Abuse of Power in Doubt, by John Patrick Shanley - 1177 Words

Power is earned, not given. There are many different types of power that people can earn. Power becomes a problem when it is not questioned or tested. Therefore, the one with the power would have total control over anything or anyone they wanted, or they would feel that way. People with power feel invincible when it is not questioned. Throughout history it has been proven that this creates a problem. For example, Richard Nixon and the Watergate scandal is similar to the scandal with Father Flynn in Doubt. Doubt, by John Patrick Shanley, exemplifies an underlying message that unquestioned faith leads to abuse of power. Specifically, shown in Father Flynn’s reputation, cover up, and resignation, which all correlate to Richard Nixon’s†¦show more content†¦In the election of 1972, Nixon won by over sixty percent of the votes and won all states except Massachusetts against George McGovern (â€Å"The History Place†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ). This is one of the biggest landslide s in U.S. Presidential election history. In January 1973, Richard Nixon’s approval rating was sixty-seven percent, which is relatively high compared to current president Barack Obama’s forty-seven percent and many other Presidents before him (â€Å"The History Place†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ). Therefore, he had a great reputation and was in the highest possible position, the leader of the free world, just like Father Flynn was in his parish. Richard Nixon also had a very positive relationship with members of the White House. For example, members of the White House were caught breaking in and violating the law to get President Nixon re-elected (â€Å"The History Place†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ). Abuse of power comes from a high reputation that is unquestioned. When one’s unquestioned reputation is being attacked one often feels obligated to make a plan to cover up accused actions to save their reputation. When Sister Aloysius first accuses Father Flynn of having an inappropriate relationship with Donald Muller he responds, â€Å"Happened? Nothing happened. I had a talk with the boy.† (32). Finally, Father Flynn says he did have some interaction with Donald after denying it for a while, but he still clearly states nothing happened. Father Flynn ends the conversation by saying, â€Å"I don’t wish to continue this conversation at all further. And if

Cynthia Ozick - 993 Words

Cynthia Ozick (1928 - †¦.) Cynthia Ozick was born in New York City on April 17, 1928. She was the second of two children. Her parents, Celia (Regelson) and Wiliam Ozick immigrated to the US from the northwest region of Russia. The family came from the Litvak (Lithuanian) Jewish tradition which was a tradition of skepticism, rationalism and antimysticism. Her parents owned a pharmacy in Pelham Bay section of Bronx. They worked very hard, usually fourteen hours a day. Cynthia delivered perscriptions sometimes. Her mother was a generous, lavish, exuberant woman full of laughter whereas her father was a discreet, quiet man. He was also a Jewish scholar, and knew Latin and German. When she was five and a half, her grandmother took her to†¦show more content†¦Three of her stories have won first prize in the O.Henry Prize Story competition, and five of her stories were chosen for republication in the yearly anthologies of Best American Short Stories. The editor of the 1984 volume called her one of the three greatest American writers of stories living today. Ozick has been nominated for the National Book Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award and the National Book Critics’ Circle Award. She has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. She also received the American Academy of Arts and Letters Mildred and Harold Strauss Living Award, Edward Lewis Wallant Memorial Award and The B’nai B’rt Jewish Heritage Award. Cythia Ozick has the unique honor of being the first writer to be given the Rea Award for the Short Story. In making this selection, the first Rea Award jurors, William Abrahams, Shannon Ravenel and Peter Schimdt said: A writer of great intelligence, moral energy, and imaginative power, Cynthia Ozick has appreciably widened the range of what the short story is able to be. Reading The Shawl we are moved past the truth of fact to a deeper, different understanding; we bear witness to the truth of art. Only rarely does this happen, and when it does, it must be celebrated. She has turned 80 earlier this year and has won not one but two lifetime achievement awards. In April 2008, she was receved the PEN/Malamud Award for short fiction and the PEN/Nabakov Award forShow MoreRelatedLiterary Analysis : Blue Tigers By Cynthia Ozick1718 Words   |  7 PagesCynthia Ozick exploits figurative language in The Shawl to create a grim and surrealistic atmosphere representative of The Holocaust’s brutality and impression of interminability. Though depicting The Holocaust– which is often recounted through biographical narratives–Ozick, uses abstract yet stirring metaphors when recounting her characters’ plight to attain emotional precision. From lines like â€Å"a walking cradle† when describing Rosa to â€Å"blue tigers† when describing Magda’s eyes, readers immediatelyRead MoreCynthia Ozick uses several symbolisms throughout the course of this compelling story of â€Å"The1300 Words   |  6 Pages Cynthia Ozick uses several symbolisms throughout the course of this compelling story of â€Å"The Shawl†. Ozick uses descriptive details to have interaction the reader. This use of symbolism is extremely vital to the story. Themes of survival, humanity, motherhood, tolerance, and prejudice course through the canvas of the vivid image the author tries to color for the readers. The author uses symbolism copiously to assist the reader envision the setting. Ozick uses several symbols and imaging as an exampleRead MoreThe Shawl, By Cynthia Ozick1319 Words   |  6 Pagesthought the Jews were the reason that Germany lost World War I (Jews in Nazi Germany- History Learning Site). Hitler blamed them for almost all of Germany’s problems and he wanted to exterminate the entire Jewish population. â€Å"The Shawl†, written by Cynthia Ozick, tells one of the many horrifying stories from the Holocaust. The story has three main characters: the young mother Rosa, her baby Magda, and her fo urteen-year-old niece Stella. They were victims of the Holocaust who had an awful experience inRead More Comparing the Use of Setting in The Shawl and The Portable Phonograph859 Words   |  4 PagesThe Shawl and The Portable Phonograph  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚   In literature, setting is often used to enhance or develop characters, provide realism, and create a mood or atmosphere for a story (Roberts 256). Two short stories, The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick and Walter Van Tillburg Clark’s The Portable Phonograph explore victims of war in the vivid settings that the authors have created. Although both works are vague as to geographic setting and place in time, the authors’ detailed descriptions ofRead MoreA Short Story Usually Forms A Conflict Or Multiple Conflicts894 Words   |  4 Pageshelp the readers to see the symbolism. When the readers pay attention, and analyze the stories can give them opinions while discussing to other people. In â€Å"Everyday Use† by Alice Walker, â€Å"A Rose for Emily† by William Faulkner, and â€Å"The Shawl† by Cynthia Ozick, show symbolism in each story. In the story â€Å"Everyday Use†, Momma is a strong-willed woman, with strong hands. Momma has two daughters; Dee is the oldest and Maggie is the youngest. The two daughters struggle with their identities and their heritageRead MoreWhat Is The Theme Of The Shawl By Cynthia Ozick701 Words   |  3 PagesIt is human nature to strive for comfort, to seek ease in a burdensome situation. When deprived of this sense of comfort, as demonstrated by Cynthia Ozick in â€Å"The Shawl†, it is through the suffering that ensues in which humanity is lost. This is made evident in her sparse writing style, the duality of the setting, and the use of illusionary symbolism. Ozick exhibits a degree of sparsity in the style of which â€Å"The Shawl† is written that mirrors the dehumanizing effect of suffering. There is almostRead MoreTravelers: Fantasists, Conjurers, and Seers of the World Essay1137 Words   |  5 PagesWorld What makes traveling to foreign lands such a coveted and memorable experience? What does one get out of exploring new cultures and atmospheres? In â€Å"The Shock of Teapots,† by Cynthia Ozick, the quality and nature of traveling and travelers themselves is explored. Within this work of creative nonfiction, Ozick strategically uses genre, diction, and exemplification to effectively emphasize that travelers see ordinary things in a new light when visiting other places and countries. She startsRead MoreThe And Of The Red And Black Ink By Gloria Atwood1381 Words   |  6 Pagestheir message is by presenting their own language into their writing.The use of language in writing creates and identity in the act or experience of writing. As it is shown in the text How it feels to be forcibly fed by Djuna Barnes, The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick, and Tlilli, Tlapalli/ The path of the Red and Black Ink by Gloria Anzaldua. In the text how it How It Feels to be forcibly fed by Djuna Barnes, is about the way a woman goes through the experience of women being fed forcibly in order for herRead MoreAccording to Arp and Johnson, â€Å"Literary fiction plunges us, through the author’s imaginative vision1200 Words   |  5 Pagesyou because of how he looked being turned into this gross cockroach is done so well by Kafka so you can empathize with Gregor and understand the story much better by putting yourself in Gregors shoes. In addition to Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, Cynthia Ozick wrote a brilliant short story The Shawl which also uses such great vision to feel like you’re in the story. As one reads the short story, it has such an effect on you the way that she brings you into this trance like if you’re in the HolocaustRead MoreJewish American Literatue2224 Words   |  9 Pages Jewish American Literature â€Å"Duty Matters† Throughout the course of the semester, the concept of duty has been a major theme in various novels, such as in Anzia Yezierska’s Bread Givers, Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl, and Saul Bellow’s Herzog. Although Yezierska, Ozick, and Bellow offer different circumstances, they all suggest a sense of responsibility from parent to child. I will show how the relationship between Sara and her father in Bread Givers differ from Rosa and the living incarnation of

Gut Feeling free essay sample

My friend Jerome called me talking about a party that was supposed to be the party of the year across town. My gut was telling me it was a bad idea, because across town were our rivals, Alcovy. A lot of animosity was built up from the game the other night. The game was so intense the basketball teams were even getting hostile towards one another. Once again that was my gut. My mind was telling me to go have fun. â€Å"What can possibly happen? I told myself. â€Å"My boys are going to be there. † As it got closer to the afternoon, more and more people began to tell me about this party. So my mind was made up that I was going. Problem was I didn’t want to tell my mom. She’s the type to go into a lecture about fighting, curfew, all the stuff mothers worry about. We will write a custom essay sample on Gut Feeling or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Honestly I wasn’t trying to sit through or hear all that, but I couldn’t lie to her so I told her. Two hours later I’m getting off the couch trying to shake out the cob webs from my ears. Some of what she was saying was processing in my head, but my main focus was on how the girls were going to look at the party.So you know I had to bring out one of my best outfit. As it came closer and closer to party time I began to think about what my gut was telling me earlier. â€Å"Don’t go† is what I kept hearing in my head. All I repeated to myself was that nothing was going to happen and I have nothing to worry about. My friend Jerome called me again and asked can he ride with me. Of course with him being my friend I said yes. I hopped in the shower, threw on my clothes, and was on my way to pick up Jerome. When I pulled up, his mother answered the door. When I walked through the door I saw Jerome on the couch.His mom was giving him the same lecture my mother gave me. When she was done we jumped in my beat up Ford Explorer. As we pulled up to the party I could see something hanging out his pants where his waist was. It was a gun. I pulled into the parking lot and before he could step out the car I grabbed him. I asked him why he brought the gun. He told me just in case anything popped off. I shook my head and got out the car. I told him to keep it in the car. The party was on point like I knew it was going to be. Then I saw my crush, Taija Bradley. I’ve had a crush on her since 9th grade.She had short hair with beautiful brown eyes. Her body made everybody double-take. This was my chance to actually talk to her face to face. As I approached her Tamarco Robins intercepted. Tamarco was the man at Alcovy. But with me being who I am I didn’t let that stop me. As he was talking to her I grabbed her hand and pulled her my way. Tamarco was heated. The whole part he began to mug me as I was dancing with Taija. The party was coming to an end, and I had got Taija number. When I turned around Tamarco was standing in my face. He pushed me and his boys surrounded me. I looked and my boys rushed in.Next thing I know there is a big brawl inside the party. Security got between us and broke us up. All I could hear was Tamarco and his crew talking about continuing the fight outside. So my friends and I looked at each other and proceeded outside. When we got outside Tamarco’s brother was at his car. As I turned around Tamarco punched me. I fell to the ground. When I got up I saw everybody fighting. Then I turn around and seen Tamarco’s brother coming towards the crowd with a gun. Before I could say anything he began to shoot. Everybody started to scatter. When he was done shooting, Tamarco and his boys got in their cars and left.I began to look around and saw somebody lying on the ground. â€Å"Jerome† I said to myself. I ran to him screaming his name. As I got to him I rolled him over and I could see he was shot twice. He was shot in the back and the chest. My friends and I put him in my truck and we took him to the hospital. Two hours had past, and his family and friends were in the waiting room. As we waited all I could think about was him. This was my fault for getting into it with Tamarco. All I wanted was revenge. When the doctor came out everyone stood up and waited for him to tell us what condition Jerome was in.Jerome didn’t make it he told us. It was like the world came to an abrupt halt. I had lost my best friend to nothing. My friend I had known my whole life was gone in one night. I turned to his mother and hugged her real tight as tears ran down my face onto her shoulder. To this day I think about him. The brother I always wanted. My gut feeling was right. I should have never gone to that party. Nothing was worth losing my best friend. He taught me a great lesson. Before you make an important decision, think about all the consequences. You never know how severe they may be.

