The Peoples Republic of Power Essay -- Literary Analysis

The essay under critical analysis is entitled, â€Å"Philadelphia’s Radical Caucus That Propelled Pennsylvania to Independence and Democracy,† written by Gary B. Nash. This analytical essay consumes the fourth chapter of the book Revolutionary Founders: Rebels, Radicals, and Reformers in the Making of the Nation, edited by Alfred F. Young, Gary B. Nash, and Ray Raphael. His essay, along with the twenty-one other accounts in the book depicting lesser-known individuals, whose contributions in securing independence from Great Britain and creating a new government in America rival that of the nation’s more notorious and beloved founders, such as Thomas Jefferson or James Madison. Dr. Nash focuses his efforts on Philadelphia’s Radical Caucus of the 1770’s and 80’s and the lasting influences of the 1776 constitution it created within American politics as well as several nations around the world. Within his analysis and interpretation of Pennsy lvanian politics during the American Revolution, Dr. Nash utilizes a pro-whiggish, radically sympathetic stance to assert the Radical Caucus’ remarkable ability to gain support from and bestow power upon the common working man, take political power from conservatives within Pennsylvania’s public offices, and revolutionize democratic thought through their landmark reformations of the state’s constitution. Respecting the fact that Dr. Nash’s position on this subject required extensive research through first hand accounts, pamphlets, newspapers and the analysis of countless preserved records, indicates that the account he has given is very credible. Complying with his presentation of facts and the significance of the topic within early American history has prevented a well-rounded counter-argument ... ...ailable. Charles A. Beard argues this point in his book An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States, stating that â€Å"The Constitution was essentially an economic document based upon the concept that the fundamental private rights of property are anterior to government and morally beyond the reach of popular majorities.† Works Cited Beard, Charles A. An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States. New York: Dover, 2004(1913). Print. Lynd, Staughton, and David Waldstreicher. "â€Å"Free Trade, Sovereignty, and Slavery: Toward an Economic Interpretation of American Independence." William and Mary Quarterly (October 2011): 597-656. Print. Young, Alfred Fabian, Gary B. Nash, and Ray Raphael. Revolutionary Founders: Rebels, Radicals, and Reformers in the Making of the Nation. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2011. Print.

Dragonsbane :: essays research papers

The setting for Dragonsbane was in about the 1400's in a place called Wyr. Jenny John and Gareth are the main characters. Jenny is a wizard women who is always trying to advance her skills but still isn't very good. John is Jenny's husband and is also a dragon's bane, which means that he has slayed a dragon. Gareth is a prince who's hero is John. And final Zyerne, she is also a wizard women whom is the most powerful in the land. Gareth comes up from the South to ask of John's assistance in slaying a dragon that is threatening the King's lands. John decides to go with him and talk to the king. When they get there they find out that Zyerne is holding the king under some sort of spell and using him for her bidding. John talks to the king and gets ready to slay the dragon. He asks Jenny to make the most powerful poisons she can and then dips his harpoons in it. John then rides off to slay the dragon. When the battle his over Jenny goes out to were the battle happened and finds the dragon and John lying in bloody pools and realizes that john is still alive. She takes him back to camp and puts healing spells on him. She then goes back to the dragon and sees that he is still alive to. The dragon told her that if she healed him that he would tell her where the books of healing were in the caves called the deep so she could heal John. She agrees and the dragon through telepathy shows her the way in the maze of tunnels. It is always said to save a dragon is to slave a dragon for life. So Jenny saved the dragon and John. Zyerne was waiting for them to kill the dragon so she could take over the deep because of the huge amounts of gold in them. So Zyerne came and tried to kill the dragon and Jenny but failed and she was killed. The dragon through all of this fell in love with Jenny and asked her to turn into a dragon and return with him to were the dragons lived.

Free Essays on Homers Odyssey: Telemachus :: Homer Odyssey Essays

Telemakhos of The Odyssey Telemakhos, Odysseus's son, finally realizes that in order to preserve his estate he must fill in his father's shoes and grow up. Telemakhos not only needs to do this for himself, but for his father who is still alive. Telemakhos became a man his father would be proud of. Twenty years ago Odysseus left for Troy, leaving Telemakhos without a father figure since he was an infant. He grew up a mommy's boy not knowing his role in the kingdom because Odysseus was far away. Telemakhos recognizes that all the men trying to court his mother, Penelope, only want control of his kingdom. Zeus, King of the God's, gives his daughter, Athena permission to encourage Telemakhos to fall into his fathers shoes and become the man he was meant to be. "For my part, I shall visit Ithaka to put more courage in the son, and rouse him."(211 &212) In a way Zeus and Athena are doing what Odysseus could not be there to do. The reader is left to question if Telemakhos needed to be encouraged or would he have grown up on his own? The first sign that Telemakhos is becoming a man is when instead of comforting his mother in her grieving for Odysseus, he scolds her and tells her "Mother, why do you grudge our own dear minstrel joy of song, wherever his thought may lead?" (218) "Odysseus was not the only one at Troy never to know the day of his homecoming. Others, how many others, lost their lives!" (218) Telemakhos then went to his mother's suitors and told them "At daybreak we shall sit down in assembly and I shall tell you---take it as you will---you are to leave this hall." (218) This was very stunning to all the suitors because Telemakhos had no male guidance and they wondered who had invoked him to take back his home and inheritance. The suitors questioned Telemakhos if the God's were "teaching you this high and mighty manner." (218) Telemakhos justified himself by saying "all I insist on is that I rule our house and rule the slaves my father won for me.

