect. According to Cole (2001, p.307) † Customer service is one of the most direct tools we have for building loyalty, attracting repeat business, generating word-of-mouth business and boosting profits. It might be full of paradoxes, but customer service can make or break your organisation.† 6.2 Principles of reengineering It would be unprofessional of CSAA to think that all of their problems would disappear without careful thinking and planning. In order for their reengineering efforts to succeed, they needed follow the principles of reengineering initiated by the management expert Michael Hammer. Refer to appendix B. 6.2.1 A reengineered job After much deliberation, CSAA devised a new system designed for better customer service centring around a new position called â€Å"members service consultant. CSAA felt it was time and as Cole (2001, p.8) states, â€Å"planning involves establishing a goal and objectives and deciding how best to achieve them. What needs to be accomplished? By when? What needs to be done to make it happen? Who is best equipped to do it? As the old saying goes ‘if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.’ Things don’t happen by themselves: wee need to plan them carefully. After all, a goal without an action plan is just a wish.† Supporting the service consultant would be a new information system that links data that currently reside in three separate systems. This technology will enable a service consultant to most members on the spot (Chase, Jacobs & Acquilano 2004). 6.2.2 Three quickies The new system heralded huge savings for both members and CSAA. Average turnaround time for processing new business applications was reduced from six days to three days; and the proportion of new auto policies that had to  be ‘reworked’ dropped from 50% to 16%. 6.2.3 A comprehensive survey A widespread survey was carried out by four employee teams, to focus on issues encountered by CSAA members and employees. Questions ranged from services, products and previous experiences for members and what you would do if you were president of CSAA for a day, to employees. One of the subjects consistently brought up, by members and employees, was that of how a visiting member would have to go from window to window to tie up different enquiries. 6.2.4 Get Crazy For the member service consultant to work, cross-training for employees on a range of CSAA services was crucial. The new computer system would require a good understanding by employees in order to intertwine all the vital information at CSAA together and make it readily available to those who accessed it. Employees would also have a say on how the system was designed, developed and also tested a prototype that would support the new service consultant. By this they would simulate everyday situation to help modify or identify any foreseeable problems. To further make employees comfortable with the transition to the new system workshops, meetings, posters, newsletter and videotapes were provided. 6.2.5 Sell with scenario On-line prompts, on-screens prompts and what-if scenarios will replace the tedious paperwork and thumbtack memos. John Clark, a regional claims manager, says of the new system, â€Å"we’re trying to create a learning environment for the future, for all levels of employees from clerical to management† (Chase, Jacobs & Acquilano 2004 p.343). 6.2.6 One-stop shop Now members have the luxury of getting complete service with just one stop. 7. What tools from the operations consulting tool kit were applied here? Which other ones would be of value here? Explain. 7.1 Problem definition First on the agenda for CSAA to get their new system up and going would be that of problem definition. 7.1.1 Issue trees Initially, CSSA had identified a problem with their customer service. By embarking on a long-term reengineering effort, business processes were put under the microscope. For this to work, a plan had to be put into place to target problems and figure out possible solutions. By structuring the process into different phases specifies a direction CSAA can take 7.1.2 Customer surveys Chase, Jacobs & Acquilano (2004) suggest that OM consultants frequently observe customer surveys such as to determine customer loyalty. In the case of CSAA a widespread survey was conducted. 7.1.3 Employee surveys These can involve questions on employee satisfaction or as CSAA developed, a question posing what you would do if you were president for a day. 7.2 Data gathering With the goals of CSAA to improve customer service, speeding up turnaround  times is high on the agenda. To have something to aim for, gathering existing information, such as, processing new business applications and the cost of baseline expenses will serve to improve or reduce these fundamentals. 7.3 Data analysis and solution development To rid CSAA of its old working environment, it had to introduce the new computer information system. 7.3.1 Computer simulation For employees to grow accustomed to the new system, CSAA had to cross-train employees to help them understand the computer simulation. Although not as sophisticated as much of the software available, employees had to become familiar with the new package. 7.4 Stakeholder analysis Coming under the heading of cost impact and payoff analysis, CSAA’s most important stakeholder would be its members and employees. In endeavouring to put into operation a new system, the importance of considering the interest of all its stakeholders is central. 7.5 Implementation Chase, Jacobs & Acquilano (2004) indicate that creating a new process and sustaining the improvement requires more than creative application of information technology. In order for implementation of reengineering to be successful any organisation, let alone, CSAA has to follow three important guidelines. Refer to appendix B. 7.5.1 Responsibility charts Having workshops, meetings, posters, newsletters and videotapes issued to all employees would help ensure that each task is being covered by the employees. 