Balanced Scorecard: Traditional Performance Measurement

Balanced Scorecard Traditional Performance Measurement Historically, the measurement system for business has been financial. Activities of companies were measured and monitored through the traditional financial accounting model. However, the extensive, even exclusive use of financial measurements in business has been criticized primarily because an overemphasis on achieving and maintaining short-term financial results can cause companies to overinvest in short-term fixes and to underinvest in long-term value creation, particularly in the intangible and intellectual assets that generate future growth. Indeed, the Harvard Business School Council on Competitiveness project in 1992 identified the following systematic differences between investments made by U. S. corporations and those made in Japan and Germany: The U. S. system is less supportive of long-term corporate investment because of the overemphasis on improving short-term returns to influence current share prices. The U. S. ystem favors those forms of investment for which returns are most readily measurable; this leads to underinvestment in intangible assets – product and process innovation, employee skills, customer satisfaction – whose short-term returns are more difficult to measure. Inevitably, as managers are pressured to deliverconsistent and excellent short-term financial performance, trade-offs are made that limit the search for investments in growth opportunities. Even worse, the pressure for short-term financial performance can cause companies to reduce spending on new product development, process improvements, human resource development, information technology, data bases, and systems as well as customer and market development. In the short run, the financial accounting model reports these spending cutbacks as increases in reported income, even when reductions have cannibalized a company’s stock of assetsand its capabilities for creating future economic value. Alternatively, a company could maximize short-term financial results by exploiting customers through high prices or lower service. In the short run, these actions enhance reported profitability, but the lack of customer loyalty and satisfaction will leave the company highly vulnerable to competitive inroads. The concern with the overemphasis on financial performance measures has also permeated the U. S. rofessional association of public accountants as a high-level special committee on financial reporting of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants reinforced concerns with exclusive reliance on financial reporting for measuring business performance: â€Å"Users focus on the future while today’s business reporting focuses on the past. Although information about the past is a useful indicator of future performance, users also need forward-looking information. The committee acknowledged the importance of reporting on how well companies are creating value for the fut ure, and recommended linking business performance reporting to management’s strategic vision: â€Å"Many users want to see a company through the eyes of management to help them understand management’s perspective and predict where management will lead the company. † It went on to say that nonfinancial measurement must play a key role: â€Å"Management should disclose the financial and nonfinancial measurements it uses in managing the business that quantify the effects of key activities and events. The committee concluded by recommending that companies adopt a more â€Å"balanced† and forward-looking approach: To meet users’ changing needs, business reporting must: Provide more information about plans, opportunities, risks and uncertainties Focus more on the factors that create longer-term value, including nonfinancial measures indicating how key business processes are performing Origins of the Balanced Scorecard By the mid-1990s other organization al theorists had taken up Kaplan and Norton’s work and modified the design method of balanced scorecards, ironing out early flaws. Kaplan and Norton published their ideas in full in The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy into Action in 1996 and it became a business bestseller. The Balanced Scorecard Each perspective of the Balanced Scorecard includes objectives, measures of those objectives, target values of those measures, and initiatives, defined as follows: Measures – the observable parameters that will be used to measure progress toward reaching the objective. For example, the objective of profitable growth might be measured by growth in net margin. Targets – the specific target values sought for each of the measures, for example, +2% growth in net margin. Initiatives – action programs to be initiated in order to meet the objective and reach the target. The framework for the balanced scorecard is illustrated below: Figure 1: Balanced Scorecard Framework {draw:frame} As can be seen from the diagram, the objectives and measures of the scorecard are derived from an organization’s vision and strategy. The balanced scorecard should translate a business unit’s mission and strategy into tangible objectives and measures. The measures represent a balancebetween external measures for shareholders and customers, and internal measures if critical business processes, innovation, and learning and growth. The measures are also balancedbetween the outcome measures – the results from past efforts – and the measures that drive future performance. Lastly, the scorecard is balancedbetween objectives, easily quantified outcome measures and subjective, somewhat judgmental, performance drivers of the outcome measures. Every measure selected should be part of a link of cause-and-effect relationships that culminate in improving financial performance. The scorecard should tell the story of the strategy, starting with the long-run financial objectives, and then linking them to the sequence of actions that must be taken with financial processes, customers, internal processes, and finally employees and system to deliver the desired long-run economic performance. Financial Perspective Table 1: Stages of a Business’s Life Cycle Table 2: Measuring Strategic Financial Themes Revenue growth and mix refer to expanding product and service offerings, reaching new customers and markets, changing the product and service mix toward higher-value-added offerings, and repricing products and services. The cost reduction and productivity objective refers to efforts to lower the direct costs of products and services, reduce indirect costs, and share common resources with other business units. For the asset utilization theme, managers attempt to reduce the working capital levels required to support a given volume and mix of business. They also strive to obtain greater utilization of their fixed asset base, by directing new business to resources currently not used to capacity, using scarce resources more efficiently, and disposing of assets that provide inadequate returns on their market value. All these actions enable the business unit to increase the returns earned on its financial and physical assets. Customer Perspective The customer perspective addresses the question of how the firm is viewed by its customers and how well the firm is serving its targeted customers in order to meet the financial objectives. In the customer perspective of the balanced scorecard, managers identify the customer and market segments in which the business unit will compete and the measures of the business unit’s performance in these targeted segments. These segments represent the sources that will deliver the revenue component of the company’s financial objectives. The customer perspective enables companies to align their core or generic outcome measures to targeted customers and market segments. This core measurement group of outcomes is generic across all kinds of organizations, and is illustrated in the following diagram: Figure 2: The Customer Perspective – Core Measures {draw:frame} These outcome measures represent the targets for companies’ marketing, operational, logistics, and product and service development processes. However, these outcome measures have some of the defects of traditional financial measures in that they are lagging measures – employees will not know how well they are doing with customer satisfaction or customer retention until it is too late to affect the outcome. Also, the measures do not communicate what employees should be doing in their day-to-day activities to achieve the desired outcomes. Because of these, managers must also identify what customers in targeted segments value and choose the value proposition they will deliver to these customers. The segment-specific drivers of core customer outcomes represent those factors that are critical for customers to switch to or remain loyal to their suppliers. These attributes are illustrated in the Figure 3 below: Figure 3: The Customer Value Proposition {draw:g} {draw:frame} The customer perspective enables business unit managers to articulate the customer and market-based strategy that will deliver superior future financial returns. Thus, the customer perspective of the scorecard translates an organization’s mission and strategy into specific objectives about targeted customers and market segments that can be communicated throughout the organization. Internal Business Process Perspective Internal business process objectives address the question of which processes are most critical for satisfying customers and shareholders. These are the processes in which the firm must concentrate its efforts to excel. Objectives and measures for this perspective are typically developed after formulating objectives and measures for the financial and customer perspectives to enable companies to focus their internal business process metrics on those processes that will deliver the objectives established for customers and shareholders. The process of deriving objectives and measures for the internal business process perspective represents one of the sharpest distinctions between the balanced scorecard and traditional performance measurement systems. While traditional approaches attempt to monitor and improve existing business processes, the scorecard approach usually identifies entirely new processes at which an organization must excel to meet customer and financial objectives. The balanced scorecard internal business process objectives highlight the processes, several of which may not be currently performing at all, that are most critical for an organization’s strategy to succeed. Additionally, while the traditional performance measurement systems focus on the processes of delivering today’s products and services to today’s customers (short wave of value creation), the balanced scorecard approach is to incorporate innovation processes into the internalbusiness process perspective as illustrated in Figure 3. Figure 3: The Internal Business Process Perspective – The Generic Value Chain Model {draw:frame} {draw:frame} {draw:frame} {draw:frame} The innovation process highlights the importance of, first, identifying the characteristics of market segments that the organization wishes to satisfy with its future products and services, and, then, designing and developing the products and services that will satisfy those targeted segments. This approach enables the organization to put considerable weight on research, design, and development processes that yield new products, services, and markets. Among the measures that can be used in the innovation process are percentage of sales from new products, percentage of sale from proprietary products, new product introduction versus competitors or versus plan, manufacturing process capabilities, and time to develop next generation of products. The operations process represents the short wave of value creation in organizations. It starts with receipt of customer order and finishes with delivery of the product or service to the customer. This process stresses efficient, consistent, and timely delivery of existing products and services to existing customers. It remains important and organizations should identify the cost, quality, time, and performance characteristics that will enable it to deliver superior products and services to its targeted current customers. The influence of the total quality management and time-based competition practices of leading Japanese manufacturers has led many companies to supplement their traditional cost and financial measurements with measurements of operating processes’ quality, cycle time, and cost. Finally, the postsale service process enables companies to feature, when appropriate, important aspects of service that occur after the purchased product or service has been delivered to the customer such as warranty and repair activities, treatment of defects and returns, and the processing of payments. Measures of performance in the operating processes can also be applied to postsale service process (i. e. time, quality, and cost metrics). Thus, cycle times can measure the speed of response to failures and cost metrics can evaluate the efficiency for postsale service processes while first-pass yields can measure what percentage of customer requests are handled with a single service call, rather than requiring multiple calls to resolve the problem. Companies that deal with hazardous or environmentally sensitive chemicals and materials may also introduce critical performance measures associated with the safe disposal of waste and by-products from the production process. Learning and Growth Perspective The fourth perspective of the balanced scorecard, learning and growth, addresses the question of how the firm must learn, improve, and innovate in order to meet its objectives. It identifies the infrastructure that the organization must build to create long-term growth and improvement. The enablers for learning and growth come primarily from three sources: people or employees, systems, and organizational procedures. The financial, customer, and internal business process objectives on the balanced scorecard will typically reveal large gaps between the existing capabilities of people, systems, and procedures and what will be required to achieve breakthrough performance. To close these gaps, businesses will have to invest in reskilling employees, enhancing information technology and systems, and aligning organizational procedures and routines. Figure 4: The Learning and Growth Measurement Framework {draw:frame} Within this core, the employee satisfaction objective is generally considered the driver of the other two measures, employee retention and employee productivity. It recognizes that employee morale and overall job satisfaction are preconditions for increasing productivity, responsiveness, quality, and customer service. Companies typically measure employee satisfaction with an annual survey, or a rolling survey in which a specified percentage of randomly chosen employees is surveyed each month. Employee retention captures an objective to retain those employees in whom the organization has a long-term interest. The theory underlying this measure is that the organization is making long-term investments in its employees so that any unwanted departures represent a loss in the intellectual capital of the business. Long-term, loyal employees carry the values of the organization, knowledge of organizational processes, and sensitivity to the needs of customers. Employee retention is generally measured by percentage of key staff turnover. Employee productivity is an outcome measure of the aggregated impact from enhancing employee skills and morale, innovation, improving internal processes, and satisfying customers. The goal is to relate the output produced by employees to the number of employees used to produce that output. The simplest productivity measure is revenue per employee, which represents how much output can be generated per employee. As employees and the organization become more effective in selling a higher volume and a higher value-added set of products and services, revenue per employee should increase. Linking the Balanced Scorecard Measures to Strategy Uses of the Balanced Scorecard The Balanced Scorecard originally was conceived as an improved performance measurement system. However, it soon became evident that it could be used as a management system to implement strategy at all levels of the organization by facilitating the following functions: Clarifying strategy – the translation of strategic objectives into quantifiable measures clarifies the management team's understanding of the strategy and helps to develop a coherent consensus. Communicating strategic objectives – the Balanced Scorecard can serve to translate high level objectives into operational objectives and communicate the strategy effectively throughout the organization. Planning, setting targets, and aligning strategic initiatives ambitious but achievable targets are set for each perspective and initiatives are developed to align efforts to reach the targets. Strategic feedback and learning – executives receive feedback on whether the strategy implementation is proceeding according to plan and on whether the strategy itself is successful (â€Å"double-loop learning†). These functions have made the Balanced Scorecard an effective management system for the implementation of strategy. The Balanced Scorecard has been applied successfully to private sector companies, non-profit organizations, and government agencies as discussed in the succeeding sections. Potential Pitfalls The following are potential pitfalls that should be avoided when implementing the Balanced Scorecard: Lack of a well-defined strategy: The Balanced Scorecard relies on a well-defined strategy and an understanding of the linkages between strategic objectives and the metrics. Without this foundation, the implementation of the Balanced Scorecard is unlikely to be successful. Using only lagging measures: Many managers believe that they will reap the benefits of the Balanced Scorecard by using a wide range of non-financial measures. However, care should be taken to identify not only lagging measures that describe past performance, but also leading measures that can be used to plan for future performance. Use of generic metrics: It usually is not sufficient simply to adopt the metrics used by other successful firms. Each firm should put forth the effort to identify the measures that are appropriate for its own strategy and competitive position. Effectiveness of the Balanced Scorecard (Success Stories) Mobil North America Marketing and Refining CIGNA Property and Casualty Insurance Brown & Root Energy Services’ Rockwater Division Chemical (Chase) Retail Bank AT Canada, Inc. Zeneca Ag Products North America Southern Gardens Citrus University of California, San Diego Duke Children’s Hospital United Parcel Service Building and Implementing a Balance Scorecard Balanced Scorecard Components Figure 5: The Logic of Balanced Scorecard Strategic Planning {draw:frame} Process of Building a Balanced Scorecard Kaplan and Norton defined a four-step process that has been used across a wide range of organizations. Define the measurement architecture – When a company initially introduces the Balanced Scorecard, it is more manageable to apply it on the strategic business unit level rather than the corporate level. However, interactions must be considered in order to avoid optimizing the results of one business unit at the expense of others. Build consensus around strategic objectives – The top three or four objectives for each perspective are agreed upon. Potential measures are identified for each objective. Select and design measures – Measures that are closely related to the actual performance drivers are selected for evaluating the progress made toward achieving the objectives. Develop the implementation plan – Target values are assigned to the measures. An information system is developed to link the top level metrics to lower-level operational measures. The scorecard is integrated into the management system.