London Ambulance Service Failure

The London Ambulance fiasco ? The London Ambulance Service (LAS) Computer Aided Despatch (CAD) system failed dramatically on October 26th 1992 shortly after it was introduced: †¢ †¢ †¢ The system could not cope with the load placed on it by normal use; The response to emergency calls was several hours; Ambulance communications failed and ambulances were lost from the system. ? A series of errors were made in the procurement, design, implementation, and introduction of the system.  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 1 London Ambulance Service ? ? Managed by South West Thames Regional Health Authority. Largest ambulance service in the world (LAS inquiry report) †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ Covers geographical area of over 600 square miles Resident population of 6. 8 million people (greater during daytime, especially central London); Carries over 5,000 patients every day; 2,000-2,500 calls received daily, of which 1,3001,600 are emergency calls.  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 2 Computer-aided despatch systems ? Provide one or more of the following: †¢ †¢ †¢ Call taking; Resource identification; Resource mobilisation; Ambulance resource management. CAD software & hardware; Gazetteer and mapping software; Communications interface (RIFS). Radio system; Mobile data terminals (MDTs); Automatic vehicle location system (AVLS). ? Consist of: †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 3 T he manual system to be replaced ? Call taking †¢ Recorded on form; location identified in map book; forms sent to central collection point on conveyor belt; Form collected; passed onto resource allocator depending on region; duplicates identified. Resource allocator decides on which resource to be mobilised; recorded on form and passed to dispatcher; Dispatcher telephones relevant ambulance station, or passes mobilisation instructions to radio operator if ambulance already on road; ? Resource identification †¢ ? Resource mobilisation †¢ ? Whole process meant to take < 3 minutes. Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 4  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Concept/design of the CAD system ? Existing systems dismissed as inadequate and impossible to modify to meet LAS’s needs †¢ Intended functionality â€Å"greater than available from any existing system†. To consist of Computer Aided Dispatch; Computer map display; Automatic Vehicle Location System (AVLS); Must integrate with existing MDTs and RIFS (Radio Interface System). Near 100% accuracy and reliability of technology; Absolute cooperation from all parties including CAC staff and ambulance crews. ? Desired system: †¢ †¢ ? Success dependent upon: †¢ †¢  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 5 Problems: Procurement (i) ? Contract had to be put out to open tender †¢ Regulations emphasis is on best price; 35 companies expressed interest in providing all or part of the system †¢ Most raised concerns over the proposed timetable of less than 1 year until full implementation. ? Previous Arthur Andersen report largely ignored †¢ †¢ Recommended budget of ? 1. 5M and 19 month timetable for packaged solution. Both estimates to be significantly increased if packaged solution not available; Report never shown to new Director of S upport Services. ? Only 1 out of 17 proposals met all of the project team’s requirements, including budget of ? 1. 5M. Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 6 Ian Sommerville 2004 Problems: Procurement (ii) ? Successful consortium †¢ †¢ †¢ Apricot, Systems Options (SO), Datatrak; bid at ? 937k was ? 700k cheaper than the nearest bid; SO’s quote for the CAD development was only ? 35k †¢ Their previous development experience for the emergency services was only for administrative systems. Ambiguity over lead contractor. Systems manager: Career ambulance man, not an IT professional, already told that he was to make way for a properly qualified systems manager; Analyst: Contractor with 5 years experience working with LAS. ? 2 key members of evaluation team: †¢ †¢  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 7 Problems: Project management ? Lead contractor responsible †¢ †¢ Meant to be SO, but they quickly became snowed under, so LAS became more responsible by default; No relevant experience at LAS or SO. ? ? Concerns raised at project meeting not followed-up. SO regularly late in delivering software †¢ Often also of suspect quality, with software changes put through ‘on the fly’. ? ? Formal, independent QA did not exist at any stage throughout the CAD system development. Meanwhile, various technical components of the system are failing regularly, and deadlines missed. Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 8  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Problems: Human resources & training (i) ? ? ? ? ? Generally positive attitude to the introduction of new technology. Ambiguity over consultation of ambulance crews for development of original requirements. Circumstantial evidence of resistance by crews to Datatrak equipment, and deliberate misleading of the system. Large gap between when crews and CAC staff were trained and implementation of the system. Inability of the CAC and ambulance staff to appreciate each others’ role †¢ Exacerbated by separate training sessions. Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 9  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Problems: Human resources & training (ii) ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Poor industrial relations. Management ‘fear of failure’. CAD system seen as solution to management’s desire to reduce ‘outdated’ working practices. System allocated nearest resource, regardless of originating station. System removed flexibility in resource allocation. Lack of voice contact exacerbated â€Å"them and us†. Technical problems reduced confidence in the system for ambulance crews and CAC staff.  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 10 System problems Need for near perfect information †¢ Without accurate knowledge of vehicle locations and status, the system could not allocate optimum resources. There were numerous possible reasons for incorrect information being passed back to the system. Numerous technical problems with the system, including: †¢ Failure to identify all duplic ated calls; †¢ Lack of prioritisation of exception messages; †¢ Exception messages and awaiting attention queues scroll off top of screen. ? Poor interface between crews, MDTs & the system †¢ ? Unreliability, slowness and operator interface †¢  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 11 Configuration changes ? Implementation of the system on 26 October involved a number of significant changes to CAC operation, in particular: †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ Re-configuring the control room; Installing more CAD terminals and RIFS screens; No paper backup system; Physically separating resource allocators from radio operators and exception rectifiers; Going ‘pan London’ rather than operating in 3 divisions; Using only the system proposed resource allocations; Allowing some call takers to allocate resources; Separate allocators for different call sources. Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 12 So, what happened? ? ? Changes to CAC operation made it extremely difficult for staff to intervene and correct the system. As a consequence, the system rapidly knew the correct location and status of fewer and fewer vehicles, leading to: †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ Po or, duplicated and delayed allocations; A build up of exception messages and the awaiting attention list; A slow up of the system as the messages and lists built up; An increased number of call backs and hence delays in telephone answering.  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 13 Why did it fail? ? Technically, the system did not fail on October 26th †¢ †¢ Response times did become unacceptable, but overall the system did what it had been designed to do! Failed 3 weeks later due to a program error – this was a memory leak where allocated memory was not completely released. Management; Union; System manager; Government. ? It depends who you ask! †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 14 Lessons learned ? Inquiry report makes detailed recommendations for future development of the LAS CAD system, including: †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ †¢ Focus on repairing reputation of CAD within the service; Increasing sense of ‘ownership’ for all stakeholders; They still believe that a technological solution is required; Development process must allow fully for consultation, quality assurance, testing, training; Management and staff must have total, demonstrable, confidence in the reliability of the system; Any new system should be introduced in a stepwise approach.  ©Ian Sommerville 2004 Software Engineering Case Studies Slide 15

