Challenges Of The Hr Specialist Management Essay

Challenges Of The Hr Specialist Management Essay As a HR specialist, what are the challenges you may face and what HR intervention mechanisms would you consider using in an attempt to drive individual and organisational performance in a multinational company? Critically evaluate this question by utilising the appropriate academic literatures. This thesis proposed the challenges of the HR specialist when there engage in attempt of increasing the individual and organisational performances in Multinational Companies through developing a set of coherent HRM best practices, especially relating to employee recruitment and selection, performance management and staff retention. Since the organizations are multinational number of concerns are arises such as dealing cultural issues with the organizational goals as well as individual goals. Furthermore organizational behaviors and tools such as engagement, motivation and empowerment are basically highlighted; without those it is merely a dream to achieving the business goals. Basically Multinational companies are aiming profits and there for individual and organisational performance are very vital for their existence. HR has been organized in a different ways over the years. Some functions have emphasized delivery by location or by business structure. In these models an integrated HR team has serviced managers and employees at specific location or with in specific businesses units, with some more strategic or complex tasks reserved for the corporate centre. The degree to which these different arms of HR were centralized or co-located and the question of whether they were managed by the business unit varied. Within the HR teams, depending up on their size their might have been specialization by work area (especially for industrial relations in the 1960s and 1970s) or by employee grade or group (responsibility, say, divided between those looking after clerical staff from those covering production) The advancement of personal management starts around end of the 19th century, when welfare officers came in to being. This creation was a reaction to the harshness of industrial conditions, coupled with pr essure arising from the extention of the franchise, the influence of the trade unions and the labour movement and the campaigning of enlightened employers, often quakers, for what was called industrial betterment. (CIPD Research Role of HR) Personal Management(PM) is mainly concerned with obtaining, organizing and motivating the human resources required by the corporation (ARMSTRONG, Michael, 1977) PM includes a range of activities which deals with the workforce other than the resources and also more administrative in nature. HRM deals with soft issues rather than administrative tasks of personnel management and explain a wide vision of how management would like the resources to organise to the success of the organization. Becker and Gerhart (1996) and Wright,Dunford and Snell (2001) have concluded that although the traditional view as HR acost to be minimised (Becker Gerart,1996:779)is being challenged by the rise of strategic HRM, the conventional view is still prevalent in the professional domain. Wright, Dunford and Snell(2001)expand on this by stating that the HR function hasconsistently faced a battle in justifying its position in organisations (Wright,Dunford Snell 2001:701) and during times of economic hardship, the HR function is usually the first function to feel the full effect of organisational streamlining and cost cutting efforts. There are various models exists to explain the peoples role in an organization. The business oriented approach to people management described by Storey (1989) as Hard HRM emerged as a method of responding to and supporting the enterprise culture of the 1980s. Hard HRM and Soft HRM are two contrasting styles that helps to tackle workforce in an organization. Hard HRM mainly focused on achieving organisational goals while Soft HRM deals with more insightful functions like Human Resource Education, Leadership Development, Organization Culture, Relationship building while the achieving organisational goals. More recently the importance of involving and developing people which is characteristic of current approchches to personal management has been emphasized by the resource based theory of the firm formulated by Barney(1991). This explains that competitive advantage is achieved if a firm can obtain and develop human resources which enable it to learn faster and apply its learning more effectively than its competitors. An approach based on this concept will aim to improve resource capability(Kamoche,1996)achieving strategic fit between resources and opportunities and obtaining added value from the effective deployment of these resources.(The name has changed but has the game remained same, Armstrong) Ulrich described how HR practitioners employ in a set of roles defined along two axes: strategy versus operations and process versus people. The four key roles that become known from these two dimensions are Strategic partner, Administrative Expert, Employee Champion, Change agent. Strategic Partners help to successfully accomplish business strategy and meet customer needs. Administrative Experts continuously improve organisational efficiency by reengineering the HR function and other work process. Employee Champions maximize employee commitment and capability while Change Agent delivers organisational transformation and culture change. (CIPD Resarch Of HR, 2007) There have been considerable tensions around the conceptualizations of roles and how the work of Ulrich and others has been interpreted. According to Ashton and Lambert (2005),while Ulrichs original four roles have been influential, whether and how they are put in to practice varies. (The changing HR functions) There are some organizations where HR is seen as a central, corporate function with little advancement to business units. Some other organizations position themselves in the opposite direction, with a very small corporate centre and all the activity distributed to business units. The question of best structure is how the function best organizes itself between the pulls of centralization and the pushes of decentralization.