Engineering procurement and construction

Engineering procurement and construction Integrated Project Teams With Multi Office Execution, A Study Of EPC Projects In Canada Abstract Engineering procurement and construction (EPC) projects in the Canadian oil and gas industry have gained significant economic importance due to rising hydrocarbon commodity price. The oil and gas industry in Alberta has planned to spend approximately 142 billion dollars (Government of Alberta, 2010) within the next two decades on capital projects. Alberta has recognized the shortage of human resources during peak economic activities, to execute mega capital projects. Multi office execution (MOE) is a way forward for all the major EPC houses in Canada to meet the demands of Clients within budget and on schedule. Further, it has been identified by the industry needs that integrated project teams are critical to the success of these complex oil and gas projects. In this environment, project management techniques need to be adapted to match project complexity. This paper will provide much insight through case studies related to project teams in multi office execution, and review the existing literature body of knowledge. An analysis is presented based on the project management knowledge areas. Recommendations are made based on this analysis. The objectives of this paper are to review literature related to managing MOE projects and to determine the keys to success and areas that need improvement in MOE. Introduction Alberta oil and gas industry has gained significant economic importance over the past decades. In 2010, it is estimated that the industry has an inventory of 57 capital oil and gas projects with a total value of 142 billion dollars (Government of Alberta, 2010). Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) companies have been providing oil and gas owner companies with expertise and resources to execute these capital projects. Under current market condition, the oil and gas owner companies want the EPC companies to share more risks. More and more projects are based on lump sum and fixed-fee contracts and are executed under lower budgets and tighter schedules. To stay competitive, many EPC companies have adopted global execution business model. Work is carried out in multiple offices or even by multiple organizations (Macquary, 2003). Cost saving benefit is achieved by allocating project scopes to high-value low-cost offices in other provinces or other countries. The companies may develop a partnership with other companies with specific technical expertise or local business expertise in order to gain market share in a new or emerging market. The MOE improves resource availability under booming economy, where resource shortage becomes a sig nificant problem in executing large projects. Despite several benefits, MOE projects can be very challenging to manage. Although the project management methodology is applicable to both single-office and multi-office projects (Cowle et al, 1995), the multi-office projects require particular emphasis on some of the project management processes. The objectives of this paper are to review literature related to managing MOE projects and to determine the keys to success, challenges and areas that need improvement in MOE. Interviews with project management experts from the EPC industry who have experience managing multi-billion dollar MOE projects provided insights into MOE best practices. The interviews were designed based on project management knowledge areas established by Project Management Institute or PMI (Project Management Institute, 2004) in order to present the findings using internationally accepted framework. These knowledge areas are: project integration management, project scope management, project time management, project cost management, project quality management, project human resource management, project communication management, project procurement management, and project risk management. The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 reviews literature related to MOE. Section 3 briefly describes methodology and the MOE projects studied in this paper. Keys to success and challenges for MOE are discussed in Section 4. This is followed by conclusions in Section 5.   Literature Review Multi-Office Execution Concepts Engineering and Construction Risk Institute (2009) defines two main elements of a multi-office executing organization: 1) Lead office which is an office that provides leadership and has overall responsibility for the execution of the project; 2) Support office which is an entity participating in the project under the overall management and supervisory control of the lead office. The multi office execution strategy is found to be popularly framed within concepts such as virtual teams and offshore outsourcing (off shoring). A common definition available for a virtual group/team is a group of geographically and temporally dispersed individuals who are assembled via technology to accomplish an organization task. Joseph (2005) specifically defines Global Virtual Engineering Team (GVET) as a group of geographically dispersed individuals organized through communication and information technologies that need to overcome space, time, functional, organizational, national, and cultural barriers for the completion of a specific engineering task. According to Joseph (2005), the following comparison can be made between a virtual team and a conventional team. The most critical and important feature of virtual teams is that they cross boundaries of space. Whereas the members of traditional teams work in close proximity to one another, the members of virtual teams are separa ted, often by many miles or even continents. Although many traditional, localized teams also communicate through computerized communication media, technology such as video conferencing is typically used by virtual team members to supplement their rare face-to-face communication. In physically collocated teams, members of the team are likely to have similar and complementary cultural and educational backgrounds since they have gone through the same recruitment and selection procedures as they are employed by the same organization. In a virtual team the members may vary in their education, culture, language, time orientation and expertise. There can also be conflicting organizational and personal goals among the members of a virtual team. Multi-office execution also can be part of off shoring when local EPC companies subcontract project activities to branches or a different company in a foreign country. Off shoring is an extreme version of outsourcing, and it refers to the transfer of production/service capacity from a site within a country to a site in another country and then importing back for national consumption of goods and services that had previously being produced locally (Goff, 2005). Off shoring business operations offer a potential for 15-20% cost savings, but further analyses show that organizations that properly plan and operate offshore initiatives can reap substantially higher rewards (Fox and Hughes, 2008). According to Goff (2005) the benefits of off shoring for large companies include: maintaining or increasing profitability by reduced labor costs if resources with the same or higher level of expertise can be obtained in the foreign countries; maintaining its competitive position or even protecting it from going out of business; and increasing the market share of a company by improving their capacity and utilizing available in-house resources to more value added ventures. Canada ranks high among most attractive host countries for companies wishing to locate abroad to improve their financial position according to the offshore location attractive index (Goff, 2005). The multi-office execution has been made possible and successful, solely due to the advancements in the information and communication technology. With the rapid advancement of the electronic age the ability to staff a project from multiple offices has gone from a dream to a practical reality (Cowle et al, 1995). The latest developments in communication technology such as teleconferencing, video conferencing and host of other online applications coupled with ever increasing speed of data, voice and video transfer literally eliminate distance barriers. According to Macquary (2003) we are at a point in time where information technology is allowing us to change many of our traditional way of doing work. Hence it is possible to create an organizational structure agile enough to accept them and quickly apply them to add value. MOE Driving Forces Economy conditions are the main driving forces for the MOE strategy (Macquary (2003), Joshep (2005), Global Insight USA (2004), and Engineering and Construction Risk Institute (2009)). Under booming economy, labor shortage becomes a problem for many organizations and the MOE is a way to acquire project teams from other remote offices or even other companies. The MOE strategy is also used to add resources in order to meet tighter/compressed project schedules. On the other hand, slower economy growth demands constant vigilance over cost. Companies with global operations often allocate or outsource work to high-value low-cost offices, especially when qualified resources with lower wages are available. For instance, offices in India, China or Far East countries could be candidates for such support offices. Company policy to gain market share is another driver for MOE strategy. Companies can setup offices in other countries or develop business partnership with local companies to capture global or emerging markets. A joint venture between companies (or even competitors) with complementing expertise to take on a project that requires diversified expertise is also another driver for MOE. Other driving forces are: development in technology such as internet connections and other communication tools; a need to free resources for core business or higher value purposes; change in educational trend which results in smaller number of graduates in some studying fields (Joseph, 2005). Managing MOE Projects Engineering and Construction Risk Institute (2009) suggested issues to be addressed for MOE projects during sales/pre-execution, project mobilization, project execution, and project completion phases. Key issues are: early engagement with the client to obtain agreement to MOE and address clients concerns; early engagement of the support offices; clear definition of scopes and responsibilities for individual offices and kick-off meetings; alignment of work processes, deliverables, and reports; selecting suitable key project roles who are opened to MOE; and communication plan. Joseph (2005) has identified technology, management, organization, project control and team communication as important items to consider in global virtual team formation and execution. Clear and frequent communication, periodic face-to-face meetings, good communication tools and compatibility in information technology, standard work processes and communication procedures, and clearly defined scope expectations are named as top success criteria for multi-office execution. Whereas lack of or poor communication, lack of face-to-face meetings, lack of understanding of local work practices/ cultural differences and/or language issues, lack of management involvement experienced leadership, changes not handled properly, slow response to changes, incompatible or