David Myers, Worldcom Essay Example for Free

David Myers, Worldcom Essay Introduction WorldCom was Americas second largest telecom company in 2000 (The WorldCom Accounting Scandal, 2002). Making a modest beginning in the hinterland of Mississippi in 1983 with a meager capital of less than 100,000 USD it reached the pinnacle of corporate success reporting more than USD 39 billion in revenue and USD 150 million in MCAP (The WorldCom Accounting Scandal, 2002). In the process it became 42nd in the Fortune 500 list. Under the leadership of CEO Bernie Ebbers it grew rapidly by means of acquisitions and increased demand for telecom services farther fuelled the growth of WorldCom during the whole of 90s. However on June 25, 2002, WorldCom announced that it had overstated earnings in 2001 and the first quarter of 2002 by more than $3.8 billion (The WorldCom Accounting Scandal, 2002). The Scandal WorldCom scandal was one of the biggest accounting scandals of American corporate history. WorldCom was a U.S based telecommunication company. The WorldCom accounting scandal was disclosed in 2002. The Company had resorted to fraudulent accounting practices for five quarters (four quarters of 2001 and the first quarter of 2002) (The WorldCom Accounting Scandal, 2002). The well-known telecommunication company WorldCom and the accounting, auditing and consultancy enterprise were involved in this big accounting fraud. The corporate scandal of WorldCom ultimately headed the company towards the disgrace that ensued in the biggest bankruptcy in American history. After this act the company terminated the service of the top executive including Scott Sullivan, the Chief Financial Officer and David Myers, the Senior Vice President and Controller. Myers knew that the accounting entries were made without supporting documentation, were not in conformity with GAAP, were not disclosed to the investing public, and were designed to allow WorldCom to appear to meet Wall Street analysts quarterly earnings estimates. In addition, during the same period Myers and others, including members of senior management, made materially false or misleading statements or omissions to WorldComs independent auditors in connection with audits and the preparation of filings with the Commission. Myers violated the anti-fraud, books and records, and internal control provisions of the federal securities laws, and aided and abetted WorldComs violations of the reporting, books and records, and internal control provisions of the federal  securities laws. Using this illegal accounting practice WorldCom intended to defer and spread the expenditure for the next 5-10 years. Significance of Organizational Behavior Theories Organizational theories help to the company for surviving in the global environment. The WorldCom Company CFO and Director may not have followed good organizational behavior theories. Had they followed good organizational behavior theories, they would save the organization from the failure. Ethical Decision Making Ethical decision making represents the decision that is based on the ethics. The ethical decision making involves making those decisions that are in the favor of all related persons of company such as board of directors, shareholders and stakeholders. The ethical decision making helps the company for making the goodwill and the long term survival in the global market. The WorldCom Company did not adopt the ethical decision making theory as if they did there would have been false numbers reported. The company was continuously doing misrepresentation of the accounts and the company became the bankrupt. If the company CFO and executive would adopt the ethical decision making theory, they would have resolved the bankruptcy due misappropriation of balance sheet of the company (McKenna, 2000). Goal Setting Goal setting theory is very useful methods to motivate the employee to enhance their capacity for attain the organizational goal. Goal setting theory directly affects the performance of the organization. This theory helps the employee and the concern people of the company to set the appropriate objective for the organization. If the WorldCom would have adopted the goal setting theory in their organization, its executive and auditor would have not gone for the unethical accounting practices for the business (Griffin Moorhead, 2009). Corporate Governance Corporate governance is the set of processes, customs, policies, laws and institutions, which directed, administered and controlled over the corporation (Monks Minow, 2008). Corporate governance is a way by which a  company governs itself for providing the values to their stake holders. The WorldCom did not follow the corporate governance policy. If the WorldCom would have followed the corporate governance it would have not led towards this business failure and company would have not gone for the unethical practices conduct in the organization. Corporate governance would have increased the faith of stakeholders towards the company and company would have survived for long time (Monks Minow, 2008). Adoption of Ethical Behavior The Ethical Behavior would enhance the performance of the company, because the ethical behavior would creates the good image of the company among the stakeholders. If The WorldCom would have adopted the ethical behavior in the organization it would not have attained bankruptcy in the market. The company acted in unethically to misrepresent the accounts of the company (Salter, 2008). Contribution of Leadership, Management and Organizational Structures Every organization is directed with a particular leadership, management and organizational structure. The WorldCom Company is directed by their directors, CFO and the auditors. If a leader is indulged in ethical practice its follower also follows that kind of management