Fast Food Nation Fast Essay Example for Free

Fast Food Nation Fast Essay Eric Schlosser is the author who has written about the fast food industry and he presents many of his findings in the book Fast Food Nation. However, his book is not merely an expose of the fast food industry but is even more a consideration of how the fast food industry has shaped and defined American society in America and for other nations as America exports its fast food culture to others. Schlosser describes a great deal of American culture to the fast food mentality, and he finds that globalization is taking the fast food culture around the world at a rapid rate. Schlosser addresses a number of specific issues related to food production and distribution. He connects the social order of a society to the kind of food it eats and the way it eats that food, with American society very much defined by the fast food culture that has developed. Schlosser tends to represent the theory stressing the importance of interdependence among all behavior patterns and institutions within a social system, as can be seen from how he connects fast food to other social processes and institutions. The icon that represents fast food culture for most people is McDonalds, though the fast food culture developed long before the creation of that restaurant chain. Schlosser considers the impact of such fast-food chains but also considers the primacy of the hamburger in the American diet and some of the dangers it poses. McDonalds reliance on hamburger is a questionable item for a steady diet in a more health conscious age, and interferes with local customs and food in different parts of the world. Schlosser addresses this issue from several perspectives, beginning with a consideration of how safe the meat really is, not only on the basis of nutritional value but also on the basis of additives, preservatives, diseases, and even potential radioactivity. Some beef is considered questionable, and much of it makes its way through the USDA to school cafeterias as part of the National School Lunch Program. This is a very damaging charge as the most questionable beef is sent directly to the most vulnerable population, suggesting that protecting the industry is more important to the government than protecting the consumer. The hamburger is connected to a huge industry, which in turn has a vital role in the overall American economy. More than this, the image of the hamburger represents America to many people around the world, and other icons carrying the idea of America is seen in the logos of companies like McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and similar companies. A related food item is the potato, for french fries are apart of in hamburger meals. Schlosser makes it clear to the reader that many of the foods he or she eats have been altered, with artificial flavors added even to natural foods like potatoes. French fries are not simply carved out of potatoes and then cookedthey are also laced with food additives of various sorts, including artificial flavoring, to assure that the flavor is uniform and that it comes through after the processing and cooking. Some additives are also used to maintain the color of the product, so that it appears as the color the consumer associates with a given food even if that would not be the natural color if the food were merely cooked and served. Obviously, all this raises questions about how safe the various additives may be and whether this has been as thoroughly investigated as it should have been. Schlosser points out the process involved but does not take a strong stand against such practices. The way fast food is prepared has made much of this secondary industry necessary, and supports the connection between fast food and the social order made by Schlosser. The work environment is also addressed by Schlosser, and much of what he reports is troubling. The dangerous situation in slaughterhouses has long been known. Schlosser finds that the dangers have not diminished a great deal in the processes of raising, slaughtering, processing and distributing meat products in America in spite of inspections and OSHA regulations and other efforts. Pressure on some companies to increase revenues and profits has also meant companies breaking the law and taking chances with the lives of employees and even the public. Also, many of the workers are illegal immigrants, favored because they are willing to take menial jobs for low wages to raise, pick, transport, and process food. The needs of this industry shape a number of social institutions and also have a direct effect on local communities by bringing in people who require more social services than would otherwise be the norm. Throughout, Schlosser shows not only the dangers inherent in the fast food industry itself but also ways in which this industry has altered American society and may alter society around the world. The underlying force involved is profit rather than food value, and this is raising questions/concerns about the values we are exporting. Work Cited Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation. New York: Perennial, 2002.