7.5.2 Project management techniques The reengineering effort is now being carried forward by five interdisciplinary teams whose focus includes workforce retraining, reward and pefromacne management and information technology (Chase, Jacobs & Acquilano 2004). 7.6 Which other ones would be of value? After observing the operations consulting tool kit, refer to appendix C, it suggests that CSAA took up on at least one aspect of the five categories. Issue trees, customer and employee services for problem definition; data gathering; computer simulation for data analysis and solution development; stakeholder analysis for cost impact and payoff analysis; and both responsibility charts and project management techniques for implementation. 8. Discuss process enablers’ role developing the new design. A number of bridges have to be crossed to help develop the new design. The major one of these being information technology. 8.1 Information technology Information technology (IT) is considered the major enabler for spanning processes over functional and organisational boundaries and supporting process driven organisations. However, the point is not to use IT as an improver for existing activities, as which it often has been conceived, but as enabler for the CSAA. Some of the ways that IT can change the business process at CSAA include: process automation and speed; virtual presence and distance collaboration becomes possible; mobility; allows information to be shared differently; and increases interactivity and allows instant feedback. IT, when used appropriately, can enhance business processes. 8.2 Selection CSAA chose three employees from field officers for intensive training to help with the design and development of the new system. For CSAA it would have been important to select the most appropriate candidates based on the agreed job descriptions and person specifications that have been created over time. This knowledge can be transferred to other employees and the playing out of simulated scenarios would pose not problems. The selection process needs to be handled with care to avoid costs of failure to select the right candidate or legal problems arising down the track. 8.3 Additional information Constant monitoring form senior management and additional information, such as, workshops, meetings, posters, newsletters and videotapes enable a smooth transition for other employees. 9. Conclusion It seemed as though Levi’s decision to promote teamwork only frustrated employees, especially those with superior skills. The common grounding on working in teams is that businesses who have employees working together to reach a common goal are more likely to succeed than the ones that do not. Sadly this was not the case with Levi’s. Psychologically, people desire recognition, need to feel a part of a team, and want to do a good job. But people, after all, are only human. Long-term personal goals often fall prey to daily or weekly frustrations. With Levi’s, employees may have found it hard to meld personal goals with the organisation’s long-term or even short-term goals. This may have contributed to workers being absent or inexperienced and led to increased workloads on other Some people may have trouble sculpting individual performance goals at  all. As Powers (2000), describes, in all cases, excitement, interest and performance can suffer. In the case of CSAA, management needs to consider the importance of customer service in a primarily service organisations. Successful organisations, irrespective of nature or size, have one thing in common – the loyalty of their customers. Organisations that spend time, effort and money on anticipating and fulfilling customers’ needs and requirements will undoubtedly reap the benefits from loyal customers by enhancing customer satisfaction. However management should not put all its efforts in keeping customer satisfaction, as this will be generated by the overall service concept that the company provide to the customer. Certainly the customer has to be in employees’ mind all the time reminding them that they are there because there is a customer who is willing to pay.

Georg Simmers Analysis Essay Sample

Georg Simmers Analysis Essay Sample Critique of Georg Simmers Analysis Essay Sample Critique of Georg Simmers Analysis Essay Sample Well known for his contributions in philosophy and sociology, Georg Simmel is perhaps one of the best thinkers of all times. He was a well learned person, receiving his Ph. D from the Berlin University in Germany. Besides this academic degree, he also received an honorary degree doctorate from one of the best universities in the world. In most of his dissertations, he used the Kantian theory of monads. This was in relation to its application to the nature of matter that formed most of his subjects. Moreover, he was always at logger heads with some of the best thinkers of his time. Much of the debate about not accepting his work was due to the fact that most of his work had spelling errors and some of the passages he wrote were not well spelt. All the same he was a great force to reckon with. He cited much of his work in alien languages that the board of examiners could not read. Between the 1885 and 1914, he was an unpaid lecturer and later he was employed as an honorary professor owing to his immense knowledge in a number of disciplines. His life was later to change when the University of Strasbourg offered him a full time job as professor of philosophy. Simmel gained