Tuesday, December 24, 2019

Corporate Background Of Worldcom Company Essay - 1322 Words

Corporate Background WorldCom, now known as MCI, began humbly as an obscure long distance telephone company, LDDS Communications, in 1983, and rose to the second largest long-distance phone company in the United States and one of the largest companies handling worldwide Internet data traffic, with an aggressive corporate strategy of growth though acquisition (Moberg, and Romar. â€Å"WorldCom†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ) With its corporate headquarters located in Clinton, Mississippi, WorldCom consisted of an employee base of 85,000 workers at its peak and provided a broad range of communication services in over 200 countries on six continents, including voice and Internet communication services for millions of consumer customers, one of the most extensive communications networks in the world, and value-added services such as customized solutions for network design, configuration of customer premises equipment, proactive network monitoring, managed hosting as well as authentication, firewall and virus scanning services (WorldCom Form 10-K, 2002). Between 1991 and 1997, WorldCom spent almost $60 billion in the successful completion of 65 acquisitions, two of which, the MFS Communications acquisition and MCI Communications acquisition, brought both â€Å"a major supplier of Internet services† and â€Å"one of the largest providers of business and consumer telephone services†. Benefited by this prescient and successful business strategy, WorldCom’s stock rocketed to over $60 per share. These acquisitions providedShow MoreRelatedEssay on Worldcom1595 Words   |  7 PagesRestoring Trust in WorldCom 1. What are the three or four central objectives that Breeden hopes to achieve with the proposals in â€Å"Restoring Trust†? Why is reform needed? What are the benefits? What are your concerns regarding the reform? The WorldCom Corporate Monitor, Richard Breeden, believed that in order to correct the ills that faced the company, WorldCom needed to adopt a strong Corporate Governance structure. The central objectives of his proposal â€Å"Restoring Trust† included improvingRead MoreWorldcom Failure1198 Words   |  5 PagesWorldCom Failure in relation to its Organizational Behavior LDR/531 - Organizational Leadership October 7, 2010 WorldCom Failure in relation to its Organizational Behavior INTRODUCTION Year 2002 saw an unprecedented number of corporate scandals: Enron, Tyco, Global Crossing, etc. In many ways, WorldCom is just another case of failed corporate governance, accounting abuses, and outright greed. Many people may question if there is a secret to operating a successful business in modern times.Read MoreLong Distance Discount Services ( Ldds )1460 Words   |  6 Pages1. Introduction Worldcom Group, formally known as Long Distance Discount Services (LDDS) and the second largest long distance telecommunications provider in the U.S., was involved in one of the biggest accounting frauds in history. The scandal, when unearthed in 2002, revealed that Worldcom had overstated it’s earnings in the five quarters between 2001 and 2002 by more than 3.8 billion. This was a result of inappropriate accrual releases and classifying periodic line costs as capital expendituresRead MoreWorld Com1454 Words   |  6 Pages Table of Contents Mission Statement 3 Ethical Principles/Tenets 4 Day to Day Operations 5 Cynthia Cooper and the Culture 6 Conclusion 8 Works Cited 10 1)Provide a Mission Statement and brief background about WorldCom. Briefly explain how WorldCom did not honor their statement. WorldCom - our objective is to be the most profitable , single source provider of communications services to customers around the world. Unstated Mission - Increase shareholder value. WorldComs mission statementRead MoreThe Sarbanes Oxley Act Of 20021015 Words   |  5 Pagesof some major accounting frauds such as Enron and WorldCom. The main objective of this act is to recover the investors’ trust in the stock market, and to prevent and detect corporate accounting fraud. I will discuss the background of Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and why it became necessary in the first section of this paper. The second section will be the act’s regulations for the management, external auditors, and companies, mainly publicly-traded companies, and the cost and benefits of the act. The last sectionRead MoreEnron : The Financial Statement1461 Words   |  6 Pages whenever companies have outstanding energy-related or other derivative contracts (either assets or liabilities) on their balance sheets at the end of a particular quarter, they must adjust them to fair market value, booking unrealised gains or losses to the income statement of the period. A difficulty with application of these rules in accounting for long-term futures contracts in commodities such as gas is that there are often no quoted prices upon which