Positive Risk Taking Essay

Explain ways in which risk is an integral part of everyday life, Risk for most people is an accepted part of everyday life e.g. catching a bus or walking to the shop etc†¦ will carry some element of risk. Risk is associated with our health, safety, security, well being, employment, education, daily activities, using resources and equipment and community participation. Some adults such as those who are disabled or who are older are usually discouraged from taking risks with their budgeting, planning, employment and their daily living skills usually because people fear for their limitations or that they might hurt themselves or others. Everyone has the right to take risks and make decisions about their own lives, a balance should be found between service users participation in everyday activities and the carers duty of care. Social care and health policies are encouraging residents to increase their independence by being involved in the wider society such as leisure and work. It should be noted that it is impossible to eliminate risk completely , however minimising and being prepared for risk by preventative action. Supporting people to live independently by taking part of their lives means accepting that there are risks that cant be avoided but can be prepared for. Explain why individuals may have been discouraged or prevented from taking risks, see more:explain ways in which risk is an integral part of everyday life For some services, approaches to risk have been a problem because they have been concerned with avoiding potentially harmful situations for the service user and staff. People need to take risk to achieve things on their own merit, but there are people who should support them but will discourage them from taking risks because of perceived perceptions of the persons limitations. Risk taking can have benefits for the individual as it will enable them to do things most people take for granted. Risk is beneficial, balancing levels or protection and preserving levels of choice and control. A balance will need to be achieved between the wishes of the individual and the law duty of care. Described the links between risk taking and responsibilities, empowerment and social inclusion, Personalised care is a right for everyone, however some people will need more support than others in helping to make choices of their own lives. Effective personalisation of care comes the need to manage risk for people to make decisions as safely as humanly possible. Making risks clear and understood is crucial to empowering residents and the carers, risk management does not eliminate risks. managing risk to maximise peoples choice and control of their own lives. If the outcomes are part of the support plan and all risks have been discussed and understood, this will lead to real choice and control and will offer a better quality of life for the individual. Positive risk taking will help the resident to gain self confidence, develop new skills knowledge and hopefully allow them take an active part within their community so that they don’t feel included. Explain the process of developing a positive person centered approach to risk assessment, The person centered approach will focus on the individuals rights to choose their own lifestyle, even if that includes making bad decisions. A person centered approach is about helping people and those involved, think in a positive way to achieve the changes they want whilst keeping risk at bay. Risk management is about finding the balance been positive risk taking based on autonomy and independence and a policy of protection for the person and the community based on reducing harm. Its been stated that for a positive person centered approach to a risk assessment should consist of the following, involvement of the service user and relatives in the risk assessment, positive and informed risk taking, proportionality, contextualising behavior, defensible decision making, a learning culture and tolerable risks. Explain how to apply the principles and method of a person centered approach to each of the different stages of the process of risk assessment, Working in a personalised way and developing a positive person centered approach means to know that risks cannot be avoided but however can be prepared for. Reasonable risk is about balancing empowering people who need help to make their own decisions, once they have all the information, that is tailored to their needs so that they make their best decisions. Involvement of service users and relatives in risk assessment, to involve the resident, nearest and dearest is one of the most important parts of the person centered approach. The people involved with the resident will help gather information in framing of what the risk actually is, in thinking, generating ideas and solutions, by evaluating the solutions, in decisions making around the risk, in implementing the actions and by the learning that takes place during these actions. Staff must make note of the residents and others wants, their views on their owns risk and what responsibilities each person has in managing their own risk effectively. The person Centered Approach will meet this by asking for a clear picture of what the person is wanting to achieve, why it is important, what the outcome would look like, a history of the risk, the decision making agreement tools to look at staff roles and responsibilities and who will be responsible for the different decisions relating to the r isk. Positive and informed risk raking, This particular process is formed around the positive view of the person. This process is based on finding creative solutions rather than just saying no. Informed and positive risk taking is about quality of life being lived to the full whilst people in the community are kept safe, by meeting what is important to them, how they would keep themselves and others safe. Remember that positive and informed risk taking needs to touch on what the law says and allows i.e. legislation within The Human Rights Act. Proportionality, The management of risk must match the potential harm that could be caused. Using a person centered approach means flexibility. The more serious the task the more time you would consider it in greater detail. Centered approach looks at the consequences of not doing the task that could have potential risks for the resident, family member etc†¦ and being able to balance against the consequences that could happen of taking the risk. Contextualising Behavior, asks why did the person behaved in a certain way? at this time? in this situation? Part of this process involves getting information regarding previous information about the person, including the history of the resident of the risk they are wanting to undertake from their own perspective, historical data from a variety of sources to look at what has worked in particular situations, and communication charts will help with a persons words and behaviors, seeking their meaning and what the best response should be. This will help to get a understanding of the persons behavior in different context, but also to build a picture of what has been learned about how to best support the resident. Defensible Decision making, Following the person centered approach generates a clear trail of written and recorded records of what has been discussed, the different perspectives, the problems and solutions that have been considered, alongside any legal issues, such as the Human rights act or that of the mental health act that could effect the risk decision. All paperwork generated during the process provides a clear rationale for the decisions that will emerge during the processes that have been taken, and why other options have been declined. The rationale for decision making is also more clearly expounded and recorded than in traditional risk assessment forms in common usage. A learning Culture, The positive and productive approach to risk has a deep emphasis within its on going learning, using learning and reflective tools such as questions such as whats working? whats not working etc†¦ by defining staff their core duties and their own judgement and creativity in relation to the risk. Tolerable Risks is a key aspect for the Person Centred Approach in using this process it enables participants to have a more balanced and rational approach to risk, finding ways to enable the person to achieve what is important to them while considering what keeps that person and the community safe in a way the individual understands. Explain how a service focused approach to risk assessment would differ from a person centred approach A risk assessment only identifies the probability of harm, assess the impact on the individual, and interventions that will help to diminish the risk or to reduce the harm. Assessments cannot prevent risk. Risk is a normal and enables learning and understanding. Risk assessments are full of charts and scoring systems. A service focused approach seeks to avoid all risks. Risk assessments have no flexibility and is not a responsive approach to meet peoples changing circumstances. A service centred approach to risk assessment would be guided by a standard procedure and can compromise individuals rights to make choices and take risks. A person centred approach to risk taking will find the balance between what is important to the person, their aspirations and the supports that they require. Identify the consequences for individuals of a service focused approach to risk-assessment. Risk taking will usually often have positive benefits for individuals, enabling them to do things that most will take for granted. The problem with a service focused approach to risk assessment, is that it reduces the individual’s independence which in turn could reduce the positive benefits for the individual in question. A service focused approach to risk taking usually tends to have a negative focus on what the individual is not able to do or what they cannot achieve and has a limited outlook on identifying the benefits of positive, person-centred risk assessment. It does not empower the individual or encourage independence. Explain how legislation, national and local policies and guidance provide a framework for decision making which can support an individual to have control over their own lives, There are many different legislations and policies in place to promote human rights, in relation to support the individuals right to make up his or her own mind and to take risk. The equality Act 2010, is a law that bans any unfair treatment and help to get equal opportunities in the workplace and society. This Act covers nine protected characteristics, which cannot be used as a reason to treat people unfairly they are, Age Disability gender reassignment marriage and civil partnership pregnancy and maternity race religion or belief sex sexual orientation The Human rights Act 1998, This Act states that are able to seek help from courts if their Human rights have been infringed. The Human Right Act guarantees the following rights; The Right to life The right to freedom from torture and inhuman or degrading punishment The right to freedom from slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour The right to liberty and security of person The right to a fair and public trial within a reasonable time The right to freedom from retrospective criminal law and no punishment without law The right to respect for private and family life, home and correspondence The right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion The right to freedom of expression The right to freedom of assembly and association The right to marry and found a family The prohibition of discrimination in the enjoyment of convention rights The right to peaceful enjoyment of possessions and protection of property The right to access to an education The right to free elections The right not to be subjected to the death penalty Mental Capacity Act 2005, is to promote and safeguard decision making within a legal framework. It does this in two ways: By empowering people to make decisions for themselves wherever possible and by protecting people who lack capacity by providing a flexible framework that allows them to be part of the decision making process By allowing people to plan ahead for a time in the future when they might lack the capacity for any number of reasons Mental Health Act 2007 – amends the Mental Health Act 1983 and the Mental Capacity Act 2005. It introduces significant changes which include: Introduction of Supervised Community Treatment. This replaced supervised discharge with a power to return the patient to hospital, where the person may be forcibly medicated, if the medication regime is not being complied with in the community. Redefining professional roles: broadening the range of mental health professionals who can be responsible for the treatment of patients without their consent. Nearest relative: making it possible for some patients to appoint a civil partner as nearest relative. Definition of mental disorder: introduce a new definition of mental disorder throughout the Act. Criteria for Involuntary commitment: introduce a requirement that someone cannot be detained for treatment unless appropriate treatment is available. Introduction of independent mental health advocates for qualifying patients. Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006 This act is intended to prevent unsuitable people from working with vulnerable people and to reform current vetting and barring practices. The act sets out a legal framework for the Independent Safeguarding Authority. Valuing People (Department of Health, 2001) This states the importance of Person Centred Planning can play in helping people with learning difficulties take charge of their own lives. The Guidance (Department of Health, 2002) stressed that Person Centred Planning is not a professional activity done to people; instead people themselves and their friends, families or other allies, must lead it. Putting People First, stated that person centred planning must become mainstream. Putting People First recognises that person-centred planning and self-directed support are central to delivering personalisation and maximising choice and control. It recognises that to achieve real change, users and carers must participate at every stage. These areas are: universal services – transport, leisure, health, education, housing and access to information and advice; choice and control – shaping services to meet people’s needs, rather than shaping people to fit in with the services on offer; social capital – care and support that individuals and their carers can get from their local community (friends, family, neighbours or community groups); and early intervention and prevention – support that is available for people who need help to stay independent for as long as possible, to keep their home or garden tidy, or to start taking regular exercise. Describe how a human rights based approach supports an individual to make decisions and take risks; A human rights based approach to risk management means to make sure individuals know their rights and that they are being supported to participate in making their own choices and decisions. A human rights based approach to risk assessment will balance the human rights of service users, carers, and other members of their communities. This is done so risks can be managed more positively and effectively. A human rights based approach looks at risk with ‘Human Rights’ in mind, it identifies the relevant equality and diversity issues, and maximises service user participation and empowerment. A human rights based approach to risk, means ensuring service users are as involved as they can possibly be in their own risk assessment process. support an individual to recognise potential risk in different areas of their life, and support the individual to balance choices with their own and others’ health, safety and Wellbeing; Positive risk taking is the process which will identify the potential benefit or harm. Positive Risk taking is to encourage and support people in positive risk taking so that they can achieve personal change or growth. Risks can be in many different areas of their life including, risks relating to their own health, their social life and also their finances and it is important to support the individual to recognise all of these potential risks. The risk assessment looks at four areas of risk; risks to self, risks to others and risks from other and risks to property. It is important that whilst improving on their quality of life they need to maintain their safety, responsibilities to themselves and others. Supporting an individual to recognise potential risks whilst balancing the choices with their own and others health, safety and well-being involves: Empowering people to access opportunities and take worthwhile chances. Understanding the person’s perspective of what they will gain from taking risks and understanding what they will lose if they are not allowed to take the risk. Ensuring the individual understanding the consequences of different actions to understand what the reasonably expected consequences may be of making that choice. Helping the individual to make decisions based on all the choices available and accurate information. Being positive about risk taking. Understanding a person’s strengths and finding creative ways for people to be able to do things rather than ruling them out. Knowing what has worked or not in the past and where problems have arisen, understanding why supporting people who use services to learn from their experiences. ensuring support and advocacy is available sometimes supporting short term risks for long-term gains. ensuring that services provided promote independence not dependence assuming that people can make their own decisions (in line with the Mental Capacity Act) and supporting people to do so working in partnership with adults who use services, family carers and advocates and recognise their different perspectives and views developing an understanding of the responsibilities of each party promoting trusting working relationships. Describe how own values, belief systems and experiences may affect working practice when supporting an individual to take risks Encouraging risk taking can put people in a difficult position as trying to balance someones own personalisation through risk taking with your own values and beliefs and the duty to keep people safe. Peoples past experiences may make them feel that the risks involved, will result in problems, however they should not let this interfere with the individual’s wishes. At some point everyone will have had a bad experience following a course of action this does not necessarily mean this will happen to other people. Your beliefs and experiences should not cloud the issue. It is key that you feel confident and equipped to support people to assess and evaluate their own risks. Advice is readily available when facing difficult cases in the form of risk enablement panels. Record all discussions and decisions made relating to supporting the individual to take risks, It is very important to ensure that all discussions and decisions made relating to supporting the individual to take risks are recorded within their support plan. Records will need to be eligible and understandable to all the members that work with the individual. The aim of record keeping is to ensure that the right people have the right information at the right time to provide the best care for the person in question. Recording information will provide a record of what has been discussed and decided in regards of risk taking. The records should also record any incidents which have taken place. The reason for keeping the records are: To show that you have offered the individual choices To show that you have agreed the desired outcomes To show that the individual has given their consent. complete a risk assessment with an individual following agreed ways of working, Risk assessment is the activity of collecting information through observation, communication and investigation. It is an ongoing process that involves considerable persistence and skill to assemble and manage relevant information in ways that become meaningful for the users of services (and significant other people) as well as the practitioners involved in delivering services and support. An effective risk assessment will need the person in question, their families, carers, advocates and practitioners to speak with one another to decide on decision and course of action. communicate the content of the risk assessment to others It is important to communicate and work in a consistent way with all those whom are supporting the individual. Gathering information and sharing is important. It is not just an essential part of risk assessment and management, but also key in identifying risks. Its important to communicate the relevant information of the risk assessment to all relevant staff. It will also be important to discuss and explain the risk assessment with the individual’s carer and family, so that they are kept in the loop. The individual’s goals and targets should be discussed too, so that they can aid understanding regarding the risk assessment and to ensure all those involved are aware of the desired outcomes. support the individual to take the risk for which the assessment has been completed; One way of supporting the individual to take the risk, could involve having a trial run. An example could be where the individual wants to make an independent trip in to town using public transport. On the first trip you could accompany the individual on each step of the journey. On the second trip, you could accompany them to the town and then arrange to meet with them later in the day. On the third trip, you may just accompany them to the bus stop. Gradually you can reduce the amount of support you provide. It is also important that the individual knows what to do if things do go wrong. You can support them to take risks by ensuring they have clear information and advice about what to do if they have any concerns. Review and revise the risk assessment with the individual; After each risk assessment has been agreed it will be important that to monitor and review in case any revisions are necessary. Risks may change as circumstances change, so they should be reviewed regularly. Risk assessments should be reviewed periodically and whenever circumstances change to ensure they remain current. i.e. Resident Baths on the own accord, but due to a fall now need assistance getting in and out of the bath. evaluate with the individual how taking the identified risk has contributed to their well-being. Well-being describes the way we think and feel about ourselves and others, our confidence, and our ability to control things in our life. When evaluating you will need to speak, with the individual, how taking the identified risks has helped their well-being and their quality of life. This will involve looking at the positive /negative consequences and outcomes of their choices they have made. Looking at whether taking the risks have met the individual’s needs and achieved their desired outcome. Taking an identified risk will hopefully make the individual feel empowered and to have a greater feel of independence, control and normality. In supporting the individual to take positive risks, it should help them to evaluate other courses of action and can build confidence. The experience of failure, as a result of risk taking in a safe environment, can help to manage the identified risk better in the future. explain how the principle of duty of care can be maintained while supporting individuals to take risks, Everyone has a duty of care and a responsibility not to agree to a support plan if there are any serious concerns that it will not meet the individual’s needs or if it places an individual in a dangerous situation. Whilst an individual can choose to live with a level of risk and is allowed to do so through law, the local authority does not have to fund it. When you support individuals so that they can have more choice and control within their lives through positive risk taking, things may go wrong from time to time. A defensible decision is one where those involved in the risk assessing process: Used reliable assessment methods Acted responsibly in relation to their duty of care Were not negligent Assessed and took steps to manage and minimise foreseeable risks Recorded decisions and subsequently checked they were carried out Followed policies, procedures and guidance Involved the person and other relevant people in the process Supported people to make informed decisions Identification of positive and negative risks Involvement of people who use services and those who are important to them – this includes people who form the individual’s informal ‘circle of support’, who are involved from the beginning to gather information, define what the risks are from the individual’s point of view and to discuss ways to enable and manage these risks. Positive and informed risk-taking – this is built on a strengths-based approach to the person and looks at creative ways for people to be able to do things rather than ruling them out. Proportionality – this means that the time and effort spent on managing a risk should match the severity of that risk. The approach should also explore the consequence of not taking the risk in question, such as loss of autonomy or restriction of choice. Contextualising behaviour – this means knowing about the person’s history and social environment, their previous experience of risk, what has and has not worked in previous situations. Defensible decision making – this means recording a clear rationale for all the decisions made and the discussions that led to the decisions, including reference to relevant legislation such as the Mental Capacity Act or the Human Rights Act. A learning culture – this require a commitment to ongoing learning and the use of reflective practice for people working at the frontline. Tolerable risks – this involves negotiating and balancing issues of risk and safety to identify what is acceptable for everyone concerned (the individual and others including the community) on a case by case basis. Describe what action to take if an individual decides to take an unplanned risk that places him/herself or others in immediate or imminent danger, When looking after someone if you believe that he or she is about to take an unplanned risk which could potentially place them or others in immediate or imminent danger it is very important to take appropriate corrective and preventative action and stop the activity immediately. Risk assessments should include contingency plans that address risks from unplanned events. Physical intervention may only be the course of action. Staff should be trained with a range of skills to deal with any potentially violent situations, as well as a range of restraint techniques that will help them use the minimum level of force possible. Physical intervention is only used in response to challenging behaviour.