notoriety and fame in equal measure. His lecturing skills were superb. He was a good orator who knew how to get his points across. He wrote so many articles that touched on many topics. Some of the topics he covered were art, sociology, ethics, esthetics, psychology, history and literature. Unluckily for him, his vast knowledge in most topics exposed him to criticisms. He was blamed for being a dabbler and as lacking in overall expertise in a number of issues he covered. The criticisms and his anti-Semitic undercurrents in the academia field, especially in Germany hindered his further professional development. He was a good instructor who was well understood by his students. Despite this, he f elt he had no â€Å"spiritual heirs† who would take over after him when he was gone. Some of the great thinkers at the time whom he was able to work with were Max Weber and Gvorgy Lukacs. It was through the latter that his presence was greatly felt at the Frankfurt School. Most notable of his presentation styles were his rationality and objectivity. These are the two areas he was able to adequately use to get people to like his thoughts and points. He was able to carry out his self-assessment; thus, this was later proved to be a true depiction of him. Through his self assessment, some people claimed a direct intellectual heritage from him. One of the places where his presence was felt was the Chicago Ecological School of sociology. Here, he combined theory and ethnography in an urban setting. Some of his thoughts still apply to date. His idea had been to found a school, though this was never happened. His greatest area of interest was writing. He especially wrote the anglophile world in the 1950s. This was after many translations of his work became well known and readily available. From the year 1889 to 1909, he helped foster the German Sociological Association. It took his efforts to see it come to existence, and became one of the strongest bodies. A Critique of Georg Simmel’s Work Simmel viewed sociology as a subsidiary field to philosophy. He had had an important intellectual interest in 1905. He went through philosophical problems on philosophies of history. In 1907, he was able to tackle the earlier works of Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche in a treatise. He was the first instructor to teach principles of sociology at a German University. This was in 1887. He later did attempt to plot a sociology course. This would be distinct from the earlier work of Herbert Spencer or Auguste Comte. He worked toward a sociology that was more formal. Simmel handled form and content distinctly. His critics see his insistence on dichotomy as well as his writing style to obscure any assertions he might have tried to make. Another aspect of his writing that proved problematic for him was the reputation for spotty translation. This was especially bad given his most important work Sociologie: Untersuchugen uber die Formen der Vergesellschaftung. In English, this is tr anslated as The Problems of the Philosophy of History. It was published in 1892. In the text, he uses a Kantian frame to investigate the modern world. About a decade later, the philosophy Of Money (Philosophie des Gesdes), was released. In this context, Simmel uses psychological, historical, social and political lenses to scrutinize the different aspects of historical materialism of the subject. These are the undercurrents that he uses to continue metaphysical machinery. Another significant aspect of his writing is modernism and his portrayal of the modern world. He uses this to continually revise and renew the very concept. These works counteract what would develop into Post-Modern cynicism and Modern Skepticism. Furthermore, he identifies currency as a social functioning substance. He advances this concept through stating that money is instable that it contributes to most problems experienced in the modern life. It comes with such a dissatisfaction and impulse that characterize its instability. In the contemporary world, most of the problems are due to people getting dissatisfied or even greedy and always wanting more. Paradoxically, Simmel singles out money as being dependent on freedom, and at the same time being a source of estrangement and animosities that come with it. However, this thought has been met with several reviews in the recent past. One of the reviews was carried out by Emile Durkheim proposed that work cannot be substantiated. Max Weber could not agree more. He especially praised the important and significance of the observations. Hegel is thought to have influenced Georg Simmel’s Philosophie des Geldes. In much of his work, Simmel uses synecdoche as a dialect in single direction. Through this, he captures the ambiguity of the modern time and the modernity that comes with it. He identifies the cause of this ambiguity as an uncertainty that arises from modernization process. For all his metaphysical urges, his ultimate project is far from finding essential nature behind most of his subjects. Rather, it is to align many disciplines in his study. The project does not include the desire for an innate meaning of experiences in his study. It is often thought that the tensions in his methodologies are as a result of his looking for meaning in a fragmentary world that defines most of his work. Some people see Simmel to be establishing a phenomenology, which better investigates an individual’s lack of awareness in the basic aspects of their lives. This is a deprivation of essential meaning of life. In one of characteristic passages of Elizabeth Goodstein, he quotes one of the forms of Simmel Philosophie des Geldes where Simmel’s thoughts become largely apparent. I believe that the secret agitation, the