poor technology including hardware and software are top failure factors found within EPC industry for multi-office execution. Chinowsky and Rojas (2003) outlined the top 10 management issues that must be addressed when initiating and maintaining virtual teams. They are categorized as Team issues and Process issues. Team issues include: initial face-to-face meetings are required to develop a sense of ‘‘team, managers must visit remote participants during the course of the project, trust between team members is difficult to establish when operating in a virtual environment, and virtual team leaders should be selected with an acknowledgment of the unique demands placed on distributed teams. Process issues includes: project objectives must be restated and reinforced frequently to ensure that all members remain focused on a common outcome; conflicts must be addressed quickly to prevent unresolved issues from interfering with communications; discussions on decisions will be more difficult as participants continue discussions via electronic media; expectations of each team member must be stated clearly to assist the members as they work independently; team member workloads should be monitored to ensure that significant increases do not occur due to increased electronic communications; and regular training must occur equally for all members of the virtual team. Methodology And Studied MOE Projects The methodology used in this paper to gain insights into MOE best practices and challenges is interviewing project management experts who have experience managing MOE projects in EPC industry. The interviews were designed using project management knowledge areas: project integration management, project scope management, project time management, project cost management, project quality management, project human resource management, project communication management, project procurement management, and project risk management. The project management knowledge areas are identified by its knowledge requirements and described in terms of their component processes, practices, inputs, outputs, tools, and techniques (Project Management Institute, 2004). The two major reasons for the projects to implement MOE strategy found in this paper are resource constraint and cost saving. All of the projects discussed in this paper were executed during the booming economy (i.e. high oil price) and manpower shortage became a problem for many projects. Therefore, the MOE beame a necessary strategy to acquire project teams with required skills from locations with more resource availability. To save cost, project scopes were allocated to high-value low-cost offices in either other provinces or other countries (e.g., India and China). Cost benefit was achieved in both cases. Some of the projects allocated â€Å"less technical† work such as cloning design work and closing project work to these support offices. Another driving force identified is a company strategy to expand and maintain national or global operations. The MOE strategy is used to balance resource utilization. In booming economy, work is allocated to reduce workload at some offices. During an economy down turn, work is allocated to maintain support offices as it is more economical than closing the support offices and rebuilding them when demand resumes. Engineering work is usually allocated among lead and support offices. For better coordination, a procurement organization is usually setup in the offices that perform engineering design. However, smaller projects may choose to have only one procurement organization in the lead office. Construction is mostly executed by the lead office. However, some construction scopes (e.g., fabrication and modularization programs) may be subcontracted to local or international third-parties, therefore they are considered as MOE. Prime contract management/ legal functions are usually executed by the lead office only. Other project functions such as Project Management, Project Controls, and Document Management are executed from the lead office. However, depending on the size of the project and project strategy, these functions may also be executed from other support offices. Keys To Success Challenges In MOE Further discussion on keys to success, challenges, and areas required improvement for MOE projects is divided into 9 subsections per Project Management Knowledge Areas (Project Management Institute, 2004): project integration management, project scope management, project time management, project cost management, project quality management, project human resource management, project communication management, project procurement management, and project risk management. The discussion is summarized at the end of this section. Project Integration Management For MOE projects, the lead office is normally responsible for developing the project charter and preliminary project scope statement. This is due to closer contact with the Client. Furthermore, at the early stage of the project, the support offices may not have been involved yet. It is important that the project management team provides MOE justification to gain support from the Client. It is recommended that the project management plan developed during the planning phase addresses the MOE strategy including high-level justification, organization, resource utilization and scope allocation. Some projects may choose to develop a separate subsidiary plan which addresses MOE issues such as scope allocation, responsibility, and communication in more detail. The MOE brings many challenges in monitoring and controlling project work. All offices should take responsibility for their own work but the lead office must take the responsibility to monitor and control overall project work. Managers in the lead office need to understand their roles in monitoring and controlling project work even though the work may be executed by the support offices. Basic communication approaches such as regular phone calls and VDO conference meetings and information systems that allow progress information to be collected from support offices are used for monitoring and controlling project work. Project changes should be managed and controlled centrally by the lead office. Changes are initiated from all offices but only the lead office should have authorization to approve changes. The approved changes need to be captured and project plans (e.g., budget and schedule) are adjusted accordingly. It is important that no office should start executing the changes before they are approved even if the changes are initiated by the Client. Closing project is identified in this paper as one of the major challenges in MOE. Each office is normally responsible for closing the work under their scopes. However, the support offices have smaller scopes of work, therefore they usually de-staff earlier than the lead office. If the support offices de-staff before the close out is complete, the work is transferred to the lead office which may not have sufficient background understanding to properly close out the work/scope. To avoid this circumstance, the projects must plan and execute the project closing process carefully. It is also important that sufficient budget is allocated for the project closing process. Electronic archiving of project documents is recommended to facilitate the project closing. Other challenge identified for project closing process is lessons-learned management. Lessons learned from all offices need to be captured, analyzed for follow-up actions or recommendations, archived, and internally published. Lessons learned are proprietary and required careful review before they are published to avoid any commercial or legal impacts. Some EPC companies may have a corporate function dedicated to manage lessons learned from all projects. If not, the project management team in the lead office should be responsible for managing lessons learned from all offices. As this is a part of project closing, management of lessons learned needs to be planned, scheduled and have budget provided for like other project work. Project Scope Management After the preliminary project scope statement is developed, the project scope must be further refined. Scope allocation among the offices is a major part of scope management for MOE projects. Depending on the types of projects, the scope can be further divided vertically or horizontally. For example, oil and gas facility construction projects normally divide scope vertically by geographical areas of the facilities while power plant construction projects usually divide the scope horizontally, by specialized technical systems such as steam lines, control systems, rotating equipments, etc. Nevertheless, the project scope should be divided in the fashion that requires as little coordination as possible. In reality establishing a balance between MOE scope division and effort to coordinate the project scopes becomes a fine art for the project management team. Several criteria are used to allocate the scopes among the multiple offices. These include expertise and experience, cost, resource availability, and organizational strategy. The lead office is mainly responsible for scope allocation. It is identified in this paper that clear understanding of scope is one of the key elements to successful MOE. Therefore, it is highly recommended that the lead office organize kick-off meetings to engage the support offices as soon as possible in order to develop the scope definition and WBS. It is crucial that these processes are a joint effort between the lead office and support offices. This will develop a better understanding of the scope and a sense of ownership for the support offices which will later benefit the scope control process (e.g., recognizing scope changes and their impacts). Tools that are used for scope planning are responsibility matrices that clearly indicate the responsibility among the offices at project deliverable level (e.g., division of responsibility, material assignment schedule, control and monitoring needs, etc.). Detail responsibility to verify and accept the project deliverables can also be included in the responsibility matrix. Critical deliverables are accepted directly by the lead office for review before transferring to the Client, while the other deliverables can be submitted directly by the support offices to the Client. However, the lead office has overall responsibility to ensure that the project deliverables are completed as per project scope. The scope should be controlled centrally by the lead office as a part of integrated change management discussed in the previous section. As a result, it is important that the lead office has a good understanding and control of the scopes that are performed by all offices. Project Time Management Project work broken down into tangible components and assigned to a resource is essential for schedule development. Project schedules should be developed by the lead office in close communication and cooperation of support offices. The lead office usually initiates high-level schedule which contains major project milestones usually knows as master schedule, then the support offices provide detail information (e.g., activity sequence, activity resource estimating and activity duration estimating) to be incorporated into the master schedule. Once the project schedule is developed and adopted as a time management tool, activity status information required to update this schedule is collected