to base valuations. Companies having theseRead MoreSarbanes Oxley Act Of 20021410 Words   |  6 Pagesof some major accounting frauds such as Enron and WorldCom. The main objective of this act is to recover the investors’ trust in the stock market, and to prevent and detect corporate accounting fraud. I will discuss the background of Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and why it became necessary in the first section of this paper. The second section will be the act’s regulations for the management, external auditors, and companies, mainly publicly-traded companies, and the cost and benefits of the act. The last sectionRead MoreAnalyzing The Fraudulent Acti vities Of Worldcom3290 Words   |  14 Pagesfailed company. In this paper an attempt is made to analyze the fraudulent activities reasons and fraud performance of WorldCom. Also analysis the accounting and audit environment in WorldCom. WorldCom was the second largest long distance telecommunications corporation in America. Although the corporate structure was consistent with â€Å"best governance practice† and some governance indicators were even higher than the industry average requirements, the WorldCom’s failure proves that their corporate governanceRead MoreThe Anatomy Of Corporate Fraud Essay845 Words   |  4 PagesArticle Critique #1 The first article researched was The Anatomy of Corporate Fraud: A comparative Analysis of High Profile American and European Corporate Scandals. The abstract discusses the analysis conducted on the three major American accounting scandals; Enron, WorldCom, and HealthSouth, and compares to the three major European accounting scandals; Parmalat, Royal Ahold, and Vivendi Universal. Bahram Soltani (2014), also discusses within the abstract the different areas reviewed regardingRead MoreCase Analysis Arthur Andersen: Questionable Accounting Practices1000 Words   |  4 PagesThus, it leaded to a negative influence on Andersens Corporate culture, which enabled Andersen to be more interested in its own revenue growth through ethical and legal misconducts, such as accounting irregularities and fraud. More seriously, it developed a number of lawsuits from1997 to 2005, which impelled the SEC to keep a close watch on, from its client such as Baptist Foundation of Arizona, Sunbeam, Waste Ma nagement, Enron, and Worldcom. Especially for the SEC to Enrons investigating, it would

Monday, December 16, 2019

Mid Term 1 Solution Free Essays

COT5405 Analysis of Algorithms Midterm 1 Solution Summer 2012 June 11 In all cases explain clearly and as succinctly as possible. Problem 1 10 Pts Answer: n T (n) = 2T ( n ) + log n 2 2 n = 4T ( n ) + logn n + log n 4 2 2 2 n = 4T ( n ) + log nn? 1 + log n 4 2 2 = †¦ ?log2 n 1 = nT (1) + n i=1 i ? n Since i=1 1 ln n, T (n) ? ?(n log log n) i Problem 2 20 Pts Answer: The general idea is to use the technique similar to quick sort, by doing partition on both lids and cups. First we pick a cup randomly, and use it to partition the lids into two subsets: those lids smaller than the size of that cup, and those larger than the size of the cup. We will write a custom essay sample on Mid Term 1 Solution or any similar topic only for you Order Now We can also ? nd the correspondent lid for that chosen cup. Second we use that lid to partition the cups and divide them into two sets. We keep on repeating this procedure on each subset of cups/lids until all the cups/lids are paired. The overall time complexity is O(n log n) (Worst case: O(n2 )). Problem 3 20 Pts Answer: In this problem we are more interested in ? ding the median instead of the minimum/maximum element. The ? n ? th element in a min/max heap is not the median. 2 In this case, we should develop a new type of heap to adapt this problem. Problem 3 2 The solution is to use two heaps: a min heap and a max heap. Suppose the total number of elements is n, we set the restriction that the max heap should contain ? n ? 2 elements. Correspondingly, the min heap contains n ? ? n ? elements. 2 When we insert an element, we always insert it into the max heap. If the number of elements in the max heap exceeds ? n ? , we remove the maximum element in the 2 max heap (the root), and insert it into the minimum heap. During this procedure, we need to do heapify to maintain the heap structure for both heaps. Under this setting, it is easy to see that all the elements in the max heap are less than those in the min heap, and the two elements at the root of both heaps represent the ? n ? th 2 and (? n ? + 1)th element. 2 Suppose the median is de? ned to be the ? n ? th element over all n elements. When 2 we delete the median, we just delete the root of the max heap, and the following two cases might occur: (1) If the max heap contains ? n? 1 ? elements, then we do delete-max to the max 2 heap. (2) If the max heap contains ? n? 1 ? ? 1 elements, we take out the root of the min 2 heap and set it to be the root in the max heap (because it is larger than all the elements in the max heap), then we do delete-min to the min heap. It is straightforward to see that the time complexity for both insert and delete-median is O(log n). COT5405 Analysis of Algorithms HW 2 How to cite Mid Term 1 Solution, Essay examples