Essay about recent hate crimes and statistic Essay

Lifeless bodies with slashed throats were found in the mountains of Virginia nearly six years ago. This is quite a disturbing image; the unfortunate result of a hate crime. What exactly is a hate crime? The American Psychological Association defines hate crimes as â€Å"violent acts against people, property, or organizations because of the group to which they belong or identify with† (1). The different groups usually involved include homosexuals, ethnic groups, and religion affiliations. Dr. Jack McDevitt, a criminologist at Northeastern University in Boston, said hate crimes are forms of messages the offender wants to send to members of certain groups letting them know they are unwelcome in that neighborhood, community, school or workplace (APA, 1). According to CNN.com, Darrell David Rice of Columbia, Maryland, was found guilty of committing the 1996 slayings of hikers Julianne Marie Williams and Laura â€Å"Lollie† Winans, who were the girls in the opening disturbing image. Rice is serving an 11-year sentence in federal prison in Petersburg, Virginia, for attempting to abduct and kill a female bicyclist in the same park in 1997. U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft called the killings of Williams and Winans â€Å"hate crimes† and said Rice could also receive the death penalty, in addition to the present sentence (Frieden, 1). Examples of hate crimes provided by Stephen Wessler’s â€Å"Addressing Hate Crimes: Six Initiatives† include (3):  ·the dragging death of African-American James Byrd, Jr., in Jasper, Texas  ·the deadly attack on Matthew Sheppard, a gay student in Laramie, Wyoming  ·the shooting rampage targeting minority citizens in Chicago  ·the shootings of children at a Jewish community center in Los Angeles  ·the murder of Joseph Santos Ileto, a Filipino-American mail carrier A report done by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) states that 7,947 hate crime incidents were reported. In 1995, a comparison of states showed that California was at the top of the charts with 1,751 incidents reported, and Florida stood with 164 incidents (2). The total number of hate crimes only decreased by less than a hundred between 1995 and 1999. While these numbers may seem relatively small, the Southern Poverty Law Center has posted more dramatic statistics: every hour someone commits a hate crime, every day eight blacks, three whites, three gays, three Jews and one Latino become hate crime victims, and every week a cross is burned (1). In order to prevent the hate crimes from occurring, different things are being done in order to prevent and deal with the hate crimes. In schools, the Anti-Defamation League websites suggests planning ahead by doing the following (1): 1.Work with your school administration to establish a plan for responding promptly to hate incidents and hate crimes. 2.Educate school staff on how to recognize hate-motivated incidents and hate crimes. 3.Establish procedures for reporting hate-motivated incidents/crimes. 4.Establish school policies which clearly indicate that hate-motivated behavior will not be tolerated. On a wider scale, since the 1980s research on hate crimes has increased, especially from those in the fields of criminology and law enforcement. There focus is primarily on reporting the frequency of the problem and preparing criminal justice responses to it. While many hate motivated crimes go unreported, the number of reported incidents is up. However, with special training, people are prepared to deal with the situations. According to Wessler, the first professionals to respond to the scene of a hate crime are police officers. How they act in the situation will affect  the outcome of the incident. Wessler stated, â€Å"law enforcement agencies have a pivotal role in responding to, investigating, prosecuting, and preventing hate crimes.† Training is given to the police officers in order to carry out their role. Wessler said the training includes how to â€Å"recognize and investigate potential hate crimes, have clear protocols on how to respond to hate violence, and develop innovative programs for preventing the hate crimes.† Along with the professional training of police personnel, laws against hate crimes have been enforced in some states. As of 1999, there are only eleven states that do not have hate crime laws: South Carolina, Hawaii, Wyoming, New York, Kentucky, Rhode Island, New Mexico, Kansas, Arkansas, Georgia and Indiana. The anti-hate laws may not be well known but there are some out there. For example, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act â€Å"provides assistance to state and local law enforcement agencies and amend federal law to streamline the investigation and prosecution of hate crimes.† This bill will change the already existing law, adding crimes against sexual orientation, gender, and disability. This law also allows authority to respond to all crimes covered by the existing law, meaning crimes based on race, color, national origin, and religion (1). The number of hate crimes is slowly being decreased and the number of laws against hate crimes is slowly being increased, but the truth is, they are still out there. It may seem impossible to eliminate all the hate crimes that are occuring, but with more research, training, and handling each situation as they arise more seriously, America is slowly on it’s way to eliminating the problem of hate crimes. Works Cited American Psychological Association. 1998. Anti-Defamation League. 1999. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Uniform Crime Reports. 1995. Frieden, Terry. 10 Apr. 2002. National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. NGLTF Communications Department. 25 Sep. 2002. Southern Poverty Law Center. Wessler, Stephen. Addressing Hate Crimes: Six Initiatives That Are Enhancing the Efforts of Criminal Justice Practitioners. Feb. 2000.

Shangri-La Hotel and Resort

[pic] Prepared By: Yee Shan (Sarah) CHUNG, Yan Sin (Jessy) LI, Kim Sang (Anson) HO, Kit Yat (Donald) TAI Table of Contents 1. Introduction3 2. Summary of Macro Environment4 3. Summary of Industry Analysis8 4. Summary of Internal Analysis12 5. Gap Analysis14 6. Recommendations22 7. Appendices26 8. References52 1. Introduction Since the parent company, the Kuok Group, is established in 1949 and until 1979 the home-grown Shangri-La Hotel, Singapore, was opened its doors in 1971 and it was opened under the management of Western International Hotels.However, Shangri-La International Hotel Management Ltd was founded in 1982 and from that time until now, Shangri- La endeavoured through countless challenged from the Asian financial crisis to the outbreak of SARS in 2003 and a lot of other challenges, Shangri- La Hotels and Resorts (SLHR) recently was announced and located its properties premier city addresses and some of the world's most exotic destinations across Asia, Middle East, North Am erica and Europe. As of 2006, SLHR was the largest Asian – based deluxe hotel group in Southeast Asia.The company managed a total of 50 hotels under three brands: the five-star Shangri-La, the four-star Traders and Kerry – with total inventory of over 23000 rooms across 39 locations. Furthermore, SLHR also join the stock market of Hong Kong, Malaysia and Thailand. As of SLHR’ mission statement â€Å"To delight our guests every time by creating engaging experiences straight from our heart†, SLHR also produce new product differentiation such as Chinese theory spas which named the â€Å"Chi† in most of its organization.The success of SLHR does not stop there expanding its market or increase their inventory, but the management always concern its competitors who can bring the better product and service base on SLHR’s ones. SLHR management also requires having strategies for long term running the organization. The aim of this strategic analysis re port is to create vision for organization in future; by identifying and analysing the major macro-environmental trends which believe the major issues affect to the future growth of SLHR.The report also quickly examines the five forces within the industry analysis to rough idea the current effectiveness of the industry and also based on evidences to expect the future profitability of SLHR. Besides, to create the advantage competitive of SLHR, all of internal operations in term of resources and capabilities could inspect. Moreover, to have an overall the difference between the desired situation and the actual situation of SLHR, a gap analysis will be point out for bringing all analysis together and base on this analysis gap, organization will have an overall difference.Lastly, it is definitely not absent in this report will be a list of recommendations which help formulating for SLHR in relation to achieve to greater its position in all markets in the future. 