from all offices. It is important that all offices follow the master project schedule. Use of universal scheduling tools that provides visibility to all offices particularly benefits the MOE execution. Communicating and resolving schedule misalignments among offices is considered to be one of the challenges for MOE. Therefore, it is recommended that the master schedule control is centralized and the lead office assign personnel to coordinate schedule information from all offices. Project Cost Management Cost estimating is a significant activity during the early execution of the project. During the early stage the scope and responsibilities are with the lead office, therefore the cost estimating is also performed by the lead office. Early estimates are conceptual estimates with some details (e.g., major equipment cost, estimated bulk quantities and construction cost). When further design development takes place and if significant scopes are allocated to support offices, area estimators could be assigned to provide input to the lead estimating team. Detail estimates are developed when significant engineering is completed. Input and feedback from all the execution offices are used in developing detail estimates. Once the detailed estimates are approved and implemented each support office is responsible for its scope of work. Typically, total cost management and final reporting remain the responsibilities of the lead office. Cost control strategy can be either centralized or decentralized, depending upon the scope splits, project staffing, level of effort needed to control and report project cost. For instance, if a support office is allocated a small scope (e.g., the support office only produces isometric drawings), total cost control can be performed by the lead office. On the other hand, if a support office has significant scope (i.e. a complete plant area), cost control for that area can be assigned to the support office with periodic reporting to the lead office. Regardless of centralized or decentralized cost control strategy, the lead office has a responsibility to control and report to the Client overall project cost. Project Quality Management The quality planning should be initiated by the lead office with consideration to Clients quality standards and requirements. Project quality assurance and quality control are typically executed by all offices. For the MOE projects that involve support offices from foreign countries or from different companies, different quality practices may be allowed as long as they comply with the project quality management plan. In case the quality assurance and control of support offices do not comply to project quality plan, the lead office may need to execute these two processes as appropriate. Project Human Resource Management For MOE projects, the lead office should initiate the human resource planning by providing allocated man-hour budget to the support offices. Factors such as capability, reliability, quality, and expertise of the support offices should also be considered when developing the budgets. Then the support offices are responsible for developing their own staffing plans. The lead office should also ensure that: the budgets allocated to the support offices are appropriate; all managers are trained to do staff planning; and the staffing plans developed by the support offices align with project plans (e.g., budget, schedule, and scopes of work). As leadership is crucial for project success, the project lead roles (e.g., engineering leads) in the support offices should be identified early. These lead roles provide direction to the teams and are communicating channels between the lead office and the support offices. Some projects may instead select to assign a coordinating role for smaller scope of work allocated to the support offices. Lead offices may influence staff assignments at support offices especially for the lead positions. However, the support offices are usually responsible for acquiring their own project teams for the reasons that they have better knowledge and understanding of their staff as well as they are directly responsible for the staff career development. MOE projects have to overcome many challenges in developing the project team. Phone calls and meetings between offices in different time zones are more difficult to arrange while communicating only via emails may not be an ideal approach to develop a working relationship. Cultures and languages also add challenges to communication. It also takes time to develop trust and working relationship between offices which is a challenge for offices that have never worked together before or offices that have high-turnover or are downsized. Other challenges are standardizing or aligning work processes. This paper identifies that having staff from the leading office visit support offices at regular intervals and vice versa is an effective approach to build project team for MOE projects. These visits could be for training, meetings, or trouble shootings. The project should arrange these visits as often as possible during the project life cycle. VDO conference is also recommended as a more effective meeting tool than just a phone conference. The project management should be instrumental in arrange all-office team building activities such as project progress presentation, discipline presentations and recognition and reward program. Each office is responsible for managing its own staff. However, the lead office needs to manage overall performances of the support offices. Cultural difference should be considered for appropriate management style. It should also be noted that the performances between offices should not be compared without understanding the legitimate factors that may impact the performance from each office (e.g., expertise experience). Other challenge found in managing the MOE team is that delivery and performance issues (e.g., rework, delay, or actual amount of remaining work) may not be communicated to the lead office. These are often driven by fear of negative consequences such as losing work. Therefore, it is important to set reasonable performance targets based on capability of the support offices and the lead office provides support in solving any performance issues such as training and trouble shooting. Project Communication Management As a part of communication planning, it is recommended that the stakeholder analysis is performed for all offices to determine the project communication requirements. Communication planning should address information, information originator, information receiver, frequency, and communication medium. It is important that the lead office is the only point of contact for handling commercial and contractual matters. When appropriate, mass communication methods such as group email, project portal, shared drive are recommended for MOE projects. It is important that project changes (e.g., revisions) are communicated with high priority between offices to prevent rework, especially if work is shared between multiple offices (e.g., outputs from one office become inputs for the other offices). To facilitate the information distribution during the execution phase, the use of information distribution matrix is recommended. The matrix determines the list of employees that the information is to be distributed to and is managed by document management group. Overall project performance reporting should be a responsibility of the lead office with inputs from support offices. The performance reporting should be included in the communication management plan. Reporting schedule and format should be developed and agreed upon by all offices. Necessary trainings (e.g., use of tools to collect performance information, data gathering and data analysis) should be provided to all offices to ensure reporting accuracy and consistency. Project Procurement Management One of procurement decisions to be made at the beginning of an MOE project is purchasing and managing strategy for each material commodity. It is generally more economical that bulk material (e.g., bulk piping materials, steel, and cables) requirements from all offices are consolidated and purchased together by the lead office. However, commodities that require customized engineering design such as mechanical and electrical equipments may be managed more effectively if they are procured by the same engineering office. After the decisions are made, the procurement organization then can be setup to support the commodity management strategy. It is a best practice to have procurement organizations in all engineering offices. However, some smaller projects may choose to setup only one project procurement organization in the lead offices. Subcontract function (which is a part of procurement management per project pr

Vampires and Vampirism Essay -- exploratory essay research paper

Vampires and Vampirism Missing Works Cited    The vampire of today is most commonly associated with the type that was created by Bram Stoker when Dracula was published in 1897 (Florescu and McNally 221). This popular cultural icon is described by Stoker in his novel: "The teeth were strong and white, and the canine teeth protruded over the lower lip when the mouth was closed. The [vampire's] hands were large and powerful, the nails black and pointed like a bird's talons" (qtd. in Florescu and McNally 227). However popular, the vampire-as-monster theme has not always been the primary way of employing this motif. The vampire of the English Romantics served more as symbol or as a metaphor rather than an actual character that haunted the night, plunging his fangs into the neck of unsuspecting victims to drain them of their life's blood (South 251). Indeed, the use of vampirism symbolically could actually be considered a "stock literary motif" in the nineteenth century (Grudin 52). The themes of sex and violence that are the essence of the vampire serve to expose the sexual and psychological uneasiness that reside deep inside human beings through interaction with these creatures (South 251). This creature is used as an element in nineteenth-century literature as a combination of all of the classic elements that distinguish the vampire from other creatures and to examine human experience. The vampire's English literary life began in 1819, when The Vampyre was published. The author of this novel was John Polidori, Lord Byron's doctor and companion, who finished the idea that Byron had started but never completed. The popularity of this novel resulted in what could be called a "vampire craze" in the 1820s in both English and F... ...e alive by moonlight while others will perish from the light of the sun. Some central similarities that span cultures are the importance of blood, the sexual connotation associated with the relationship between vampire and victim, the rancid odor they emit, the fact that they eat little, if any, food, and perhaps the most disheartening to humans, their inability to die. The central themes of vampire folklore seem to be violence and sexuality (South 246). It is not difficult to relate the penetration of the (usually male) vampire's long fangs into its (usually female) victim and the ensuing ecstasy that results from the consumption of blood with the act of penetration. The vampire/victim relationship may also be seen as one of domination/submission because vampires were seen as power-seeking beings who will seek relationships that satisfy this need (Auerbach 6).