restless compulsion just below consciousness that drives the human being of today from socialism to Nietzsche, from Bà ¶cklin to Impressionism, from Hegel to Schopenhauer and back again is not simply a consequence of the external haste and excitement of modern life, but that on the contrary it is often the expression, the manifestation, the discharge of that most inner circumstance. (Simmel 2007) Simmel talks about a number of contemporary issues that affect different aspects of lives of an individual. Some of the topics he discusses are money, fashion, socialism and other issues as well. These are the real life experiences that people go though each day. Most of his thoughts on different issues apply to this day. Some of the critiques are in: Sociology On sociology, Simmel views it as a social science discipline. In the world, there are different interactions. Some of the interactions explain why people are able to identify with different situations. In his article The Problem of Sociology he sought that readers understand sociology as a social science discipline that should be viewed to be independent. The basic principle in this conclusion was that the basic foundations of sociology can be ostensible and far-reaching with myriad consequences. People interact with other people daily. It therefore means that people must get along. It was this mentality that Simmel had in mind when he wrote this famous piece. His propositions are true in the real world too. There are several examples that can be used to illustrate the same. People come together during different situation to offer help to people who are close to them. For this reason, the society realizes the need to come together and offer assistance to people who most need it in th eir different challenges. This is a fundamental interrelatedness. It applies in almost every facet of life. He introduces conceptualization in a number of ways that surpasses the thinking of the modern man. What we term as the society today comes into being through the interaction of different members or people who make up the society. A society can be broadly understood as a collection of different people with the same interest even if they were to come from different clans. In his world, and going by what is the norm in this day and age, society comes about as an interrelationship that encompasses many people. It is therefore important to note as well that they will be conflicts of interests and ideas along the way (Gross et al. 2003). This explains why understanding of the other person becomes the best thing and in fact the order of the day. Sociology, according to Simmel, is the only science that seeks to â€Å"understand the sensu strictissimo.† It can be defined to be the study of what a society actually is. Being members of a society will require that people within the society come together and work towards a common cause. Thus, this explains why people should come together in times of adversity and work together, assisting each other in their daily endeavors and finding solutions to different problem s that affect the society. Society is also defined as forms of sociation by Georg Simmel. Perhaps, he can be called the father of modern sociology, rightly because of immense contribution in the definition and the understanding of the current state of the society. In trying to understand the society, it would be important that first and foremost, people understand the society as the very building block, the very thread that holds the society and communities they come from at large to be what they are. How do we engage the different members of the society to do what they are supposed to do? How do make them understand the fundamental principle of culture of inclusiveness? These are some of the questions that must have been going on in the mind of the great thinker Georg Simmel and this must have inspired most of his works. The society is about the co-operation, the co-existence and the coming together of different people towards a common goal in the society. It is for this reason he makes a string case on matte rs that deal with investigation of the society. Any forms of sociation within the society should be deeply and well interpreted so that most of the problems in the society can be adequately and well understood in the first instance of problems being noticed within the society. Interactions occur everywhere within the life of an individual. They occur at the meal table, at the church and virtually in every social gathering. What make society to what it is are these interactions that must be well understood. In agreeing with Georg Simmel it would be important to note the fact that societies occur due to positive interactions of families and individuals within the family. This is what makes the society to be called so. It is about associations and positive interactions. All forms of associations should be studied comparatively and historically so that people may understand the general properties and features that all interact to make the society and understand what actually contributes to peaceful co-existence as well as all other forms of interactions that may be seen in the society. Conflicts can arise from many aspects of the lives of an individual, what is most important is the fact that the different people who make up the society come together and that they are united towards a common purpose which is to make the best out of the interactions. Society The society can be understood to be preceded by sociology. â€Å"How is society possible?