Saturday, December 7, 2019

Theoretical Concepts of Strategic Management

Question: Describe about the Theoretical Concepts of Strategic Management. Answer: Introduction Theoretical concepts in the workplace determine the business culture of a company. Managers need to understand adequately the underlying entrepreneurial culture in the organizations where they work. According to Morgan (2012), managerial concepts should be clearly communicated to all employees so as to avoid confusion and facilitate sound decision making. In the job environment, theoretical concepts range from how employees act, work, and dress in respect to the professional ethics of codes for a particular company. Miller and Tsang, (2011) argues that strategic management goes hand in hand with theoretical concepts in the attempt to formulate sound decisions of achieving better performance and a competitive advantage over the rivaling firms. Concepts involve making conscious decisions by the management, and this favors strategic management by helping the responsible company make profits higher than the mean returns for all other enterprises in the sector. Since its establishment in 1993, Maxis Berhads main objective has been creating a competitive environment in the market. Maxis operates as an integrated service provider company in Malaysia and leverages on technology to innovate and offer mobile and wireless broadband services to the customers (Hamid Atan, 2011). As part of the company's current employees, Maxis recognizes the value of employees inputs towards achieving its set goals. The company organizes training and development opportunities to the staff to nurture their talents and develop their potential in the workplace. Communication is an essential element of strategic management since it leaves room for increased participation and growth of every person in Maxis. The purpose of this essay is evaluating the theoretical concepts to strategic management as applied in Maxis Berhad Company. Further, the article provides an examination of how these theoretical concepts influence managerial practices in Maxis concerning effective strategic management approaches of gaining competitive advantage. Evaluation of Theoretical Concepts in Strategic Management To begin with, strategic management in Maxis provides a wider perspective that assists the personnel to understand how their jobs fit into the entire enterprise's plan. Afifi and Afifi, (2015) argues that theoretical concepts bring in the art of managing the workforce in a manner that maximizes the ability to meet the set goals. The management of Maxis adopts the use of business ethics and policies that aim at creating core competence and formulating strategic decisions that conform to the business objectives (Hamid Atan, 2011). As observed in management literature, various strategic management theories can be applied and play a relevant impact to improving productivity within an organization. The following is a critical examination and evaluation of the applicability of these methods in Maxis company to facilitate effective strategic management. Human Resource-Based Theory According to this theory, the human element plays a significant role in a company when it comes to strategic decision making (Hayes, 2014). The executive management of Maxis recognizes that the human element when it comes to decision making and values the employee's inputs towards exhibiting business success in the telecom industry. Hayes, (2014) justifies the argument that there is a need for the human resource management department of Maxis acknowledges that subordinate skills and efficiency workforce contributes to gaining a competitive advantage due to the possibility of high-quality mobile and internet services provided. The main competitors being Axiata and DiGi, Maxis capitalizes on the human capital aspect and attribute to firm position itself in the competitive business environment. In Maxis, the executive invests most capital on their personnel as they perceive the human resources as the greatest asset of the company. The company keeps on organizing for training and development opportunities to enhance the level of their employee retention. Maxis encourages workforce commitment and passion by benchmarking its service performance with those of the competitors in a transitory manner. In Kapferer, (2012) human resource-based theory argues that people remain as the most vital resource that drives the sustainable competitive advantage of an organization. In this regard, Maxis manages the human resources strategically and thereby reaping competitive advantage in the telecommunication industry. The Contingency