Focus magazine :: essays research papers

History of The Company LIBERIS PUBLICATIONS S.A. was founded in its current legal status on the 2.6.1986 (Official Gazette 2324/11.6.86 S.A.s and LTDs Issue) by Antonios Liberis, with the goal of becoming involved in the sector of publications and presswork. In the course of all these years, the company has had a spectacular development, dynamically moving in the sector of publications, launching new and successful magazines that conquered the top ranks amongst their competitors. In addition, by concluding strategic alliances with large foreign companies of the sector, the most noteworthy of which being the participation of the Groupe Edipresse, the Swiss publishing group in the share capital of the company since 1998, and by founding or acquiring shares in new or well-established companies in this market, this company has fortified it position in the Greek publishing market and now expands its activities in new sectors. Today, it is one of the largest publishing companies in Greece, chartered in the stock exchange and heading a group of 2 companies (Mother company and Libecom S.A.). This group employs in total approximately 400 employees, with activities covering a broad spectrum in the media field, from the publishing sector - where it holds a leading position with 24 publications in the Greek market. In addition, the company holds 50% of DESMI PUBLISHING S.A., a company with experience in the field of publications and 10.05% of the daily and periodic press distribution company ARGOS S.A. In March 2000, the second international collaboration of LIBERIS PUBLICATIONS with GRUNER UND JAHR/MONDADORI publishing houses was put into effect with the publication of the scientific magazine FOCUS. This magazine aspires to make the reader become more involved in issues of science, technology, the environment, as well as historical issues. The way, in which all the topics are presented, in conjunction with impressive graphics and photos, has made this magazine not only impressive, but also easy to understand. Environmental analysis Marketing environment Doing a brief environmental analysis we have to examine the 6 basic forces that affect the environment  ·Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Political forces Due to the fact that the specific magazine doesn’t have any political articles with the only exception towards its tendency to protect the environment is not affected by political forces in Greece.  ·Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Legal forces There aren’t any real limitations that affect this specific magazine especially due to the fact that European legislation is currently stronger than the national one as we observed after the last periods legal adventures