The Communist System of Government

Communism is an ideal society that is unrealistic for humans to maintain. In this system major resources and means of production are owned by the community rather than by individuals. The society is without money, without a state, without property and without social classes. All people would contribute to the society according to their ability and take from the society according to their needs. Fredrick Engel's believed that a proletarian could only be liberated by abolishing competition, private property, and all class differences, and replacing it with association. The concept was derived from ancient sources, such as Plato's Republic and the earliest Christian communes. In the early 19th century, the idea of a communist society was a response to the poor social classes that developed during the beginning of modern capitalism. Communal societies have existed for centuries, yet they eventually failed. Throughout history, religious groups have had the most success in maintaining communes. The Roman Catholic Church established monasteries all over Europe in the middle Ages. Most of these small-scale private xperiments involved voluntary cooperation, with everyone participating in the governing process. Philosophers Karl Marx and Fredric Engel influenced the movement of communism greatly. In the late 1800's the two discovered that they had individually come to ideal opinions on the perfect society. They collaborated their ideas in their most famous â€Å"Communist Manifesto†, as well as many other informative pamphlets. Third World countries striving for national independence and social change experimented with their philosophies on economics. Fredrick Engel wrote, â€Å"The general co-operation of all members f society for the purpose of planned exploitation of the forces of production, the expansion of production to the point where it will satisfy the needs of all, the abolition of a situation in which the needs of some are satisfied at the expense of the needs of others, the complete liquidation of classes and their conflicts, the rounded development of the capacities of all members of society through the elimination of the present division of labor, through industrial education, through engaging in varying activities, through the participation by all n the enjoyments produced by all, through the combination of city and country — these are the main consequences of the abolition of private property. The philosopher's ideals were kindled by the mistreatment of the working class throughout history. Every social system of the past, Marx argued, had been a device by which the rich and powerful few could live by the toil and misery of the powerless many, therefore causing class differences and conflict. Engel and Marx believed that the capitalist system was flawed and was bound to destroy itself. They tried to show that the more productive the system became, the more difficult it would be to make it function: The more goods it accumulated, the less use it would have for these goods; the more people it trained, the less it could utilize their talents. Capitalism, in short, would eventually choke on its own wealth. Poverty rapidly spread through civilized countries during the industrial revolution in the late 18th century. It was precipitated by the discovery of the steam engine, mechanical loom, and other various mechanical devices. Only â€Å"big capitalists† could afford the expensive achines, which transformed the entire mode of production. Former workers were replaced by machines, which were more productive, along with cheaper labor. Industrial product (brought about by machine labor) prices decreased, completely destroying the old system of hand labor. Within no time the bourgeoisie (big capitalists) increased profits and the former workers remained with nothing. The former workers, proletarians were then forced to work minimum wage for the bourgeoisie. They only provided the lower class enough money to survive, so they would not be able to rise above their class. So as the old saying goes, â€Å"the rich got richer and the poor only got poorer†. Many countries were revolutionized by Europe's mechanical industry production. Countries such as India and China were complete strangers to historical development, until they were violently forced out of their isolation. They bought cheaper commodities from the English and allowed their own manufacturing workers to wither away. Due to the one world market, civilized countries have repercussions in third world countries. By abolishing private property, competition would become obsolete. Karl Marx did not think that competition and individual management of industry could be separated, so his solution was to destroy both of the problems with one stone. He wanted to limit private property through progressively increasing property taxes (basically taxing the bourgeoisie). By removing competition, greediness would be eliminated. â€Å"Greediness is a consequence of capitalism and is merely a learned quality†, explains Kominf. If all humans were treated equally, there would be no need to compete with one another. In the ideal society, the state would provide ducation for all children. The children would be trained for a variety of occupations. Thus entering the work force, they would be prepared for a variety of jobs. Workers would rotate occupations in response to the needs of society. No longer would they be bound or exploited to their occupation. This would remove class differences, such as the one-sided character that is transfixed upon our current society. The variety of classes would soon disappear because there would no longer be a division of labor. Within a communistic society commodities are traded, opposed to using money. Commodities value is based upon the amount of labor time that was necessary to produce the product. However, this could result in a situation in which a lazy worker taking their time about making a commodity makes a commodity worth much more than the commodity made by a hard working efficient worker. If this were the case then employers would be sacking their diligent workers while telling the rest to go as slow as they can. Instead of Right-Wing politicians lambasting the poor for being lazy they would be lambasting them for being too hard working. This is not, however, what determines the value of a commodity. What determines the value of a commodity is the labor time socially necessary for its production. Shortages, inequalities, and coercive government have persisted in countries that call themselves ‘communist'. The followers of Marx that have come into power in nations have lacked some preconditions that Marx and Engel considered essential. Russia was one of the first countries to experiment with their own revised version of communism. In the early years its enemies within the country challenged the government's very existence repeatedly. The country strived to transform their backward country into a leading industrial nation and first rate military power. However this task required harsh discipline imposed only by an unrelenting dictatorship. Which controlled all of citizens activities. The resulting system of total control has been labeled totalitarianism. Totalitarianism by no means carried out Marx and Engel visions of utopia. The country's cultural and intellectual life remained under the control of the ruling party. Eventually in the early 1980's, the USSR had become the world's second-ranking industrial power. Its armed might and industrial potential were backed by important scientific advances and by a generally high level of technical education. However, their living conditions were low in comparison to that of the Western countries. The success was not maintained for more than a decade. In 1991 the political struggle led to the collapse of the Soviet Communist Party. In order for communism to succeed, it must be world wide. This is because of our one world market that exists in modern day. Countries in the world depend on one another for economical growth. Although with this dependency, the countries rise and fall with one another's economy. The internet is spreading the word of communism. Groups represented throughout the world are preparing for a future revolution. Unfortunately they are not afraid of brutally taking lives to get what they want. It is expected that one day the large number of the working class will join together and revolt against their higher class. If communism were to be world wide, they would be able to completely abolish competition. Within removing competition, people's trait of greediness would soon wither.