Relative Truth Essays (727 words) - Epistemology, Truth,

Relative Truth One version of relative truth is used when people disagree. A person might say Well, that may be true for you, but its not true for me. The implication here is often that there is no real truth to the matter but is instead a matter merely of belief. You believe what you want to believe and I'll believe what I want to believe and let's go on our merry way. You can see what a boon to self-deception a mechanism like this could be. You can believe anything and no one would have the right to tell you that you can't rationally believe it. So, one can isolate oneself and one's beliefs from the critical evaluation of others, because what also goes without saying in this framework of relative truth, is that no one besides yourself can tell you what is true for you. The closest another could come would be to say something like It's true for me that it's not true for you. This is never actually done in the 'true for me' game. But if it were, then since all that the other would be expressing is what is true for them, even though your beliefs are the subject of their 'truth', there opinion has no real importance (except to them). It is only true in their world which is inaccessible to you. You can dismiss it and forget it. We can see that by this view true for me just means that I believe it. The word 'true' is in there to give the belief its own legitimacy. You may ask: What does 'I believe it' mean?. There doesn't seem to be any way of answering this without saying I believe it to be TRUE. And so we see that for it to mean anything to have a believe, we must already presuppose that there is an actual truth or falsity to the matter that is the subject of the belief. This is another thing denied by the relativists. He often says, there is no real truth, only what is 'true for me'. It is as if the relativist by the mere act of believing something can make it true in his/her reality. And this suggests that everyone has a different reality. Of course, we all have a different concept of reality, but there is only one reality. Thus, the confusion that the relativist makes between belief and truth is mirrored in a confusion between concept of reality and reality. If everyone really does make their own reality, then you are alone in your world and everyone else is your entertaining fiction. You are a solipsist, the only real person in the world. Now this is real isolation. But anyone who tries to think about this in a serious manner, doesn't really believe it. We know, for instance, that a belief can be wrong. If a belief can be wrong, it is because there is a truth out there that the belief conflicts with. If beliefs could never be wrong, there would be no reason to ever change a belief, unless it became clear that something else would be a happier thing to believe. So, most relativists don't believe that 'all truth is relative' but instead that there are some relative truths, especially in those areas where people argue the most: Politics, religion, ethics. But the reasons given above would still apply except to a smaller domain of discourse. And so we can see that if there were any area where the truth of something was just a matter of believing that something, then the legitimacy of that belief is questionable as coherent. If you think it is coherent, then try spelling out the meaning of It is true for me and try explaining what information is conveyed by an 'it is true for me' assertion. One might think that it means 'I believe it. But what sense does it make to 'believe it' unless you 'believe it is really true'? Thus to hold a belief at all requires the presupposition that there is truth, otherwise the belief would be nothing. If all truth were relative then language would be worthless when attempting to convey information, for that information would only be about your reality in which I have no access. But even if only certain areas were the domain of relative truth, then claims in those areas would carry no information, and would be the

Organizational Behavior Taking Motivation and Teamwork Into Perspective

Organizational Behavior Taking Motivation and Teamwork Into Perspective Free Online Research Papers TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Declaration 1 2. Acknowledgement 2 3. Summary 4 4. Introduction 5 5. Findings 7 5.1. Teamwork 7 5.1.1. Creative Innovation 8 5.1.2. Cultural aspects 10 5.2. Motivation 11 6. Discussion 14 6.1. Teamwork 14 6.2. Motivation 15 7. Conclusion 18 7.1. Teamwork 18 7.2. Motivation 18 8. References 20 9. Annexure 21 9.1. Starbucks Corporation: Case Study in Motivation and Teamwork 22 9.2. Diagram of Maslows Needes Pyramid†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦31 9.3. The Saint Paul Hotel 31 SUMMARY This report is made with the intention of displaying how motivation and teamwork are two pivotal factors ensuring success in hospitality. Literature finding coupled with case studies like that of Starbucks and Saint Pauls hotel will be used to illustrate the above statement. Using GAP analysis, the difference in theory and practical working of the company will be seen. INTRODUCTION The evolution of economies worldwide showcases the fact that the hospitality sector is expanding the fastest. Contrary to this, the quality of service and product in this sector is declining. The success of the hospitality sector depends on various aspects. These aspects remain constant under any given circumstances. The application of these factors in an efficient and accurate manner is what dictates the success of the establishment. Due to a rapid rise in globalisation in the recent past, competitiveness has increased tremendously. This is even more so, between companies marketing the same product or service, as in the case of the hospitality industry. Researchers have found that it costs for more to attract new customers than to retain current customers (Oliver, 1999; Rosenberg Czepiel, 1983) Motivation and teamwork are two of these integral factors. Here, there is a constant connection felt by the patrons and the employees. This forms a potential situation where the glass can be viewed as half full or half empty. Optimists believe that this medium of connection is what enables companies to initiate and hopefully sustain a steady relationship. The initiation can be created. It is the sustainment that poses the potential problems. The entire burden of this endeavour lies in the hands of the employees. Motivation of the employees is one of the key factors to ensure augmented success. Rensis Likert, one of the pi oneers in the field of motivation theory, and after which the Likert Scale is named, said The greater the loyalty of a group toward the group, the greater is the motivation among the members to achieve the goals of the group, and the greater the probability that the group will achieve its goals. The hospitality sector, as mentioned above, attains success based on various factors, like motivation. One of the other key factors that assist this attribute is teamwork. Any unit in the hospitality sector relies on their employees working in a single, cohesive unit. Hoegl Gemuenden (2001) observed that the definition of teamwork is a social system including more than three people in an organization or context. These members identify others as one member of the team and they have the same goal. Robbins (2001) stated that the factors influencing teamwork are relation of leadership, roles, principles, status, size, composition and the power of agglomerate. This is true in case of the hospitality industry as well. Being dependent primarily on the abilities and capabilities of its employees, teamwork forms an important aspect. FINDINGS TEAMWORK Different hospitality units focus on teamwork in different ways. None the less, the motive is the same, which is to improve results for better customer satisfaction and better revenue. Few organizations, however, are totally pleased with the results their team improvement efforts produce. If a team’s improvement efforts are not living up to the organization’s expectations, there are self-diagnosing check points that may illustrate why. Successful team building, that creates effective, focused work teams, must lay emphasis on the following. Competence Clear expectations Context Commitment Charter Control Collaboration Communication Creative innovation Cultural change Coordination Consequences In this report, focus will be given to the creative innovation and cultural aspects of teamwork. CREATIVE INNOVATION In today’s world, the level of competition cannot be faced with primitive methods. To give the guest something that is not being offered by another organization is the prime motive. This is not a responsibility that can be successfully carried out by any one individual. In the hospitality sector, every member of each organization may have creative input that may not be replicated. Since group processes have been said to be an important predictor of innovative performance (West and Anderson, 1996) and creativity (Amabile et al., 1996), there has been an expanding focus in research on elaborating factors within teams that facilitate team and innovative performance. A comprehensive model is offered by Hoegl and Gemuenden (2001) as well as Hoegl et al. (2004) who link the success of innovation projects to team performance and holistic success. For successful team performance communication, its frequency, degree of formalization, structure, and openness is important. Communication contributes to team performance (Hoegl and Gemuenden, 2001) as well as to the achievement of exceptional outcome (Sethi and Nicholson, 2001). Coordination, the synchronization and harmonization of individual tasks, is fostered by aligned goals with clear sub goals as well as defined roles which do not overlap each other (Hoegl and Gemuenden, 2001). Shared objectives and vision are linked to innovativeness (Anderson and West, 1996; Pearce and Ensley, 2004). Also, including all team members in the decision making process without having individuals on a team, who dominate discussions (balance of team member contributions), has been found to be links positively to innovation (Anderson and West, 1996; De Dreu and West, 2001; Hoegl and Gemuenden, 2001; West and Anderson, 1996). Mutual support refers to intensive collaboration and cooperation between tea m members (Hoegl and Gemuenden, 2001). Collaboration is also one of the dimensions of Sethi and Nicholsons (2001) charged behaviour that is linked to innovation; trust and support is found one factor that enhances creativity (Amabile et al., 1996). Also, the finding that an equally high level of effort contributes to team work quality (Hoegl and Gemuenden, 2001) is in line with Pearce and Ensleys (2004) argumentation that social loafing is affecting innovation negatively. Feeling committed to the work of the group supports individual creativity (Amabile et al., 1996). Finally cohesion has been a topic of several studies around creativity and innovation (Craig and Kelly, 1999; Gully et al., 1995). It covers interpersonal attraction of team members, commitment to the teams task and team spirit. CULTURAL ASPECTS Within cultural concepts we concentrate on two different aspects. Hall and Hall (1990) identified three dimensions of culture though interviewing practitioners who are interacting with other cultures. In their communication model they suggest the following dimensions to differ between cultures: Various degrees of tabulating information via language. A different need for areal space. Dissimilarity in the applicability of time and working styles (monochronic/polychronic). Hofstede (1983) instead delivers less visible concepts than Hall and Hall. The cultural concept of Hofstede (1983) identified four cultural dimensions which refer to values as a guiding idea. Power distance, the acceptance of differences in hierarchical status. Uncertainty avoidance, an individuals motivation to keep away from uncertainties and changes. Individualism/collectivism, the importance of independence from ones company, and own activity. Masculinity/femininity, the importance of income, recognition and advancement as well as the degree of role allocation between men and women. Confucian dynamism or the long term orientation of a country was added to the concept (Hofstede and Hofstede, 2005). Throughout the term multi-cultural team it is seen that the considered teams have expansive cultural values and communication styles due to their affiliations to different nationalities and socialization in diverse cultural groundings. Through this approach, the fact that cultural values can differ within one country (Kirkman and Shapiro, 2005) and that only concentrating on a diverse national background ignores potential changes of personal behaviours which are culture related are take into account. MOTIVATION Motivation is a key factor that influences the daily operations of any hospitality unit. It is the key factor which influences an employee to go above and beyond the call of duty. The pioneering hospitality organizations in the world believe that in some way or the other, employee motivation plays an integral role in their success. â€Å"There is one key to profitability and stability during either a boom or bust economy: employee morale.† - Herb Kelleher, founder of Southwest Airlines. There are various factors by which motivation can be attained. Many of these factors are based on models. Some of these models are:- Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. -Dr. Abraham Maslow. ERG Theory of Motivation. –Clayton P. Alderfer. ARCS Model of Motivation. – John Keller. Motivational Theory. -Frederick Herzberg. In this report, Maslow’s theory will be used. This is done as they have some overlapping views, which will assist a simpler understanding. According to Maslow, there are general types of needs (physiological, survival, safety, love, and esteem) that must be satisfied before a person can act unselfishly. He called these needs deficiency needs. As long as we are motivated to satisfy these cravings, we are moving towards growth, toward self-actualization. Satisfying needs is healthy, while preventing gratification makes us sick or act evilly. As a result, for adequate workplace motivation, it is important that leadership understands the exertive needs active for individual employee motivation. Maslows model indicates that basic, minor needs like safety and physiological requirements have to be satisfied in order to pursue higher-level motivators along the lines of self-fulfilment. Maslows Needs Pyramid or Maslows Needs Triangle, shows how after a need is satisfied it stops acting as a motivator and the next need one rank higher starts to motivate(Diagram present in Annexure). To summarise the above theory, a manager’s goal is to ensure that his employees have a reason to be motivated at all times. The needs that will motivate employees, changes with time. To recognise these needs is the job of the manager. Given below are the various needs of the employees. Physiological Motivation: Provide ample breaks for lunch and recuperation and pay salaries that allow workers to buy lifes essentials. Safety Needs: Provide a working environment which is safe, relative job security, and freedom from threats. Social Needs: Generate a feeling of acceptance, belonging, and community by reinforcing team dynamics. Esteem Motivators: Recognize achievements, assign important projects, and provide status to make employees feel valued and appreciated. Self-Actualization: Offer challenging and meaningful work assignments which enable innovation, creativity, and progress according to long-term goals. There are a few limitations present in Maslov’s theories. In some cultures, social needs are higher on the priority list than others. Maslows hierarchy fails to explain the starving artist scenario, in which the aesthetic neglects their physical needs to pursuit of aesthetic or spiritual goals. Additionally, little evidence suggests that people satisfy exclusively one motivating need at a time, other than situations where needs conflict. DISCUSSION TEAMWORK Starbucks is an internationally recognized hospitality chain. A case study based on this organization will be taken into consideration. This establishment is known for its ability to sustain its customers and have a relatively low turn-over rate. Here, team work is given monumental importance as they believe it to be the reason for their holistic success. The managers of the establishment refer to their peers and the people working under them as â€Å"partners†. By doing so, the corporate gap of title is bridged. The managers of the unit work aside the employees at the front line of service. This shows no discrimination in work, leading to self respecting employees who love their job. This is transmitted via the employees to the customers, creating satisfaction and loyalty. Simultaneously, it creates an open environment that contributes greatly to expression of innovative thinking. Starbucks has invested in creating a place where its employees can rest and enjoy. This also for ms a platform for creative inputs which are valued. As has been mentioned before, creativity of a person may never be replicated. The cultural barrier is present in every organization. How it is dealt with, is subject to change. Starbucks’ managers have authority to reschedule work timings of individuals. This is done in accordance with an employee’s personal or religious needs. Furthermore, emphasis is given to understanding an employee’s needs and problems. By following such exercises, the cultural barrier is overcome. At a particular shift, there are 6-8 employees working. As the unit of people working together is relatively small, people of various religious and ethnic backgrounds converse and know each other well. This again is another manner in which the cultural barrier is overcome at Starbucks. MOTIVATION The Saint Paul Hotel is a four star hotel located in downtown St. Paul, Minnesota, USA. This will be the case study for motivation that will be used. The hotel believes, like many others worldwide, that employee motivation is an important aspect attributing to the company’s success. The Saint Paul Hotel will provide training both for job skills and safety. Standards-based training occurs weekly in each department. Managers and employees will spend about 15 minutes to talk about their ideas. It is an opportunity to fine-tune or learn new skills. This training provides an opportunity for communication within the departments. For the employees to have their ideas heard and processed (if valuable) creates a sense of belonging and motivates them, as they have instilled in them the fact that they are valuable. Given below is a list of benefits given to the employees with the intention of motivating its employees. Uniforms: provided and maintained on the premises. One meal a day in employee dining room at no cost. Health, dental and life insurance. Employees of the month/year Manager of the quarter/year. Paid time off program used for sick pay, day off, vacation. Departmental incentives for safety/revenue generation/expense savings. Higher pay than the other hotels: Salary increases will occur on a schedule for Union employees, or annually for non- union employees. The Saint Paul Hotel will reward longevity with a watch for five years and a diamond pin for ten years. That diamond pin then has a new jewel set in it at each subsequent five year interval. After twenty years with the Hotel, a pin would have a diamond, a ruby and a sapphire. The Saint Paul Hotel prefers to promote from within whenever possible. However, this can be frustrating because often employees assume they are entitled to promotion based on seniority. Sometimes attendance/performance issues preclude allowing transfers or promotions. Sometimes lack of required experience interferes. While the Saint Paul Hotel trains many individuals in their jobs, even if they have had no experience, certain jobs (sales, accounting, etc.) require a certain level of expertise that must be grown into, as opposed to handed over (Personnel Communication, October 25, 2001). As said by Maslov (1943), there are various needs, that when fulfilled, create a motivated spirit and environment to work in. Saint Paul’s hotel is providing their employees with various benefits and perks. It can be seen that basic psychological needs are being fulfilled. By doing so, the basic level of motivation is instilled. Safety needs, being the second level of Mallow’s Hierarchy of needs, is also being given, in the form of health, dental and life insurance. By doing so, it is visible that the hotel cares about its employees and their well being. Gina Soucheray, training and employee development manager at the Saint Paul Hotel, stated that â€Å"right now we continue to look at how to get better support in the transportation process. However, nowadays we would like every employee to take the bus. We are looking at providing a better support structure for people who have to 29 take the bus or people who have to drive. Moreover, we are looking for the opportunit y for childcare for both union and non-union employees. That’s two key things right now transportation and childcare. We have a lot of employees who have problems with a good childcare system and we have a candidate who has come down to fill out memo about not enough parking space what we should do, and who’s going to pay for parking† (Personnel Communication, October 25, 2001). This is the extent to which Saint Pauls hotel engages itself in employee satisfaction, which is grounds for motivation. CONCLUSION TEAMWORK Teamwork is a wide field of study. In this report, two aspects of teamwork have been dealt with. These aspects are creative innovation and cultural aspects. A GAP analysis has been shown by applying views of established authors, like Hoegl and Gemuenden, Hofstede and Kirkman and Shapiro, to a case study of Starbucks. The importances of the two aspects shown are explained in this report. It is shown how Starbucks, being a multi-national company, promotes creative innovation from its employees. It also focuses on overcoming cultural backgrounds of individuals. Two people hailing from different backgrounds are evident not to have everything in common. The aim is to understand the other individual’s culture and needs, and to compromise. By doing so, the employees and managers of Starbucks are able to work harmoniously. MOTIVATION Today, there is an irrefutable connection between employee satisfaction and financial performance. This is based on numerous studies that support the analogue. Therefore, companies have a rare opportunity to emolument competitive leverage and contrasting by domesticate their greatest asset which is their employees. Employees are the most critical point of differentiation for any company in today’s business environment. The correlations are evident. Satisfied employees transfer their joy to attain satisfied customers, who in turn build long-term relationships, and spend more money. This presents a finding for American corporations, most of which do not utilize their employee potential to the max. A major survey conducted by the Public Agenda Forum indicates that fewer than 25 percent of American workers are working to their full potential. And 75 percent said they could be significantly more effective in their jobs than they are. Plus, 60 percent believe they don’t work as hard as they did in the past. These are not the characteristics of satisfied, engaged and happy employees. With a closer analysis of the different models mentioned in this report, and practical implication of those guidelines, would open doors to financial growth and holistic betterment of the industry. REFERENCES 1. Hoegl, M Gemuenden, H G (2001) Teamwork Quality and the Success ofinnovative Projects: A Theoretical Concept and Empirical Evidence Organization science, Vol 12, No. 4, pp 435-449. 2. Nicholson, N (1998) Encyclopedic Dictionary of Organizational Behaviour Blackwell, pp 215 3. Robbins, S P?2002?Organizational Behavior America: Prentice-Hall, pp 335 4. Assessing the Work Environment for Creativity. Academy of Management Journal, 39(5), 1154-1184. 5. Hoegl, Martin and Gemuenden, Hans Georg, 2001. Teamwork quality and the success of innovative projects Organization Science, 12(4), 435-449. 6. Hofstede, G., 1983. National Cultures in Four Dimensions. A Research-based Theory of Cultural Differences among Nations. International Studies of Management and Organization, 13(1-2), 46-74. 7. Kirkman, Bradley L. and Shapiro, Debra L., 2005, The Impact of Cultural Diversity on Multicultural Team Performance, vol. 18. Elsevier Ltd. 8. Sethi, Rajesh and Nicholson, Carolyn Y., 2001. Structural and Contextual Correlates of Charged Behavior in Product Development Teams. Journal of Product and Innovation Management, 18, 154-168 9. West, Michael A. and Anderson, Neil R., 1996. Innovation in Top Management Teams. Journal of Applied Psychology, 81(6), 680-693. 10. Amabile, Teresa M., Conti, Regina, Coon, Heather, Lazenby, Jeffrey and Herron, Michael, 1996 11. Pearce, Craig and Ensley, Michael, 2004. A reciprocal and longitudinal investigation of the innovation process. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 25, 259-278. 12. De Dreu, Carsten K. W. and West, Michael A., 2001. Minority dissent and team innovation: The importance of participation in decision making. Journal of Applied Psychology, 86(6), 1191-1201. 13. Abraham Maslows book Motivation and Personality(1954), formally introduced the Hierarchy of Needs. Websites 1. http://orgsci.journal.informs.org/cgi/content/abstract/12/4/435 2. www.netmba.com 3. envisionsoftware.com/articles/Maslows_Needs_Hierarchy.html 4. envisionsoftware.com/articles/ERG_Theory.html 5. uwstout.edu/lib/thesis/2002/2002petcharakp.pdf 6. employeebenefits.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?h=365;category_cs=14;link_cs=2 7. articlesbase.com/sales-articles/using-incentives-to-effectively-motivate-employees-1169188.html 8. http://ezinearticles.com/?How-to-Motivate-Employees-Effectivelyid=1864705 9. businessballs.com/employeemotivation.htm Research Papers on Organizational Behavior Taking Motivation and Teamwork Into PerspectiveResearch Process Part OneIncorporating Risk and Uncertainty Factor in CapitalThe Relationship Between Delinquency and Drug UseThe Project Managment Office SystemOpen Architechture a white paperInfluences of Socio-Economic Status of Married MalesMarketing of Lifeboy Soap A Unilever ProductDefinition of Export QuotasEffects of Television Violence on ChildrenBionic Assembly System: A New Concept of Self