† This is the question that Simmel was able to ask in one of his works. Without citizens who come and interact with one another in the community, there would be no society. Simmel is able to bring this out this too well in his pieces of work. He explored this in the transcendental, quasi- Kantian question. He asserts three important aprioris of individuality, role and structure. It is possible to find the four conceptions of society in Simmel Georg piece of work (Symons 2009). The first misconception of his ideas was the fact that society should be seen in totality. This should in fact have been the first sociological object. This is seen as an absolute entity. This could have contributed to disagreements between earlier think tanks Hubert Spencer and Durkheim. The society is viewed as the general term that embraces totality of all individuals within a society. They must be having specific interactions. There are myriad interactions that may take place within the society. However, before all these are exhausted, it is important that all these concepts are looked into any meaningful actions can take place. Before anybody can look into all the factors that influence what a society stands for, it would be important and in order that all the interactions and association within the society are looked into. This is what constitutes the wellness and the inclusiveness of the society, and without which the society cannot be said to be operational. Therefore, the society can be viewed as constellations of people, all who have come together to interact towards a common goal and course. The unities arising from these interactions can be a minimum of three, but this is only according to the Simmel. There are the â€Å"we†, the ‘I’ an d the â€Å"you.† These are very important aspects of what makes up a society. There crucial differences even in the society of the modern day. Going by what Simmel had foreseen some time back, it can be concluded that the triadic and dyadic relationships actually exist, even in the modern world and society that it is today. Simmel was able to indicate this candidly in most of his work. The society has many formations, though. There are for instance the class, the state and religion. These are important aspects of the society as well. These had been foreseen and well indicated by Georg Simmers. The individuals within the society must be able to interact and come together towards a common goal. These are the important connections or rather the threads that keep the society together and help in the unity of individuals who are part of the society. It is true going by what Simmers had foreseen that we should not just concentrate on the important formations within the society. Most of the times, it is important that many other factors are looked at the same time to for a better understanding of the society. As regard knowledge of a society really is, reference is made to Simmel’s essay, when he wrote about â€Å"how is the society possible?† and the ‘epistemology of society.† It is not just about the many cases and the meanings of the society that we ascribe to. Rather it is about formations and the consciousness with which the society should be understood. According to Simmers, and other thinkers of all times, a society is only possible when people wo rk together and solve the issue facing them in their daily lives. This cannot be overemphasized even in the contemporary society. These are the issues that affect people in the daily aspects of their lives. When it comes to sociological knowledge, again the society plays a major part in this front. The discipline of sociology cannot be overstated. It cannot be simplified, either. In fact, most of the works of Simmel Georg apply even today. These are aspects of lives that Simmel, together with other thinkers of his time had foreseen and predicated, and which have come to pass and can be witnessed in the contemporary world. The society can be taken to be an enterprise with so many participants and in which each and every one of these has a part to play and a contribution to make as well. There should be an agent of connection that connects different members of the society. These are the very bonds that keep society together. Forms of Association and Beyond This is another important aspect of Simmel and one that he is able to bring out clearly in the pieces he did write. This is a diversity of sociology and an important are that different schools of thought have examined more so after they were first discussed by Georg Simmel. These are some of the facts he is able to foresee and some that still take part in the modern world even today. How do cultural and social theories interact in the modern world? These were some of the questions that occupy most people’s minds in the contemporary society and most of which Simmel was able to look into. Through he faced objections and criticisms form most of his distracters then, he is often thought to be the father of modernity. He an insight of what the society looks like in terms of the many and selective values that some individuals within the society identify with. However, it must be notable that in his works, it was never his intention to create confusion about the subject. Rather, it w as his way of enlightening the current intellectuals about how a society should be organized. His different forms of sociation may have been misunderstood, but they set a good precedent to modern forms of associations that are understood even today. Moreover, he placed different and contemporary subjects into their current contexts. One example of these was his definition of fashion. Fashion appears in the same context as the philosophy of money. This is true even in the modern society where people are preoccupied with money or lack of it. This means that money is a major motivation of most people in the world today. With it comes greed since people in society try to get more and more of it. The philosophy of money according to Simmel was that (and still is) a differentiation of different commodities in the market can assume. This is quite true even in the contemporary society, â€Å"where money is used to show the value of a commodity.