2. Summary of Macro Envir onment Macro environment or PESTE analysis is the first step in creating the Environmental Analysis. The macro environment examines the general business climate as it relates to the organisation, but the organisation has nothing to do with it. It has an impact to influence Shangri-La Hotels by four different factors, such as Political or Legal, Economic, Socio-cultural, Technology and Environmental.These four factors had been analysed in the Appendix 1, which is based on the Shangri-La over the world. The Global economic has more negative factors that impact the Hotels, Global Financial Crisis nowadays is one of the big issues for most of the industries around the world, as it leads recession which will affect the finance of the countries or industries. Because of the Global Financial Crisis, the unemployment rate of some countries is still increasing in the beginning of 2012, such as Euro Area increased to 11%, Italy increased to 10. 0%, Spain and Greece has increased over 20%, but some of the countries are decreasing such as Japan, Thailand, Turkey and Hong Kong(Trade Economic, 2012). The unemployment rate is increasing because of the cost of labour is increasing as well which the current financial situation is not good enough to support. People are more concern on price or become price sensitive now because of global financial crisis, as they will think the product is worth with the listed price or not.Some of the countries had announced Carbon Tax scheme which will affect the hotels, as every organisations need to pay a certain amount for the carbon that they produced. These negative factors may leads the guests rarely go travel and stay in hotels because they have less income, as the net income of Shangri-La Hotels Group had decreased to $253. 0 million (Bloomberg Business Week, 2012). However, the Gross Domestic Product around the world is increasing while the inflation is decreasing in most of the countries. Same as the Economic factors, the Political a lso has more negative factors impact the hotels.Over 90% of the countries had established a legislation of minimum wages, the legislation is to prevent the employers when there is the intense market competition and they in order to save costs, at the same time the wages of the employees are unable to meet their basic needs. On the recent years, there are some conflict occurs between nations, for example, there was two attackers rammed a border post with a rubbish truck and threw two grenades, and then attacked policemen with knives in Kashgar, Beijing; and a roadside bomb explosion in Diwaniyah.The most recent hotel bombing is the Marriott Jakarta bombing in 2009 because of terrorism which leads at least 9 people killed and 50 people injured. For a hotel chain as Shangri-La, the properties are everywhere in the world, they need to prevent and consider about the location’s political issues before or after they take over or establish a new Shangri-La. On the other hand, some na tions have a legislation to control the people own arms or guns. But when the numbers of arms holding increase, the country and properties need to increase the insecurity as well (Shah, 2011).By having legislation of arms controlling is good for Shangri-La. As in 21st Century, everything is being high technology which means there are lots of new technology products invested and announced into the market such as 3D televisions and surrounding audio systems. When those products had announced to public, the guests may expect the hotels will have one of these products in house. Most of the technology factors are neither positive nor negative impact for Shangri-La, as the number of the internet users is increasing rapidly every year, nearly everyone will have at least one computer and smartphone.When most people have at least one technology product, some of the companies will start produce some up-to-date communication softwares and some new applications will announce to the sociality. B y the time when the number of internet users is increasing rapidly, Shangri-La can take advantages from that, as they can do marketing via internet, especially the social networks (e. g. Facebook, Twitter, Myspace). The guests can book a room via their official website or some travel agents website, and Shangri-La can announce the latest news on their official website and social networks for the guests to read.For the industry, the socio-cultural has average impact. As the population in the world is increasing which is good for all the industries, there are more consumers to consume their products. But at the same time, the fluctuating death rate is increasing which is the age population is increasing as well, because the medical technology has been improving year by year, the people will have longer life than the past. Most of the people will expect a better quality of life, such as for living and for travelling, they would like to have good experience on everything, especially on travelling and accommodation.Multi-cultural is a good for the business as well, because Shangri-La can adopt the culture and develops a different experience for the guests, for example, in India, Shangri-La can design an Indian style hotel to cater and adopt the environment to attract the guests to stay in. However, because of different culture and the religion of the culture, they need to understand and get known about these before they establish the hotel in a country or city. In addition, there are several environmental issues that affect the industry, for example, natural disasters will occur in some countries such as Earthquakes, Floods, Tsunamis and Hurricanes.Nowadays, natural disasters had become more serious and more often, because of the climate change within a decade and global warming, ozone depletion are caused primarily by increases in â€Å"greenhouse† gases as Carbon Dioxide. Due to the natural disasters and the global warming, the lands will be destroyed and lead land shortage. Land shortage will influence Shangri-La as there is no enough land for it to build new hotels, it can make them could not expand their business.While they building new hotels or running existed hotels, pollutions will be produced, for example, building new hotels will produce lots of dust and the lighting of running existed hotels as the light will open 24hours 7days. On the other hand, 3Rs policy has been announced as Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, the government encourages people to reuse and recycle the products that they used. According to Lincoln (2007) Shangri-La have a wide of environmentally friendly measures such as fitting all guestrooms with water saving device in taps and showers as well as using energy-saving lamps in more than half of the group’s guestrooms.For saving energy and resources, Shangri-La has variety of methods, as by rainwater harvesting, hot water production using solar panels or heat pumps and improvements in building envelope desi gn to reduce heat loss or heat gain as well as air filtration. Shangri-La also has several methods to reduce the greenhouse gases, such as through existing systems and processes, the use of new technologies and alternative energy sources and by building more efficient buildings. In summary, the luxury hotel industry has opportunities and threats associated with the macro environment. There is variety of positive, balanced and negative trends.There are still opportunities for reasonable growth in this industry despite the threats. 