Employee Resourcing Essay

Edwards, Scott and Raju (p. 71, 2003) have defined the term recruitment as â€Å"organizational practices and policies developed for the primary purpose of motivating applicants to apply, remain in the candidate pool, and accept offers. † Recruitment has been traditionally considered to have a minor role in the hiring process. Earlier the term recruitment to the hiring managers was primarily a means to indentify and use the sources, for instance the print media, which would give the maximum output in terms of applications from promising candidates. The importance of recruitment has increased multi-fold in recent times. This has been due to trends in 1990s like the changes in market which has necessitated a need for a large work force of specialized labors, and the internet which has given a wide platform for both the recruiters and job searchers to come in contact with each other (Edwards, Scott and Raju, p. 71, 2003). As a result of these trends the organizations have come to a scenario that not many people might apply when a job is posted. Even when the organization has selected a candidate it can no longer be assumed that they would be accepting these offers. Hence, there is an increasing awareness among people who take care of a company’s recruitment that the process covers far more than merely looking out for sources where the advertisements for job openings are to be put. This report gives an overview of the recruitment trends and selection practices in recent times in UK, the factors impacting these trends and selection practices in the country. Recruitment trends in UK in recent times The recruitment practices of organizations in UK have seen a drastic change in the recent times. Various practices and conditions are seen to exist in the organizations these days, which were not present a few decades ago like provision of creches, job-sharing, part-time work, and home-working. There is also a lot of stress on gender equality by the various companies. For instance, banks are seen to be the pioneers in devising various schemes to hire and retain women. Another of these trends is also to review policies such as those which used to encourage early retirement based on various conditions (Hendry, p. 42, 1995). There have been some additional schemes like performance related pays, which brought about the appraisal management system to fore. The trends for various organizations in UK is to use systems like the 360 feedback system for performance related pays, to motivate their employees so that they stay and work with the company and see this translated to an increase in the pay packages (Anderson, p. 130, 2005). Internet boom has been seen to impact all the aspects of businesses. Recruitment is no exception, and has seen a major change in the way companies recruit people. The trend to adopt internet as a means to recruit people, has also seen in face of the increasing number of companies looking to recruit people. The ease of finding people has increased as the companies can now access databases of people living in far off places in a short time. The online recruitment activity in UK increased by 30% for August 2007, from last year August 2006 (Monster, p. 1, 2007) For the managerial vacancies, the trend is that the vacancies are filled from the internal labor market while the senior management positions are as likely filled internally as externally. This trend means that on the supply side there has been an increase in new entrants in the labor market while on the demand side the organizations have a need for new managerial recruits. Selection Practices in UK in recent times Swift and Robertson (2000) cite several surveys conducted for selection practices to point out that the employers use a wide range of selection techniques depending upon the type of jobs for which the people are being recruited. They also said that the survey showed that no one method for selection was used as a standardized or stand-alone technique in small, middle, and even large sized corporations. The most used current selection practices were found to be application forms, interviews with single interviewer, panel interviewers, personality tests, references, ability tests, selection centers, CVs, and group selection centers. Despite the many reports of unreliability and invalidity, traditional selection methods of interview, application form and references are the most popular selection practices used. Of these, personal interviews are considered to be the most widely criticized method of selection, and the third most popular toll behind reference checking and application forms. The more sophisticated techniques like the assignment centers and psychological testing are relatively less used in UK. Though there has been a rise in the number of psychometric tests used by large sized corporations while selecting new recruits, the traditional methods are still the most common tools for selection (Brewster, Mayrhofer and Morley, p. 60, 2004). Brewster, Mayrhofer and Morley (2004) also point out that there has been a rise in the flexible working practices in UK, in particular the non-standard contracts. There has been a rise in flexible contracts related to salary packages like sharing profits, introduction of performance incentive and also flexibility in the working hours. Changing environment in UK in the last few decades Organizations in UK faced the impact of the economic changes that occurred in 1980s through the 1990s. There were changes in the economic environment, labor law, government labor market policy, demographic changes and also the political climate, all of which had an impact on the organizations and hence their personnel management policies. There was a severe recession of 1980-81, followed by a period of growth till the early 1990s and again a slump in the last quarter of 1990s when the economic growth ceased (Hendry, p. 23, 1995). Due to the recession in the country there was a need for bringing in more foreign currency, hence imports became cheaper and foreign firms were drawn to the UK market. All of these brought about a collapse in the manufacturing sector which could not keep up with the measures taken by the government to bring up the recession. The industries began to restructure and this brought about the internationalization of various firms due to acquisitions and mergers (Hendry, p. 25, 1995). The trend for internationalization was present in UK but was chiefly restricted to Europe both in terms of trade and movement of capital. But the 1980s and 1990s saw the companies expand overseas in other countries to explore newer market and / or use cheaper labor due to the inherently tight labor market (Hendry, p. 27, 1995). There were other changes for instance the demographic and social changes brought about by the education system, which meant that more people were trained in higher education, and hence the labor force fell sharply through the 1980s. However, the proportion of women entering the labor market started to rise. Politically too UK saw marked changes as the Thatcher government gave way to new governments and different work related policies as well as the overall policies (Hendry, p. 40, 1995). Effects of External Environment on Labor Markets All the changes in the UK environment affected the personnel management practices by the organizations. The section above gave a brief on some of the major environment changes while this section would be giving the impact of the changes on the labor market and the next section would give the corresponding consequences in the recruitment and selection process. The collapse of the industrial segment in UK had far reaching impacts on the labor market. There was large scale unemployment which was well over 3 million for almost five years, with large regional imbalances. There were forced redundancies and many of the units were closed down. This made the companies look out for increased measures in productivity by using flexible working practices. This also led to the sharp demarcations between the various levels of employees. The slump led to internationalization in two ways. First the people in the middle class who were traditionally the labors increasingly sent their offspring to universities for higher studies. This led to an increase in the number of people qualified tor white collar and professional jobs, and the number of labors decreased. Organizations in UK hence started looking to countries in Asia and Africa for filling this labor gap. There were also direct acquisitions which led to foreign companies acquiring stakes in UK companies, which led to internationalization. The internationalization brought people from different cultures in contact with each other on regular basis. This meant that the people needed to be culturally conditioned to blend in easily with the increasingly changing work environment. The increase in the number of women in the industry at various levels brought about massive changes in the working culture of the organizations. There were issues like employee safety and newer incentives were introduced to attract employees like facilities of creches, providing pick-up and drop facilities. Effects of External Environment on Recruitment Process The labor market in UK has traditionally being tight due to the reasons outlined above. The market was affected due to two important events foot-and-mouth disease and 9/11 crisis. These events brought about crisis in the financial markets, a fall in tourism and other related activities, thus increasing the unemployment. However, in spite of these changes the labor market remains a challenge for recruiters in terms of recruitment and selection (Brewster, Mayrhofer and Morley, p. 48, 2004). The recruiters need to attract people to work in their organizations, which is the first important step. The second step is to follow a rigid but effective selection process which would ensure that the right people have been selected to work in the company. Recruitment and selection process are seen to be the most important functions of Human Resource Management process. This is because an effective recruitment and selection process ensures an efficient labor force while a poor one might have negative effects to the company’s productivity which are long lasting. The companies prefer that their employees are sources both internally and externally, so that the internal employees are motivated and fresh blood is brought into the company which is necessary for innovation. The rise in technology especially the internet has seen to it that the companies can have a diverse work force. The large companies have also used software technologies to use databases to keep track of their employees for checking their performance levels which would air the process of internal recruitment. UK companies traditionally preferred to fill their positions internally especially for managerial recruitments, though this is changing in the face of internationalization. Various organizations are also seen to improve the process of re-training and provide attractive incentives like performance related packages for recruiting and retaining employees (Brewster, Mayrhofer and Morley, p. 0, 2004). Effects of External Environment on Selection Process After potential candidates apply for the position, the selection process must ensure that the most promising candidates are selected for the positions. This is again a challenge to the recruiters because of the increasing stress laid on the employees to excel not only in their job but also added skills like team-spirit and adapting to change. Many of the positions require that the candidate must be comfortable for working in newer locations, which was traditionally limited to people in the sales and marketing department. In addition, the potential candidates must also be abreast with the fast changing technological environment, and be able to cope up with it. All these must be the elements of the selection process, which means a high burden for people designing the process to ensure only the right candidates, are selected (Brewster, Mayrhofer and Morley, p. 60, 2004). As is already mentioned above, personal interview though is the most criticized, is still the most preferred by recruiters in UK. The reason for this is probably the importance the company people give to personal judgment. With the increasing number of people coming from different regions and countries, references and applications are considered to be the most important tools in the selection process. The reference checking is done with due diligence and the responses are always recorded. In many cases, the companies also go in for reference checking by employing private agencies to check up on the potential candidate. Application forms are of course the necessary input for any further steps in the selection process (Brewster, Mayrhofer and Morley, p. 60, 2004).