† The higher the value of the commodity, the more the value of money associated with it. Fashion is an equally a major preoccupation of most people today. As such, there are so many trends of fashion in the current world. Simmel was able to foresee these quite vividly. In his narrative style, he illustrates well how fashion affects different aspects of the lives of individuals within the community. The youth especially spend most of their time in front of mirrors and at the beauty shops all in a bid to look good and appeal to the members of the opposite sex. The society seems to have understood this and started dealing in most of these products that the youth are known to associate with. It is in the same light that money is also viewed. Fashion The modern metropolis understands the significance of fashion and how different individuals use it in order to differentiate themselves from the others. This has contributed to the trend that can be witnessed today in most parts of the world where the youth try to wear some of the best attires that they can lay their hangs on. This is what motivates them. These are trends they want to identify with so that they can maintain their looks and appeal to other members of the society. Furthermore, it gives them a sense of identity and some of the different aspects of life that contributes to their satisfaction, or sense of it. Wearing smart clothes of being fashionable gives an individual a chance to represent class and, gender and culture in interactions in cities and different places of stay (Simmel 2007). Fashion can also be understood as people wanting to be like others. In this front, they are likely to wear clothes and attires that will make them to be like other people. These are pe ople they have always admired and want to emulate. Simmel was able to bring this out candidly in most of the essays he wrote on fashion. It is purely a dialectic of choosing lives that belong to others of resemble other people’s lives. It could also mean that individuals are trying to differentiate themselves from the rest of the society and at the same time establishing social boundaries. These are the aspects of fashion and identity as pointed out by Simmel. These are the fuller treatment of fashion that can be witnessed in the modern society as well. He was able to bring us closer to modernity though he died centuries back. Such was the eloquence of this great thinker and philosophers of all times. He depicts modern life as being characterized by patience and haste. These can be seen in the modern life even to date. Today, it would not be unusual to see people moving hurriedly in streets and other business areas. These are some characteristics of modern life that are well depicted in the stories that he wrote some decade back, and those that will continue having relevance even to generations to come. In his own words he did say â€Å"the fact that fashion takes unprecedented upper hand in the modern culture perhaps is an indication that the contemporary culture is coalescing of modern psychological trait. This then means that internal rhythm requires shorter pauses to change impressions.† Through his stories, it can be seen that the accent of attraction is transferred to an increasing extent from its substantive center to its initial and final finishing points. However, this does not imply that Georg was preoccupied with contemporary issues. It was his way of indicating that these were some of the changes that would be witnessed in the contemporary society. Fashion is a concentration of consciousness within an individual â€Å"upon the seeds in which its death lie.† What this basically means is that fashion will always keep changing since individuals try to look into other issues or fashion trends that come into being. There will always be improvements in fashion given that designers and creative and will always come up with new fashion designs. In his view, fashion is a gradual form of destruction- aesthetic form of destruction. Can it ever be broken from the past? In the contemporary society, this is true because people adopt new forms of fashion each and eve ry day of their lives. It is a fleeting and changeable element that keeps changing. Can they lose their force in modernity? His analysis of fashion can be well understood in the modern context. Could it be an exploration of time consciousness? Among his earlier categories of experience, he was able to realize that there would be relation of his facts then to those of the society today. Enlargement of social groups contributes to diversity of fashion as well as different people want to identify with new fashions in the market. The contemporary culture takes fashion seriously. This can be witnessed in a number of people especially the youth conforming to the cultures. Some of these were well explained and articulated in Georg Simmel pieces. He had foreseen a culture where â€Å"fashion takes unprecedented upper hand in the modern culture.† The significance of fashion was not lost in the works of Walter Benjamin as well. The relevance of fashion in the contemporary society cannot be overstated since fashion has become a major preoccupation of most fashion icons of the modern designers. In fact, some well renowned fashion magazines in the world indicate that most fashion and design are among the best earning enterprises all over the world. Besides fashion, Simmel was able to work on religion as well. Concerning religion, he mentioned that religion can be used by the family to foster unity of purpose and unite towards achievement of peace and belonging. These can still be witnessed nowadays where different people are inclined towards different religious associations. Religious affiliations provide people with a common sense of purpose. He helped stretch the sociology of emotions. People have different emotions of th e â€Å"inner life.