3. Summary of Industry Analysis Industry environment has a more direct effect on the firm’s strategic competitiveness and ability to earn above-average return as compare to the general environment (Misangyl et. al, 2006). Hitt et. al (2011, p. 51) mention â€Å"Industry analysis will be using the five forces model of competition such as the threats posed by new entrants, the power of suppliers, the power of buyers, product substitutes, and the inten sity of rivalry among competitors to understand the profitability potential within the industry†.The strength and interaction of the five competitive forces are what influence profit potential. This section will discuss about the industry analysis of hotel industry and a more detailed analysis can be seen in Appendix2. The threat of entrants in the hotel industry is not significant which leads to high industry profitability. New entrants need to have sufficient amount of budget in order to build and run the hotel such as require substantial upfront investment in building, specialized equipment, infrastructure and staffs.Products and services are easy to replicate in hotel industry, therefore, brand identity is the differentiator in the hotels. It is difficult for new entrants to gain access to the capital requirements needed to develop and build hotel. The industry’s incumbents have established relationships and experience, which enables them to achieve significant cost savings. In addition to brand loyalty and costs the new entrants must also contend with the probability of retaliation from the established hotels. The xisting businesses in the industry have a high degree of absolute cost advantages as they have built good relationship and trust between the suppliers and customers. The number of suppliers to the hotel industry is extremely high. The types of suppliers for hotels include construction suppliers, monopoly suppliers such as electricity, gas and water, furniture suppliers, linen and bedding suppliers, food suppliers, decor suppliers, appliance suppliers, uniform suppliers and most importantly then staffs. The suppliers have medium bargaining power which will affect the attractiveness and profitability of the industry.There is high concentration of suppliers. However, the majority of hotels have regional contracts with suppliers. This locks the hotel companies into using certain suppliers and creates switching costs. The volume being so ld to the industry is important to the raw materials sources suppliers and equipment manufacturers because hotels will purchase in bulk to operate the business. Contracted suppliers costs and employees’ costs are high because they are needed to work for the operation of the business. These suppliers have high bargaining power.However, they are unable to bargain and will make close to their best offer at the first opportunity in order to gain profit for their business. Differentiation of outputs from suppliers is necessary to deliver performance in order to be more profitable in the industry. Hotels and resorts are part of the accommodation in the lodging industry. Rooms are highly perishable products. There are other options to stay when the customers are away from home such as apartments, condos, cabins and town houses. Buyers have high bargaining power in choosing the accommodation that they would like to stay.Hotels can create differentiation strategy to add value to attra ct customers such as dealing with the pricing strategy, good customer services and provide up-to-date technology in the hotels. However, there is high concentration of buyers relative to the industry. There is very little threat of backward integration from the consumer due to the high costs of start up in the hotel industry. Hence, when the buyers have medium to high bargaining power, then the industry profitability will be low. Substitutes to the hotel industry have a high level of power which leads to low industry profitability.There are a lot of substitutes in the industry. Leisure customers have more alternatives when they travel overseas as well as business customers, they can plan whether to fly to a city in order to have meetings. Nowadays due to the advance technology invented, Internet helps the business people a lot. Business man can do video-conferencing in their own country without flying to other country. This helps the business to save a lot of money. In regards to le isure customers, they have more choices to choose such as staying in boutique hotels, motels, apartments, camping, cruise ships and even caravan.Substitutes gave greater power. The substitutes can provide similar services and products and providing better value for money which make economic sense for buyers to switch. The intensity of rivalry in the industry is medium to high which leads to low industry profitability. Hotel industry is in mature stage, there is no industry growth. With the increase of competitors such as the expansion of luxury Asian brand – Mandarin Oriental, it makes it difficult for the hotels in the industry to maximize its profit by strengthening its occupancy rates.The high cost of building, furnishing and servicing the hotels in the industry create high fixed costs and high exit barriers. This increases rivalry as they need to maximise profits to have significant returns on investment. It makes it difficult to withdraw from the industry and has to comp ete with other existing rivals. The level of diversity among the companies is medium because the majority of the hotels provide similar types of high quality service. Due to this reason, it is easy for buyers to switch from one competitor’s product to another.While there is great rivalry in this industry, there are opportunities for expansion into national and international markets. Moreover, there are many stakeholders involved and large dollar investments, thus, it involves high commitment from every members in the organisation. Overall, analysis of the five forces in hotel industry found out that hotel industry’s attractiveness is rated as medium-low in terms of the potential to earn adequate or superior returns.It is considered as a partly unattractive industry because it has low entry barriers, medium to strong bargaining position of suppliers and buyers, strong competitive threats from product substitutes and intense rivalry among competitors. 4. Summary of Inter nal Analysis Internal analysis is an analysis about the organisation itself, it finds out organisation resources and capabilities to create value to customers and identify area of weaknesses to be addressed by future strategic and evaluate core competencies (Evans, Campbell and Stonehouse, 2003).Acknowledging those resources and capabilities can understand company position and competitive advantage to achieve superior performance and profitability by strategic (Hill and Jones, 2012). Resources Tangible Shangri-la group comprises 110 hotels and resorts throughout Asia Pacific, North America, the Middle East and Europe. In future development more than 20 hotels and resorts will be built in variety countries. Revenue has growing up nearly a quarter from 2009 to 2010, US $1,729 million to US 2,145 million.But, Share of profit of associates of hotel operation total is 15. 0, and property rentals total is 47. 7. Intangible Shangri-la group has great reputation in public, goodwill value is US $84,504,000 in 2010, because create green image to public, ‘Sustainability’ is umbrella brand which has several action to reduce energy consumption, waste water and carbon dioxide emission. It shows the low turnover rate, this is because company pays respects, cares and aware their employee and provide work-life balance program to motivate staffs to work productively and efficiently.Capabilities It has strong human resource capabilities which is compare to others hotel property, the staff turnover rate is low, Shangri-la provide a series training to staff ensure reach service consistency that ensure meet the expectation of service quality, so this is the competitive advantage. The distribution channels are strongly developed, it has several internet distribution channels, e-commerce is the best way to deliver and receive information nowadays.However, the product differentiation, marketing and management are not strong enough to be core competencies. 