Oedipus Rex, Good vs Evil - 1130 Words

Aristotle also outlined the characteristics of a good tragic hero. He must be better than we are, a man who is superior to the average man in some way. In Oedipus s case, he is superior not only because of social standing, but also because he is smart  ¬ he is the only person who could solve the Sphinx s riddle. At the same time, a tragic hero must evoke both pity and fear, and Aristotle claims that the best way to do this is if he is imperfect. A character with a mixture of good and evil is more compelling that a character who is merely good. And Oedipus is definitely not perfect; although a clever man, he is blind to the truth and refuses to believe Teiresias s warnings. Although he is a good father, he unwittingly fathered children†¦show more content†¦Finding out who his true father is seems important for someone who has just been told he will kill his father. Nor is Oedipus particularly intelligent about the way he conducts himself. Even though he did not know that La ius and Jocasta were his parents, he still does kill a man old enough to be his father and marry a woman old enough to be his mother. One would think that a man with as disturbing a prophesy over his head as Oedipus would be very careful about who he married or killed. Blindly he pursues the truth when others warn him not to; although he has already fulfilled the prophesy, he does not know it, and if he left well enough alone, he could continue to live in blissful ignorance. But instead he stubbornly and foolishly rummages through his past until he discovers the awful truth. In this way, Jocasta s death and his blindness are his own fault. GOODNESS IN OEDIPUS: The statement Life is a constant struggle between good and evil is valid. All people have admirable traits. These same people may also have a despicable side to them. This is proven in the tragedy Oedipus the King by Sophocles. Oedipus is characterized as an admirable ruler. He is a man of action. Before he is even asked by his people, he sent Creon to the Oracle at Delphi. He also sent for Tiresias. Oedipus also cares a great deal about Thebes.Show MoreRelatedThe Difference Between Good And Evil?978 Words   |  4 PagesEnglish CP10 Final Draft 16 Oct. 2014 O vs. C What is the difference between good and evil? How can one person’s life be more tragic than another? What is a tragedy? â€Å"A tragedy is a dramatic composition, often in verse, dealing with a serious or somber theme, typically that of a great person destined through a flaw of character or conflict with some overpowering force, as fate or society, to downfall or destruction† (Dictionary.com). The play Oedipus Rex by Sophocles includes different rulingsRead MoreOedipus Rex1350 Words   |  6 PagesGreek Tragedy The Greek drama Oedipus Rex is clearly a tragedy. It definitely meets the five main criteria for a tragedy: a tragic hero of noble birth, a tragic flaw, a fall from grace, a moment of remorse, and catharsis. Interestingly, even though Oedipus the King came before Poetics, Sophocles’ play illustrates Aristotle’s rules for classical drama. Oedipus the King particularly displays a tragic emotion, a tragic character, and a tragic fall. Aristotle also writes that such a drama ought to haveRead More Destiny, Fate, Free Will and Free Choice in Oedipus the King3894 Words   |  16 PagesThe Concept of Fate in Oedipus Rex  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚        Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   To the first-time reader of Sophocles’ tragedy, Oedipus Rex, it seems that the gods are in complete domination of mankind. This essay will seek to show that this is not the case because the presence of a tragic flaw within the protagonist is shown to be the cause of his downfall.    In the opening scene of the tragedy the priest of Zeus itemizes for the king what the gods have done to the inhabitants of Thebes:    A blight isRead MoreAnalysis Of Henrik Ibsen s A Doll s House 1325 Words   |  6 Pages20, 1828 - May 23, 1906) and â€Å"Oedipus the King†, by Sophocles (which is an Athenian tragedy performed 495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.) both have men who were destroyed by a secret which lead them to their horrible outcomes on life because of the conflicts in their relationships with their families although, both pieces of Literature were written many years apart from each other and in different areas of time. Two characters who share some of the same qualities are Oedipus from â€Å"Sophocles’† and Torvil fromRead MoreCan You Truly Ever Escape?2156 Words   |  9 PagesGreek tragedy. The most memorable of his warnings was in Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, king of Thebes that he was the land’s pollution. The prophet Tiresias spoke the truth about Oedipus—â€Å"God within reckon that out, and if you find me mistaken, say I have no skill in prophecy†Ã¢â ‚¬â€denouncing the tragedy, as the angry Oedipus begins his painful search for the truth about himself. However, the prophecy is Oedipus’s ultimate demise. Oedipus fought the limits of free will by ignoring social ques, and even disbelievingRead MoreViolence in the Arts Ââ€" Plato vs. Aristotle Essay1285 Words   |  6 PagesViolence in The Arts Ââ€" Plato vs. Aristotle Nowadays, it is hard to turn on a television program, catch a movie or buy your younger sibling a video game without encountering a warning for extreme violence. Everyday, our lives are exposed to violence on the screen, whether it is in the latest Sopranos episode or even watching the six oclock news. For quite a while now, people have been demanding that stricter censorship be placed on the media, especially those programs and video games that canRead MoreSins Of The Fathers : Man s Hubris Vs. Fate s Intervention2466 Words   |  10 Pages Sins of the Fathers: Man’s hubris vs. Fate’s intervention in the Theban plays. The sins of the fathers in the Theban plays written by Sophocles, illustrates the conflicts between man’s actions against the power of unwritten law, the willingness to ignore the truth, the misused limits of free will, and the false notion of beating the ways of fate. The fathers, chronologically Lauis, Oedipus, and Creon all exemplify people who acted in ways to avoid the predestined fates set up on themRead MoreHow to Read Lit Like a Prof Notes3608 Words   |  15 Pagesa. Whenever people eat or drink together, it’s communion b. Not usually religious c. An act of sharing and peace d. A failed meal carries negative connotations 3. Nice to Eat You: Acts of Vampires a. Literal Vampirism: Nasty old man, attractive but evil, violates a young woman, leaves his mark, takes her innocence b. Sexual implications—a trait of 19th century literature to address sex indirectly c. Symbolic Vampirism: selfishness, exploitation, refusal to respect the autonomy of other people, usingRead MoreIslamic Terrorism and the Attack of September 11 Essay3155 Words   |  13 Pagessays this is a campaign against evil . . . .[and that ] we face a brand of evil the likes of which weve never seen (speaking in Chicago Sept. 27)? When viewed though a mythic methodological lens, I was reminded of the ancient wisdom in the classical Greek tragedy, Oedipus Rex. I wondered if the same myth was being enacted in the American psyche through the words that George Bush uttered. Recall how at the beginning of the tragedy, Oedipus vows to seek out the evil that has brought a plague to ThebesRead MoreThe Sisters Brothers Notes : Trouble With The Horses4563 Words   |  19 Pagesweapon on him. Nothing bad happened o → Theme of good vs. evil: Eli is more of the calmer and reasoning character, Charlie is almost blood hungry †¢ The commodore is wealthy †¢ Eli’s face becomes swollen †¢ Dr. Watts- business man/dentist. His business have a failed- he’s a failure †¢ Watts says the cause of Eli’s swelling is unknown. †¢ Charlie goes to the saloon and when he returns he points his gun at Watts with anger †¢ Eli isn’t feeling too good, so they stop at a home where an old woman answers

School, Work, Friends Stress in Teens - 2026 Words