5 Strategies That Will Help You Build Strong Workplace Skills

5 Strategies That Will Help You Build Strong Workplace Skills As we look at a brand new year, you might have the classic resolutions lined up: eat better, sleep better, be better. If your revamped goals also include being better at your job (or stepping up your game so you can nab a new job), there’s a great way to make progress without changing everything at once: build your workplace skills. This can mean bolstering skills you already have, or seeking out new ones. Saying â€Å"go forth and build skills† is one thing, but how to actually do that? Let’s look at some strategies for how to start your growth process.1. Be realistic.If you decide you want to brush up your Spanish language skills, don’t expect to be fluent in six months’ time (no matter what that app tells you). Make sure you’re setting SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time Bound). Make sure your skill-building goals have concrete steps that can be achieved in the time and brainspace you have available.For exampl e, if you’ve been saying you’ll take that management seminar when you have a magical period of free time that never materializes, chances are you’re not going to do it this time around, either. Make sure you have the time and space in your life to work on these skills before you dive in.2. Focus on quality over quantity.Making a little progress on 10 skills is nice, but wouldn’t you rather make tons of progress on 2 skills? Pick a few areas where you can really dig in and put in the work, with the time you have available.3. Focus on process over end result.Let’s say your current plan (realistically) looks like this:1. Improve communication skills.2. Yada yada yada.3. †¦Promotion!That’s a system that isn’t going to work. It’s great to envision where you want to end up (that’s a key part of any goal setting exercise), but you can’t let the details in the middle get muddled while you focus on the end. Make sure you know exactly how you’re going to get to that endpoint by creating specific steps and touchpoints along the way. Where do you want to be in two months with this? Six months? A year?4. Pick skills that will be useful.Don’t learn Swahili because hey, why not learn Swahili? Learn Swahili because your company just opened an office in Tanzania, or because your boss’s boss is fluent, and you’d love to drop some key phrases at next year’s office holiday party. Focus on skills that will be useful to you in the short term, and that are specific to your career path. For example, if the next level at your job involves presentations, work on your public speaking skills. If data analysis is an emerging trend in your field, seek out online lessons for some ninja tricks to improve your Excel game.5. Know your existing strengths.Yes, the whole point of this exercise is to learn new things. But it will be very difficult to learn these new things if you’re going too far outside your comfort zone, and want to give up because your new skill is hard. It could very well be that you’re just not learning the skill in a way that makes sense to you. Make sure that you understand how you learn best. If it’s by watching other people do things, take online tutorials. If you process information by hearing it, seek out lectures. If you would rather read about it, head to the library. If you try to align your skill-building with your best learning style, you increase your chances of success.So what skills will you be building in the new year? We’d love to hear about your progress!

The Business Strategies of Google Inc and Its Effects on the Business Essay - 2

The Business Strategies of Google Inc and Its Effects on the Business and the Industry - Essay Example This paper illustrates that a research study conducted by Morgan Stanley pegs the total number of internet users at about 1.8 billion as of the year 2009. The number is expected to grow by about 13 percent annually on a year on year basis. The report also states that approximately 18.8 thousand minutes was spent on internet browsing by ‘netizens’ across the world. Geographically China followed by USA and India have the largest number of active internet users with the numbers growing geometrically over the years. The analysis of the strategic framework of an organization can be done by using the framework of the Generic model proposed by Michael Porter. The model states that a firm can pursue four strategies that include overall cost leadership, focus, differentiation, and differentiation focus strategies. Depending on the business and the market environment a firm can either chose one strategy or a combination of these strategies. Overall cost leadership strategy involve s a strategic framework in which a business organization lowers its cost of operations and uses the cost benefits to sell products at lower prices than their competitors. Business organizations using a differentiation strategy provide a unique product or service offering that is unmatched by the competitors in the industry segment. Firms using such a strategy normally charge a premium for their uniqueness in the product or service offering and generate their core competence based on their innovations. Focus strategy involves targeting a very core and niche consumer segment and providing services that tend to cater to the very specific needs of the customers.

Critical Power Grid Security Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3250 words

Critical Power Grid Security - Essay Example More than 140 million customers in America rely upon the 3 linked sectors of over 3,200 utilities of electric distribution, ten thousand plus, generating units as well as tens of thousands of transmission miles which make up the power grid of the United States of America (LISA, 2013). With 500,000 people in average by United States Power Grid outages every day, it is quite safe to describe the power grid as reaching its capacity as well as weakening with age and infrastructure that is declining as the key culprit (Massoud & John, 2008). The experts are becoming worried for a good reason. The US outages costs running to billions of dollars, the unpredictability as well as the unease for the infrastructure and the absence of physical security, has been leading to uncertainty amongst users of power especially in large scale, for instance data centers, institutions, manufacturing firms. Most power users as a result are being forced to become more innovative and come up with alternative s ources of power (LISA, 2013). Within the past one year alone, there has been instances documented, for instance, Superstorm Sandy, within which weaknesses of the electric power grid got to be exposed or within which officials like those within Texas had to step in so as to avert a possible blackout. With regard to this, a number of industries were forced to shut down or limit operations leading to huge problems from customers as well as the public. The greatest power consumers are among the very first to feel a waning grid pressure. In case of an absence of connectivity to generator failures as well as everything in between, this aging power infrastructure is intimidating to hurt businesses as well as individuals in more than one way. The original pathways of the electric power grid similar to those of the highway system were put in place during early the 20th century. In addition, most utility companies still have structures which have run for about 50 to 70 years. It is so

A Defense of Abortion Essay Example for Free

A Defense of Abortion Essay Thomson argues that in some though not all cases, women have a right to abortion due to property rights in regards to their body, and the undue burden against these rights that would be placed on women if they are to be made responsible for any and all pregnancies. Thomson uses a variety of sometimes strange analogies to make her point that even if we give in to the argument that a fetus is a person, and thus has a right to life, this right to life does not necessarily ensure a right to sustain that life by using another person’s property, in this case the mother’s body, against her will. Thomson first asks us to consider the following case. You wake up and find yourself in a hospital bed hooked up to a famous violinist. It is then explained to you that you’ve been kidnapped by the Society of Music Lovers because you happen to be the only person whose blood type is compatible with the violinist’s, who is suffering from a kidney disease, and will die unless you remain plugged into him for nine months. Keeping in mind that both you and the violinist are innocent parties, and that both you and the violinist will walk out of the hospital alive and unharmed when the nine months are up, are you morally obligated to remain connected to the violinist, who in the case of pregnancy would be the fetus? First we must consider the given analogy and its relativity to the primary scenario, being the morality of abortion. There are no other cases quite like pregnancy, where one’s ability to sustain life is directly dependent on the use of another’s body. This is why Thomson must create the violinist analogy. There are surely many similarities between the case of the violinist and the case of the fetus. As stated before, both parties, the fetus/violinist and the mother/donor are innocent. The cause of their connection is based on the actions of a third party, in this case the Society of Music Lovers. The fact that the donor was kidnapped presents a distinguishing factor, allowing the analogy to be applied in cases such as pregnancy because of rape, where it is clear that the mother did not consent in any way to becoming pregnant. There are also dissimilarities. The kidnapping itself has not traumatized the donor, while in the case of a young girl being raped and becoming pregnant, the rape itself is very traumatic. However, Thomson discounts this by saying that if those who oppose abortion based on the grounds that a person’s right to life is more important than a mother’s property right to her body, make an exception in the case of rape, they are saying that those who come into existence because of rape have less of a right to life than others, which sounds somehow wrong. Furthermore, many who oppose abortion on this ground do not make an exception for rape. Thus, the primary question remains, is it morally permissible to disconnect yourself from a person, even if doing so will kill them? Thomson then takes the violinist scenario a step further, asking us to imagine that it turns out that supporting the violinist is putting additional strain on you, and if you continue to remain plugged into him, you will die. Some would say that it is still impermissible, because unplugging yourself would be directly killing the innocent violinist which is murder, and always wrong. Thomson vehemently denies that you are obligated to sacrifice your own life in order to save the violinist, saying that in this case â€Å"if anything in the world is true, it is that you do not commit murder, you do not do what is impermissible, if you reach around to your back and unplug yourself from that violinist to save your life. † (Vaughn, 175) Many of Thomson’s other analogies deal with the concept of a woman’s property rights to her body making a case for abortion being permissible. She gives the analogy of a young boy being given a box of chocolates, and eating them before his envious brother. Of course the boy ought to share his chocolates with his brother, as most of us would agree. However, Thomson claims that if he doesn’t, he is simply being selfish and greedy, but not unjust. He is not unjust in denying his brother the chocolates simply because they were given to him, and thus are his property. If the box had been given to both of the brothers, it would be a different story. Distinguishing between what one ought to do and what one is morally obligated to do ties back to the violinist analogy. Even if the violinist only required use of your body for one hour, while you ought to allow him to use your body, as it requires little effort on your part, you are not unjust if you refuse. You are perhaps callous and selfish, yes, but not unjust. As Thomson states â€Å"Except in such cases as the unborn person has a right to demand it-and we were leaving open the possibility that there may be such cases-nobody is morally required to make large sacrifices, of health, of all other interests and concerns, of all other duties and commitments, for nine years, or even for nine months, in order to keep another person alive. (Vaughn, 181) The criticism I would make of this argument is that she does not specify in which cases the unborn person has a right to demand use of a mother’s body, only that they can occur. She does clearly state however, that having a right to life does not inherently give one the right to be given the use of or allowed continued use of another’s body, even if one needs it for life itself. (Vaughn, 178) Some who oppose abortion argue that because pregnancy is preventable, if one happens to become pregnant they must take responsibility, which gives the fetus special rights that a stranger, such as the violinist would not have. Thomson points out that this theory only gives a fetus a right to a mother’s body if the pregnancy resulted in a voluntary act, leaving out instances of rape. She uses the people-seed analogy to further discuss the implications of holding women responsible for all pregnancies. She asks us to imagine people as seeds, innocently drifting around the world, sometimes even into your home, getting stuck to furniture and carpets. To prevent this from happening to you, you put the best screens on your windows you can buy. As we all know, sometimes screens are defective, and a seed finds its way in and takes root, despite your preventative measures. Does that seed have a right to use your house to develop into a person? It is true that it could have been prevented from taking root if you lived your life in a house without furniture or carpeting, but this seems ridiculous. By the same token you could say that women who are raped have a responsibility to the fetus because rape could be prevented by never leaving home without a reliable army, or never leaving home at all. This is far too high of a burden to put on individuals. When evaluating these analogies and the argument Thomson uses them to make, certain questions arise. For example, if I am not morally obligated to give my property to someone who depends on it for survival, is it morally permissible to let someone starve to death because I refuse to share my food that I bought earlier from the grocery store? Given her analogies, such as the instance of the boy who refuses to share his chocolate, it would seem that Thomson would say that it is permissible to let someone die of starvation. After all, you are not morally obligated to share what is rightly yours. She would say you are selfish and greedy, like the little boy, but not unjust or immoral. However, letting an innocent person starve to death, when doing something as little as giving them some of our food, does not sit well with the average person. This is where Thomson’s concept of the Good Samaritan vs. the minimally decent Samaritan comes into play. In the biblical story, the Good Samaritan saw a man dying in the road, abandoned by others who passed. He cleaned the dying man’s wounds and took him to an inn, paying for his stay. He went out of his way to help someone in need, at some cost to himself. Thomson illustrates the other extreme by using the case of Kitty Genovese, who was murdered while thirty-eight people stood by and did nothing to help. In this case the Good Samaritan would have rushed to her aid, putting his own life on the line in order to save a stranger’s. While Thomson seems to say that this is too much to ask of people, and they are not morally required to risk their own life to save another’s, she does say that the Minimally Decent Samaritan would have at least called the police. Because no one even called the police, they are not even minimally decent Samaritans, and their actions are monstrous. While the Good Samaritan gives aid they are not obligated to give, the Minimally Decent Samaritan fulfills their minimal obligations. Just as watching a person be murdered and doing absolutely nothing to help is falling below the standard of minimally decent Samaritan, I would have to believe that watching a person starve and doing nothing to help is also monstrous. After all, using Thomson’s analogies we could say that the people who watched Kitty Genovese get murdered ought to have used their cell phones to call the police at the very least, but being that their cell phones are their property, they can use them as they wish, and are not morally obligated to use them to save a life, even if the cost it would bring to them seems extremely insignificant. Thomson seems to distinguish between situations such as letting someone starve to death because you refuse to share your food, or letting someone be murdered because you refuse to use your phone, and aborting a fetus. She claims that many laws prohibiting abortion compel women to be Good Samaritans (Vaughn, 181) as opposed to minimally decent. This claim suggests that she believes that harboring a fetus is an act of a Good Samaritan, not a minimally decent one. Furthermore, by calling the people who watched Kitty Genovese die â€Å"monstrous† it suggests that she does in fact believe that watching a person die and doing nothing to help is immoral. By these tokens, it seems that she would in fact view letting another starve as immoral, suggesting that her argument of property rights is inconsistent. Thomson somewhat accounts for these inconsistencies in her closing argument, simply by conceding that the analogies she uses are not fool proof or meant to be applied to all cases. She states â€Å"while I do not argue that abortion is not impermissible, I do not argue that it is always permissible. There may well be cases in which carrying the child to term requires only minimally decent Samaritanism of the mother, and this is a standard we must not fall below. † (Vaughn 182) For example, she believes it would be immoral for a woman to abort her child late in the pregnancy because she had a vacation planned. By asserting that her analogies and arguments are not meant to make an absolute case for or against abortion, they do in fact only help her to prove her somewhat tentative point that women do have a right to abortion, in some though not all cases, because of property rights and the undue burden against these rights that would be placed on women if forced to carry all pregnancies to term.