5. Gap Analysis Macro-environment Business Strategy Gaps |Trend |Date of Impact |Business Strategy match or Mismatch | |Economic Growth in Asia |1-5 years |Match – Currently Shangri-La group is focusing on developing the | |(especially in China) | |market in China. |Euro economic crisis |1-5 years |Match – Europe is not an essential market segment for the Shangri-La | | | |group and does not have big influence on the hotel financial | | | |performance | |Increasing value of Chinese |Now and ongoing |Mismatch – As the exchange rate of RMB is getting higher, tourists | |RMB’s | |prefer going to other Asian countries while China is the main market | | | |for Shangri-La | |Green Awareness |Now and ongoing |Match – Shangri-La really makes an effort on sustainability, creating | | | |a green organisation image to the public and gaining goodwill from | | | |that. | |Use of Technology |Now and ongoing |Match – Shangri-La spends significant resources on network pro moting, | | | |for example customer can book a room through Shangri-La’s Facebook | |Diminishing Target Demographic |3-5 years |Mismatch – Even Shangri-La group has other brands like Traders and | |Segment | |Kerry, but the target market is also focusing on up-scale market. | Industry Environment Business Strategy Gaps Industry Environment Element |Opportunity of Threat |Effect on Industry Profitability |Business Strategy Consistency or | | | | |Inconsistency | |Suppliers |Natural |Average |Consistent | |Buyers |Threat |High |Consistent | |Threats of New Entrants |Opportunity |High |Limited Consistency | |Substitutes |Threat |High |Limited Consistency | |Rivalry |Threat |High |Consistent | |Government |Opportunity and threat |Various by Location |Some Consistency | |Complementors |Opportunity |Low |Limited Consistency | Key Competitor Business Strategy Gaps |Competitor | |Physical | |Brands | |Decision Making | |Values | | | ECONOMIC FACTOR |Recession |Negative | | | Global Finance Crisis, spend money discreetly (Shah, 2010). | | | | | | | |Good & Service Tax, spend more money in good (Kalia, 2010). |Negative | | | | | | |Some of the countries had announced Carbon Tax which increase | | | |expense (World News Australia, 2012). Negative | | | | | | |Gross Domestic Product is increasing which stimulate people spend | | | |in hospitality (The Economist Online, 2011). |Positive | | | | | | |People are more concern on price due to Global Financial Crisis | | | | |Negative | | |High Labour cost, especially in China grow up rapidly fast. | | | | | | |The inflation in most of the countries are decreasing , | | | |China still growing so fast (Global-Rates. com, 2012) |Negative | | | | | | |The unemployment rate in most of the countries are decreasing | | | |(Trading Economics, 2012) |Positive | | | | | | |Negative | | | |(China) | | | | | | | |Positive | |Overall Negative | |POLITICAL/LEGAL FACTOR |Around 90% of countries had established a l egislation of minimum |Negative | | |wages that increase labour cost extremely (Herr and Kazandziska, | | | |2011). | | | | | | |Conflict between nations, it is not safety for travelling that |Negative | | |influence hospitality industry (Global Conflict Map. com, 2011)( The | | | |World Bank, 2011). | | | | | | | |Arms control in some nations, limit import and export goods (Shah |Positive | | |2012).For instance, North Korea has strict control rules in | | | |hospitality industry. | | |Overall Negative | |TECHNOLOGICAL FACTOR |Growth of Internet with fast broadband can assists consumers to |Positive | | |search for rooms available via websites. They can make | | | |reservations easily which help the costs of industry’s marketing | | | |activities. | | | | | | |Communication software or technology improved every year such as |Positive | | |Facebook and Twitter are Social Medias for marketing. | | | | | | | |Many new technology products announced into the market, energy | Positive | | |saving light reduce pollution. For example, the installation of | | | |solar energy system in hotels which can help saving the budget of | | | |the company. | |Overall Positive | |SOCIO-CULTURAL FACTOR |Fluctuating Death Rate which mean age Population is increasing |Negative | | |(Population Reference Bureau, 2011). | | | | | | | |Expectations of service quality. Consumers now expect to get | | | |intangible experience and want to be recognized by the employees. Negative | | |As long as the industry keep up the standards with what the | | | |customers are expecting then it will bring positive effect to the | | | |industry. | | | | | | | |The number of population is increasing over the world; it | | | |increases the workforce and potential customer (Rosenberg, 2011). Positive | | | | | | |Multi-culture around the world, allow knowledge and technique | | | |exchange. | | | | |Positive | |Overall Balance | |ENVIRONMENTAL FACTOR |Greater awareness in global warming i ssues is a concern.Energy |Negative | | |consumption needs to be considered to reduce greenhouse gas. The | | | |most cost-effective greenhouse gas reductions can be made by using| | | |existing low technology in building insulation, lighting, | | | |air-conditioning and water heating systems and electricity standby| | | |(Enkvist et. al, 2007), (Fenger and Tjell, 2009). | | | | | | |Climate change (Shah, 2012) & Global Warming (National Geographic,| | | |2012). For example, mountainous areas reduce snow cover and winter| | | |tourism; southern areas decrease summer tourism period. |Negative | | | | | | |Water use management, reduce water use is a long-term strategic. | | |(Queensland Government, 2012) | | | | | | | |Waste disposal management, Use filters in deep fryers to extend | | | |the life of | | | |cooking oil or sale to driver(Lincoln, 2007) | | | |Indoor air quality, more countries forbid smoking in indoor than |Positive | | |last decade(Lincoln, 2007) | | | | | | | |3Rs (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) reduce waste cost in daily operation. | | | |For instance, use mugs to instead of disposable cups (USA |Positive | | |Recycling Facility Service, 2012) | | | | | | | |Some countries may need to face the natural disasters, e. g. | | | |Earthquake, Tsunami, and Hurricane (Shah, 2011). Negative | | | | | | |Land Shortage in nations, less land available, so the cost of land| | | |is become expensive. For example, rise around 9% of the total |Positive | | |property price, since 2001 in Australia (Hopkins, 2012),(Asia for | | | |Educators, 2009), (Your Investment Property, 2012). | | | | | | | |Negative | | | | | | | | | | | |Negative | |Overall Negative | 2. Industry Analysis |Forces |Issues |Impact | |Threats of new |Economies of scale |Medium | |entrants |New entrants need to have a certain large-scale production and huge finance because | | | |hotel industry requires substantial upfront investment in building, specialized | | | |equipment, infrastruc ture and staffs. | | |Small lodges will find it difficult to enter to the industry and compete with | | | |Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts because it requires large investment, however, the other| | | |well-known brands hotels such as Marriot International, Hyatt and Hilton might find it| | | |easier to build new hotels. | | | |Proprietary product differences |Medium | | |Product differentiation in hotel industry is low. It is relatively easy to replicate | | | |differentiation such as the products and services. Every hotels and resort can provide| | | |rooms that meet the demands of the customers and also train their staffs well to | | | |provide personalized service. | | |However, Shangri-La Hotels and Resort have built good brand and reputation; thus, it | | | |is the differentiator to compete with other new competitors. | | | |Brand identity |Low | | |Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts have built a good brand image in the mind of customers. | | | |Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts is alrea dy the leader in Asia (Dogan, 2010). They have | | | |established high product differentiation and brand loyalty.Other new brand hotels | | | |that want to come into the industry, they have to spend lots of costs to attract the | | | |customers to be competitive advantage. | | | |Buyer/customer switching costs |Medium | | |It is simple and easy for customers to switch costs. Customers can be easily attracted| | | |to different hotels that offer more value for money, or affordable prices. Due to the | | | |presence of Internet, customers will search and compare the hotel’s price via | | | |websites. Loyalty program can prevent the guests from switching costs. | | |Capital requirements |Low | | |High capital requirement is required for new entrants even though the competitors plan| | | |to do franchise, merger and acquisition, there is still high investment costs involved| | | |such as costs of inventories, high risk and law return situation and marketing | | | |activities. H ubbard & Beamish (2011, p. 76) state â€Å"New entrants with good ideas but | | | |without finance are unable to break into the