SCHOOL, WORK, FRIENDS†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. WHAT TO DO! Stress is the most common thing in a teen’s life. The most common stressors are School, Work, Family Environment, and even Friendships/relationships. Those are the top categories that teens stress about. Most of the stress is natural and normal, but too much stress can cause serious problems. It is said that female teens have a higher rate than boys to stress out (http://www.nbcnews.com/id/20322801#.UqJn8UPnaUk). Teens should learn how to manage stress in a productive and calming way.Excessive stress can build up making it hard to focus on things that are important. Too much stress can make it harder to fight illnesses like the cold. It also makes it hard time fighting against cancer. How a person†¦show more content†¦Teens have to deal with their drama on top of whatever they are going through. When your friends break up with their boyfriends/girlfriends that somehow will affect other people, and their lives. They would want their friends to take their side (T.H.Hol mes pg. 5-7). Friends can affect you by peer pressure and the fact that they tell them everything. When teens tell their friends everything that happened about a certain thing, teens then are part of drama and stressful situations.People would want them to tell what happened, which is also part of drama. The story is converted or twisted to make it seem interesting. This has to deal with peer Pressure. Peer Pressure is a really big thing when it comes to social events and more importantly friends. Your friends want to take up most of your time.But that is not always convenient. It is a good idea to hang out with your friends just don’t do it all the time (Chisholm, Patricia). Make time to do other important things to. It also doesn’t help that your friends don’t care about the same things. Of course you like some things or teens wouldn’t be friends. You might think that school is important and you spend a lot of time on homework, they might only think ab out drama and partying all the time. That could be stressful because the fact that you want to go out and have fun, you have other things to do. You are probably asking how this stresses teens out; well teens worry or think about either going out with yourShow MoreRelatedThe Destruction of Stress in the Lives of Teenagers801 Words   |  4 PagesLarge amounts of stress in a teenager’s life can lead them down a destructive path. This problem occurs every day, and is a common occurrence in every teen’s life. There are many different causes of stress and even more ways it can affect the person. Mandy causes of stress may include: expectations from loved ones and teachers, family problems, social issues, and balancing school, extracurricular activities, and work. Some teens are very good at managing their time while others cannot handle as muchRead MoreStress in Teens: When is it too much?1059 Words   |  5 Pagesyoung woman. She encompasses a big group of friends and gets pretty sensible grades. She appears to have herself together. No one realizes what she has to undergo to keep herself that way. She is making an attempt to balance school, work, and sports. She feels flooded perpetually because she feels she has no time. Eventually she breaks down. She stops making an attempt in class, equal her job, and gets launched the volleyball team. Giant amounts of stress on a young person will lead them down a destructiveRead MoreTeenage Pregnancy : A Growing Epidemic1733 Words   |  7 Pagesthe incidents that happen with accidental teenage pregnancy are spontaneous acts that involved a lack of education and parental guidance. Two years ago, 19.4 percent of teen girls got pregnant in Maryland, according to The Office of Adolescent Health. According to guttmacher.org, â€Å"Although 70% of girls use contraceptives, most teen pregnancies happen because of misuse or failure of birth control† (http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_contr_use.html) For example, a guy and girl are in a bedroom, andRead MoreThe Death Of A Girl1236 Words   |  5 PagesImagine this. There is a fifteen-year-old girl walking into first block at her high school. She is trying to remember what is due today for her first class and the rest to follow. Today is a different day though; it is the one-year anniversary of her stepbrother committing suicide. Not everyone knows that today is the day, but she doesn’t want to talk about it. She is stressed about the homework she might not have done and her mind is in so many different places. The first bell rings so she takesRead MoreWhat ´s Teen Anxiety?817 Words   |  4 Pageshad an increase in teens recently. In the last 30 years, the statistics for anxiety in fifteen to sixteen year olds have doubled for both girls and boys (â€Å"Increased Levels of Anxiety†¦Ã¢â‚¬  1). It is said, â€Å"in societal moments like the one we are in†¦it often feels as if ours is the Age of Anxiety†(Henig 1). Anxiety affects teenagers profusely because the emotions of a teenager are more vulnerable than those of an adult. The brain of a teenager is not fully developed and the stress put on teenagers toRead MoreEffects Of Stress On Young Adults1667 Words   |  7 Pagespositive stress, stress in young adults has become an overwhelming obstacle in the way many of them function; managing, utilizing, and overcoming stress will help them become more successful in life. Stress is the body s normal emotional and physical response to different stimuli and different situations that it may encounter. Any situation, either positive or negative, may start to become dangerous when it builds up to a point of being overwhelmed. It is a common experience for teens to feelRead MoreStress And Its Effect On Our Lives1494 Words   |  6 PagesSinister Stress Everyone has stress, but not everyone realizes the impact it has on their lives. Most people don’t realize or understand the amount of stress they are under. What used to be considered extreme levels of stress has become normal in today’s society. Most people, adults especially, don’t realize that teens largely experience these high levels of stress. Before talking about the stress that teens experience, though, it is best to understand what stress is and why one has it. Stress is a naturalRead MoreThe Effects Of Homework On Teens Sleep Schedules, Stress Levels, And After School Opportunities1632 Words   |  7 Pagesstarted homework as a way of punishing his students for not doing their work. Nowadays, homework is assigned to help students receive more practice for what they learned in school that day. Despite the good intentions that homework is supposed to provide, it actually proves more harm than good. In the twenty-first century, the increase of homework negatively affects American teens’ sleep schedules, stress levels, and after school opportunities. Parent involvement in homework can turn into parent interferenceRead MoreTeen Stress Essay871 Words   |  4 PagesMany people in high school, mostly teens, experience dozens of pressure in their life. To be specific, Schoolwork. Most teens want to excel in school, but want to have a social life or play some kind of sport. One thing that teens don’t understand is that once you’re out of high school, you have college, and then maybe graduate school. Our education will not be over just in High School. You have to work hard and these four years of your life, will impact everything that you do. If you mess up evenRead MoreMajor Stressors in Teens Lives1236 Words   |  5 PagesMajor Stressors In Teens’ Lives What is stress actually and how do we determine who is stressed? Most of us describe stress as when everything became too much that we are overloaded and wonder if we can cope with the amount of pressure placed upon us. Stress actually is anything that poses challenge or a threat to our well-being is a stress. While most people took stress as something negative, it can also be a good thing as it gets you going in life – when there are problems which need to be solved

Gm Powertrain - 1906 Words