Nutrition Essay -- Health Nutrition Pyramid Diet

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Table of Contents Nutrition Therapy  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  1 Nutrition Consult  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  1 Meal planning  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  2 Body Weight Considerations  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  2 Psychosocial support.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  3 Calorie Intake  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  4 Nutrient Composition of the Diet  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  4 Fat Intake  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  5 Carbohydrate Intake  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  6 Sucrose  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  6 Fructose  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  6 Vitamins and Minerals  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  7 Alcohol Intake  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  7 References  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  8 Nutrition Therapy The most fundamental component of the diabetes treatment plan for all patients with type II diabetes is medical nutrition therapy. Specific goals of nutrition therapy in type II diabetes are to:[1] Achieve and maintain as near-normal blood glucose levels as possible by balancing food intake with physical activity, supplemented by oral hypoglycemic agents or insulin (endogenous or exogenous) as needed Normalize blood pressure Normalize serum lipid levels Help patients attain and maintain a reasonable body weight (defined as the weight an individual and health-care provider acknowledge as possible to achieve and maintain on a short- and long-term basis) Promote overall health through optimal nutrition and lifestyle behaviors. Because no single dietary approach is appropriate for all patients, given the heterogeneous nature of type II diabetes, meal plans and diet modifications should be individualized to meet a patient's unique needs and lifestyle. Accordingly, any nutrition intervention should be based on a thorough assessment of a patient's typical food intake and eating habits and should include an evaluation of current nutritional status. Some patients with mild-to-moderate diabetes can be effectively treated with an appropriate balance of diet modification and exercise as the sole therapeutic intervention, particularly if their fasting blood glucose level is < 200 mg/dL. The majority of patients, however, will require pharmacologic intervention in addition to diet and exercise prescriptions. It is important to note that ... ...ng insulin or sulfonylureas are susceptible to hypoglycemia if alcohol is consumed on an empty stomach. Therefore, these individuals should make sure to take any desired alcohol with a meal. Patients with diabetes and coexisting medical problems such as pancreatitis, dyslipidemis, or neuropathy may need to reduce or abstain from alcohol intake. References American Diabetes Association. Medical Management of Non-insulin-dependent (Type II) Diabetes, 3rd ed. Alexandria, Va: American Diabetes Association; 1994:22-39. American Diabetes Association. Diabetes 1996 Vital Statistics. Alexandria, Va: American Diabetes Association; 1996. Davidson MB. Diabetes Mellitus: Diagnosis and Treatment, 3rd ed. New York, NY: Churchill Livingstone; 1991:35-93. Henry RR. Protein content of the diabetic diet. Diabetes Care. 1994;17:1502-1513. Mudaliar SR, Henry RR. Role of glycemic control and protein restriction in clinical management of diabetic kidney disease. Endocr Pract. 1996;2:220-226. American Diabetes Association. Clinical practice recommendations 1995. Position statement: nutrition recommendations and principles for people with diabetes mellitus. Diabetes Care. 1995;18(suppl 1):16-19.

Biology Class Xi Chapter Essay

The description of living organisms including human beings began much later in human history. Societies which indulged in anthropocentric view of biology could register limited progress in biological knowledge. Systematic and monumental description of life forms brought in, out of necessity, detailed systems of identification, nomenclature and classification. The biggest spin off of such studies was the recognition of the sharing of similarities among living organisms both horizontally and vertically. That all present day living organisms are related to each other and also to all organisms that ever lived on this earth, was a revelation which humbled man and led to cultural movements for conservation of biodiversity. In the following chapters of this unit, you will get a description, including classification, of animals and plants from a taxonomist’s perspective. Born on 5 July 1904, in Kempten, Germany, the Harvard University evolutionary biologist who has been called ‘The Darwin of the 20th century’, was one of the 100 greatest scientists of all time. Mayr joined Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences in 1953 and retired in 1975, assuming the title Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology Emeritus. Throughout his nearly 80-year career, his research spanned ornithology, taxonomy, zoogeography, evolution, systematics, and the history and philosophy of biology. He almost single-handedly made the origin of species diversity the central question of evolutionary biology that it is today. He also pioneered the currently accepted definition of a biological species.

Summary: The Native Son

The Native Son is a novel by Richard Wright, which is set in southern part of Chicago in the 1930’s. The novel, which was divided into three books, Fear, Flight, and Fate, is basically a story of 22-year old Bigger Thomas, an African-American, and his struggles living an impoverished life of crime The scene opens with Bigger being awakened by the screams of his sister, Vera and mother. He saw that the cause of the commotion was a big rat. He and his brother, Buddy, drove the rodent into a corner, but the rat retaliates and wounds Bigger. Ultimately, Bigger kills the rat with a heavy iron skilled Bigger's wanted to become an aviator but is instead given a job for a white millionaire-philanthropist named Henry Dalton. During this time, his mother warns him to forget his criminal habits, lest he end up in prison and also tells him to go out and get a job if he â€Å"had any manhood in him.† Although he sincerely cares about his family, Bigger knows that he will never have a big time job that will enable him to support his family Despite his mother’s warning, Bigger meets his gang and they hatch a plan to rob Blum's Deli. However, he is actually afraid to commit robbery and he tells this to his friend Gus, who in turn calls Bigger’s bluff. This angered Bigger and he attempted to stab his would-be friend but gets up being kicked out of the gang. He then prepares for the interview with Mr. Dalton. Although Bigger doesn’t really want to take the job, he is amazed by the massive wealth of his potential employer so he decides to proceed. However, he fails to answer clearly at the interview and frightened by some of the house’s furniture as well as Mr. Dalton’s blind wife, his maid Peggy and daughter Mary. Bigger remembers seeing Mary in a newsreel which showed that she was Communist sympathizer along with her boyfriend, Jan Elrone, who is a communist herself.

Simon Bolivar and the Battle of Boyaca

Simon Bolivar and the Battle of Boyaca On August 7, 1819, Simà ³n Bolà ­var engaged Spanish General Josà © Marà ­a Barreiro in battle near the Boyaca River in present-day Colombia. The Spanish force was spread out and divided, and Bolà ­var was able to kill or capture almost all of the enemy combatants. It was the decisive battle for the liberation of New Granada (now Colombia). Bolivar and the Independence Stalemate in Venezuela In early 1819, Venezuela was at war: Spanish and Patriot generals and warlords were fighting each other all over the region. New Granada was a different story: there was an uneasy peace, as the populace was ruled with an iron fist by Spanish Viceroy Juan Josà © de Smano from Bogota. Simon Bolivar, greatest of the rebel generals, was in Venezuela, dueling with Spanish General Pablo Morillo, but he knew that if he could just get to New Granada, Bogota was practically undefended. Bolivar Crosses the Andes Venezuela and Colombia are divided by a high arm of the Andes Mountains: parts of it are practically impassible. From May to July of 1819, however, Bolivar led his army over the pass of Pramo de Pisba. At 13,000 feet (4,000 meters), the pass was extremely treacherous: deadly winds chilled the bones, snow and ice made footing difficult, and ravines claimed pack animals and men to falls. Bolivar lost a third of his army in the crossing, but made it to the western side of the Andes in early July, 1819: the Spanish at first had no idea he was there. Battle of Vargas Swamp Bolivar quickly regrouped and recruited more soldiers from the eager population of New Granada. His men engaged the forces of young Spanish general Josà © Marà ­a Barreiro at the battle of Vargas Swamp on July 25: it ended in a draw, but showed the Spanish that Bolà ­var had arrived in force and was headed for Bogota. Bolivar moved quickly to the town of Tunja, finding supplies and weapons meant for Barreiro. Royalist Forces at the Battle of Boyaca Barreiro was a skilled general who had a trained, veteran army. Many of the soldiers, however, had been conscripted from New Granada and doubtless there were some whose sympathies were with the rebels. Barreiro moved to intercept Bolivar before he could reach Bogota. In the vanguard, he had some 850 men in the elite Numancia battalion and 160 skilled cavalry known as dragoons. In the main body of the army, he had about 1,800 soldiers and three cannons. The Battle of Boyaca Begins On August 7, Barreiro was moving his army, trying to get into position to keep Bolivar out of Bogota long enough for reinforcements to arrive. By the afternoon, the vanguard had gone ahead and crossed the river at a bridge. There they rested, waiting for the main army to catch up. Bolà ­var, who was much closer than Barreiro suspected, struck. He ordered General Francisco de Paula Santander to keep the elite vanguard forces occupied while he hammered away at the main force. A Stunning Victory It worked out even better than Bolivar had planned. Santander kept the Numancia Battalion and Dragoons pinned down, while Bolivar and General Anzotegui attacked the shocked, spread-out main Spanish army. Bolà ­var quickly surrounded the Spanish host. Surrounded and cut off from the best soldiers in his army, Barreiro quickly surrendered. All told, the royalists lost more than 200 killed and 1,600 captured. The patriot forces lost 13 killed and about 50 wounded. It was a total victory for Bolà ­var. On to Bogot With Barreiro’s army crushed, Bolà ­var quickly made for the city of Santa fà © de Bogot, where Viceroy Juan Josà © de Smano was the ranking Spanish official in Northern South America. The Spanish and royalists in the capital panicked and fled in the night, carrying all they could and leaving their homes and in some cases family members behind. Viceroy Smano himself was a cruel man who feared the retribution of the patriots, so he, too quickly departed, dressed as a peasant. Newly-converted â€Å"patriots† looted the homes of their former neighbors until Bolà ­var took the city unopposed on August 10, 1819, and restored order. Legacy of the Battle of Boyaca The Battle of Boyac and capture of Bogot resulted in a stunning checkmate for Bolà ­var against his enemies. In fact, the Viceroy had left in such haste that he even left money in the treasury. Back in Venezuela, the ranking royalist officer was General Pablo Morillo. When he learned of the battle and the fall of Bogot, he knew the royalist cause was lost. Bolà ­var, with the funds from the royal treasury, thousands of possible recruits in New Granada and undeniable momentum, would soon sweep back into Venezuela and crush any royalists still there. Morillo wrote to the King, desperately begging for more troops. 20,000 soldiers were recruited and were to be sent, but events in Spain prevented the force from ever departing. Instead, King Ferdinand sent Morillo a letter authorizing him to negotiate with the rebels, offering them some minor concessions in a new, more liberal constitution. Morillo knew the rebels had the upper hand and would never agree, but tried anyway. Bolà ­var, sensing the royalist desperation, agreed to a temporary armistice but pressed the attack. Less than two years later, the royalists would once again be defeated by Bolà ­var, this time at the Battle of Carabobo. This battle marked the last gasp of organized Spanish resistance in northern South America. The Battle of Boyac has gone down in history as one of the greatest of Bolà ­vars many triumphs. The stunning, complete victory broke the stalemate and gave Bolà ­var an advantage he never lost.