and leadership qualities. The WorldCom auditor was indulged in the misrepresentation of the accounts of the company and due to his this kind of conduct his followers also got indulged in wrong act. How it could have been avoided? We conclude that the debacle in WorldCom could have been avoided by a more independent and watchful board of directors, which should have sent a signal to the company management that somebody, is watching them closely and they better mend their ways and means. The concept of board of directors is age old and when it functions properly it is effective. In this case the independent directors failed in their responsibilities. In almost all corporate fraud it has been seen that the board has been ineffective over a long period of time and aggressive managers use this opportunity to take the rein completely in their own hand. We also conclude that Arther Anderson miserably failed in its duty as external auditor. We hold a puppet board and a malleable auditor as responsible in allowing Ebbers and his associates to perpetrate the accounting fraud. Both the board of directors and external  auditors has roles in averting operational risk and they have failed in their responsibilities (McShane, Glinow, Sharma, 2006). The Sarbanes-Oxley Act Due to organization such as WorldCom Congress rushed to pass the complicated Sarbanes-Oxley Act. CEOs and CFOs of public companies are required to personally certify the accuracy of various financial reports, with significant criminal penalties for false certifications (up to 10 years in prison for â€Å"knowing† violations; up to 20 years if â€Å"willful†) (WorldCom scandal, nod.). While the penalties sound significant, the government’s difficulty in enforcing this provision will likely come in proving that a corporate officer’s inaccurate certification was done at least â€Å"knowingly,† as opposed to negligently or even recklessly. However, in short this law made many disclosures and certifications on the part of the firm mandatory. It also made the commitment of the external auditor binding. This is significant in view of the fact that when WorldCom fraud came to light, Arthur Anderson simply issued a statement saying the last two year’s accounting statement are no longer reliable without owning much responsibility. What is noteworthy is the fact that US authority introduced the risk management step in the form of Sarbanes Oxley legislation, making the BOD, the company management and the external auditor responsible and bound by law. In addition, if a public company makes a required accounting restatement due to misconduct, that company’s CEO and CFO can be forced to forfeit any bonuses or profits gained from selling company stock for a one-year period. But the lack of definitions for the terms required and misconduct, other potential loopholes, and the SEC’s power to grant exemptions could combine to dilute the strength of this provision. The new law makes it somewhat easier for the government to prohibit officers and directors who have committed securities law violations from ever again serving in those positions. However, that potential sanction was at least theoretically available even before passage of Sarbanes-Oxley. Conclusion A leader is a person that directs a company and its management and if he adopts wrong practices to achieve personal goals, the management may get distract and go in the unethical direction. Management of WorldCom was not  evaluating the efforts of its executives, CFO and auditors that is a conduct as every business demands continuous evaluation. Another major contributing factor in the direction of companys failure was its organization structure that was not managed and apportioned appropriately by its top management. The organization structure of the World Com was also not appropriate. In WorldCom, there was the lack span of control, means the audit department was not report to the companys upper level management and not provides the right information about the accounts status of the company (Mcshane, Von Glinow Sharma, 2006). There was also lack of transparency in the organization. That means in the organization two different levels of management did not know about the wrongdoings which they were doing in the organization and there was not flow of information with each other. In any business, the organizational behavior of the company starts from top management. If the top management has high moral, ethical and leadership traits and standards, then so will the employees. The leaders of WorldCom, in this case did not and it not only affected the company but other telecommunications equipment manufacturers, and other employees. Top management must set the standards and keep them. Changing basic accounting procedures and the lack of ethical standards with top management contributed to the fall of WorldCom. References Griffin.R.W Moorhead.G. (2009). Organizational Behavior: Managing People and Organizations (9th ed.). Cengage Learning. McKenna, E. F. (2000). Business Psychology and Organizational Behavior: A Students Handbook (3rd Ed.). Psychology Press. McShane.S.L, Von Glinow.M.A. Sharma.R.R. (2006). Organizational Behavior (3rd ed.). Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company Limited. Monks.R.G Minow.N. (2008). Corporate governance (4th ed.). John Wiley and Sons. Salter, M.S. (2008). Innovation Corrupted: The Origins and Legacy of Enrons Collapse. Harvard University Press. The WorldCom Accounting Scandal, (2002). Retrieved September 7, 2013. From http://www.icmrindia.org/casestudies/catalogue/Finance/The%20WorldCom%20Ac counting%20Scandal.htm WorldCom scandal: Lessons for corporate America, (n.d.). Retrieved September 5, 2013. From WSJ.com: http://online.wsj.com WorldCom Scandal. (n.d.). Retrieved September 6, 2013. From http://voices.yahoo.com