On the legacy of Elliot Liebow and Carol Stack: Context-driven fieldwork and the need for continuous ethnography Essay

Ethnographic Research Introduction Reading response            The study reveals that ethnographic research is used to study people’s culture in different geographical locations and or occupations. Most research are concerned with the studies of people in either schools or communities. Hence, it can be concluded that ethnographic research are the major approach to the study groups of people. The studies also revealed that ethnographic studies obtain data using two main research methodologies, which include observations and interviews. Some studies combine both interviews and observations as the tools of data collection for example Duener, (2007). Few studies rely on only one type of data collection tool where interviews dominate. However, the two data collection tools are inseparable in most studies.            Ethnographic research involves studying a group of people or their cultures that can be done in schools or other fields. For example, it can involve studying of the performance of students in school and how they interact during their studies or communities interactions (Valenzuela, 2005; Fine, Centrie, & Roberts, 2000).The study is one of the most preferred research approaches since it allows observe and record data in an interactive session with participants (Gilmore, & McDermott, 2006). As a result, the study generates detailed and accurate data about the study subjects. The research approach is simple and cheap and thus it is suitable to study wide variety of populations and geographical locations.            Ethnographic research involves interactions between participants and researchers. During these interactions, the researchers use various methodologies to obtain data from the participants. Observations and interviews forms the major methodologies used to carry ethnographic research. For example, Heath, (1983) Flowers, (2000) and Fine et al., (2000) uses interviews to obtain information from the study populations. Interviews help the researcher to obtain data from the participant through question and answer session. Duneier, (2007) used observations to obtain data about how kinsmen are brought up during their childhood. According to the observations, the study revealed that family members and not their mothers kept at least one-third of the target subjects, kinsmen. Reflection            The data collected from ethnographic studies may give descriptions of how people lived in the past or in day-to-day life and how explains their behavioural interactions. Hence, it makes it easier to study people in the different communities and their behaviour. The results obtained from these studies gives insight or deeper understanding of the people of a given community. For example, ethnographic study carried out by Duneier, (2007) gave insight on how families and parents relates with their kinsmen. This helps to give broader understanding how the society brings up their relatives. In addition, the data obtained from ethnographic studies can be used to give insights on various social processes in a given field. For example, a number of studies involved data collection from schools and helped the research to understand how various performances are related to other factors that children interacts with for example repeating of classes.            In addition, the ethnographic studies help one to have a deeper understanding of the societies in terms of what they do, how they behave, and how they interact socially. Understanding of such issues is an important factor in developing an area of interest in any field of study. For example, since most ethnographic studies involve groups of people in either school and out of schools field, it would be appropriate adopt ethnographic studies in the field of education and study how children interacts and perform in school. In addition, the interactions between teachers and children may be studied to understand whether there is relationship with their performances. This is because, in a group of people, it would be easier to carry out observations when they are interacting together. Moreover, it would be appropriate to carry out interviews. Description of the final topic            The topic of the final paper will be how children’ behaviour impacts on their academic performance in local schools. The study will involve studying children’s behaviour at school and home and then relating it to the academic performances. Some studies argue that bad behaviour detracts children from academic activities and thus affecting their performances negatively. On the other hand, studies argue that children behaviour has no impact on their academic performance in schools. Hence, the study will try to establish whether there is a correlation of behaviour and academic performance.            The study will involve observations of children in school and homes and their behaviours recorded as good or bad. Some features such as how they interact with other children in schools and homes, obedience, and respect to adults and their teachers will be used as major observational characteristics. In addition, interviews will be conducted to both parents and teachers top evaluate the behaviour of their children. Academic performance will be retrieved from the schools’ achieve databases. This will then be related with the performance of the children and conclusion reached.            The study will help to prove the current contentious findings on the impacts of children’s behaviour on the academic performance. The information obtained from this study will help parents and teachers to understand whether children’s behaviour affects their performances in school. As a result, they will be able to make appropriate decisions and implement appropriate measures. Reference Duneier, M. (2007). On the legacy of Elliot Liebow and Carol Stack: Context-driven fieldwork and the need for continuous ethnography. Focus, 25(1), 33-38. Fine, M., Weis, L., Centrie, C., & Roberts, R. (2000). Educating beyond the borders of schooling. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 31(2), 131-151. Flowers, D. A. (2000). Codeswitching and Ebonics in Urban Adult Basic Education Classrooms. Education and Urban Society, 32(2), 221-36.Gilmore, P., & McDermott, R. (2006). † And This Is How You Shall Ask†: Linguistics, Anthropology, and Education in the Work of David Smith. Anthropology & education quarterly, 37(2), 199-211.Heath, S. B. (1983). Ways with words: Language, life and work in communities and classrooms. cambridge university Press. Valenzuela, A. (2005). Subtractive schooling, caring relations, and social capital in the schooling of US-Mexican youth. Beyond silenced voices: Class, race, and gender in United States schools, 83-94. Source document

Internation study-proposal Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Internation study-proposal - Essay Example Globalization leads to increased government lending by developed nations and hence the country is able to start and complete economic projects. Access to funds improves various government aspects such as education, healthcare and social services. Globalization reduces poverty since people are employed and have access to better education. Expansion of some companies to developed nations brings resources necessary to develop new industries and in the end local industries grow more. On the other hand, globalization also has negative effects to developing nations. According to Brown and Lauder, globalization limits the expansion of industries in developing nations (Brown and Hugh 14). Globalization leads to unfair competition that brings down local companies in developing nations. Fallen companies in turn leads to an imbalance between exports and imports and hence such countries develop at a slower rate. Globalization leads to export of knowledge such that the developing nations have no skilled labor for their industries (Kose 208). The salaries in developing nations are low as compared to developed nations. Since globalization allows for movement of labor, most people tend to leave the undeveloped countries and go to developed nations to seek for employment. This hampers industrial and economic growth of many developing