industry†. | | |Access to distribution |Low | | |New entrants may have limited sources to access such as raw materials and distribution| | | |channels, as existing hotels have regular customers and partners. | | | |Absolute cost advantages |Low | | |The existing businesses in the industry have a high degree of absolute cost | | | |advantages.They have built good relationship and trust between each others; already | | | |establish hotel’s experience, favourable raw materials, advertisement expenses and | | | |favourable location. Thus, it is hard for new entrants to enter into the industry | | | |because there is low level of trust and familiarity with the suppliers. | | | |Government policy |High | | |Depends on the country’s regulations, government has the opportunity to set many | | | |restraints in the industry or encourage and facil itate the development of hotels. | | |Expected retaliation |High | | |Retaliation is expected as existing hotels will low down price and promotes some | | | |packages to attract customers. Unique and differentiated products by diversifying it | | | |can therefore persist the retaliation. | | |OVERALL RATING: LOW – MEDIUM | |Bargaining power of |Differentiation of inputs |Medium | |supplier |Supplier’s input is crucial to the final product. Good quality of the products and | | | |services provided by the suppliers will create a good outcome.Hence, it will have to | | | |boost the economy of the business. Hotels in the industry are the buyers and the | | | |producers of inputs that are the suppliers (Buffett & Munger, n. d). There are many | | | |suppliers involve in hotel industry such as: | | | |The construction companies tend to have a particular strong position when it comes to | | | |the hotel owner who would like to build a hotel. Thus, it strengthens the power o f | | | |being a supplier. | | |Monopoly suppliers who control electricity, gas and water supplies have high | | | |bargaining power. | | | |Hotels need to spend lots of money in the operational costs. Hotels need to buy | | | |Property Management System and Point of Sales to help the effectiveness of business | | | |operation. Hotels also need to buy amenities products, chemical products and raw | | | |materials for catering. Moreover, it needs to spend money on maintenance and servicing| | | |the equipments.If the hotels are locked into a contract, then the power of suppliers | | | |will be lower, they cannot increase the prices when they want to. | | | |Hotels are in the service industry. Hence, it needs people to provide exceptional | | | |services to the customers. High education and good experience employees will have | | | |higher bargaining power. They may negotiate the wages that they would like to receive | | | |and they think is reasonable before working with the hotels. | | | |Hotel customers are fragmented. Hence, as a supplier to the customers, the argaining | | | |power is low because there are substitutes that the customers can choose such as | | | |Marriott International Hotels and Hilton Hotels. | | | |Switching costs of suppliers and firms in the industry |Medium | | |Suppliers have power if there are few firms supplying the product or if there is no | | | |reasonable substitute for it (VBulletin Solutions, 2012). However in large hotel | | | |chains, many things are done by signing contract legally. Legal costs may increase if | | | |one party is not working as per contract listed. Thus, the switching cost is low. | | |Supplier concentration relative to industry concentration |Medium | | |There are high concentration of suppliers to choose from for Shangri-La Hotels and | | | |Resorts. Therefore, the suppliers have lesser power. | | | |Importance of volume to suppliers |Low | | |The volume being sold to the industry is important to the raw materials sources | | | |suppliers and equipment manufacturers because Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts will | | | |purchase in bulk to operate the business.Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts have a great | | | |deal of power over the suppliers when purchasing raw materials sources and equipments. | | | |Cost relative to total purchases in the industry |High | | |Supplier cost is a huge part of the total cost. Contracted suppliers costs and | | | |employees’ costs are high because they are needed to work for the operation of the | | | |business. Suppliers retain the power. | | | |Information about supplier’s product |Medium | |Hotels are highly aware of the quality of the products they purchase such as raw | | | |materials, equipments and even labour sources. Hotels will not take the risks to | | | |change the suppliers before they did research and compare the market price among the | | | |supplier’s industries. | | | |Supplier profitability |Low | | |Hotel industry ha s higher profitability as compare to the supplier industry.Suppliers| | | |will be unable to bargain and they will make close to their best offer at the first | | | |opportunity in order to gain profit for their business. | | | |Decision makers’ incentives |Medium | | |Hotels need to motivate their employees by giving incentives in order for them to | | | |provide good service to the customers. | | | |Hotels will do promotional packages when it is in low season to attract more customers| | | |to stay in the hotel. | | |Threat of forward integration |High | | |Suppliers can sell their products via Internet and even to the supermarkets. They have| | | |the power to enter the industry (Hubbard & Beamish, 2011). | | |OVERALL RATING: MEDIUM | |Bargaining power of |Differentiation of outputs |High | |buyers |Customers determine the profitability of the hotel’s business by choosing which one | | | |they would like to stay with, they have high bargaining power to choose.Hotel s create| | | |differentiation strategy to add value to attract customers such as: | | | |Customers place products and pricing strategy at first. For instance, the hotels | | | |should plan for low price strategy during low season or include complimentary goods | | | |for customers. | | | |Staffs provide good quality of service. | | | |Good geographic location which convenience the guests. | | | |Good atmosphere of the rooms and restaurants. | | |Give service for disable such as have disabled rooms in the hotels which located in | | | |the first floor to convenient the handicapped people. | | | |Switching costs of buyers |High | | |Shangri-La Hotel and Resorts have created a loyalty program named â€Å"Golden Circle† to | | | |attract existing customers by earning points and then the customers can redeemed for | | | |hotel stays, dining or spa experiences at any  Shangri-La hotel, resort, Traders hotel | | | |or Kerry hotel (Shangri-La International Hotel Management, 2012) .Thus, this group of | | | |customers will most likely be repeat customers and choose to experience services from | | | |Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts. There are low switching costs for customers. | | | |Presence of substitute outputs |High | | |There is an important level of the industry’s output has to the buyer. Hotels and | | | |resorts are part of the accommodation in the lodging industry. There are other options| | | |to stay when the customers are away from home such as apartments, condos, cabins and | | | |town houses (CarrHallCastle, 2012). | | |Industry concentration relative to buyer concentration |Medium – Low | | |Tourism industry is growing rapidly and the demand of hotels for customers increased. | | | |Travellers are highly concentrated relative to the industry, thus, the buyers do not | | | |have lots of bargaining power. | | | |Importance of volume to buyers |High | | |Large volumes of customers are expected to stay in the hotels because they are th e | | | |main source of income for hotels to generate profit.For example, tour operators, who | | | |book thousands of customers into hotels, have a strong bargaining position and can | | | |demand lower prices from hotels. Rooms are perishable, thus, hotels must try to meet | | | |the occupancy level. Buyers have more bargaining power. | | | |Cost relative to total buyer purchases |Medium | | |Corporate customers might invest large amount of money into the hotels when there is | | | |conference happens. They will reserve lots of rooms and meeting rooms. Therefore, they| | | |have more bargaining power. | | |Buyer information about the industry output |High | | |Customers can survey on the best firms that offer great services. They can have | | | |assistance from