Graduation Speech -- Graduation Speech, Commencement Address

Ladies, gentlemen, parents, friends, family, staff, fellow students: Instead of taking up more time and reading my speech, it is available to you at http://www.olen’s_speech.com. Thank you. No, just kidding. But seriously folks... Today we are gathered here to celebrate our graduation from 12 long years of schooling. The education granted to us has been a privilege. One so graciously given to us by the citizens of our state, by our community, and by our parents. Today would not be possible without them. So far this evening we have looked back over the many past memories of our school years, remembering the good times and the bad, talking about the fun times, and so on. Now I would like to bring your focus to the present, and make a challenge for us for the future. The ceremony tonight is a very old and traditional one. In past, such a graduation meant not only the completion of a school career, but also a step into adulthood, into society, into the world. With this came many duties and responsibilities. This still applies to today. I’m sure many of you have heard the â€Å"going into the real world† speech as often quoted at high school graduations. You know, the one outlining the responsibilities of living on your own: cooking your own meals, balancing a checkbook, doing your own laundry, etc. Those are all well and good, but I’m talking about something a little different — responsibilities which go beyond those — the duties and rights of citizenship. Most of you are 18 already, or will be very soon, this is the age at which we can vote. As full citizens, it is now our right, and one which we should not let pass by. Our country is founded upon a democracy, and all democracies have one integral part: power b... ...hould in the future suffer what they did — to save freedom by bloodshed. We owe it to them to prevent wars, and to know, to understand, to teach, and to learn from our neighbors around the world, so that we might learn to live in peace. I am saying all of this tonight as a challenge to us as we venture forth this day. It is tempting for us as graduating seniors to treat this moment as one of reveling in our independence from high school. But this night is not just for the moment; it is also for our futures to look back to. Let’s celebrate the new privilege and responsibility which will be given to us as the class of the new millennium: to make it better than the past. For we should all be concerned with the future, because that is where we will all spend the rest of our lives. Thank you, everyone. And the best of luck to the future of the Class of 2006!