The Compound Conjugations of the French Verb Être

The Compound Conjugations of the French Verb Être The very irregular French verb  Ãƒ ªtre (to be)  is among the most frequently used and, therefore, most valuable verbs in the French language. You will find some form of it on every printed page, in every lesson and on the tip of every tongue. The  simple tenses  form the basis of most communication in everyday French, not only used by themselves as the equivalent of to be, but also as auxiliary verbs for the compound forms of many French verbs. The verb  Ãƒ ªtre also has its own compound tenses, which are likewise commonly used in spoken and written French. Both the irregular simple tenses and the irregular compound tenses of this verb also appear in many of the most common idiomatic expressions in the French language. Below are all of the compound tenses in which the  verb  Ãƒ ªtre appears. Compound Conjugations of the Irregular French Verb Être Pass compos Pluperfect Past subjunctive j ai t avais t aie t tu as t avais t aies t il a t avait t ait t nous avons t avions t ayons t vous avez t aviez t ayez t ils ont t avaient t aient t Future perfect Conditional perfect Pluperfect subjunctive j aurai t aurais t eusse t tu auras t aurais t eusses t il aura t aurait t et t nous aurons t aurions t eussions t vous aurez t auriez t eussiez t ils auront t auraient t eussent t Past anterior Conditional perfect, 2nd form j eus t eusse t tu eus t eusses t il eut t et t nous emes t eussions t vous etes t eussiez t ils eurent t eussent t Past imperative Past infinitive Perfect participle (tu) aie t avoir t ayant t (nous) ayons t - - (vous) ayez t - -

Principles of Management Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Principles of Management - Research Paper Example The employees stand to obtain a better insight into the functioning of the company, due to this initiative. Furthermore, employees obtain a better understanding of the lacunae in the performance of the company, which in turn could motivate them to seek methods for bettering the situation (Dossenbach 16). Subsequent to the evaluation of corporate performance, the employee’s achievement in realizing individual goals can be scrutinized. This task should be so conducted that the employees are made to review their individual objectives and achievements. At this juncture, the employees should be encouraged to provide suggestions for improving their deficient areas. As such, suggestions for change that emanate from the employee, will be adopted voluntarily, in addition to engendering a sense of well – being and accomplishment (Dossenbach 16). It is essential to realize that human resources management is critically dependent on the motivation of employees. The individual and collective motivation levels of employees have an overbearing and direct influence on the persistence, level and direction of their efforts. This circumstance finds substantial evidence in the fact that the best performers in the corporate sector enjoy a workforce that is highly motivated (Gilley, Gilley and Quatro 129). In fact, the functions of human resources management are based on a thorough comprehension of the theory of employee motivation. As such, any motivational theory is founded on a fundamental understanding of the influence of intrinsic and extrinsic rewards on the motivation levels of employees (Gilley, Gilley and Quatro 129). Extrinsic rewards are basically motivational stimuli that are provided to employees as inducements for indulging in certain activities. Such rewards constitute valued consequences for completing a task in an exemplary manner. On the other hand, intrinsic

International finance management Research Paper

International finance management - Research Paper Example The issuers of the obligations/securities might include companies, various special purpose related entities, local governments, states, nonprofit seeking organizations and/or sovereign nations. There are various credit rating agencies which provide credit ratings. The agency or company which has been selected in this project is Moody’s Investors Service. Moody’s Investor Services Moody’s Investors Services, also referred as Moody’s, is a bond credit rating business under the Moody’s Corporation (Moody’s Corporation, 2011; Bloomberg Businessweek, 2013). It provides financial research on the bonds which are issued by the government and commercial entities along with Fitch Group and Standard & Poor’s. It is considered as one among the Three Big Credit Rating Agencies. ... It produces research for the government entities, corporations, and finance securities. The main objective of the business is helping the investors in assessing the credit risk. Moody’s Investors Service has set a goal of offering the best sought-after ‘credit’ opinions to all the sectors involved in the fixed income market. Moody’s Investors Services is one of the leading providers of the credit ratings and research & risk analysis. The expertise and commitment of the business contributes towards transparency and formation of integrated financial markets by means of protection of the integrity of credit. The ratings and analysis department of this business tracks debt of more than 115 different countries 10000 corporate issuers. 82000 finance obligations (structured). 22000 public finance issuance companies. These credit rating services provided by the business helps the investors in analyzing the credit risks related to the fixed income securities. The in dependent and accurate credit ratings as well as risk analysis contributes in the increase of efficiency in the fixed income markets and other related obligations like the insurance policies, derivative transactions etc, by means of offering independent and credible credit risk assessment guiding the investors (Moody’s Corporation, 2013b). ‘Moody’s default studies’ helps in validating the predictive ratings. The published research and investors briefings help in bringing in thousands or even more attendees every year and keeps the investors up to date with the rationale underlying the credit opinions. Functions in capital markets Closest competitors of Moody’s Investors Service are Fitch Group and Standard & Poor. These three

Equity and Trusts Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 3

Equity and Trusts - Essay Example Jeremy Fanshawe, being a the trustee of the estate of his late father with sole beneficiary as his son, Kelvin as well as trustee of a small family trust or â€Å"joint trust† where the beneficiaries are his ex-wife Lydia and their adopted daughter Miriam, has a sensitive role in not only ensuring that the trusts are managed effectively but also beneficiaries received their share. As trustee, he has the fiduciary duty to enforce the agreed contents of the contract he has signed with his late father as well as the small family trust or joint trust2. Under the UK law, he is required a duty of care which is Part 1 of the Act wherein as trustee, Jeremy is expected to be reasonable3: (b) if he acts as trustee in the course of a business or profession, to any special knowledge or experience that it is reasonable to expect of a person acting in the course of that kind of business or profession†4. This would require Jeremy to have prior knowledge and sufficient effort exerted to determine the viability of conducting the business about purchase of art works by the artist Farrah Foster as an investment. Whilst his first purchase, a painting, indeed increased value from  £13,000 to  £26,000, the manner of which this â€Å"investment† has been undertaken without clear purpose and process.  £20,000 worth of money was transferred from the joint trust account to his personal current account. Section 2 of the Schedule specifies that â€Å"when exercising any corresponding power, however conferred† 5 under Compounding Liabilities. On Part II Investment Section 4, it was required under Standard investment criteria, the trustee upon exercising power of investment, whether arising under this Part or otherwise, the trustee must have expertise to the standard investment criteria6. On the same manner, The Act also provides that: â€Å"Application of duty of

Some Of The Models And Frameworks For Reflection Education Essay

Some Of The Models And Frameworks For Reflection Education Essay Having established the need for experiential knowledge that arises out of reflection, this handout is exploring some of the models structures and frameworks that can facilitate the reflective process. However, before we explore these frameworks some important distinctions are needed to be made about different types of reflection. Edgar Schon, an influential writer on reflection, described reflection in two main ways: reflection in action and reflection on action. Reflection on action is looking back after the event whilst reflection in action is happening during the event. To complicate matters there are different interpretations of reflection on action. Lets now explore these terms. Reflection in action means To think about what one is doing whilst one is doing it; it is typically stimulated by surprise, by something which puzzled the practitioner concerned(Greenwood, 1993). Reflection in action allows the practitioner to redesign what he/ she is doing whilst he/she is doing it. This is commonly associated with experienced practitioners. However, it is much neglected. Reflection on action is defined as: The retrospective contemplation of practice undertaken in order to uncover the knowledge used in practical situations, by analysing and interpreting the information recalled (Fitzgerald, 1994pp67) We can see here that reflection on action involves turning information into knowledge, by conducting a cognitive post mortem. Alternatively Boyd Fales suggest reflection on action is: The process of creating and clarifying the meanings of experiences in terms of self in relation to both self and world. The outcome of this process is changed conceptual perspectives (Boyd Fales, 1983pp101) We see here that Boyd and Fales focus more on self development. Here refection does not only add to our knowledge but challenges the concepts and theories we hold. Furthermore as a result we dont see more, we see differently. Atkins and Murphy (1994) take this idea one step further and suggest that for reflection to make a real difference to practice we follow this with a commitment to action as a result. The problems with these views of reflection on action are that they do not take account of the importance of reflection before action. This is when we plan out before we act what we want to do. So what have we learnt about reflection? It can best be seen as: Reflection before action Reflection in action Reflection after action. Now lets see which frameworks best support these approaches. Gibbs Framework for Reflection (Linked with the core skills of reflection) Stage 1: Description of the event Describe in detail the event you are reflecting on. Include e.g. where were you; who else was there; why were you there; what were you doing; what were other people doing; what was the context of the event; what happened; what was your part in this; what parts did the other people play; what was the result. Stage 2: Feelings and Thoughts (Self awareness) At this stage, try to recall and explore those things that were going on inside your head. Include: How you were feeling when the event started? What you were thinking about at the time? How did it make you feel? How did other people make you feel? How did you feel about the outcome of the event? What do you think about it now? Stage 3: Evaluation Try to evaluate or make a judgement about what has happened. Consider what was good about the experience and what was bad about the experience or what did or didnt go so well Stage 4: Analysis Break the event down into its component parts so they can be explored separately. You may need to ask more detailed questions about the answers to the last stage. Include: What went well? What did you do well? What did others do well? What went wrong or did not turn out how it should have done? In what way did you or others contribute to this? Stage 5: Conclusion (Synthesis) This differs from the evaluation stage in that now you have explored the issue from different angles and have a lot of information to base your judgement. It is here that you are likely to develop insight into you own and other peoples behaviour in terms of how they contributed to the outcome of the event. Remember the purpose of reflection is to learn from an experience. Without detailed analysis and honest exploration that occurs during all the previous stages, it is unlikely that all aspects of the event will be taken into account and therefore valuable opportunities for learning can be missed. During this stage you should ask yourself what you could have done differently. Stage 6: Action Plan During this stage you should think yourself forward into encountering the event again and to plan what you would do would you act differently or would you be likely to do the same? Here the cycle is tentatively completed and suggests that should the event occur again it will be the focus of another reflective cycle Gibbs model incorporates all the core skills of reflection. Arguably it is focused on reflection on action, but with practice it could be used to focus on reflection in and before action. Bortons` (1970) Framework Guiding Reflective Activities What? So What? Now what? This is the descriptionand self awarenesslevel and all questions start with the word what This is the level of analysisand evaluation when we look deeper at what was behind the experience. This is the level of synthesis.Here we build on the previous levels these questions to enable us to consider alternative courses of action and choose what we are going to do next. Examples What happened? What did I do? What did other do? What was I trying to achieve? What was good or bad about the experiences Examples So what is the importance of this? So what more do I need to know about this? So what have I learnt about this Examples Now what could I do? Now what do I need to do? Now what might I do? Now what might be the consequences of this action? Bortons model incorporates all the core skills of reflection. Arguably it is focused on reflection on action, but with practice it could be used to focus on reflection in and before action. Johns Model of Structured Refection Chris Johns (1994; 1995) model arose from his work in the Burford Nursing Development Unit in the early 1990s. He envisaged this model as being used within a process of guided reflection. His focus was about uncovering and making explicit the knowledge that we use in our practice. He adopted some earlier work by Carper (1978) who looked at ways of knowing in nursing. Ways of knowing Cues Aesthetics the art of what we do, our own experiences What was I trying to achieve? Why did I respond as I did? What were the consequences of that for the patient? Others? Myself? How was this person (people) feeling? How did I Know this? Personal self awareness How did I feel in this situation? What internal factors were influencing me? Ethics moral knowledge How did my actions match my beliefs? What factors made me act in an incongruent way? Empirics scientific What knowledge did or should have informed me? The framework uses five cue questions which are then divided into more focuses to promote detailed reflection. Cue Questions 1. Description of the experience Phenomenon describe the here and now experience Casual what essential factors contributed to this experience? Context what are the significant background factors to this experience? Clarifying what are the key processes for reflection in this experience? 2. Reflection What was I trying to achieve? Why did I intervene as I did? What were the consequences of my actions for: Myself? The patient / family? The people I work with? How did I feel about this experience when it was happening? How did the patient feel about it? How do I know how the patient felt about it? 3. Influencing factors What internal factors influenced my decision making? What external factors influenced my decision making? What sources of knowledge did / should have influenced my decision making? 4. Evaluation: Could I have dealt with the situation better? What other choices did I have? What would be the consequences of these choices? 5. Learning How do I now feel about this experience? How have I made sense of this experience in light of past experiences and future practice? How has this experience changed my ways of knowing Empirics scientific Ethics moral knowledge Personal self awareness Aesthetics the art of what we do, our own experiences Smyths Framework for Reflection on Action Activity Cues Describe What did I do? Inform (Analysis) What does this mean? Confront (Self awareness) How did I come to be like this? Reconstruct (Evaluation and Synthesis) What do my practices say about my assumptions, values and beliefs? Where did these ideas come from? What social practices are expressed in these ideas? What is it that causes me to maintain my theories What views of power do they embody? Whose interests seem to be served by my practices? What is it that acts to constrain my views of what is possible in my practice? We can see with a number of models they go through, some, or all of the following phases. Descriptive phase Reflective phase Emancipator phase Processes Description of practice events Reflective analysis against espoused theories Critique of practice regarding conflicts distortions and inconsistencies Examination of descriptions for genuiness and comprehensiveness Reflective analysis of the situations Reflective analysis of intentions Engagement in emancipatory change process Products Descriptive accounts/narrative Knowledge about practice processes and applications Learning and change in practice Self awareness Self critique and emancipation Phases in critical reflective inquiry Kim 1999

An Analysis of Judith Wrights Woman To Man Essay -- Judith Wright Wom

An Analysis of Woman To Man  Ã‚   The form of this text is a poem. The visual appearance of the text on the page indicates to us that it is a poem: it is positioned in the center of the page and it is made up of uniform sections, or stanzas. The form is more constrained than that of a novel, which runs freely across the page from left to right. The text also utilizes formal poetic features, such as: multiple stanzas containing equal numbers of lines; line breaks between stanzas; and a regular number of beats per line. The knowledge that Judith Wright is a well-known poet adds to the evidence that this is a poem. This text has more than one intended audience. The primary audience is Judith Wright's husband. It is a well-known fact (in literary circles) that Wright addressed this poem to her husband when she was pregnant with one of their children. The intimate nature of this exchange between Wright and her husband is evident in her use of personal pronouns: "†¦you and I have known it well"; "†¦your arm†¦"; "†¦my breast†¦". The second intended audience is every woman and every man, as an expression of something from every woman to every man. The title Woman To Man makes the poem universal, more than just a poem from Judith Wright to her husband. There are no names given to the woman and the man within the world of the poem. The experience of 'the Woman' becomes the experience of 'every woman'. The third audience for this text is the literati – the world of literature. Judith Wright is a well-known Australian poet; this poem has been published many times; this po em obviously did not stay between Wright and her husband. The poem displays the poet's highly technical and sophisticated control over language: this skill has been analyse... ...childbirth. The tone of "Woman To Man" is serious and moves from contentment to fear. To begin with, Wright calmly pours her emotions onto the page. She contemplates her unborn child, joyfully sharing her experience with her husband: "†¦yet you and I have known it well†¦". Her joy is shown in the beautiful images she uses to describe her child: "†¦the intricate and folded rose†¦". It is only in the final stanza that her joy and contentment turn to fear. She begins to imagine the intense pain of labour and she becomes frightened: "†¦the blaze of light along the blade / O hold me for I am afraid." The conclusion of the poem is dramatically appropriate. The shift in tone from peaceful contentment to fear is only natural, as the Woman (the poet) moves from the state of pregnancy, which she has known for nine months, into the early stages of labour, which frightens her.