Introduction Joe Hinrichs, a recent Harvard Business school graduate, was hired in February 1996 to run the General Motors’s the Fredericksburg Torque Converter Clutch (TCC) manufacturing plant. At 29 years old, Hinrichs was GM’s youngest plant manager. Hinrichs was inheriting a poor performing plant that continually underachieved, losing money year after year. Improvements were desperately needed to increase the efficiency of the manufacturing process and reduce operating costs. GM had considered shutting down the plant; however, when a new bonding process, using carbon fiber, for the TCC was approved in 1995, GM instead invested thirty million dollars into the Fredericksburg plant to incorporate the new process.†¦show more content†¦He knew that if he could reconfigure the plant away from assembly lines and into individual work stations, workers would be able to take more ownership of their work, producing better quality parts and be self-motivated by being able to measure their individual output, increasing job satisfaction. The new cells turned out to be a hit. Workers were excited about having more control over their output and being part of the new process. Hinrichs’s active management of change within the factory and focus on worker satisfaction and buy-in resulted in a lot of small victories that he used to win over the workforce’s trust and respect. In the process, Hinrichs transformed the plant from one that was resistant to change to one that embraced and was excited for change. Process Improvements One of the biggest needs for improvement was the assembly process. Although several changes were made throughout the years, quality and efficiency still fell below expectations. Hinrichs implemented the newly developed assembly which consists of two separate work stations that allowed operators in the adjacent stations to share the expensive balancer machine. These assembly cells were much more efficient as workers were no longer forced to wait for another person or machine in the process. Each cell was built like the other with quick turn set-up which created flexibility in the process while also reducing tooling inventory by almost a half. Now cellsShow MoreRelatedEssay on Gm Powertrain Case Analysis2578 Words   |  11 PagesGM Powertrain: Case Study Shannon Mitchell Regis University October 30, 2011 History The General Motors (GM) manufacturing plant located in Fredericksburg, VA was purchased and renovated by GM in 1978. Although this is a small plant comparatively to many of GM’s other plants it is a staple within the small town of Fredericksburg. As a major producer of the Torque Converter Clutch (TCC) for GM’s automatic transmission worldwide the Fredericksburg plant plays a key role in GM’s manufacturingRead More General Motors Inc. Essay examples1410 Words   |  6 Pageswhich are essential to competing in the global market place.(2) In the spirit of entrepreneurship, which is the process of discovering new ways of combining resources,(5) General Motors is a majority shareholder in GM Daewoo Auto Technology Company of South Korea, and has product, powertrain and purchasing collaborations with Suzuki Motor Corporation in Japan.(3) These associations allow General Motors to maneuver into specific customer markets and broaden its product base. Being an inno vative organizationRead MoreGeneral Motors Corporation ( Gm )1074 Words   |  5 PagesGeneral Motors Corporation (GM) General Motors Corporation (GM) is another leader in the automobile industry. It is located in Detroit and operates in almost 157 countries. It has close to 207,000 employees. Its products are Chevrolet, GMC, Buick and Cadillac. GM revenue was almost $155.4 billion globally during 2013 (Ruiz, 2014). Financial performance. According to GM’s 2014 10-K, over the past five years, GM’s revenue is expected to increase from 9.6% to $19.7 billion. GM filed for bankruptcy inRead MoreFord Motor Company: the Product Warranty Program1730 Words   |  7 Pagesyear/12000 miles in 1970. Any additional warranty to powertrain was made optional. Rivalry competition on warranties Chrysler had mean the most aggressive warranty marketer in the industry and they increased powertrain basic warranty from 2 year/24000 miles to 5 years/50000 miles by positioning their car as higher quality than before. This caused Ford and GM to lost 0.5% market share each. Due to this, in 1986, they both increased the powertrain basic warranty to 3years / unlimited miles. As a supportRead MoreThe General Motors, Ford and Honda Companies904 Words   |  4 Pagesand Honda. General Motors (GM)’s has different brands, including, Buick, Cadillac, GMC, and Chevrolet. Ford’s major products inclu de the Ford Fiesta, Ford Mustang, Ford Focus, and Ford Explorer. Volkswagen is known for their VW Passat and Jetta. While Honda’s main attractions are their Honda Civic and Honda Accord. According to Bloomberg Personal Finance, worldwide vehicle sales at Toyota rose 2.4 percent to 9.98 million units last year. This resulted in Toyota leading GM and Volkswagen in global autoRead MoreEssay On 2018 Ram 3500945 Words   |  4 Pagesabout the most crucial mechanical functions. This truck has been designed to separate itself from its competitors like GM and Ford. For example, you have a solid front axle, and you can choose from either rear wheel drive or four-wheel drive. The height adjustments and air suspension also help to make this one of the best vehicles in its class. 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Husted Delphi Corporation Reprinted From: Hybrid Vehicle and Energy Storage Technologies (SP-1789) Future Transportation Technology Conference Costa Mesa, California June 23-25, 2003 400 Commonwealth Drive, Warrendale, PA 15096-0001 U.S.A. Tel: (724) 776-4841 Fax: (724) 776-5760 Web: www.sae.org All rights reserved. No part of this publication may beRead MoreGeneral Motors, And Tesla Motor s Competitive Strategies2209 Words   |  9 PagesThis study discusses Toyota, General Motors’ (GM), and Tesla Motor’s competitive strategies. These three companies are top leaders in the automotive industry, and this paper focuses on what their current strategies are and how they develop and manage their opportunities. The paper will also address what can impact these three companies, how they protect their company from competitors, and some recommendations for each companies. Industry Analysis between Toyota and General Motors, and Tesla MotorRead MoreConsumer Opinions And Observations Regarding The American Auto Industry847 Words   |  4 Pagesmemories, not just lawsuits and Congressional investigations, are what GM has to work hardest to overcome.† (Forbes Welcome, n.d.) â€Å"The auto maker GM for example, lost its position as the world’s biggest automaker and it wound up in a government-sponsored Chapter 11 filing, which cost American taxpayers $50 million.† (Forbes Welcome, n.d.) What we have seen in recent years is a huge decline in quality, and some auto makers like GM are running to fix their tarnished reputatins, but the recalls contunie

National Commercial Banking Corporation - Free Samples to Student

Question: Discuss about the National Commercial Banking Corporation. Answer: Introduction: The law which governs the relationship between the principal and its agent is the agency Law. Under this law, the principal is held responsible for the acts which are undertaken by his agent, to a third party (Munday, 2010, p. 13). Agency governs the relationship between a principal, and its agent, and in such cases, the agent acts on behalf of its principal. The raison d'tre behind the agency law stems from the absence of awareness to the third party, regarding the presence of authority with agent, for their acts, and so, the principal is held liable for the conduct of their agent (Busch, Macgregor and Watts, 2016, p. 37). It can be broadly made two forms, the first one is the actual authority and the other one is the apparent authority. In actual authority, the individual has the express authority to work on behalf of the principal (Murdoch, 2014, p. 5). The other is the apparent or ostensible authority, under which, the conduct of the principal is such, which leads the third party into believing that there was a presence of the required authority to do the act, even when in actuality, the same authority had never been awarded to the agent (Patterson Law, 2012). In a leading case of Freeman and Lockyer v Buckhurst Park Properties (Mangal) Ltd [1964] 2 QB 480, the plaintiff initiated legal action against the defendant, along with Kapoor, the director of the company, for the unpaid payment of thee architecture work fees. Though, the director was never appointed as the MD or the Managing Director of the company, it was always portrayed that he was the holder of this position. And the other directors were aware about this portrayal. Hence, due to the presence of ostensible authority, the defendant was held liable for the unpaid payment (PQ Magazine, 2017). In another legal case of Hely-Hutchinson v Brayhead Ltd [1967] 1 QB 549, the defendant was sued by the plaintiff for failing in finishing the takeover deal, as a result of which, a loss was incurred. In this case, the plaintiff was the de facto MD and the CEO of the company and had guaranteed the repayment of money. Though, the payment was denied to the plaintiff and it was stated that he did not have the requisite authority to provide any guarantee. Though, it was held by the court that there was a presence of authority and hence, the defendant was required to honor the guarantee given by its agents (Nanda, 2012). In the case of Watteau v Fenwick [1893] 1 QB 346, the beerhouse was operated by Humble and the plaintiff was the cigar supplier. The interest was assigned to the defendant by the plaintiff and the supply of cigars was continued by the plaintiff to Humble; though he was unaware about the participation of the defendant. The plaintiff sued the defendant for nonpayment. It was held that the defendant was