How Height Affects Time Taken for A Falling Object to Reach Ground Level Essay

Introduction: In this investigation, how height will affect the time taken for a steel ball bearing to reach the ground will be investigated. It is was Isaac Newton that first discovered gravity and wrote laws defining it. His Second Law of Motion states that the Resultant Force on an object (F) is equal to the Mass of the body (m) times its acceleration (a), or . The weight (W) of a body is the force of gravity acting on it, which gives it acceleration (g) if it is falling freely close to the earth’s surface. If the body was to have a mass (m) Newton’s 2nd Law of Motion could calculate its weight. Given that and Newton’s Law becomes . In April of 2003, in a method similar to that, which will be conducted in this investigation, the acceleration of gravity was concluded to be 9.81. Using the knowledge mentioned above, several equation of motion have been created. One particularly relevant to this investigation is . In this equation: S = Distance in meters (In this case height) u = Initial velocity in * t = Time Taken in seconds a = Acceleration in ** * As the ball begins its fall from rest, its initial velocity, u, will be 0 ** As the ball is falling under acceleration due to gravity, = 9.81 Plan: In this investigation, since the means to calculate air resistance and friction are unavailable, they will be ignored. Acceleration due to gravity and the method by which the investigation will be carried out are controlled variables. The height from which the ball is dropped is the independent variable, i.e. the variable that is changed and the dependent variable is the time taken for the ball to reach the ground. It is predicted that as the height from which the ball is dropped decreases, the time taken for the ball to reach the ground will also decrease. An actual set of predicted values can be predicted from the earlier mention Equations of Motion. This line of the equation can be related to the straight-line graph equation , (the gradient) and . When the ball is dropped from 0.00m, it takes 0.00seconds to reach the ground as this will mean that the graph will pass through the origin so . Alternatively: . Using the above equations, the expected results for the investigation are: Height H, (m) Time t, (secs) Time squared t2, (secs2) 1.0 0.452 0.204 0.9 0.428 0.183 0.8 0.404 0.163 0.7 0.378 0.143 0.6 0.350 0.123 0.5 0.319 0.102 0.4 0.288 0.082 0.3 0.247 0.061 0.2 0.202 0.041 0.1 0.143 0.020 0.0 0.000 0.000 This is what the expected graph of Height vs. time should look like: Height (m) Time (secs) The following page shows what the expected graph for Height vs. time2 should look like. It is a straight line passing through the origin, thus proving the prediction . The expected gradient, m, should be equal to 1/2 g, or, 4.905ms-2. It is actually 4.926ms-2, which is only 0.021 ms-2 out or 0.428%. This is probably due to the rounding of decimal places when drawing the graph and human error in plotting the points (i.e. not exactly accurate to 3 decimal places.) Apparatus & Diagram: Safety: As there is a very minimal risk in this investigation, no safety measures need to be taken. It is planned to drop the ball from a height of 1m and decrease in intervals of 0.1m. At each height 5 readings will be recorded and then the mean result will be calculated. This makes the results more reliable (and better for use in calculation like working out g or the mass of the steel ball.) The Results will be recorded in a table like this: Height (cm) Time taken for ball to reach ground (seconds) Mean Result Mean Result2 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 00 It is hoped that a graph of height vs. the mean results squared will be produced similar to that on page 4. In the graph, it is hoped to prove that the time-taken-for-a-ball2 to fall is directly proportional to the height it is dropped from, i.e. . Obtaining Evidence: Height (cm) Time taken for ball to reach ground (seconds) Mean Result Mean Result2 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 100 0.456 0.454 0.458 0.454 0.454 0.455 0.207 90 0.432 0.431 0.431 0.432 0.432 0.432 0.186 80 0.406 0.407 0.406 0.407 0.406 0.406 0.165 70 0.380 0.382 0.382 0.383 0.381 0.382 0.146 60 0.353 0.354 0.354 0.354 0.354 0.354 0.125 50 0.323 0.323 0.322 0.322 0.322 0.322 0.104 40 0.289 0.288 0.293 0.289 0.287 0.289 0.084 30 0.252 0.251 0.251 0.250 0.251 0.251 0.063 20 0.208 0.207 0.206 0.206 0.206 0.207 0.043 10 0.150 0.150 0.150 0.150 0.151 0.150 0.023 00 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 Graphs: In the following pages, the results recorded in the above table will be shown in the form of line graphs. This will make it easier to identify a trend in the results. It is also an appropriate method of recording the information and is useful for quick reference; also if the time for the ball to fall is desired from a height other than the ones specified in the table, the value can be obtained from the graph. Conclusion: The general trends from the graphs show, as predicted; when the height from which the ball was dropped decreased, the time taken for the ball to reach the ground also decreased. In the graph of Height vs. Time2,, it is shown that Height is directly proportional to Time2. The reason for this is derived from one of the Equations of Motion: , from this equation below, it was shown that . The final line of the above equation can be related to the straight-line graph equation . , (the gradient) and . C can be ignored as the line in the graph passes the y-axis at the orgin. Fundamentally: . H = S = The height in meters from which the ball was dropped. = The time in seconds that the ball took to land. a = g = The acceleration due to the gravitational pull of the earth. Note: The factor that affected the acceleration was g, (which, on earth, is ) is the mass of the planet, for Earth this is constant. The results of the investigation are consistent with the prediction. The relationship of was proved in the similarity of the graphs on page 4 & 8, they had almost the exact same gradient, only 0.072ms-2 in difference (or 1.462%) it was also very similar to the mathematical prediction of the gradient (1/2g) again only 0.051 ms-2 out. Evaluation: In this investigation, all results are held to be very reliable. When the data was being collected, sophisticated technology was used which measured time accurately and reliably to the nearest thousandth of a second. All recorded results were in very close proximity of each other, so that 0.006seconds was the maximum difference observed. There were no anomalies observed. All points on the graph on page 8 are not only close to the line of best fit, they are actually on it. The results in this investigation are believed to be very reliable; as a result no changes need to be made to the procedure.