Cross-Docking: State of the Art

Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Omega journal homepage: www. elsevier. com/locate/omega Review Cross-docking: State of the art Jan Van Belle n, Paul Valckenaers, Dirk Cattrysse KU Leuven, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 300B, B-3001 Heverlee (Leuven), Belgium a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Received 23 June 2011 Accepted 17 January 2012 Processed by Pesch Available online 25 January 2012 Keywords: Cross-docking Logistics Classi? cation abstractCross-docking is a logistics strategy in which freight is unloaded from inbound vehicles and (almost) directly loaded into outbound vehicles, with little or no storage in between. This paper presents an overview of the cross-docking concept. Guidelines for the successful use and implementation of crossdocking are discussed and several characteristics are described that can be used to distinguish between different cross-dock types. In addition, this paper presents an extensive review of the existing literature about cross-docking. The discussed papers are classi? d based on the problem type that is tackled (ranging from more strategic or tactical to more operational problems). Based on this review, several opportunities to improve and extend the current research are indicated. & 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Contents 1. 2. 3. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 827 When and how to use cross-docking? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 829 Cross-dock characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 830 3. 1. Physical characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 831 3. 2. Operational characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 831 3. 3. Flow characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 831 Literature review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 832 4. 1. Location of cross-docks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 832 4. 2. Layout design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 833 4. 3. Cross-docking networks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 833 4. 4. Vehicle routing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 834 4. 5. Dock door assignment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 834 4. 6. Truck scheduling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 837 4. 6. 1. Single strip and stack door . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 837 4. 6. 2. Scheduling of inbound trucks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 839 4. 6. 3. Scheduling of inbound and outbound trucks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 840 4. 7. Temporary storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 841 4. 8. Other issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 842 Conclusion and research opportunities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 843 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 844 4. 5. 1. Introduction Cross-docking is a logistics strategy nowadays used by many companies in different industries (e. g. retail ? rms and less-thantruckload (LTL) logistics providers). The basic idea behind crossdocking is to transfer incoming shipments directly to outgoing Corresponding author. Tel. : ? 32 16322534; fax: ? 32 16322986. E-mail addresses: jan. [email  protected] kuleuven. be (J. Van Belle), paul. [email  protected] kuleuven. be (P. Valckena ers), dirk. [email  protected] kuleuven. be (D. Cattrysse). 0305-0483/$ – see front matter & 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10. 1016/j. mega. 2012. 01. 005 n vehicles without storing them in between. This practice can serve different goals: the consolidation of shipments, a shorter delivery lead time, the reduction of costs, etc. The role of cross-docking in industry even seems to increase [1–4]. In a traditional distribution center, goods are ? rst received and then stored, for instance in pallet racks. When a customer requests an item, workers pick it from the storage and ship it to the destination. From these four major functions of warehousing (receiving, storage, order picking and shipping), storage and order picking are usually the most costly.Storage is expensive because of the inventory holding costs, order picking because it is labor 828 J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 intensive. One approach to reduce costs could be to impr ove one or more of these functions or to improve how they interact. Crossdocking however is an approach that eliminates the two most expensive handling operations: storage and order picking [5–8]. A de? nition of cross-docking provided by Kinnear [9] is: ‘‘receiving product from a supplier or manufacturer for several end destinations and consolidating this product with other suppliers’ product for common ? al delivery destinations’’. In this de? nition, the focus is on the consolidation of shipments to achieve economies in transportation costs. The Material Handling Industry of America (MHIA) de? nes cross-docking as ‘‘the process of moving merchandise from the receiving dock to shipping [dock] for shipping without placing it ? rst into storage locations’’ [10]. The focus is now on transshipping, not holding stock. This requires a correct synchronization of incoming (inbound) and outgoing (outbound) vehicles. However, a perfect synchronization is dif? cult to achieve.Also, in practice, staging is required because many inbound shipments need to be sorted, consolidated and stored until the outbound shipment is complete. So, this strict constraint is relaxed by most authors. Cross-docking then can be described as the process of consolidating freight with the same destination (but coming from several origins), with minimal handling and with little or no storage between unloading and loading of the goods. If the goods are temporally stored, this should be only for a short period of a time. An exact limit is dif? cult to de? e, but many authors talk about 24 h (e. g. [5,7,11,12]). If the goods are placed in a warehouse or on order picking shelves or if the staging takes several days or even weeks, it is not considered as crossdocking but as (traditional) warehousing. However, even if the products are staged for a longer time, some companies still consider it cross-docking, as long as the goods move fr om supplier to storage to customer virtually untouched except for truck loading [3,13]. Many organizations use a mixture of warehousing and cross-docking to combine the bene? ts of both approaches [1].A terminal dedicated for cross-docking is called a cross-dock. In practice, most cross-docks are long, narrow rectangles (I-shape), but other shapes are also used (L,T,X, . . . ) [5]. A crossdock has multiple loading docks (or dock doors) where trucks can dock to be loaded or unloaded. Incoming trucks are assigned to a ‘strip door’ where the freight is unloaded. Then the goods are moved to its appropriate ‘stack door’ and loaded on an outbound truck. Mostly, there is no special infrastructure to stage freight. If goods have to be stored temporarily, they are placed on the ? oor of the cross-dock (e. . in front of the dock door where the departing truck is or will be docked). However, it is possible that the cross-dock contains for instance a pallet storage, ce rtainly if cross-docking is combined with warehousing. Fig. 1 presents a schematic representation of the material handling operations at an I-shaped cross-dock with 10 dock doors. Incoming trucks are either directly assigned to a strip door or have to wait in a queue until assignment. Once docked, the freight (e. g. pallets, packages or boxes) of the inbound truck is unloaded and the destination is identi? ed (e. g. y scanning the barcodes attached to the goods). Then, the goods are transported to the designated stack door by some material handling device, such as a worker operating a forklift or a conveyor belt system. There, the goods are loaded onto an outbound truck that serves the dedicated destination. Once an inbound truck is completely unloaded or an outbound truck is completely loaded, the truck is replaced by another truck. Cross-docking corresponds with the goals of lean supply chain management: smaller volumes of more visible inventories that are delivered faster and mor e frequently [14].In the literature, several other (possibly intertwined) advantages of cross-docking compared with employing traditional distribution centers and point-to-point deliveries are mentioned (e. g. [2,3,6,15,16]). Some advantages compared with traditional distribution centers are:  cost reduction (warehousing costs, inventory-holding costs,       handling costs, labor costs); shorter delivery lead time (from supplier to customer); improved customer service; reduction of storage space; faster inventory turnover; fewer overstocks; reduced risk for loss and damage.Some advantages of cross-docking compared with point-to-point deliveries are:     cost reduction (transportation costs, labor costs); consolidation of shipments; improved resource utilization (e. g. full truckloads); better match between shipment quantities and actual demand. Fig. 1. Material handling at a typical cross-dock. These advantages make cross-docking an interesting logistic strategy that can give companies considerable competitive advantages. Wal Mart is a well-known example [17], but also several other companies have reported the successful implementation of cross-docking (e. . Eastman Kodak Co. [14], Goodyear GB Ltd. [9], Dots, LLC [18] and Toyota [13]). Although cross-docking has already been applied in the 1980s (e. g. by Wal Mart), it has only attracted attention from academia much later and mostly during the recent years. For instance, more than 85% of the academic papers found by the authors are published from 2004 on. During these years, a considerable number of papers have been published and because of the growing interest from industry [1–4], the authors expect that still more research on this topic will be performed the coming years.The objective of this paper is to present an overview of the cross-docking concept. First, guidelines for the successful use and implementation of cross-docking will be discussed. Further, several characteristics will be de scribed to distinguish between different types of cross-docks. Next, the paper will provide a review of the existing literature about cross-docking. The discussed papers are classi? ed based on the problem type. These problems range from more strategic or tactical to more operational problems. This review can help (future) cross-docking J. Van Belle et al. Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 829 practitioners to ? nd the correct literature to start or improve their cross-docking operations. Without a proper implementation, it is impossible to bene? t from the above-mentioned advantages. Based on the provided review, the authors try to identify gaps of knowledge and interesting areas for future research. The term cross-docking usually refers to the situation in which trucks or trailers1 are loaded and unloaded at a cross-docking terminal. However, the operations to handle freight at a harbor or airport are sometimes very similar.At a harbor for instance, containers are unloaded from a shi p and temporarily placed onto the quay until they are loaded onto another ship or onto a truck. An airport can also be seen as a kind of cross-dock for transferring passengers and their baggage. In the literature, several papers can be found that deal with similar problems as encountered in crossdocking, but speci? c for harbors or airports (e. g. how to determine the layout of an airport terminal [19,20], how to assign airplanes to gates [21], etc. ). These papers are not taken into account for the literature review presented here.The paper focuses on the typical cross-docking in which goods are transferred between trucks at a cross-dock. The speci? c application or industry (e. g. less-than-truckload (LTL) or courier, express and parcel (CEP) industry) is not important, as long as the applied material handling can be considered as cross-docking. To the best of our knowledge, only two papers present a review of cross-docking papers. Boysen and Fliedner [2] discuss papers about the truck scheduling problem and provide a classi? cation of the considered problems. The approach taken ere is however more general and several problem types related to crossdocking are discussed, including the truck scheduling problem (see Section 4. 6). Agustina et al. [22] provide a general picture of the mathematical models used in cross-docking papers. These models are classi? ed based on their decision level (operational, tactical or strategic) and then subdivided by problem type. However, another classi? cation is presented here as the authors do not completely agree with the proposed classi? cation (the considered problem types and the assignment of papers to problem types).For instance, Agustina et al. [22] do not consider vehicle routing and temporary storage and the papers about cross-dock networks are discussed in two different sections (transshipment problems and cross-docking network design). Also, some papers about dock door assignment are discussed in the section about cross-docking layout design. In addition, the review presented here is more extensive; more papers are included and the papers are discussed in more detail. This paper also includes a general overview of cross-docking and describes several cross-dock characteristics. The paper is organized as follows.The next section discusses in which situations cross-docking is a suitable strategy and deals with the requirements for a successful implementation. In Section 3, the characteristics are discussed that can be used to differentiate between alternative cross-docking systems. The literature review is presented in Section 4. The discussed papers are classi? ed based on the problem type they deal with. The conclusions with opportunities to improve and extend the current research are summarized in Section 5. Fig. 2. Suitability of cross-docking (adapted from Apte and Viswanathan [1]). 2.When and how to use cross-docking? Although cross-docking is nowadays used by many companies, it is probabl y not the best strategy in every case and in all circumstances. This section brie? y describes the existing 1 In the following pages, the terms truck, trailer and vehicle will be used interchangeably. literature that gives some guidelines for the successful use and implementation of cross-docking. Apte and Viswanathan [1] discuss some factors that in? uence the suitability of cross-docking compared with traditional distribution. 2 A ? rst important factor is the product demand rate.If there is an imbalance between the incoming load and the outgoing load, cross-docking will not work well. Hence, goods that are more suitable for cross-docking are the ones that have demand rates that are more or less stable (e. g. grocery and regularly consumed perishable food items). For these products, the warehousing and transportation requirements are much more predictable, and consequently the planning and implementation of cross-docking becomes easier. The unit stock-out cost is a second importan t factor. Because cross-docking minimizes the level of inventory at the warehouse, the probability of stock-out situations is higher.However, if the unit stock-out cost is low, the bene? ts of cross-docking can outweigh the increased stock-out cost, and so cross-docking can still be the preferred strategy. As shown in Fig. 2, cross-docking is therefore preferred for products with a stable demand rate and low unit stock-out cost. The traditional warehousing is still preferable for the opposite situation with an unstable demand and high unit stock-out costs. For the two other cases, cross-docking can still be used when proper systems and planning tools are in place to keep the number of stock-outs to a reasonable level. Some other factors that can in? ence the suitability of crossdocking are the distance to suppliers and customers (higher distances increase the bene? ts of consolidation), the product value and life cycle (a larger reduction in inventory costs for products with a highe r value and shorter life cycle), the demand quantity (a larger reduction in inventory space and costs for products with a higher demand), the timeliness of supplier shipments (to ensure a correct synchronization of inbound and outbound trucks), etc. [1,23,24]. Some authors use a more quantitative approach to study the suitability of cross-docking. For instance, Galbreth et al. 6] compare the transportation and handling costs between a situation in which a supplier has to ship goods to several customers with only direct shipments and a situation in which also indirect shipments via a cross-dock are possible. For the second situation, a mixed integer programming (MIP) model is proposed to determine which goods should go directly from supplier to customer and which goods should be shipped via a cross-dock to meet the (known) demands. The transportation costs are modeled in a realistic way: ?xed for truckload shipping, while the less-thantruckload shipping costs are modeled using a modi ? d all-unit discount (MAUD) cost function. The holding costs at the customers are proportional to the quantity and the holding time between arrival time and due date. The costs for the two situations are compared under varying operating conditions. The authors conclude that cross-docking is more valuable when demands are less 2 It is assumed that the demand quantities are small, otherwise point-to-point deliveries are more suited. 