Primary source analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Primary source analysis - Essay Example His spiritual level is supposed to be at par with Buddha. So, the issue is defined in clear terms in the sutra that enlightenment does not depend on initiation. Vimalakirti belonged to Licchavi, one of the ruling clans of ancient India, and he commanded high respect from all. The second chapter makes a reference to his illness. There is passing reference to his feigning illness but the fact is he probably has taken the illness of one of his devotees upon himself. People come to enquire about his welfare and Vimalakirti takes that opportunity to preach the finer aspects of dharma and many of them are blessed with enlightenment. In the ensuing chapters Lord Buddha advises his disciples and bodhisattvas to visit Vimalakirti as well. But they are disinclined to go and make pretexts, because in the past they had all been overwhelmed by Vimalakirtis loftier understanding of the ultimate spiritual truth. Vimalakriti owns extraordinary spiritual talent. Evan Manjusri, bodhisattva of wisdom, is no match for him. When he agrees to visit Vimalakriti, a galaxy of Buddha’s disciples, bodhisattvas, gods and goddesses decide to follow him to avail the opportunity to watch the two great spiritual giants conversing with each other. All of them know that it would be an astounding and illuminating experience. Soon the room where Vimalakirti is convalescing becomes the spiritual dispensation center. A large number of people keep on arriving to that place and proclaim that they have enjoyed the realm of bliss with his audience. In the discussion with visitors and Buddha’s disciples, Vimalakirti’s elucidation leads them to higher realms of spirituality, and their existing grasp of the issues are rectified. In the meantime, Buddha is delivering his spiritual sermons in the garden. Vimalakirti presents himself there along with his large number of

The government should prohibit the production of cigarettes Essay

The government should prohibit the production of cigarettes - Essay Example With this information, the essay affirmatively agrees that the government should prohibit the production of drugs, especially in the European Union and the Netherlands. Smoking cigarettes has adverse effects especially on the health of the smoker. Smoking reduces the health of an individual by affecting nearly every organ in the body. Smoking causes chronic obstructive lung diseases such as emphysema and chronic bronchitis (Ruiz, Strain, & Lowinson, 2011). Research has shown that, smoking of tobacco causes more death every year compared to other diseases such as HIV/AIDS and motor vehicle accidents. This is because smoking tobacco causes lung cancer, which is incurable if not noticed at its early stages. Tobacco is an addictive drug so once the user starts using it becomes hard for him or her to stop thus causing adverse negative effects on the health of the user. Smoking of tobacco causes different types of cancer they include cancer of the esophagus, kidney cancer, cancer of the la rynx, cancer of the oral cavity, stomach cancer and bladder cancer. Cigarette smoking has adverse effects on early childhood and reproduction especially to women who smoke. It causes infertility, preterm delivery, low birth weight, and stillbirth (King & Brucker, 2011). Research has shown that women who smoke have an increased risk of hip fracture compared to women who have never smoked. Recent research has shown that, students who smoke perform lower than students who do not smoke (Ruiz, Strain, & Lowinson, 2011). This is because smoking causes mental disorders especially among the college students. It also causes depressive disorder, which generally affects the students’ performance. The National Institute on Drug Abuse in their research concluded that, smoking causes mental disorders especially among young adults and adolescents (Lapointe, 2008). College students who smoke are likely to participate in behaviors, which pose great health effects. Smoking of cigarettes result s to respiratory infections and asthma. Exposure to environmental tobacco has also adverse effects to both the smokers and nonsmokers. The environmental protection agency classifies it as a group, a carcinogen. This carcinogen causes lung cancer to both smokers and nonsmokers. This means that, cigarettes affect both smokers and nonsmokers because of the release of harmful substances from the cigarettes such as ammonia, nicotine and carbon monoxide. With these effects there is a need to implement measures to prohibit the production of cigarettes. In the Netherlands, there are laws that have been set to prohibit smoking tobacco in public transport and public building (Blanpain & Anderson, 2005). In the year 2004, the Netherland government said that, every employee has a right to work in a smoke free zone without being affected by smoke from the other people. In the year 2008, Amsterdam Airport Schiphol in Europe was the first smoke free airport. This means that, the government worked towards prohibiting the smoking of cigarettes in public places. The smoke free law applied to all public places in the Netherlands, especially in hotels and restaurants (Rom & Markowitz, 2007). In the Netherlands, all forms of sponsorship, promotions, and advertising of cigarettes were prohibited. This ensured that cigarettes did not have a

Ethical dilemmas teachers face Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Ethical dilemmas teachers face - Essay Example He came from a financially well-off family. His parents were always very concerned about Joseph’s progress in studies and had left no stone unturned in the way of making Joseph take interest in studies, but all went in vain. One day, the school had arranged the parents-teachers’ meeting. Joseph’s parents approached me and asked me about Joseph. I wished there was some improvement in Joseph’s studies but there wasn’t any. Caught in distress, his father, Henry asked me to give Joseph extra time. I told Henry that Joseph to me was like my own child and that I was trying my best, but there were time constraints. I could not attend Joseph beyond a fixed duration, and there were other students that equally required my attention as well. Henry told me that he had arranged a number of tutors before, but nobody managed to do his job successfully. Henry also told me that Joseph had told him that he understood nobody’s lecture better than mine. I also k new that because whenever I told Joseph something, he seemed to have got that there and then. Henry asked me if I could give Joseph time after the classes. He also asked me if the school forbade me as a teacher to see some student after the school. I told Henry that although there was no such rule in the school, but it would be very difficult for me to do justice to my job as a teacher. However, I did not refuse him, though it was no less than an ethical dilemma for me. On one hand, I had the potential to save a child’s future from getting spoiled because Joseph understood what I taught him and just required a little more time from me. On the other hand, paying more attention towards Joseph alone might be an injustice to other students who were studying with him. â€Å"It is important to remember that your job entails keeping the entire class engaged† (Wood, 2009). But I decided to accept the offer because by giving Joseph tuition after the school, I would not have don e as much

The Former Soviet Satellite of Ukraine Research Paper

The Former Soviet Satellite of Ukraine - Research Paper Example Within such a construct of analysis, this paper will seek to identify key issues as well as provide a rational response to the ways in which these can work to be ameliorated. With regards to the geography of Ukraine, it occupies a territory larger than any other European nation asides from the Russian Federation. As such, due to the fact that the Russian Federation is divided between Europe and Asia, Ukraine can definitively be said to be the largest wholly European country. As with a large part of Eastern Europe, the landscape of Ukraine is mostly flat with fertile steppes stretching out over nearly 80% of nation. One of the defining aspects of the nation’s geography is that of the Danube and the Dnieper. The Danube accounts for the nation’s southwestern border whereas the Dnieper runs laterally bisecting the nation and flowing through a majority of the major cities and industrial centers of the nation. Geo-politically speaking, the nation is bordered by Russia and Belarus to the north, Poland and Slovakia to the west, Moldova to the southwest, and the Black Sea in the South. Of course it is difficult ot discuss the geography of the nation without discussing the way in which several failed Soviet experiments have inalterably changed the landscape and geography. Although there are a number of factors that contribute to this, a lion’s share of the death rate is directly linked to heavy smoking and alcoholism; both issues that continue to plague the nation.   Though it may seem to the reader than an extensive understanding of the demographic situation is not required before delving into the way in which the nation seeks to house and provide for its people, the fact of the matter is that such an issue has a direct correlation to the need, demand, and production of housing within the system (Tsenkova & Turner, 2004).

MARKETING & SOCIETY Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

MARKETING & SOCIETY - Essay Example This essay will detail the Achilles Heel of Coca-Cola’s operations in India, namely its competition with native inhabitants over limited water resources, and critically evaluate the company’s strategy for handling of these criticisms. The competition for water between Coca-Cola manufacturing plants and local inhabitants was nowhere more blatant than in Plachimada – a rural part of the state of Kerala in South India. A subsidiary of Coca-Cola – Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages – set up a manufacturing plant here in the year 2000. Plachimada and its surrounding areas were prone to periodic droughts. Yet, the governing authorities approved the project, apparently reasoning that the plant will stimulate the local economy and increase the speed of development in Plachimada. Coca-Cola promptly dug six bore wells for drawing water and before long the water table in the entire region dried up. This meant that the local inhabitants have to walk (or cycle) nearly seven kilometres to reach drinkable water. For example, according to the first hand report of Mark Thomas, â€Å"People I spoke to said they used to earn about 1 [pounds sterling] a day as harvesters, and they used to get about 20 days work a month. Now they are lucky if they get five days work a month, because the local crops have failed. They felt they had no option but to fight the company, and set up a 24-hour vigil opposite the plant. At the end of the month, they will have been there for 647 days.† (Thomas, 2004) Hence, the grievances expressed by local villagers and social activists are not confined to the issue of drinking water. The operation of the manufacturing plant gives rise to a myriad of challenges to the environment, agricultural productivity and people’s livelihoods. The Plachimada episode was only the first of many run-ins between Coca-Cola and rural communities in India. Following the tumult in