Case Study for Canady vs Walmart Essay

1. In your own words, what does pretext mean? Pretext is a reason given in justification of a course of action that is not the real reason. 2. Write a paragraph that supports the argument that Canady’s dismissal was based on racial discrimination. Canady’s would say that his dismissal was based on racial discrimination because Smith a manager introduced himself as a slave driver. Next Smith, ask Canady â€Å"What’s up, my nigga?† and was also referred to as a â€Å"lawn jockey†. He also claimed that Smith made states that all African American look alike, and that his skin color wiped off on towels. Since Canady did not report these comments when Smith made them; Smith continued to use the phase from the Rush Hour movie. He could also believe that the day we was left in the department by himself that management was discriminating against him because he was left to do all the work with no help. 3. Write a paragraph that supports that argument that Wal-Mart’s decision was based on Canady’s insubordination. Wal-Mart’s decision was based on insubordination for one Canady was eating in an area where there are policies in place that prohibits easting in the food preparation area. When asked to stop eating in the prohibited area Canady started an argument with management. After the store manager was called to help with the situation Canady continued argue loudly in front of customers and other associates. Candy did not follow the policy that does not allow employees to eat in the food preparation area and he was arguing with management in front of other was insubordination. 4. Research the case. How did the court rule? Why did they rule in this manner? The wrongful termination claim, that claim fails to make out a prima facie case in that Canady failed to establish the fourth prong (i.e. that there are facts that permit an inference of discrimination). Alternatively, even if Canady made out a prima facie case, he failed to present sufficient evidence of pretext. The fact that Smith made racially offensive remarks is of no consequence because those remarks were made outside of the decision making process. The ruling on the hostile work environment claim, the Court found that Smith’s comments are not sufficiently offensive to the actionable. The Circuit Judge Lay dissents.