† Some of the emotions that he explored were shame, pessimism, gratitude and love. These are common emotions that people display in their daily lives. They have different motivations. Emotions change. One time an individual is happy; the other time they are angry. These are common feelings that people have. It pertains to â€Å"our mental life.† Emotions, unlike physical developments are not constant. This means they keep changing depending on different situation they find themselves. The articles he wrote were not just limited to his personal feelings. He did talk about trade unions. These are bodies that bring people, especially workers, together so that they can air their grievances and make suggestions about what best works for the in their places of work. Such unions are important in the modern world. In fact, studies show that workers who work under such unions always lobby for the best pay and work conditions. These are the kind of association that Simmel had foreseen and that still remain relevant to this day. The Berlin trade exhibitions that he wrote about in one of his pieces could be used to demonstrate his philosophy for money. Money remains the major motivation for most of these trade shows. Organizers of such events are people whose intention is to get money. It is still true even in the modern society. Nothing much has changed since the first time Simmel wrote about this. These could or can be used to explain the aesthetic value of money as well. Money is used to accord one the luxury and the comfort they want in modern life. Money is used to develop social hierarchies in the society. Thus, this explains why there social castes of classes within the society. If it were not for money there would be no such classes in the society. Simmers talks of â€Å"widening gap betw een subjective and objective culture, the creation of culture of things known as human culture† these would explain why even in the modern society, people would seek power over other. People have authority over then become their subjects. Such was the â€Å"gap† Simmel was talking about in his articles. Cultural Forms In sociology of culture, Simmel is perhaps one of the major contributors of all times. Apart from philosophical culture, he was able to bring out major cultural differences in most parts of the world. He talks of â€Å"conflict, tragedy and crisis† in culture. This means that people from different cultural identities may at some points of interactions with others conflict. These conflicts are brought about differences in values, cultures and interests. For instance, the Muslim and Christian cultures may conflict on these fronts. Christians believe in a holy and supernatural being they call God (Laermans 2006). On the other hand, the Muslims believe on a powerful being they call Allah. What then could be their differences? These are some of the questions psychologists, of who Simmel was part, seek to find answers to. Sociologists have tried to explain these tendencies. Differences in religious doctrines contribute to some of the religious warfare experienced in the world. One then wonders what could be the causes of these. In the contemporary society, it is a struggle between form and life, a conflict between objective and subjective culture. The two sites of modernity mentioned by Simmel in his works create a distinction between a modern metropolis and a money economy. These can be witnessed in the contemporary culture today. He talks of a â€Å"gendered culture.† This is true in that men control most aspects of life; they control most of the economic, social and political facets of life. Despite the fact that human activists and concerned individuals within the society lobby for gender equity, this has not been successful. Nowadays, society still experiences male chauvinist, inequality in gender as well as oppression of some members of the society. His assertion â€Å"with the exceptions of very few areas, our objective culture is thoroug hly male† brings the fact of gender equity to light. He talks of historical power relations, where most of the power in the past historical context, has been in the hands of males-not females. On this, different schools of thoughts may not agree with him, though. Historically, and even from biblical contexts, men have been known to be the custodians of power. Women were meant to be submissive to their husbands. Instead, the place of the woman in society was to take care of the household, and children. The man was to be the bread winner and provide protection for the family (Goodstein 2002). Though times have changed and the age of enlightenment is incumbent upon us, the woman will still not be at par, in terms of power, with the man. He will still continue domineering over her. Is it really possible to create a female culture that would be independent of the male-dominated culture? The answer to this frequently asked question would be â€Å"NO.