the travel agents, corporate travel consultants, internet and words of| | | |mouth to determine where they can get the services that they would like to experience. | | | |Positive words of mouth will build good reputation a nd image to the hotel whereas bad | | | |words of mouth will badly impact the business of the hotel. | | |Buyer Profitability |High | | |Customers have the freedom to choose which property they would like to stay in and | | | |dine for. They will gain ‘profit’ when they receive more services as compare to what | | | |they expected. They are still holding high bargaining power. | | | |Decision makers’ incentives |Low | | |When there is a large group coming to stay in the hotel, hotel will provide a discount| | | |price. | | |Threat of backward integration |Low | | |It is impossible for individual customer to enter the hotel industry due to large | | | |investment required. | | |OVERALL RATING: MEDIUM – HIGH | |Power of substitutes |Relative price/performance of substitutes |High | | |Hotelmule (2008) states â€Å"Continual developments in technology keep changing the | | | |potential threat from substitute products†.Technological advancements in th e internet| | | |make the overall market to be more efficient and at the same time expanding the size | | | |of the potential market and create new substitution threats. For example, | | | |video-conferencing has been used instead of holding a conference in hotel. Business | | | |customers tend to travel lesser. | | | |The substitutes for lodging such as camping, hostels and motels, the invention of | | | |cruise ships and trains causes travellers to have alternative choice when travelling | | | |to another country. | | |Switching costs |High | | |It is easy for buyers to switch costs, thus, the substitutes have greater power. | | | |Buyer propensity to substitute |High | | |Substitute products or services will be a threat. Capon (2008, p. 63) states â€Å"This can | | | |be achieved by the substitute being equally good and cheaper, or by it being equal on | | | |price, but offering a better product or more added value†.When other lodges such as | | | |apartments, condos, ca bins and town houses providing similar or equally good function | | | |and providing better value for money, it may make economic sense for the buyers to | | | |switch. | | |OVERALL RATING: HIGH | |Intensity of industry |Industry growth rate |High | |rivalry |There is no industry growth. The hotel industry is in mature stage. Severe industry | | | |rivalry occurs. | | |High fixed costs |High | | |The high cost of building, furnishing and servicing the hotels in the industry create | | | |high fixed costs. This increases rivalry as they need to maximise profits to have | | | |significant returns on investment. Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts must sell more rooms | | | |to cover those costs and increase hotel market competition. Hence, it makes it | | | |difficult to withdraw from the industry and has to compete with other existing rivals. | | |Intermittent overcapacity |Medium | | |Due to there are a lot of competitors in the market, there might be a lot of rooms | | | |that are av ailable and cannot be sold out. | | | |Product differences |High | | |There are no product differences because majority of hotels provide similar types of | | | |high quality service. Products and services in hotels are easy to imitate.It is | | | |difficult to reduce the rivalry through the differentiation of the products and | | | |services. | | | |Brand identity |Medium-High | | |Brand is important because through branding, a business can stand out of the crowd. | | | |People remember the organization and will choose to go to the well-known hotels as it | | | |can heighten the level of self esteem and be part of the social group. Shangri-La | | | |Hotels and Resorts have developed their brand name and are well known in worldwide. | | |However, other hotel groups such as Marriott International and Starwood have great | | | |brand identity as well. | | | |Switching costs |High | | |It is easy for buyers to switch from one competitor’s product to another; industry | | | |riva lry will be increased (Hubbard & Beamish, 2011). Thus, Shangri-La Hotels and | | | |Resorts create a loyalty program named Golden Circle to retain their customers. | | |Informational complexity |Medium-High | | |Consumers can look at rooms available in different hotels and compare prices online. | | | |Internet will have information about the price and service differences. Furthermore, | | | |some hotel websites provide virtual tours which introduce the guests about the real | | | |experience spending time in the hotels. There are also lots of travel websites such as| | | |trip advisor which provide guest’s review about the hotels. Information is readily | | | |available on the Internet. Thus, industry rivalry is enhanced. | | |Concentration and balance |High | | |Cline (n. d) mentions â€Å"Hospitality customers increasingly seek predictable services | | | |that support their ability to move quickly and easily around the world†. International| | | |hotel chains are e xpanding their business to meet the demand of the customers and to | | | |determine the way to be ‘happy’ with their position in the industry. Hence, rivalry | | | |will be significant. | | |Diversity of competitors |Medium | | |The level of diversity among hotels is medium because majority of the hotels provide | | | |similar types of high quality service. However, some hotels like Marriott | | | |International; it diversifies its business into planning and organizing wedding events| | | |for the couple who would like to marry. Marriott provides free assistance from | | | |certified wedding planners and help with everything from selecting centrepieces to |

Loan Management System Essay

The Traditional way of maintaining details of a user in a bank was to enter the details and record them. Every time the user need to perform some transactions he has to go to bank and perform the necessary actions, which may not be so feasible all the time. It may be a hard-hitting task for the users and the bankers too. The project gives real life understanding of Online Banking System and activities performed by various roles in the supply chain. Here, we provide an automation for banking system through Internet. Online Banking System project captures activities performed by different roles in real life banking which provides enhanced techniques for maintaining the required information upto-date, which results in efficiency. The project gives real life understanding of Online Banking System and activities performed by various roles in the supply chain. Scope of the Project This Project investigates the entry threshold for providing a new transaction service channel via the real options approach, where the entry threshold is established by using an Internet banking system designed for the use of normal users(individuals), Industrialists, Entrepreneurs, Educational Institutions(Financial sections), Organizations and Academicians under transaction rate uncertainty. Customer must have a valid User Id and password to login to the system If a wrong password is given thrice in succession, that account will be locked and the customer will not be able to use it. When an invalid password is entered a warning is given to the user that his account is going to get locked. After the valid user logs in he is shown the list of accounts he has with the bank. On selecting the desired account he is taken to a page which shows the present balance in that particular account number. User can request for the details of the last ‘n’ number of transactions that he has performed. A report can also be taken of this. User can make a funds transfer to another account in the same bank. User is provided with a transaction password which is different from the login password. User can transfer funds from his account to any other account with this bank. If the transaction is successful a notification should appear to the customer, in case it is unsuccessful, a proper message should be given to the customer as to why it failed. User can request for cheque book/change of address/stop payment of cheque’s User can view his monthly as well as annual statements. He can also take print out of the same. Generate reports at every section Administrator can take a back up of the database for every instance that is happening, periodically. All users are authenticated to avail the services FAQ section is also included for end users benefit.