Taobao Case Analysis Essays

Taobao Case Analysis Essays Taobao Case Analysis Essay Taobao Case Analysis Essay Question 1: What are the major differences in the web designs of Taobao and eBay in China? Which is preferred to on-line buyers and sellers in China? Why? Taobao sought to distinguish itself from eBay in numerous ways. So Taobao’s web designs were imbued with a strong local culture that reflected a deep understanding of Chinese consumers and an attitude of informality. First of all, the website was designed like a Chinese department store. Taobao’s web designs are with strong colors, a little bit noisy, with lots of links. For example, they designed men’s and women’s navigation tab, to make it more suitable for Chinese customers. The following are Taobao and eBay’s homepage on November 4,2010. Taobao’s Homepage: eBAY’s home page: Secondly, Taobao also developed a number of mechanisms on the website to help creat the trust between sellers and buyers because in China, even in business, affect- and cognition-based trust are highly intertwined. Sellers need to register using their ID and bank account information. * Taobao allowed buyers and vendors to provide feedback for each other and distinguished a person’s score as a seller and a buyer while eBay only has one score for one user. * Taobao introduced Alipay in 2004. Alipay is an escrow service designed to eliminate settlement risk among trading parties. Lastly, Taobao also embedded an IM service, Wangwang, in its website to facilitate communication between buyers and sellers and between users and the company. Wangwang allows buyers to directly haggle with sellers. This service reduced the communication problems of Taobao tremendously, compared to eBay. Due to the better understanding of Chinese culture and Chinese customers, Taobao’s website designs are preferred by Chinese eyes because it reflected how Chinese shoppers think. Question 2: Why did Taobao establish the Alipay system? Why did not eBay establish such a system when its market share in China was still high? The whole reason for Alipay goes back to the issue of trust between buyers and ellers. Initially, Taobao had issues with buyers paying, and never receiving the item. The solution was to create an intermediary service that received the payment, held the payment until the buyer received the shipment, and then released the funds to the seller. This system created trust between the buyer and seller, allowing them to work together under the guidance of a third party. Taobao understood the importance of offering payment mec hanisms as part of their service, because of China’s poorly developed e-business infrastructure. Ma and his team also had longstanding relationship with Chinese government officials and leaders in the Chinese banking industry, which gave him the support of existing financial institutions. Part of Ebay’s issue was a lack of understanding of some of the differences between doing business in China and the US. When a person signs a contract in the US, it is strongly protected by the rule of law, and the seller is liable if they don’t fulfill their orders. In contrast, China’s rule of law is much weaker, with little recourse if a person doesn’t fulfill a contract. In China, people are much more comfortable dealing in cash, and actually used Taobao to arrange offline meetings to exchange payment and goods. In addition, the whole idea of ecommerce was a new concept in China, and Ebay assumed that people in China were as familiar with it as people in the US. While Ebay had Paypal, it didn’t provide strong enough protection for the Chinese customer or seller. Alipay introduced several protection mechanisms other than the double-confirmation system. It connected an Alipay account to a person’s national identity card, minimizing the risk of fraudulent accounts. Alipay also worked with logistics companies to organize transportation of goods. Besides, many Internet users dislike eBay because its Paypal did not seamlessly integrate escrow into the sales process like Taobao’s Alipay made escrow as an important component of the online buying experience. Only when losing lots of market shares to Taobao, did eBay recognize this fact and made attempts to incorporate escrow but it was too late to regain lost market shares. Question 3: Why can not Harvard MBA graduates beat the locally educated managers in China in this Taobao case? Even the best CEOs who graduated from the prestigious Harvard Business School make bad acquisitions. What’s notable about Meg Whitman’s career at eBay, however, is how her record cleaves into two neat parts: She did well during the companys go-go growth stage, but much less well as the company became large and mature. Early on, Whitman recognized that China offered stupendous opportunities for new growth. In 2003, eBay purchased the Beijing-based EachNet auction site. Three years and $300 million later, eBay shut down its China site. What are the reasons to this embarrassing failure of a management team most of whom were Harvard MBA graduates while their competitors are locally-educated managers in China? The main reason is those HBS graduates lack the understanding of cultural and legal context in China. Firstly, they kept the same platform as for US. However, this sparse site was not what Chinese shoppers like. In the meanwhile, Jack Ma was so successful in Taobao design by imbuing Taobao with a strong local culture that reflected a deep understanding of Chinese consumers who prefer busy web designs with strong colors and lots of links. Secondly, eBay management team did not recognize the importance of building up trust which is critical to business culture in china. Later attempts by eBay to incorporate escrow to their payment system were too late to regain lost market shares. Besides, initially eBay did not allow buyers and sellers to communicate directly while Taobao from the very beginning allows for direct instant messaging between the two parties. It was said that while TaoBao’s no-fee policy hurt eBay, the falloff was not precipitous. What caused a customer exodus was a major strategic error, combined with bungling by eBay’s corporate bureaucracy, which failed to react quickly to mounting problems. Whitman envisioned a â€Å"global village† to create one universal eBay site. For a year, eBay and EachNet worked on a transition plan to switch from EachNet’s China technology platform to the system in the United States. EBay traffic would flow back and forth between the two countries; previously, the China traffic had mostly stayed in China. It was said to be a great vision, but a terrible business strategy. The data capacity of overseas Internet pipes couldn’t handle all the traffic; loading speeds on the site slowed dramatically. Furthermore, the overseas traffic received more scrutiny from China’s â€Å"great firewall† - a system of government filters that screens for political contentwhich further slowed eBay’s China site. Whitman’s campaign said, â€Å"Meg and her top executives moved to China for months† during the summer of 2005 to make the endeavor work and noted that Google and Yahoo faced extreme difficulty in China as well. However, despite those efforts, by late 2006, eBay shut its China site while buying a minority stake in Tom Online, a tiny auction market player whose market share today is in the single digits. In other words, Whitman and her management team accepted the failure to their locally-educated competitors from Taobao. Question 4: Can the Taobao model (C2C) apply to the B2B market in China? Why and why not? It would be fairly difficult to apply a C2C model to a B2B market because the business model is complete different, and the customer / users are totally different as well. Since the business model should be designed to meet target customers’ demand and needs, we wouldn’t suggest applying Taobao model to the B2B market in China. Like what is mentioned in the case, Alibaba Group has two platforms designed for C2C and B2B market: Alibaba and Taobao. Alibaba provide companies’ information for users to find a business partner. They know that credibility is important, so they introduced TrustPass service later on. On the other hand, Taobao is designed exclusively for a C2C market. Users can find each other’s products through the platform, and the team designed the Webpage according to users’ culture preference and habits. As we can see, for different targets, we need different strategies and methods. However, it is of course beneficial to learn from Taobao experience if a company wants to aim on a B2B market. For example, it is very important to KNOW your target customers. When Taobao was starting, they knew that if they want to beat their rival (eBay), they need to provide a core value that is unique and appealing to the users of a auction website. They study the preference of Chinese users and make web pages attractive to them. The other thing to learn from Taobao is the importance to provide a secure buy and sell system. In order to make sure that customers who make the payment would receive the products they purchase, Taobao introduced Alipay so that the seller wouldn’t receive the payment until the buyer gets the product.