A Brief Note On Modern Standing Of Sustainability

2. Modern Standing Of Sustainability In the most countries the using of energy and emissions of CO2 are the biggest driver for the buildings. About 160 million building are in the EU are estimated for using more than 40% of the energy in Europe and push more than 40% of emissions carbon dioxide. The US Energy Information Administration pointed to the share of the energy and the emissions of the greenhouse gas (GHG) that connected with building it is bigger in US and the total emissions amount to 48%. In many developing countries, the emission from buildings and the percent of the total emission have increased constantly over the last 50 years. The increasing in the energy of the devices that are been used inside the buildings and the big†¦show more content†¦Lowering the energy and GHG effect in both the existing and the new buildings represents and therefore the main challenge and a chance to treat global warming. The companies of ICT has build and operate facilities which can be demand a big amounts of energy and material consumption in all stages of the life cycle. The increasing in the effective of the energy always main goal for the ICT companies and can start with facilities themselves. There are many plans that are adopted by worldwide which is can be lead to the more sustainable design, building and operation of buildings. 2.1 Definition of Sustainability The sustainability consists of three main basics like stool, each leg presents ecosystem, economy and society. If any leg is missing from the sustainability stool it will cause destabilization, because the society, the economy and the ecosystem are complex and connected to each other. (Young, 1997). This requires for meeting the four key objectives in the whole world at the same time (W.M. Adamsm2008(: 1. The social progress that admitted the needs for everyone. 2. The efficient protection to the environment. 3. The rational use to the natural resources. 4. The maintenance to the high and stable levels for the economic growth and the chance of employment. Sustainability appears that the critical activities of the institution of the higher education (at minimum) sound ecologically, socially and viable