Theory This theory postulates that there is no best approach in itself that managers may adopt to manage the business organization (Al Ariss, Cascio, Jaap, 2014). Based on the arguments found in the contingency theory, the directors of Maxis design various managerial strategies depending on the particular situation that they are facing. According to Ward and Peppard, (2016), ensuring that Maxis thrives in its venture activities in the telecom sector, the management formulates different human resource policies such as working hours, employee salaries, job description, the roles and responsibilities of each employee in a manner that creates sustainability. For example; under the situation of WiFi installation, the management of Maxis recommends various approaches to complement each other in the whole process. Such approaches taken by Maxis include; subcontracting more than one companies to do the software installation, and forming an undercover group within the firm that will monitor the pro cess. With effective monitoring of Maxis's broadband and wireless installation procedures, this facilitates effective strategic management and thus enabling the company to gain a competitive advantage over DiGi and the other rivaling corporations. The Profit Maximizing and Competition Based Theory Miller and tsang, (2011) state that this strategic management model builds on the concept that the primary objective of an organization is maximizing profits and establishing a firm position in the industry over which it can create a competitive edge over the competitors in the business environment. Being a global company, Maxis's desire of strategic management gets centrally based on the management approaches. To strategically position itself in the telecom sector, Maxis specializes in offering various mobile, the Internet, and broadband services to the customers across different world markets (McMichael Philip, 2015). Usually, the management of Maxis has been investing some of its resources in carrying out market research in the external market environment. For fairness, the company integrates people with different skills; this makes the researchers form diverse opinions which when unionized contributes to effective strategic management and hence creating a competitive advantage i n the sector. Contributions of Theoretical Concepts to Managerial Practices of Maxis Company Management theories stress the need for effective strategy formulation to ensure that organizational goals are met. The management of Maxis aims at making the company sustainable. Human behavior based theories seek to motivate employees and cultivate a mutually beneficial relationship in the workplace. Achieving self-fulfillment within the work environment for Maxis, workers get treated as unique resources opposed to how the other resources are handled by the firm (Tynjala, 2008). The ability of Maxis to recognize the views of all employees demonstrates their commitment to creating a sustainable environment for strategic management. The collaborative efforts facilitate the management of Maxis in establishing a holistic work relation which positively contributes to the productivity of Maxis in its telecom service provision. The major contributions that management theories have made to the telecom industry at Maxis company are as discussed below. First and foremost, theoretical perspectives on strategic management help the executive officers of Maxis to make sound decisions pertaining certain the pressure existing in the telecom sector (Hill, Jones, Schilling, 2014). With the emergence of new technologies in the telecom industry, this has come about with complexities when it comes to effective strategic management. In the course whereby Maxis company is struggling to achieve its goal of establishing a strong customer base in the global telecom sector, application of management theories provides a guide about how to solve the problem (Hayes, 2014). In particular, the human relations theory guides the management in reducing organizational tensions by reallocating different employees with different skills and abilities to areas where they best suit. The problem-solving role is achieved by the directorate's ability to recognize the input of employees in formulating ideas necessary to effective strategic management that may lead to competitive advantage. Theoretical perspectives contribute to the establishment of the necessary managerial skills and helps them understand the flow of power within an organization. For Maxis company, the profit maximization and competence theory is applied by the management in its attempts to establish effective strategic management approaches (Xu Meyer, 2013). The technical skills of the executive staff at Maxis play the greatest role in manning the human skills of both the supervisors and subordinate officers. The contingency theory necessitates that, at the top management level of Maxis, the conceptual and