How to spell in lieu of

How to spell in lieu of How to spell in lieu of How to spell in lieu of By Maeve Maddox Whenever I come across an unusual misspelling, I do a search to see how common it is. This misspelling of in lieu of caught my attention: †¦so i can run keynote in leu of having to use powerpoint. A Google search for in leu of brought up about 23,600,000 hits. The bank is asking if we would like to do a deed in leu of foreclosure. I was told I could take jail time in leu of the fine. Hair flower in leu of a veil Anyone ever use duct tape in leu of rim tape? How long can I leave potatoes in the ground? (in leu of storage) To be fair, most of these examples are from forums and comments. Google does ask Did you mean in lieu of? The expression came into English from French en lieu de, in place of, from the Latin phrase in loco, in place of. Our English word instead is a calque of these foreign expressions. It was written as two words, in stead, until the 17th century. Stead means place, as in homestead. Bottom line: If youre not sure how to spell in lieu of, you can use instead of instead. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Spelling category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:15 Terms for Those Who Tell the FutureThe Parts of a Word20 Movies Based on Shakespeare Plays

Pros and Cons of a Person With a Mental Illness as a US President Essay

Pros and Cons of a Person With a Mental Illness as a US President - Essay Example Some mental disorders have symptoms which may negatively affect not only the patient him or herself but also the other people around which is classified as a violation of one’s freedom and certain right in every individual case. Delusions of the President would negatively affect his decisions making: the decision made in a condition of delusion would be characterized by nonsense, for example, to close all the universities or increase the taxes by 1000 times. Obviously, these ideas are not realistic, but the person with a mental illness would not react to such statements and would go on reckoning that only he or she is right. Hallucinations are also negative things for the person acting as a US President: for example, some decision may be taken properly, but it may turn out to be that the patient with a mental disorder has taken advice from a phantom, not from a real person, and revealing this fact would create concern among the public. Disorganized behavior is also a symptom which makes a person unpredictable: for example, today the President feels excited and makes good presents and treats the people around good, but tomorrow he or she may become very aggressive and apply the behavior model which is not proper for a country leader. Taking the above said into consideration, it is possible to state that there are more cons than pros in the possibility of a mentally ill person becoming the US President, and they all concern the way the other people may be affected by a person subjected to a certain mental illness.