830 J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 variable and when unit holding costs at customer locations are higher.On the other hand, it is less valuable when the average demands are close to truck load capacity. Other quantitative approaches make a comparison between a situation with a cross-dock and a situation with a traditional distribution center. For instance, Kreng and Chen [25] compare the operational costs. Besides the transportation and holding costs, the production costs (more speci? c the setup costs) of the goods at the supplier a re taken into account. When a cross-dock is used, more frequent deliveries to the cross-dock are required and the batch size needs to be smaller, which causes higher setup costs.Waller et al. [26] look to both situations from an inventory reduction perspective. Schaffer [8] discusses the successful implementation of crossdocking. When a company wants to introduce cross-docking, the introduction should be prepared very well. If the necessary equipment is already available and because cross-docking seems simple, one easily assumes that cross-docking can be implemented without much effort. However, cross-docking itself is quite complex and requires a high degree of coordination between the supply chain members (e. g. the timing of arrival and departure).So, the requirements for successful cross-docking should be understood thoroughly and the implementation should be planned carefully. In [8], Schaffer elaborates on six categories of requirements for a successful implementation. Accordi ng to Witt [13] and to Yu and Egbelu [27], software to plan and control the cross-docking operations (e. g. a warehouse management system or WMS) plays an important role in the successful implementation of cross-docking. The required (automated) hardware for a cross-docking system (material handling devices, sorting systems, etc. ) might come off the shelf and is easily available today.But the software needs to be tailored to the speci? c requirements and is in general relatively less developed, although it is as important as hardware to cross-docking success. This is also con? rmed by a survey among professionals who are involved in cross-docking and who denote IT system support as a key barrier to effective cross-docking [3,4]. Hence, the system requirements need to be carefully de? ned and studied in order to prevent installing the physical system to discover afterwards there is no information and communication system in place for successful operation.This software system can onl y work correctly if it is fed with accurate and timely information. Compared with regular distribution, the information ? ow to support cross-docking is signi? cantly more important [24]. For instance, to coordinate the inbound and outbound trucks to the appropriate docks, the arriving time and the destination of the freight need to be known before the physical arrival of the goods (e. g. via advance shipping notice (ASN)). Several information technology tools are available to realize this information ? ow, e. g. lectronic data interchange (EDI), shipping container marking (SCM), bar-coding and scanning of products using universal product code (UPC) [1]. Regardless of which technology is chosen, the supply chain partners must be able and willing to deliver the required information via this technology. A good cooperation across the supply chain can make or break the cross-docking implementation [8,13,24]. docking [1,29]. In a two-touch or single-stage cross-dock, products are receive d and staged on the dock until they are loaded for outbound transportation. Usually, the goods are put into zones corresponding to their strip or stack door (see Fig. 3).In the case of a multiple-touch or two-stage cross-dock, products are received and staged on the dock, then they are recon? gured for shipment and are loaded in outbound trucks. In a typical con? guration, the incoming freight is ? rst put in zones corresponding to the strip doors. The goods are then sorted to the zones corresponding to the stack doors (see Fig. 4). Another distinction can be made according to when the customer is assigned to the individual products [30]. In predistribution cross-docking, the customer is assigned before the shipment leaves the supplier who takes care of preparation (e. g. labeling and pricing) and sorting.This allows faster handling at the cross-dock. On the other hand, in post-distribution crossdocking, the allocation of goods to customers is done at the cross-dock. Still some othe r distinctions are possible. The German supermarket retailer Metro-AG for instance distinguishes sourceoriented and target-oriented cross-docking based on the location Fig. 3. A single-stage cross-dock in which the products are staged in zones corresponding to the stack doors (adapted from Gue and Kang [28]). 3. Cross-dock characteristics Several characteristics can be considered to distinguish between various types of cross-docks (and cross-docking).A common distinction made in the literature is based on the number of touches [3] or stages [28]. In one-touch cross-docking, products are touched only once, as they are received and loaded directly in an outbound truck. This is also called pure cross- Fig. 4. A two-stage cross-dock in which the products are staged in zones corresponding to the strip and stack doors and are sorted in between (adapted from Gue and Kang [28]). J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 831 of the cross-docking terminals relative to suppliers and customers [31].Napolitano [32] distinguishes several types of cross-docking based on the intended use and in [29], eight different crossdocking techniques are listed. In this section, several characteristics are described that can be used to distinguish between different cross-dock types. 3 Note that real world characteristics of the cross-dock are considered, and not the properties from a speci? c decision problem related to cross-docking. For the papers included in the literature review (Section 4), the characteristics of the considered cross-docks will be listed in tables according to the characteristics described here. However, the structure of Section 4 is not based on these characteristics, but on the considered problem type. The characteristics can be divided into three groups: physical characteristics, operational characteristics and characteristics about the ? ow of goods. 5 In the next sections, these groups will be described in more detail. 3. 1. Physical characteristics The physical characteristics are characteristics of the crossdock that are supposed to be ? xed (for a rather long time). The following physical characteristics are considered. Shape: Cross-docks can have a large variety of shapes.The shape can be described by the letter corresponding to the shape: I, L, U, T, H, E, . . . Number of dock doors: A cross-dock is also characterized by the number of dock doors it has. In practice, cross-docks range in size from 6 to 8 doors to more than 200 doors, and even a cross-dock with more than 500 doors exists [33]. In the literature, sometimes the number of dock doors is limited to only 1 or 2. In these cases, the idea is not to model a realistic cross-dock, but to gain some insight by studying a simpli? ed model. Internal transportation: The transportation inside the crossdock can be executed manually (e. . by workers using forklifts) or there can be an automated system in place (e. g. a network of conveyor belts). The available infrastructure will of course be dependent on the type of freight that is handled in the cross-dock. For instance, LTL carriers handle mostly palletized freight and so make use of forklifts. Conveyor systems on the other hand are among others used by parcel carriers, as they deal with many (small) packages. A combination of both transportation modes is also possible. 3. 2. Operational characteristics Some operational decisions can in? uence the functioning of the cross-dock.These operational constraints lead to the following characteristics. Service mode: According to Boysen and Fliedner [2], the service mode of a cross-dock determines the degrees of freedom in assigning inbound and outbound trucks to dock doors. In an exclusive mode of service, each dock door is either exclusively 3 Some of the characteristics described here are similar to the characteristics used by Boysen and Fliedner [2] to make a classi? cation of truck scheduling problems. However, they [2] consider not only real world chara cteristics, but also characteristics of the (mathematical) models. At least for the papers in which these characteristics are described, i. e. , in which real world details of the cross-dock are considered (Sections 4. 5–4. 8). 5 This classi? cation is rather vague. For some characteristics, it is not clear in which group they ? t best or they can be assigned to multiple groups. For instance, temporary storage is considered as a ? ow characteristic. However, temporary storage can also be seen as a physical characteristic (storage is not possible because of space constraints) or operational characteristic (it can be an operational decision that storage is not allowed, e. . to avoid congestion inside the cross-dock). dedicated to inbound or outbound trucks. If this service mode is used, mostly one side of the cross-docking terminal is assigned to inbound trucks and the other side to outbound trucks. A second mode is mixed mode. In this mode, inbound and outbound trucks can be p rocessed at all doors. These two modes can also be combined. In this combination mode, a subset of doors is operated in exclusive mode while the rest of the doors is operated in mixed mode. Pre-emption: If pre-emption is allowed, the loading or unloading of a truck can be interrupted.This truck is then removed from the dock and another truck takes its place. The un? nished truck has to be docked later on to ? nish the loading or unloading. 3. 3. Flow characteristics The characteristics of the ? ow of goods that have to be processed by a cross-dock can be very different. The following characteristics are distinguished. Arrival pattern: The arrival times of the goods are determined by the arrival times of the inbound trucks. The arrival pattern can be concentrated at one or more periods if the inbound trucks arrive together at (more or less) the same times.For instance, a cross-dock in the LTL industry serving a certain geographical area usually receives freight at two periods. Goods that have to be transported from inside that area to another area are picked up during the day and all pickup trucks arrive in the evening at the cross-dock. The goods are then sorted during the night and the outbound trucks leave in the morning. To simplify the problem, several papers assume that the inbound trucks arrive together (at the beginning of the time horizon). On the other hand, freight from outside the region but destined for that area arrives in the early morning and is then istributed during the day. Another possibility is that the arrival pattern is scattered and the inbound trucks arrive at different times during the day. The arrival pattern has an in? uence on the congestion of the cross-dock and on the scheduling of workers and resources. Departure time: The departure times of the trucks can be restricted or not. In many cases there are no restrictions and the trucks leave the cross-dock after all freight is loaded or unloaded. However, it is also possible that the trucks have to depart before a certain point in time, for instance in order to be on time for a next transportation task.In this case, there can be restrictions imposed on the departure times of the inbound trucks only, so that these trucks have to be unloaded on time. In a similar way, it is possible that only the outbound trucks have to leave the cross-dock before a certain moment. 6 For instance, in the parcel delivery sector, the outbound trucks usually leave at a ? xed point in time. Parcels arriving late have to wait until another truck departs for the same destination. It is also possible that both inbound and outbound trucks have restricted departure times.Product interchangeability: The freight handled at a cross-dock is in general not interchangeable. In this case, all products are dedicated to a speci? c destination7 or a speci? c outbound truck (pre-distribution). Information about the destination or the dedicated truck is normally known before the products arrive at th e cross-dock. It is however also possible that interchangeability of products is allowed (post-distribution). In this situation, only the type of products to be loaded on the outbound trucks and the corresponding quantity is known (see footnote 7).When the products are interchangeable, usually some value-added activities (e. g. labeling) need to be performed. 6 This point in time can be dependent on the (due dates of the) actual load of the truck. 7 The assignment of the products to a speci? c outbound truck is then an operational decision. 832 J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 Temporary storage: In pure cross-docking, the arriving freight is directly transported to outbound trucks, so no storage is needed. In practice however, this is rarely the case. In general, the goods are temporarily stored on the ? oor of the cross-docking terminal (e. . in front of the stack doors) or even in a (small) warehouse. However, it is possible that goods are not allowed to be sto red. For instance, if refrigerated products have to be cross-docked in a non-cooled terminal, these products have to be directly moved from a cooled inbound to a cooled outbound truck. 4. Literature review Cross-docking practitioners have to deal with many decisions during the design and operational phase of cross-docks. These decisions can have a serious impact on the ef? ciency, so they have to be carefully taken. In the literature, several decision problems are studied.Some of these problems are more concerned about decisions with effects on a longer term (strategic or tactical), while others deal with short-term decisions (operational). This section gives a review of the existing literature about crossdocking problems. The literature review is structured according to the basic planning process a manager, wanting to start with cross-docking, is confronted with. The ? rst decisions that have to be taken during the planning process are strategic decisions: where will a cross-dock ( or crossdocks) be located and what is the best layout of a cross-dock.Once the cross-dock is available, it will be part of a supply network (with one or more cross-docks). A tactical decision that has to be made then is how the goods will ? ow through the network to minimize the costs, while making supply meet demand. Next, the manager is faced with the operational decision (although it has also tactical aspects) of vehicle routing: before arriving at the cross-dock, freight has to be picked up at various locations, and the goods have to be delivered to multiple locations after consolidation at the cross-docking terminal.Other operational decisions deal with the assignment of trucks to dock doors or the scheduling of the trucks, and with the location where goods will be temporarily stored. Of course, the manager will also be confronted with problems that are not speci? c for cross-docking: the scheduling of the internal resources for the loading and unloading of the freight (e. g. t he workforce), choosing the best staging strategy and determining an optimal truck packaging sequence. The next sections describe the cross-docking problems dealt with in the literature.Only the problems that are speci? c for cross-docking are considered. First, the strategic decisions are discussed: the location of cross-docks and layout design. The tactical problem of cross-docking networks is described next. Further, the operational decisions are handled: vehicle routing, dock door assignment, truck scheduling and temporary storage. Finally, some papers that study other issues related to crossdocking are discussed. 4. 1. Location of cross-docks The location of one or more cross-docks is part of the design of a distribution network or supply chain.An important strategic decision that has to be made concerns the position of these crossdocks. This problem cannot be handled isolated from the decisions that determine how the goods ? ow through this network. The determination of the ? ow of goods is discussed in Section 4. 3, but problems that also involve a decision about the location are considered here. The problem where to locate facilities (e. g. distribution centers or plants) has attracted a considerable amount of attention. 8 The papers discussed in this section determine additionally the optimal ? ow of goods through the network.Moreover, they regard the facilities to be cross-docks because they explicitly take individual vehicles into account or because temporary storage is not allowed. A ? rst study about the location of cross-docks is performed by Sung and Song [34]. In the considered problem, goods have to be transported from supply to demand nodes via a cross-dock (direct shipments are not allowed). The cross-dock can be chosen from a set of possible cross-dock locations, each with an associated ? xed cost. The demands are assumed to be known and there are two types of vehicles with a different capacity and cost. The aim is to ? d which cross-docks should be used and how many vehicles are needed on each link in order to minimize the total cost. This total cost consists of the ? xed costs of the used cross-docks and the transportation costs. The authors present an integer programming model of the problem. This model is very similar to the model presented by Donaldson et al. [35] and Musa et al. [36] (discussed in Section 4. 3) and similar simplifying assumptions are applied. Compared with these two papers however, the approach of Sung and Song [34] does not consider direct shipments but does include the location decision.Because the problem is NP-hard, a tabu search-based algorithm is proposed to solve the problem. The solutions determine how the goods ? ow through the network. Based on this ? ow, the number of vehicles can be derived by solving a subproblem. Some computational experiments are performed on generated test instances and indicate that the proposed algorithm ? nds good feasible solutions within a reasonable time. S ung and Yang [37] extend this work and propose a small improvement to the tabu search algorithm.The authors also present a set-partitioning-based formulation of the problem and propose a branch-and-price algorithm based on this formulation to obtain exact solutions. The computational results show that this algorithm gives better results in terms of the number of (smallscale) problem instances solved and the required computation time compared with the results obtained by solving the integer programming model with the optimization software package CPLEX. ? ? Gumus and Bookbinder [38] study a similar problem, but now direct shipments are allowed and multiple product types are considered (multicommodity).The facility cost for each crossdock consists of a ? xed cost and a throughput cost charged per unit load. The transportation cost also has two components: a ? xed cost for each truck and a variable cost per unit load per unit distance. A last cost that is taken into account is the cost for intransit inventory. In this approach, the synchronization of inbound and outbound trucks is not taken into account. The authors provide a mixed integer programming model of the problem. By solving several smaller problem instances optimally (with the optimization software packages LINGO and CPLEX), the in? ence of several cost parameters is studied. The authors conclude that the optimal number of cross-docks is an increasing function of the ratio between the (? xed) truck cost and the (? xed) facility cost. A different approach is taken by Jayaraman and Ross [39]. They study a multi-echelon problem in which goods (from multiple product families) have to be transported from a central manufacturing plant to one or more distribution centers. From there, the goods are moved via cross-docks to the customers. The problem is tackled in two stages. In the ? st stage, a strategic model is used to select the best set of locations for the distribution centers and cross-docks. The authors provide an integer programming formulation that aims to minimize the ? xed costs associated with operating open distribution centers and cross-docks and the 8 Several references can be found in the papers discussed in this section. J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 833 various transportation costs. Demand splitting is not allowed: customers have to be assigned to single cross-docks while crossdocks have to be assigned to single distribution centers only.In the second stage, an operational model decides upon the quantities of each product type that need to be transported via distribution centers and cross-docks. The model tries to minimize the transportation costs while satisfying customer demand. This model is less restrictive than the ? rst model (it relaxes for instance the demand splitting assumption) and can be executed once the open distribution centers and cross-docks are determined with the help of the ? rst model. Both models are more simpli? ed compared with the previous approaches.For instance, individual vehicles are not considered and the transportation cost is proportional to the quantity to ship. The authors propose a simulated annealing approach to solve larger problem instances. The computational experiments on generated problem instances indicate that the heuristic gives results with a deviation of about 4% of the optimal solution (obtained with LINGO), but 300–400 times faster. In [40], the same authors present two other heuristics to tackle the problem. Both heuristics are based on simulated annealing but use an extra mechanism to avoid locally optimal solutions.The ? rst heuristic makes use of a tabu list, the second heuristic allows a sudden re-scaling of the ‘system temperature’. For both heuristics, the solution quality and computational performance are tested for different ‘cooling schemes’. The experimental results indicate that the simulated annealing heuristic combined with tabu se arch gives better solutions in slightly more time. Bachlaus et al. [41] also consider a multi-echelon supply chain network, including suppliers, plants, distribution centers, crossdocks and customers. The goal is to optimize the material ? w throughout the supply chain and to identify the optimal number and location of suppliers, plants, distribution centers and crossdocks. The problem is formulated as a multi-objective optimization model that tries to minimize the total cost and to maximize the plant and volume ? exibility. Because of the computational complexity of the problem, the authors propose a variant of particle swarm optimization (PSO) to design the supply chain. Some computational experiments are conducted and the results show that the proposed solution approach gives better results than a genetic algorithm and two other PSO variants. his at the cost of additional corners which reduce the labor ef? ciency (two inside and two outside corners for T, four inside and four out side corners for X). An inside corner renders some doors unusable, while doors around an outside corner have less ? oor space available to stage freight. So, these additional corners are a ? xed cost, which begins to pay off for larger docks. It is however not always easy to predict which shape is better, because this also depends on e. g. the freight ? ow pattern. Other papers deal with the design of the storage area where the freight can be temporarily staged (on the ? or or in racks). In many cases, the freight is placed in several parallel rows and the workers can move between these rows. Vis and Roodbergen [16] deal with the operational decision where to temporarily store incoming freight (see Section 4. 