human skills are highly valuable, but there is a relative necessity for technical abilities so as to achieve sustainability within the telecom sector (Santos, 2012). Technological skills of the manager are always contingent to every skill possessed by a player in the company. According to Santos, (2012), theoretical perspectives facilitate strategic planning, organizing, directing, coordinating, and controlling within an organization. Most times, the Malaysia telecom sector is usually complex and volatile to the extent that maintaining stability and sustainability in the business climate gets challenging. With the aid of managerial concepts, Maxis takes strategies of preventing the worst scenario fro occurring since with its occurrence; this leads to split the organization and thus poor productivity. However, Xu and meyer, (2013) argue that the application of human resource based theory brings in team building skills that seek to unite, organize, and control the actions of all participants in the Internet and mobile broadband service provision. About the classical organization theory by Henry Fayol, the top management of Maxis sets strategic goals that are complemented by the departmental manager's abilities to organize, lead, coordinate, and control all the staffing resources of the company towards the right direction. Theoretical concepts necessitate the importance of specialization and division of labor within Maxis. According to toMcMichael and Philip, (2015), in the contingency theory, no idea, ability, or skill can be useful in itself, but with the integration of numerous perspectives, effective strategic management is encouraged. Fayol's fourteen principles of administration prove the arguments of contingent theory such that for strategic management to be successful, all these fourteen principles must be present and complement each other. The management of Maxis company uses the strategy of allocating the human resources those roles which they are most qualified. Assigning different people roles which they suit best implies that division of labor cannot work well without the aspect of specialization (Killen, Kam, Drouin, Petit, 2012). For Maxis, allocation of functions is under the department of human resources, and the human resource-based theory is highly considered while implementing init iatives for stability, remuneration policies, and the spirit of teamwork. Recommendations of Enhancing Strategic Management for Maxis The fact that Maxis has embraced the contribution of theoretical concepts in its strategic management, the company has not optimized its full potential and therefore, still struggles to succeed in the telecom sector. In most times, management theories may not give enough weight to the interests of the employer may not match with the ones of the workforce. Theoretical concepts predict the effect of total engagement of every stakeholder in Maxis. In most circumstances, what the theories predict may not be achievable (Hitt, Ireland, Hoskisson, 2012). Therefore, the management of Maxis Telecommunication should diversify the strategic management approaches into other perspectives that seek to ensure that the predicted scores are realized. The following gives a series of recommendations that Maxis may adopt to enhance efficient strategic management. The management of Maxis should take an affirmative action which would offer a chance to correct employment imbalances, injustices, and outright discrimination. The management theories are only based on assumptions which sometimes may be ineffective when it comes to strategic management (Keupp, Palmie, Gassmann, 2012). Therefore, this calls for the implementation of new strategies for enabling the company to be unified and able to deliver high performance in the telecom sector. In this case, affirmative action may play a significant role in attaining a diversified and integrated workforce. The management of Maxis should acknowledge the need for interdisciplinary courses of action that expose the labor force from throughout work environment to the nature of threats the company is exposed. Organizing leadership trips will present other strategic management related challenges in the telecom sector to the vulnerability of Maxis's mobile and internet service provision and impacts well beyond financial considerations (Hayes, 2014). The integrated approach to benchmarking the company's operations with the other businesses in the sector will make the managers gain a clear understanding of the changing nature of threats in the telecom industry. In the discipline of diversity management, the company should diversify awareness of the business threats to the company from its competitors to the employees. Theoretical perspectives only explain the important characters that the workforce should possess while carrying out their mandates but fails by not providing strategies of diversifying awareness to the personnel (Miller Tsang, 