Psychology Stress Coursework Essay Example for Free

Psychology Stress Coursework Essay Stressed, unbalanced and permanently under pressure. This is how in the movie â€Å"Office Space† Peter, a programmer in a big software company, passes his days and therefore hates his bothersome job, his boss and his whole life. When seeking help in hypnosis the therapist dies suddenly and leaves him back in a state of total relaxation and casualness so that he neglects orders to do extra work at weekends, finds the courage to start dating the long admired girl next door, and surprisingly impresses some evaluation interviewers with his new coolness what ends up in unexpected promotion. In the new position he decides to strike back against his company by installing a virus-like software to invincibly transfer money from the company to their bank account together with his just fired friends Michael and Samir. By mistake, however, the plan gets totally out of control so that they fear their uncovering and decide to secretly return the money, which – after some confusion produced by mentally handicapped Milton who has been humiliated by the boss so far and therefore sets the whole office on fire – finally brings all of them to a happy life in relief, relaxation and harmony. But before that relaxation can ease his life, Peter is exposed to a variety of stressors (most of them having been discussed in our lesson) at the beginning of the movie. Most prominent are task-related job stressors. Peter is responsible for essential reports to fix millennium bugs in bank software and simultaneously works for eight bosses. This situation sets him under daily pressure when e.g. his boss asks him to deliver a report by the same day he didn’t even start working on by midday, or when he gets negative feedback from all his bosses for a single mistake. Together with high levels of monotony and the fact that he has almost no control on the type and amount of work he’s got to do within rigid deadlines, this situation is a constant source of psychological pressure and imbalance. Additional stress originates from physical stressors like the need to work in small and stuffed office boxes, disturbances by loud and annoying office equipment or by getting periodic calls from colleagues and bosses, like e.g. Milton, who permanently talks crab and even calls him on the phone for that. Further stressors can be identified as demanding and privacy-hostile working-time arrangements. When he for example tries hard to escape his boss on a Friday afternoon to not risk a â€Å"last-minute† weekend shift, but badly fails, one can imagine that the view of a boring and stressful Saturday at work is everything but relaxing. But even in his private life poor Peter is far from being relaxed and easygoing. When he for instance comes home to relax after a long day in the office, his neighbour can hear every single breath he does and they can talk to each other through the thin wall, which can be considered as a kind of social stressor within his own apartment. The same is true for his fear to talk to the waitress in his favourite lunch restaurant, who he always wants to invite for a date, but never finds enough courage to do so. All those stressors show obvious consequences and lead to clear symptoms of strain. While no real physiological strain in form of illness or injury is shown in the movie (although I’d be quite sure that he suffers from high blood pressure!), job-related and emotional signs of strain are heavily appearing. In his job, Peter reacts to raising stressors with lack of motivation and a clearly decreased satisfaction in both his professional and private life. Emotional strain can be identified in his general burnout symptoms and e.g. in dramatic loss of patience. The latter is nicely shown at the very beginning of the movie, when he is stuck in heavy traffic and tries to be faster by permanently changing lanes to the assumed faster one – which of course turns out to be a totally wrong strategy and makes him proceed even slower than an old and handicapped pedestrian on the sidewalk. To deal with his stressors, Peter applies several coping strategies in both problem-focussed and emotion-focussed manners. His activities to start work always late, to avoid real work as good as possible and to play computer games or surf in the internet instead, can all be classified as problem-focussed because they all are an attempt to change the stress producing conditions at work and make his daily routine more relaxed. The same is true for his regular and elongated coffee breaks with Michael and Samir, independently if there is the boss waiting or an urgent deadline approaching. On the other hand, his decision to undergo a hypnosis therapy is an emotion-focussed coping strategy, because it’s an internal process to change his attitude to stressful events, rather than changing the cause of stress itself. However, I believe those two categories of coping strategies are somewhat flexible and interfering, since a persons’ internal attitude towards a job can become a stressor itself by e.g. setting a person under additional pressure to fulfil certain tasks under high self-expectations. However, it was the hypnosis that finally brought substantial relief and relaxation in Peters life. Due to the – unplanned – fact that he stayed trapped in his hypnotized state, he managed to approach both his work and his private life in a very relaxed and cool way, and even when initially not expected by himself and his environment, led to an increase in his motivation, joy, brought him more credit in his professional evaluation and finally facilitated a relaxed and satisfied life. Even when the movie is clearly exaggerating at many points, the basic idea of how Peter is coping with the mentioned stressors is quite reasonable to me. In an office environment it is normally quite difficult to change tight work schedules, deadlines or an over demanding boss. For that reason, the attempt to minimize stress by e.g. keeping social contacts in coffee breaks or maintaining short resting phases during work seem to be helpful and applicable coping mechanisms. If by hypnosis or any other method, the relaxation of internal tension seems to be most reasonable to me. In real life changes will certainly never be as dramatic as shown in the movie, but reducing internal pressure can surely help to find a way back to a relaxed and balanced life, which doubtlessly can increase overall satisfaction, joy and motivation. This can by the way partially be supported by allowing aggressions against bothersome machines like the poor office printer in the movie†¦ I do believe that such behaviour can bring big relief sometimes!