liable for the act of its agent, which was Humble in this case, and he had to pay the plaintiff the amount claimed (Smith, 2012). In the given case, Brad was appointed as the agent by Tina. On basis of his apparent authority, he continued to order fuel from Caltex. Though, even when his authority was revoked, he continued to do the same. Caltex had no knowledge about the same. Applying the case of Watteau v Fenwick here, Tina would be liable for the acts of Brad due to the lack of awareness on part of Caltex about the revocation of the authority, and due to the applicability of ostensible authority. This would make her liable to pay the contractual amount to Caltex. Under the agency Law, the agents have the implied duty of acting in good faith and ensuring fair dealing in the work they undertake on behalf of the principal (Maughan and Wells, 2013). A number of duties are owed by an agent to the principal. This includes the duty of discharging their duties with care and diligence (US Legal, 2017). In the case of Yam Seng Pte Ltd v International Trade Corporation Ltd [2013] EWHC 111, the exclusive distribution rights were given by ITC to Yam Seng in 2009, as per which the plaintiff could distribute the Manchester United fragrances in Australia, Africa, Asia and Middle East. A case was made by the plaintiff against the defendant in 2010 and it was alleged that the defendant had breached the implied term of good faith by providing false information to the plaintiff. The claims of the plaintiff were upheld and the court held that the defendant had to the duty to be honest as a part of good faith (Jones, 2014). In the given case study, Paul withheld the information about the price of vehicle in the market being $ 25 000. He also failed in informing Tina that Fred, his neighbor, was interested in purchasing the same at this price. He instead lied to Tina about needing the vehicle for himself and sold it to Fred, whereby he made a profit of $ 6,000. This was a clear breach of duty imposed on Paul, by being an agent of Tina. Paul had the duty of being honest to Tina and had to inform her about the interest of Fred and the actual market price of the vehicle. He acted in a dishonest manner and so, as per Yam Seng Pte Ltd v International Trade Corporation Ltd, he breached his duty of acting in good faith. Hence, he would have to compensate Tina for her loss and for the breach of agents duties. Whether the action raised against the partnership firm by both Sunstar Computer Hardware Ltd and You Beaut Ute Ltd would hold, or not? Whether George, Sara and Mary can initiate actions against Simon, or not? Partnership can be defined as an arrangement between the parties, who come to be known as partners, whereby they agree to advance their mutual interests by carrying on a business with the aim of attaining profit. Section 1 of the Partnership Act, 1892 (NSW) contains the definition of partnership as per which, for partnership to exist, there has to be a carrying on of a business, which is common and for attaining profits (NSW Legislation, 2012). Partnership is governed by a document, which is known as a partnership agreement and which covers the details of the partnership (Commins Hendriks Solicitors, 2017). The partnership agreement is basically a contract, which sets out the terms of the partnership (Williams, 2011, p. 335). So, when a term in the contract is breached, a claim can be raised by one party, against the other party, as per the contract Law. In case of such breach of contract, the aggrieved party can initiate actions for damages against the breaching party (Latimer, 2012, p. 469). In some cases, the equitable remedies could also be sought after, which can help in stopping the individual, through an injunction; or ask the individual to do some particular task, in form of specific performance; and even rescind the contract through rescission (Clarke, 2016) . Section 53B of the Partnership Act, 1892 (NSW) contains the provisions regarding the partnership agreement. Due to these reasons, the common law of contract can be applied on the partnership. However, even without a partnership agreement, the Partnership Act of NSW allows the formation of a partnership (NSW Legislation, 2012). In addition to the contract law, the agency law, as highlighted in the previous part, is applicable on the partnership. Due to the applicability of the agency law over partnership, all the partners are liable for the actions of each other to the third party (Parisi, 2017, p. 415). Hence, the acts undertaken by one partner, are binding on the entire partnership. This provision is further contained in section 5 of this act, as per which, the partners have the power of binding the partnership and the other partners, for the actions undertaken by them. Section 9 of this act makes the partners liable for all the obligations and debts of the firm, which were undertaken when the individual was a partner (NSW Legislation, 2012). The rationale behind this is that when the partners act in the course of partnership business, they are to be deemed as each others partners and this was held in the case of Lang v James Morrison Co Ltd (1911) 13 CLR 1 (Jade, 2011). In the case of Phillips-Higgins v Harper [1954] 1 QB 411, it was held that as the partners owe a fiduciary duty towards each other, when one of the partners acts as the agent of the firm, the individual would owe duty towards their partners who owe a similar duty back to the partners (Swarb, 2015a). The case of Mercantile Credit Co Ltd v Garrod [1962] 3 All ER 1103 presents the liability of the partners towards the others. In this case, two individuals were in a partnership, where they carried on a business of leading out garages. Under this agreement, both of these individuals were prohibited from selling the motor vehicles. Even though this prohibition was applicable, one of the individuals sold a motor vehicle to the plaintiff, which was not owned by him. Furthermore, in past, he had sold such vehicles to the plaintiff. So, the partnership was sued by the plaintiff for recovery of damages. Looking at how the transaction appeared to the plaintiff, it was held by the court that from his point, the sale was as per the usual course of business and hence, valid (Swarb, 2015b). However, in the case of National Commercial Banking Corporation of Australia Ltd v Batty (1986) 60 ALJR 379, it was held that the partnership firm would not be liable for the wrongful actions of the partner, as they were not as per the scope of apparent authority of the partner, and further because the money received by the firm was not in the ordinary course of the business of the firm (Jade, 2017). In this particular case, a partnership was formed between Simon, George, Sara and Mary. They decided to form a partnership, for which a partnership agreement was drawn. This partnership agreement gave the individuals the power of entering into transactions on behalf of the company, to the value of $10,000. Simon entered into two contracts, one of which was drawn with Sunstar Computer Hardware Limited to the cost of $12,000. The rules stated above provide that the partners and the partnership firm are liable only when the act is done as per the authority given and in the course of business. In absence of transaction done in normal course of business, the firms cannot be held liable. This was a clear breach of the authority given to him as per the partnership act. Hence, applying the case of National Commercial Banking Corporation of Australia Ltd v Batty, the firm would not be liable for this particular act of Simon. This is because this particular transaction not only breached his apparent authority, but also was not as per the partnership agreement. Hence, Simon would be personally liable for this particular contract. Even though the agency law, the governing sections of the Partnership Act, and the cases like Lang v James Morrison Co Ltd make the other partners liable for the acts of their fellow partner, but being the acts beyond his apparent authority, the partners would not be liable and Simon would be held personally liable for the breach of authority and the partnership deed. Moreover, as Simon breached the partnership deed, which acts as a contract, the other partners can initiate action against Simon for the breach of provisions of the partnership act and the breach of contract. This would hold them in stopping Simon from undertaking more such contracts. However, for the agreement drawn with You Beaut Ute Ltd, the same was as per the authority given to Simon and as per the partnership agreement. Hence, the firm would be liable for this particular contract. 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