2011). Therefore, the management of Maxis should conduct a thorough market research on the strategies used by the competitors namely DiGi and Axiata so that the employees are given the insight of approaches employed by the rivals. This may assist Maxis to introduce technological and entrepreneurial transformations that facilitate smooth performance and establish a conducive environment for the workers in the workplace so that the enterprise can thrive. The managers of Maxis should understand that management theoretical concepts get only based on the assumption holding to the rationale that people will apply them in strategic management approaches. Therefore, the managers of Maxis should portray managerial traits that enable them to carry out extra tasks that are meant for the best interest of an organization even though they were not initially included in the business plan. The most strategic priority and competitive goal of Maxis should get based on the social influence tactics in which the practitioners seeks to involve the subordinates (Santos, 2012) voluntarily. Therefore, the company should establish a strategy that necessitates decisive leadership; examples include unity of command and order of power policies. The management of Maxis should acknowledge that both the formal and informal communication channels are helpful in bringing order within an organization. Conclusion The theories of strategic management encourage diversity and nondiscrimination in employment and contracting. The workplace concept relates to the personnel's behavior towards work, work style and atmosphere, and communication in the workplace. If properly implemented, the management theories lead to the provision of high-quality services and increased productivity within an organization. Enhancing service quality within a company requires the management to design effective strategies that are in conformity with the objective of the firm. For ensuring effective strategic management, appreciation of organizational values and potential conflicts underlying business operations must be acknowledged and addressed accordingly. Given the vulnerability and complexity nature of business operations, enterprises should adopt inclusiveness and provide balanced perspectives rather than single views while formulating strategies. Ineffective strategic management results to the formulation of weak p olicies, and this leads to an overall failure of the entire company's objectives. Therefore, practitioners should be keen when designing strategic plans to ensure that the plans are in conformity with the available resources within the firm and therefore, avoiding confusion and hence improved productivity. References Afifi, T., Afifi, W. (2015). Uncertainty, information management, and disclosure decisions: Theories and applications. New York: Routledge. Al Ariss, A., Cascio, W., Jaap, P. (2014). Talent management: Current theories and future research directions. Journal of World Business, 173-179. Hamid, F., Atan, R. (2011). Corporate social responsibility by the Malaysian telecommunication firms. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 198-208. Hayes, J. (2014). The theory and practice of change management. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Hill, C., Jones, G., Schilling, M. (2014). Strategic management theory: an integrated approach. Boston: Cengage Learning. Hitt, M., Ireland, D., Hoskisson, R. (2012). Strategic management cases: competitiveness and globalization. Boston: Cengage Learning. Kapferer, J.-N. (2012). The new strategic brand management: Advanced insights and strategic thinking. Kogan: Kogan Page Publishers. Keupp, M. M., Palmie, M., Gassmann, O. (2012). The strategic management of innovation: a systematic review and paths for future research. International Journal of Management Reviews, 367-390. Killen, C., Kam, J., Drouin, N., Petit, Y. (2012). Advancing project and portfolio management research: applying strategic management theories. International Journal of Project Management, 525-538. McMichael, Philip. (2015). World-Systems Analysis, globalization, and incorporated comparison. Journal of World-Systems Research, 668-689. Miller, K., Tsang, E. (2011). Testing management theories: Critical realist philosophy and research methods. Strategic Management Journal, 139-158. Morgan, N. (2012). Marketing and business performance. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 102-119. Santos, F. M. (2012). A positive theory of social entrepreneurship. Journal of business ethics, 335-351. Tynjala, P. (2008). Perspectives on learning at the workplace. Educational Research Review, 130-154. Ward, J., Peppard, J. (2016). The strategic management of information systems: Building a digital strategy. Hoboken: John Wiley Sons. Xu, D., Meyer, K. (2013). Linking theory and context: Strategy research in emerging economies after Wright et al. (2005). Journal of Management Studies, 1322-1346.