The Interrelation Between Tourism And Terrorism Tourism Essay

The Interrelation Between Tourism And Terrorism Tourism Essay Given that tourism is very fragile to terrorism, and that it has come to dominate or perhaps displace, economy of most courtiers, it is imperative to take a closer look at the interrelation between tourism terrorism to lessen the negative impacts. As indicated in the introduction, the first approach to the studies into relationship between tourism and security incidents focus on diverse but interrelated topics ranging from the nature of such relationship (including types, causes, targets, motives and so forth) to the impact of terrorism on the tourism demands. The overarching objective of this chapter is to review studies with such approach which emerged in the beginning of the 1990s. The chapter begins with a general discussion and overview of the direct and indirect importance of tourism to the national and global economies and proceeds to discuss the susceptibility of tourism industry to rampant crisis. Those terrorism concepts which relates to tourism industry are briefly reviewed. As contribution to literature, a time series analysis approach with yearly aggregated data is presented to show how and to what extent terrorists have targeted tourism since 1968. The rational and motives behind terrorists attack on tourism destination is a crucial area which seeks logically examine relationship between terrorism and tourism. The next section devoted to these significant discussions. Then it would turn to next area of studies or the impact of terrorism as a tourism crisis on the tourism industry. For this purpose the extant research on the impact of terrorism on the tourism industry in several countries will be reviewed. It also considers various determinants of ter rorism acts on the tourism industry. Last but not least, it explores the theories and components of image and perception management. It is also imperative to clarify the definitions of a few repeatedly used terms that there is potential for confusion among them. This chapter also attempt to offer definition and develop empirically derived concept. Importance Despite recent crisis, tourism represent, one of the fastest growing sectors in the world economy. In 1960 the whole tourist arrivals were around 70 million while it rocketed to some 700 million in 2003. According to World Travel and Tourism Council, out of overall world exports, tourism industry is account for 12.2% and provides 8.3% of total jobs (WTTC, 2007: 6). These figures represent direct economic impact of the industry while the indirect impacts estimated to be much larger. The indirect impacts are enormous. For instance; it plays an important role in the development of new cities, societies and provides them with necessary infrastructure and superstructure. What is more, tourism helps the protection of environment by stimulating the creation of national parks for wild life as well as the conservation and preservation of beaches and marine life as a part of tourist products. From cultural point of view, it offers more opportunities for the restoration of old monuments. It als o encourages small industries, souvenirs, handmade art and craft; it improves the standard of living in many societies. Moreover, the tourist spending in the tourist establishment (hotels, restaurants, and transportation) doesnt go totally to them. These establishments need to purchase goods and services from other sectors with local economy (services of builders, accountants, food, and beverage suppliers). Bale (1998) argues that tourism makes much contribution to employment by differentiating between its impact on direct and indirect employments. The contribution of tourism and travel to both industrialized and developing countries is now so great that any downturns in the level of activity in the industry are a cause of concern. The repercussions extend beyond activities directly associated with tourism, notably airlines, hotels and catering, to sectors that supply intermediate or final goods that are purchased by firms and employees in the industry, so that all sectors of the economy are affected to a greater or lesser extent. Adam Blake and M. Thea Sinclair, Tourism Crisis Management: adjusting to a temporary downturn,Sixth Annual Conference on Global Economic Analysis, 2002, p. 1. Tourism is important not only to developed nations but to many less developed ones, whose chief resources often come from their visitor attractions. Since no other substitute major natural resources, such as oil or heavy industry is available in such countries, they are heavily reliant on international tourism to generate national income. Although the lack of the necessary infrastructure and communication facilities are often proved to be an obstacle to attract a considerable number of tourists, some less developed countries demonstrated considerable success in attraction of tourists (Harrison 2001). In recent years, tourism has been focus of attentions for its potential to help à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã… ½to the reduction of poverty. UNWTO statistics reveals the growing strength of the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã… ½tourism industry for developing countries. International tourism receipts for à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã… ½developing countries accounted for a record number of 203 billion US dollar in 1995. According to the UNW TO, tourism is one of the major export sectors of poor countries and a leading source of foreign exchange in 46 of the 49 Least Developed Countries (LDCs). (UNWTO 2007: p 38) Terrorism background and definition Terrorism phenomena across the world is traceable to centuries ago when Jewish patriots, begun to challenge the Roman sovereignty in holy lands (Poland, 1988). In our times it dates back to the latter half of the twentieth century when terrorist attacks came to occupy a central place to in news headlines and it was in 1960s and 1970s that grabbed the attention of the people from all over the world. It was for the first time in world history that so few people managed to put into trouble so many peoples in a quick and effective manner (Sacks, 2004). The attacks against the US on 11th September 2001, and the post-9/11 attacks, including the bombings in Bali, Jakarta, Casablanca, Mombasa, Madrid, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, London, India and other places are prime examples to this. The terrorism attacks have been of importance to tourism industry as the tourism destination turn out to a prime target of terrorist attacks. Despite the omnipresence of terrorism attacks in the world today, there has been little consensus among scholars of terrorism studies over the concept. There are several reasons why terrorism is difficult to define (Cronin 2002). Firstly, labelling an action as terrorism or a group as terrorist is hardly free from ideological or political partiality (Moxon-Browne, 1994). In addition, most definitions are very flawed. Over time particularly when they come to power, the terrorism groups may recognized as a legitimate government. A prime example is Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress in South Africa. Another source of ambiguity in the definition lay in differing perception of what terrorism as it means different things to different governments and different scholars. To better define the terrorism it is important to set apart terrorism from crime-related acts. Tarlow (2001) lists the differences between acts of crimes and terrorism. He argued that dealing with criminal acts requires well trained police forces while terrorism is more war like in nature which can not cope with police actions alone. Rather it needs cooperation between all stakeholders in question. In addition, the goals of terrorist are destruction through victimization and seek publicity and mass economic destructions with added bonus of loss of life. Table 1.1 Key Difference between Acts of Tourism Crime and Terrorism Crime Terrorism Goal Usually economic or social gain To gain publicity and sometimes sympathy for a cause. Usual type of victim Person may be known to the perpetrator or selected because he/she may yield economic gain Killing is random and appears to be more in line with a stochastic model. Numbers may or may not be important Defenses in use Often reactive, reports taken Some pro-active devices such as radar detectors Political ideology Usually none Robin Hood model Publicity Usually local and rarely makes the international news Almost always is broadcast around the world Most common forms in tourism industry are: Crimes of distraction Robbery Sexual Assault Domestic terrorism International terrorism Bombings Potential for bio-chemical warfare Statistical accuracy Often very low, in many cases the travel and tourism industry does everything possible to hide the information Almost impossible to hide. Numbers are reported with great accuracy and repeated often Length of negative effects on the local tourism industry In most cases, it is short term In most cases, it is long term unless replaced by new positive image Source: Tarlow (2001: 134-135) Since the extent to which terrorism challenges governments and threatens civilian populations differs considerably, it is possible to constitute a typology based on which we can compare different types of terrorism. One approach is to differentiate between domestic restricted to the borders of one country and international consist of the citizens of more than one country terrorism. However, this distinction is proved to be perplexing in practice as most terrorist groups have links to abroad. (Chalk 1996) A more elaborate typology categorizes groups in terms of their primary motivations. Based upon such criteria, Peters (2002) classified terrorists into two broad categories: the practical terrorist and the apocalyp ­tic terrorist. The demand of practical terrorists is restricted to recreation of a state and society without destruction of the whole society, what its followers have in mind is to eradicate what they see as a political evil. A prime example of such terrorism is anti-abo rtion terrorists in United State. Apocalyptic terrorists are very different. Their ultimate goal is to destroy completely the current worlds and build up a new order from the outset. Table 1.2 summarizes the main feature of each approach. Table 1.2 Differences between Practical and Apocalyptic Terrorists Practical Terrorist Apocalyptic Terrorist Mental state Hopes to change a policy through violence Victim of self-rage and anger Time frame for success This world oriented Next world oriented Attitude toward religion Tends toward secularization Tends toward religious mystical experiences Suicide Rarely suicidal, not a key goal Highly suicidal; suicide is a means to a greater end Goal Recreation of state or policy Annihilation of the state, or people Willingness to use WMDs Limited use of chemical Biological or nuclear Value of human life Low Nonexistent Source: Peters (2002) p.86 Regardless of these ambiguities, it is imperative to offer a working definition. For the purposes of this research, the terrorism defined as the calculated threat or use of violence designed to create an overwhelming fear in a larger target population, perpetuated by individuals, sub-national groups, or state actors to attain political, social, or economic objectives. (Alexander, 2002) take the original article http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/0/9/8/4/7/pages98470/p98470-3.php (GETTING IT RIGHT: Understanding Effective Counter-Terrorism Strategies) The records of terrorism attacks on tourism targets Tourism and terrorism has always been inevitably interwoven. Over the last 30 years tourist industry have been key targets for terrorists attacks. The terrorists believed that they have been very successful in accomplishing their goals through terrorism attacks to tourism destinations. As international terrorism augmented by September 11, 2001 attacks on US targets by al Qaida, its inevitable effects on tourism became the subject of serious concern (Sabasteanski, 2005). Paraskevas and Arendells (2007) list of pos-9/11 truism destinations and tourist targets attacked by terrorists up to September 2006 include more than 18 incidents. As such, Mitroff (2005) is right to state that it is no longer a question of if terrorists will strike but rather a question of when, how and how prepared the destination is to deal with them. The records of terrorist incident on the tourism industry between 01/01/1968 and 07/20/2007 indicate that tourists have been target of 261 out of 33817 terrorist acc idents. (Figure 1) This accidents account for 676 tourists loss of lives and 1875 injury (Figure 2 and 3). Figure1.1 International Terrorism, 1968-2007, Number of Incidents Source: US Department of State (various years) and RAND series Figure1.2 International Terrorism, 1968-2007, Number of Deaths Source: US Department of State (various years) and RAND series Figure1.3 International Terrorism, 1968-2007, Number of Injuries Source: US Department of State (various years) and RAND series The targeted list of terrorist attacks varies. The 1960s and 1970s was the time of plane hijackings. Consequently, the terrorist targeted the tourism destination initially through plane hijackings in the time. In the 1960s, hijackings were often from the U.S. to Cuba with no intention to harm pas ­sengers. However, in the 1970s, the purpose of terrorists actions was the loss of life plus damage to the property. Thus we witnessed the more severe actions from them. During the 1970s, the Munich Olympic Games became the focus of one of the most notorious terrorist attacks and set a new standard for terrorism at major world events. In the consequent years, the targeted list encompassed a variety of sites including, airlines, cruise ships, buses, restaurants and cafes, events and festivals, or sporting or cultural institutions, wherever people get together for leisure or any other purpose. In the beginning of 90s, a significant number of terrorists incidents occurred at tourist destinati ons, while in the recent years we witnessed a shift in the targets of terrorism accidents (Mansfeld and Pizam, 2006). (Figure 4) Figure1.4 International Terrorism, 1968-2007, Incidents by Targets, Compare Tourists to other Targets Source: US Department of State (various years) and RAND series Terrorists motives Tourism scholars argued that understanding terrorist motive may shed light on the relationship between terrorism and tourism (Sonmez, 1997). As such they have sought to explain the motive behind the terrorist activities regarding the tourism destination. To date, there is no consensus among scholars on their explanation of terrorist objectives, however almost all agree that terrorists have much to gain by targeting tourists. In their influential work on terrorism and tourism Sonmez, Apostolopoulos, and Tarlow (1999: 85) noted that tourism destinations offer a cost-effective instrument to deliver a broader message of ideological/political opposition. They placed the terrorists objective in two main groups: strategic objectives and ideological objectives. With respect to strategic objectives, they maintained that terrorists tend to accomplish some goals that can be found only in tourism destinations. These goals include mass casualties, mass publicity and great economic damage. As discussed earlier, tourism is lucrative business interconnected with several other industries; thus an attack on the tourism industry would affect considerably a number of secondary industries as well. What is more, tourism officials have often avoided taking