7). The proposed algorithm can also be used during the design phase to determine the optimal number of parallel storage rows and their lengths. The (single-stage or two-stage) storage area can also be organized in parallel lanes directly next to each other which can only be acc essed at both ends.Gue and Kang [28] make use of simulation to study the behavior of these so-called staging queues. The results suggest that, for a single-stage storage area, it is better to have more short lanes than fewer long ones, at least when the workers follow a rational approach. The results also indicate that two-stage cross-docking has a signi? cantly lower throughput than single-stage cross-docking. 4. 3. Cross-docking networks Some authors do not study problems concerning a single cross-dock, but consider a network that contains one or more cross-docks.The aim is to determine the ? ow of goods through such a network in order to reduce costs, while making supply meet demand. The research of Lim et al. [42] extends the traditional transshipment problem. The transshipment problem consists of a number of supply, transshipment and demand nodes. The arcs between these nodes have different capacity limits and costs. The objective is to ? nd a minimum cost ? ow that meets all d emands and the capacity constraints. In the extended transshipment problem, storage is allowed at the transshipment centers.These centers can be considered as cross-docks because the aim of the model is to minimize or eliminate holdover inventory. Moreover, this problem takes supplier and customer time windows into account and considers the capacity and holding costs of the crossdocks. All shipments have to pass via a cross-dock, so no direct shipments are considered. Similar to the original problem, the objective is to minimize the total cost (transportation costs and holding costs) while meeting demand and respecting the time windows and capacity constraints.If multiple departures and deliveries within a time window are allowed (multiple shipping– multiple delivery), the authors show that a time-expanded network can be used to formulate the problem as a minimum cost ? ow problem (MCFP) which can be solved in polynomial time. For other cases, the authors prove that the probl em is NP-hard. For the special case when only one delivery or departure is allowed within a time window and the departure and arrival times are ? xed (single shipping–single delivery with ? xed schedules), a genetic algorithm is developed by Miao et al. [43].This heuristic gives better results (in terms of solution quality and computation time) than solving the integer programming formulation of the problem with CPLEX (with a time limit). Chen et al. [44] study a similar problem which they call the multiple cross-dock problem. The major differences are that supplies and demands are not-splittable and that different products can be considered (multicommodity ? ow problem). Also, transportation time is in this approach not taken into account. 4. 2. Layout design Once the location of a cross-dock is determined, another strategic decision that has to be made is to choose the layout of the cross-dock.The layout is interpreted as the dimension and shape of the cross-dock, as well a s the dimension and shape of the internal cross-dock areas and their arrangement. Bartholdi and Gue [5] focus on the shape of a cross-dock. Most existing cross-docks are long, narrow rectangles (I-shape), but there are also cross-docks shaped like an L, U, T, H or E. The crossdock shape is sometimes determined by simple constraints (e. g. size and shape of the lot on which it will stand), but in this paper the focus is on how the shape affects cross-dock performance.Several experiments are performed in which the labor costs (estimated by the total travel distance)9 are measured for different shapes. The experiments suggest that an I-shape is the most ef? cient for smaller cross-docks (fewer than about 150 doors). For docks of intermediate size, a T-shape is best and for more than 200 doors (approximately) an X-shape is best. Cross-docks with a T or X-shape have a greater ‘centrality’. However, they achieve 9 Here and in the following pages, the travel distance is the di stance traveled (by workers, forklifts, . . ) in order to transfer the goods internally from the inbound to the outbound truck. 834 J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 An integer programming formulation of the problem is provided, together with a proof of its NP-completeness. The authors propose three heuristics (simulated annealing, tabu search and a combination of both) to solve the problem. These heuristics provide better solutions than those obtained by solving the integer programming formulation with CPLEX, within only less than 10% the time used by CPLEX.Among the three heuristics, tabu search seems to give the best results. The previous studies represent the shipment of goods as ? ows. Individual transportation units are not considered and the transportation cost is proportional to the quantity to ship. However, to take advantage of consolidation, the vehicle transportation cost should be taken into account. A ? rst approach that does consider the transportat ion vehicles explicitly (and this is why the authors regard it as cross-docking) is taken by Donaldson et al. [35].In the considered problem, the goal is to determine whether to route freight directly from suppliers to customers or via a cross-dock and how many vehicles should be scheduled on each transportation link in order to minimize the transportation costs. Compared with the previous approaches however, this problem is more simpli? ed, e. g. storage at the cross-docks is not considered and the synchronization of inbound and outbound trucks is left out of the problem. The authors eliminate links with a large transportation time in an attempt to consider time windows.However, when the due dates at the destination nodes can vary for the different goods, it is possible that the vehicle allocation of an obtained solution violates the due dates in practice. The authors present an integer programming model of the problem. Because the problem is dif? cult to solve with branch-and-boun d algorithms, an alternative approach is proposed. In this approach, an iterative procedure is used in which either the integrality restrictions on the links from origin nodes to the cross-docks or on the links from the cross-docks to the destination nodes are relaxed.This relaxation heuristic provides near optimal solutions in an acceptable time. The authors used this approach to compare several scenarios (with a different number of cross-docks at different places) for the network design of a postal service company. The same problem is also studied by Musa et al. [36]. They propose an ant colony optimization (ACO) heuristic to solve the problem and show that this heuristic gives in a short time slightly better results than a branch-and-bound approach (with the optimization software package LINDO) that requires a much longer time.The approach of Ma et al. [45] takes most of the above-mentioned concerns into account. The so-called shipment consolidation problem (SCP) considers suppli er and customer time windows and also the transportation times between the network nodes. Moreover, storage at the transshipment centers (cross-docks) is taken into account, shipments can be transported directly to their destination or via a cross-dock and the transportation cost accounts for the number of trucks. However, only one type of products is considered (single commodity).Again, the objective is to minimize the total cost (transportation and inventory cost) while satisfying the constraints imposed by the time windows. The authors present an integer programming model of the problem and show that it is NP-complete in the strong sense. Therefore, the authors propose a (two-stage) heuristic algorithm to solve the problem. The basic idea of the algorithm is to consider ? rst trucks that can be fully loaded and then to ? nd solutions that combine several smaller loads that are not considered yet. In the ? st stage, a full truckload plan (TL plan) and an initial less-than-truckloa d plan (LTL plan) are constructed. In the second stage, this initial LTL plan is improved iteratively by using a metaheuristic (squeaky wheel optimization or genetic algorithm). The computational experiments indicate that the proposed heuristic gives competitive results compared to CPLEX (with a time limit) within a much shorter time. 4. 4. Vehicle routing Freight destined for a cross-dock needs in many cases to be picked up at various locations, and has to be delivered to multiple locations after consolidation at the cross-dock.Both the pickup and the delivery process can be seen as a vehicle routing problem and some studies consider cross-docking and vehicle routing simultaneously. A ? rst approach is taken by Lee et al. [46]. The aim is to ? nd an optimal routing schedule for pickup and delivery (within the planning horizon) that minimizes the sum of transportation cost and ? xed costs of the vehicles. It is assumed that split deliveries are not allowed and all pickup vehicles sh ould arrive at the crossdock simultaneously to prevent waiting times for the outbound trucks. While this can be a valid constraint for some cases (see Section 3. ), this is not generally true. The authors present an integer programming model of the problem, which however seems unsatisfactory to solve the described problem. A tabu search algorithm is proposed to ? nd solutions. This approach corresponds to the solving of two vehicle routing problems (one for pickup and one for delivery). The second routing problem can only start when the ? rst one is ? nished and the complete process has to be ? nished within a certain planning horizon. Liao et al. [47] propose another tabu search algorithm to solve the same problem. Wen et al. 12] study the so-called vehicle routing problem with cross-docking (VRPCD). In this problem, orders from suppliers have to be picked up by a homogeneous ? eet of vehicles. These orders are then consolidated at a cross-dock and immediately delivered to customer s by the same set of vehicles, without intermediate storage at the cross-dock. During the consolidation, goods are unloaded from the inbound vehicles and reloaded on outbound vehicles. The unloading must be completed before reloading starts. The authors assume that the duration of the unloading consists of a ? ed time for preparation and a duration proportional to the load size. It is also assumed that if the delivery will be executed by the same vehicle as used for pickup, the unloading is not necessary (independent of the sequence in which the vehicle is loaded during the pickup tour). A time window is de? ned for all suppliers and customers and orders are not splittable. In the case without consolidation, the solution of this problem can be found by solving two vehicle routing problems (one for pickup and one for delivery). Because of the consolidation however, the pickup and delivery routes are not independent.Only trying to minimize the distance of the pickup and delivery route s is not suf? cient, the exchanges of orders at the cross-dock also have to be taken into account. These two aspects usually con? ict with each other. The authors present a mixed integer programming formulation of the problem in which the objective is to minimize the total travel time of all vehicles. This formulation contains many variables and constraints, so the authors propose to use tabu search embedded within an adaptive memory procedure. This method is tested on realistic data involving up to 200 supplier–customer pairs.Experimental results show that the algorithm can produce solutions less than 1% away from the optimum within short computing times (less than 5 s) for small problem instances. For larger instances, the gap with a lower bound is less than 5% while the computation time stays below 5 min. 4. 5. Dock door assignment When an inbound or outbound truck arrives at the cross-dock, it has to be decided to which dock door the truck should be assigned. A good assig nment can increase the productivity of the cross-dock and can decrease the (handling) costs. So, the dock door assignment problem tries to ? d the ‘optimal’ assignment of inbound and outbound trucks to dock doors. It is assumed that there are at least as much dock doors as trucks, so each truck will J. Van Belle et al. / Omega 40 (2012) 827–846 835 Table 1 Characteristics of the papers discussed in Section 4. 5. An ‘n’ indicates that not a single value of the characteristic is valid, but that all values can be used, ‘ns’ indicates that a characteristic is not speci? ed. Paper(s) Shape No. of doors n n n n n n n n n n n n Internal transport Manually Manually Manually Manually Manually n Service mode Exclusive Exclusive Exclusive Exclusive Exclusive ExclusiveExclusive Exclusive Mixed Exclusive Mixed Exclusive Interchangeability Temporary storage Yes No ns ns ns Yes ns Yes Yes ns ns ns Peck [48] Tsui and Chang [49,50] ? Bermudez and Cole [5 1] Cohen and Keren [52] Oh et al. [53] Bartholdi and Gue [54] Gue [33] Brown [55] (semi-permanent) Brown [55] (dynamic) Bozer and Carlo [56] (semi-permanent) Bozer and Carlo [56] (dynamic) Yu et al. [57] I I n I I I I n n n n n Manually Manually Manually Manually Manually Manually Truck Destination Destination Destination Destination Destination Destination Destination Truck Destination Truck Destination e assigned to a different door and time aspects are not taken into account. If this condition is not ful? lled, the dock doors can be seen as (scarce) resources that have to be scheduled over time. This is the so-called truck scheduling problem. Both problems can be quite complex due to the number of doors and the dynamic nature of the problem. This section deals with the dock door assignment problem, while truck scheduling problems are discussed in Section 4. 6. The assignment of dock doors can be executed on a mid-term or short-term horizon [2].Several papers solve the assignment problem on a mid-term horizon. Then, each dock door serves a speci? c inbound or outbound destination for a longer period of time (e. g. 6 months). 10 All trucks coming from the same origin or having the same destination are assigned to the same dock. Such a ? xed assignment is easier for workers because they know exactly to which dock door they need to ship each load, but it comes at the expense of a reduced ? exibility. Even if a ? xed assignment is used, it is important that the dock doors are reassigned when there is a signi? cant change in the shipping pattern.When data about the inbound trucks are known far enough in advance, the assignment of the trucks can be solved on a shortterm horizon. The trucks itself are assigned to the dock doors based on the actual freight ? ow. This ‘? oating dock’ concept is put forward by Peck [48] who studied the material handling operations in an LTL terminal. Such an assignment implies that the workers are every day confronted wit h a different door for the same destination and have to take care that the freight is loaded into the correct truck. The use of modern information technology (e. g. ar code or RFID scanning together with a WMS) can be useful for this end. A combination of both is also possible. Several papers consider a cross-dock in which destinations are assigned to stack doors (so the outbound trucks are assigned on a mid-term horizon), while the assignment of the inbound trucks is done on a short-term horizon. The characteristics of the cross-docks considered in the following papers are summarized in Table 1. As time aspects are neglected and there are enough available dock doors, the preemption, arrival pattern and departure time characteristic are not relevant here and are not shown.In his dissertation, Peck [48] develops a detailed simulation model of an LTL terminal and tries to assign the trucks to dock doors in order to minimize the travel time11 of the shipments. It is assumed that the tr avel time to transport the products between This includes that the cross-dock operates in exclusive service mode. Here and in the following pages, the travel time is the time required to transfer the goods internally from the inbound to the outbound truck. 11 10 two trucks can be expressed as a function of the distance, based on the actual contents of the trucks and the required means of transport (2-wheeler, 4-wheeler or forklift).The designation of doors as either strip or stack doors is ? xed beforehand. The problem is formulated as an integer programming model and because of the computational complexity, a heuristic (greedy balance algorithm) is provided to solve it. Simulation shows that his heuristic improves an assignment based on experience and intuition. Another early study about the assignment of trucks to dock doors is performed by Tsui and Chang [49]. In this paper, a crossdock is considered in which no storage is provided; all shipments go directly from inbound to outbo und trucks.The problem is solved on a mid-term horizon, so the origins and destinations have to be assigned to dock doors, not the trucks itself. The designation of doors as strip or stack doors is ? xed. The assignment problem is formulated as a bilinear programming problem that tries to minimize the travel distance of the forklifts (the number of forklift trips required to carry a certain load is assumed to be known). To solve it, the authors propose a simple heuristic method to ? nd a local optimum.The authors do not provide test results, but conclude that the found solution can serve as a good starting point for the cross-dock manager. There exist exact algorithms to solve bilinear optimization problems, but these are not very suited for this problem as the same authors mention in Tsui and Chang [50]. In this paper, a branch-and-bound algorithm is proposed to solve the dock door assignment problem exactly. The numerical tests show that this algorithm is however computational exp ensive. ? Bermudez and Cole [51] deal with a very similar problem, but now there is no ? ed designation for the doors. All doors can have assigned either an origin or a destination. The mathematical model of Tsui and Chang [49] is adapted to take this into account. The objective function minimizes the total weighted travel distance instead of the real travel distance. A genetic algorithm (GA) is propose