† However,it is true that women could adapt to this culture though engaging in differentiated culture. They could take up roles that supplement or compliment those of their male counter-parts. It is true that this is a patriarchal system that is grounded is multifaceted interweaving of historical and psychological motives. The role of the female in modern times could be a source of problem, but one that would still be dealt with when people of the universe develop a developmental logic. The social form within the society is one where there is autonomy, a kind of independence that cuts across different facets of life. This is the objective cultural sphere that will continue to be experienced in different spheres and locations of the contemporary society. In the money economy, it can be argued that the kind of economy can be viewed as a pure relationship between different things expressed their economic motions. It is a notion of an individual that money can be used to ascertain most of the material support they may need. What then differentiates modernity and post modernity? Is it about the cultural forms that rear their faces in the contemporary society? A postmodern society is one that is alive to the fact that a society must be inclusive to different needs of members of the society, a society that tries to ensure equality among its people and one that lays more emphasis on dialogue than use of force. These are the elements of a post modern society that Simmel was able to articulate in most of his articles. Relevant debates about this argument can still be made given that the society keeps chang ing if form and cultural contexts as post (modernity) sets in. Modernity in Context The contributions of Georg Simmers to modernity cannot be overstated. He developed some of the most relevant theories about modernity, some of which have been studied in sociology and psychology classes across the world. All social sciences that have been developed theories seeking to know how the term modernity was fist coined. None of these compares to Georg Simmel’s. He provides the best definition for modernity. According to Simmers, modernity comes about as a result of people trying to rationalize their civilization and the rise of capitalism. Capitalism deals with creation of wealth. As people created wealth, built industries, there arose modernism. Thus, there came to being cities. This was civilization. Obviously people wanted a higher quality of life. Technology advanced. Mental reasoning improved. Competition came about since different members of the society tried to outdo other civilizations. Then set the class or caste systems. This was the whole idea of modernity- good life, improved fashion, improved communication, better roads, better communication and a host of other convenience that came with modernity. It is associated with aesthetic values, people looking for better forms of life and convenience. â€Å"The concept of modernity is both a socio-cultural process through which a society becomes modern and aesthetic representations of the modern experiences. Modernism can also be viewed as both a short-term and a long-term process. In the modern money economy that forms the basis of modernity according to Simmel, people’s attention to modernism is influenced by the need to be rich, and rationally so. There are those who contribute towards the economy and those who are just mere spectators of the very economy. It points towards capitalism in the contemporary society. It is also the basis of metropolis that characterizes different and modern societies. Most of the economy is also controlled by people who are in power, people who ensure that most of the economies in the world move. Simmel is a contemporary theorist, at least going by his analysis of modernity. He explains this as â€Å"mental life and money economy.† Modernity can be characterized by exchange of commodities, circulation and consumption as well. It is a post industrial as well as a post production society (Guillet et al. 2002). Industrial society dates some time back when the economy was moved or powered by industries. The same applies to production in the immediate context. However, times have changed, and today most of economies in the world are powered by capitalism, many business ventures that have contributed to the â€Å"good life† that people experience today. However, the capitalism places money only a few hands of people within society. The consumer is seen as the creation of money through trade. At the end of the day, there is money circulation, and commodities on sale in the contemporary life as had been envisioned by the iconic philosopher and great thinker, Georg Simme l. Value exists only when commodities exchange hands in the contemporary society. There is a symbolic significance of money. Urban conditions that are characteristic of modernity make it necessary for creation of â€Å"protective organ.† In The Metropolis and Mental Life, the metropolis that lives in the urban area is for instance, different from another who stays in rural area. It is for a reason that life in the urban setting is always changing and an individual has to buffer him in the constantly changing environment. Life in the city is quite different. It is fast paced. People who stay in urban areas have a higher sense of intellect and logic than people who stay in rural areas. Simmel quotes: â€Å" Instead of reacting emotionally, the metropolitan type reacts primarily in a rational manner . . . Thus the reaction of the metropolitan person to those events is moved to the sphere of mental activity that is least sensitive and furthest removed from the depths of personality. (12) The Critique relates most of Simmel’s to real life A great philosopher, he was a great think who talked of secrecy, fashion, sociology, metropolitan individual and modernity and money. Many writers and thinkers of his time critiqued him as would be expected, but the bottom line is that his works and articles explain most issues, some that are relevant even in the contemporary society. The paper is a critique of some of the issues he articulated in his articles and quotes him in some instances.