tough steps to stop terrorism because such measures often result in frightening the potential customers. As such the tourism destinations have seen as an easy target for terrorism attacks. Tourism destinations also are visited by a regular flow of new people, thus terrorists are hardly suspected. In other words, terrorists can easily disguise their identity in the tourism destinations. Tourism industry is also a sensitive area to media especially when nationals of other countries are engaged it will rec eive massive coverage from international media and at the same time it bypass their governments censorship. (Weimann and Winn 1994: 143) The ideological objectives are more complex ones encompassing clashing values, cultures, or socioeconomic levels. Such motives push the terrorists to target the tourists for their symbolic value as proxy of larger group or apparently their governments. In his discussion of terrorism in Egypt, Aziz (1995) put into question a widely accepted notion that Islam is simply against foreign tourists. According to Aziz, tourists differs from and locals by many cultural and social gaps. Following Richters he argue that since travel styles can be representative of ideological values, class behavior, and political culture of tourists and their countries, tourists may be targeted because of their tourism styles which may dem ­onstrate conspicuous consumption (i.e., demonstration of money or credit cards; flashy photography equipment; expensive clothes, jewelry, and luggage). The clash of cultures and values between locals and travelers can also account for motives. Certain tourist behaviors (i. e., consumption of pork and alcohol; gambling; Western dress; codes of behavior incongruent with Islamic tradition) oppose to Islamic cultural values-are also suggested as a possible explanation for the Egyptians frus ­tration (Aziz 1995). Wahab (1996) stated that sometimes terrorism specifically targets tourism because it is seen as a movement of visitors representing a form of neo-colonialism or a threat to well-established societal norms, traditions, value-systems, and religious convictions. The impact of terrorist attack to tourism industry The impact of terrorism on a states economy may be enormous, leading to unemployment, homelessness, deflation, crime and other economic and social ills (Laurance, 2003:2) Previous studies based on the accumulate evidence throughout the world shows that the impact of terrorists attacks on tourism industry, destination, the local community, the tourists are in the most cases negative and resulted in decline in tourism demands. Such incidents paralysed or severely impacted the local tourism industry as result of trip cancellation and the inclination of passengers of booking to safer alternative destinations. These events have resulted in major drops in tourism demand, for example we witnessed the loss of more than a million arrivals from the United States to Europe in 1986 down 23% from 1985 because of December 1985 Palestinian terrorists attacks in airports in Rome and Vienna and the 1986 hijacking of TWA flight. (Brady and Widdows, 1988: 8; Hurley, 1988; Conant et al, 1988) The following is copied from: Effects of News Shock on Inbound Tourist Demand Volatility in Korea http://jtr.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/44/4/457.pdf Blake and Sinclair (2003) explored the effects of the September 11 terrorist attack in the United States using a computable general equilibrium model. In their study, they reported the percentage decreases in the number of visits during September 2001 compared to the previous 12 months were 34% for domestic and 23% for international travel. Baron analysed monthly tourism figures to measure the effect of terrorism on tourism in Israel, Spain, Egypt and turkey. For instance, the analysis indicated that ongoing terrorism cost Israel approximately 332000 visitors from North America between Spring of 1985 to the end of 1987, at a cost of around 54 million U.S. Dollars (). Others have also reported reductions in tourist arrival and receipts in the periods following terrorist action in, for example, Israel (Pizam 1999), Egypt (Wahab, 1996) and Northern Ireland (Pizam, l999; Wall, 1996). In addition to quantifying the reduction in the number of visitors to destinations affected by terrorism, studies have also assessed the duration of this impact. Using newspaper reports of terrorism world-wide between 1985 and 1998 Pizam and Smith (2000), found that 79% of media reported terrorist incidents were associated with a significant decline in tourism, and that the effect lasted between one and six months. Enders and Sandler (1991) estimated that an average terrorist incident in Spain in the period between 1970 and 1988 resulted in a decrease of approximately 140,000 visitors. However, the decline did not start until three months after the incident, and took around two years for visitor numbers to stabilize at a le just below that prior to the incident. A somewhat longer delay was observed tourism to Greece and Italy, where it was between six and nine months after terrorist attack before tourism figures started to decrease (Enders et al., 1992). Pizam and Smith (2000) argue that observed time delays in the deterrent effect of terrorist action might be because travelers would u sually forfeit the costs of the travel if they were to cancel at short notice. In addition to the effects of terrorism on tourism over time, research has also examined whether the deterrent effect is limited just to the country targeted by the terrorists or whether it extends to other destinations. Enders et al., (1992) identified a generalized deterrent effect of terrorism in certain European countries on tourism throughout Continental Europe during the 1970s and 1980s. They also identified that terrorism in France did not specifically impact French tourism, but that it did contribute to lost revenues for continental Europe as a whole, suggesting that the deterrence was generalized to the whole continent. However, it is not clear why there was not any reduction in visitors to France. Similarly, Richter and Waugh (1936) state that tourism to Switzerland was adversely affected by terrorism in France, Italy and Austria. The determinants of terrorist attacks to tourism industry The scholars identified diverse variables determining the impacts of terrorism on the tourism industry and the ability of countries to recover quickly. However they failed to offer any integrated empirical or theoretical frameworks for the casual relationship between these variables. Still, almost all studies refer to tourism demand drop as a proxy for tourism industry suffering. Santana (1997) developed a model, which bring together the psychological and demographic factors that tend to influence the attitude to international travel (or destination image) referred to as deterrence (or drop in demand) in the light of threat from terrorism. He identified the psychological factors as Thrill and Adventure Seeking (TAS), Experience Seeking (ES), attitude to international travel (AIT), risk perception of political hazards and risk perception of physical hazards. The socialization factors of age, gender and travel experience are included in the model as well. Figure1.3 casual relationship among determinants of terrorists attacks to tourism industry TAS Gender ES Deterrence Age AIT Political Hazards Travel Experience Physical Hazards Source: Santana (1997), p. 457 To find out which certain acts of terrorism has more determining impact on tourism demand than others, Pizam and Smith (2000) identified a variety of characteristics of terrorism activities including frequencies, locations, severity and motives. They also took into account destination image and mass media as two important intervening which suppose to impact the tourism demand over the security incidents. Elsewhere Pizam (1997) have maintained that the impact of terrorism attacks on tourism industry varys by its severity of the event and the frequency of occurrence. He noted that: acts resulting in mass destruction of life and property followed by loss of life and bodily harm have the strongest effect on tourism demand. . . . Acts resulting in loss of property only have the lowest effect on tourism demand. . . . All else being equal, acts occurring more frequently will have a more intense, widespread and lengthy effect on tourism demand than those occurring less frequently (Pizam, 1997: 11). Tarlow(2006) argues that in the last decades there does not seem to be a rela ­tionship between a locales base population size and the act of terrorism. As such, ter ­rorism has targeted both rural and urban settings (Mansfeld and Pizam, 2006:17). Discussing on risk evaluation, Walker and Page, (2003) has demonstrated the interrelationship between severity and frequency of incident on a graph. As they indicated there is a direct correlation between frequency of problems and its severity. As such the minor incidents happens more frequent than the severe ones like terrorism. Figure 1.4 The Tourist Health and Safety Continuum: Severity and Frequency of Incidents Source: Walker and Page, 2003, page 222 Image and Perception management Terrorism attacks on tourism destination have not always left an enduring impact on the tourism industry. Yet, the comparative evidence show that soon after the event receives the international coverage, the information it conveys will be result in negative image among potential tourists and this in turn lead to cancelation their travel and /or choosing to book a more secure place. (Mansfeld and Pizam, 2005) Therefore, the host countries tend to take necessary measures to lessen the negative images by conveying correct, impartial and market oriented messages. Lepp and Gibson (2003) referred to four key authorities responsible for disseminating such information à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Security and risk information issued and communicated by governmental agencies in the generating markets (in the form of travel advisories); à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ The global and local mass media; à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Governmental tourism organizations in the affected receiving destination; and à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ The travel industry in the generating markets (Lepp and Gibson, 2003). Since discussing on all aspects of the topic will be beyond of the scope of the research I only explore the destination image and the role of media. 4.6.1 The Concept of Image (Tourism Events thesis) pp 57 An image is a concept that is hard to understand. It has both vague and shifting meanings and used in a variety of contexts and disciplines, thereby creating different meanings. The definition for tourist destination image that is most commonly cited is that by Crompton (1979, in Jenkins, 1999): à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦the sum of beliefs, ideas and impressions that a person has of a destination. (p. 18) Many authors have also defined tourism image of a destination as the mental portrayal of a destination (Alhemoud Armstrong, 1996; Kotler, et al., 1993, in Erfurt et al., 2003). The image of a destination is a crucial factor in a tourists destination choice process (Jenkins, 1999) and according to Mercer (1971, in Mossberg, 2000) the initial image formation stage is the most important phase in the buying process when selection a destination. Only the destinations the individual is aware of will be considered in the destination selection process and this awareness implies an image of the destination (Mossberg, 2000). Furthermore, according to Fakey and Crompton (1991) only destinations with positive images can be expected to prosper, while those with less favourable images may never achieve their fullest tourism potential. Destination image To make decision on where to go or choosing the one destination over another by potential travellers has long been of great significant to academics and tourist stakeholders. The existing literature suggested that destination choices are influenced and conditioned by both internal (such as images, perceptions, motives, attitudes, and beliefs) and external factors (i.e., time, destination attributes, perceived costs of tourism product, buyer characteristics, and benefits sought). Image among other factors received more attentions as a deciding factor in choosing on destination. Thus the scholars employed the concept of destination image to describe this determining factor. Bojanic (1991: p) defined country destination image as the impressions that a person or persons hold about a country in which they do not reside. Similarly Crompton Crompton (1979: 18, in Jenkins, 1999) noted: destination image is the sum of beliefs, ideas, and impressions that a person has of a destination. Due to its importance, destination image has come to consider as a dependent variable in the consequent studies and the scholars attempted to identify the determinants that define, modify, and strengthen this construct. For instance, Hall and OSullivan (1996) identified three basic elements creating a destination image (a) Returning tourists via verbal reporting, (b) the role of Media in making image and (c) Overall policies of the host government. The scholars are on consensus that the destinations with strong, positive images are more likely to be considered and chosen in the destination selection process. In contrast, they argue that the perceptions held by visitors about potential crisis in the tourist destination have significant influences upon the tourism demand. However, there exist little if any, clearly defined conceptual base for destination image studies, especially the ones investigating causality between destination image and negative events. Seddighi and his colleagues (2000) developed a framework for the examination of perceived impact of political instability on tourism. As illustrated in figure 1.5 a synthesis of information flow which comes from the above mentioned elements of destination image creation (i.e., word of mouth, media, and government policies) is account for the perceptions of potential travellers. This information is in turn manipulated by Prospective Holidaymakers and Tourism Generating Region through a process of the determination of the perceptual pattern/image for a particular tourism destination. The destination choice therefore is reliant on the extent to which the perceptual patterns of holidaymakers towards the destination are positive or negative. Figure 1.5 Perceived impact of political instability on tourism Source: Seddighi et al., (2000 ), p.182 Since the tourists do not spare time to check the reality behind the received images, these images become highly biased and distorted. Due to frequent hostilities that have originated from the Arab-Israeli conflict, Israels high-risk tourism image has prevailed. The struggle to reverse this image has been extremely frustrating, involving simultaneous confrontation between government agencies, tourism operators, and the media. Media Almost no researches disagree on that intensive mass media coverage of security incidents results in the drop of tourists arrivals in affected destinations (Mansfeld and Pizam, 2006:17). They widely accepted that it is the media that give the event more or less significance by different interpretation. Therefore in many cases the news media tends to distort the actual security situation and to exaggerate the risk involved in traveling to affected destinations. In addition, the media reports often is not merely limited to exact report of what happened but also act as an advisor by interpreting the risk involved i