(The changing HR functions) The HR assumptions and HR practices observed in high performing firms are the key elements to the formation of the Best Practice theory. Employment security, selective hiring, self managed teams, high pay contingent on company performance, extensive training, reduction of status difference, and sharing information are the key element of the theory. However less concern about the organisational goals and culture are given as draw backs for the theory. According to the best fit theory a firms that follows a cost leadership strategy designs narrow jobs and provides little job security, whereas a company pursuing a differentiation strategy emphasizes training and development. In other words this argues that all SHRM activities must be consistent with each other and linked to the strategic objectives of the business. Selective hiring of new employees are greatly support to achieve both individual and organisational performance. Recruitment and selection is more or less subjective in its nature, with the objectives of any given business at the forefront of process. To select the best fit there is no specific way. It is clear that combining techniques greatly increases accuracy. The combination of intelligence test or work sampling leads to a substantial improvement in validity (Shmidt and Hunter(1998)). Comprehensive recruitment and selection policy will be enable an organization to become competitive with in the market and also, with right people in the right place at the right time, will lead to a high performing culture with in the organization while adding extra value to the organisation. The main focus of Employee Recruitment is to generate a pool of appropriate candidates for the selection process. This to be carried out in cost effective way and while remain in lawfull. Organizations can de cide whether to select externally or internally. Internal recruitment may not always be beneficial. Ex: no one suitable or stagnation. Best way is to recruit both internally and externally (Torrington, Hall Taylor, 2008). But many organisations prefer to look to recruit internally first especially when this represents a promotion (Newall Shackleton, 2000) To select the best fit there is no specific way. It is clear that combining techniques greatly increases accuracy , the combination of intelligence tests with structured interview, integrity test or work sampling leads to a substantial improvement in validity (Schmidt Hunter (1998).) At the interview stage attitude based competencies should give more priority in order to select the best candidate. In addition during the recruiting and selection process psychological contract between employer and the employee is distinct and specify. According to the report Engaging for Success: enhancing performance through employee engagement,engaged employees have a sence of personal attachment to their work and organization; they are motivated and able to give of their best to help it succeed and from that flows a series of tangible benefits for organization and individual alike'(Macleod Clarke 2009:7) HRM uses various technologies to direct employees behavior towards objectives and tasks that deliver approved organisational performance. Many organizations try to frame these levers with an overall performance management system, and attach incentives and rewards to achievements of objectives and targets within this. In recent years PM has become massively popular. The basic idea was to fix behavior to targets and attach financial rewards. Howe ever performance related pay was not always introduced for the best reason; there was a preoccupation with defining measures to which individual rewards could be attached and the connection with performance was often tenuous (IPM/IMS, 1992) For many line managers PM is still means no more than the appraisal process and it seen as time consuming, bureaucratic, paper driven and top down with little reference to organisational performance and goals.(Egan,1995) Despite significant efforts to present performance management as a systemic process and to raise managers sights (eg.Armstrong,1994;Hartle, 1995) many fundamental problems remain. A PMS may, indeed, support employee development, but this is often undermined by number of problems, among the most important which are, The link between individual behavior and business objectives, Defining and aligning objectives, Motivation theory and managers own assumptions and beliefs, Performance management as a management process, The impact on the employment relationship etc.. A analysis of above issues highlights fundamental questions about performance linkages and how rewards are attached to these and how the motivation to control unnecessarily and inappropriately vitiates the design of rewards and incentives.(Human Resource Management Journal, vol 10-No-3) In addition people performance is vitiated by the obsession with control and therefore is liable to undermine, rather than contribute to, performance. It should only be done within a context of strict attention to corporate business objectives and limited number of specific improvement goals. Engagement is a crucial organisational tool that can generate both individual and organisational performance and can be defined as a set of positive attitudes and behaviors enabling high job performance of kind which are in tune with the organization mission'(Storey, Wright Ulrich 2008) Recent research concluded that there are 3 broad groups of employees. Engaged (loyal, productive, would recommend their organization to friends) , Non-engaged (productive but not bonded, tempted by job vacancies, instrumental, focus on hours JDs), Disengaged (physically present but psychologically absent, negative, uncooperative, hostile, uninvolved) (Buckingham (2001) What a waste PM October) We can perhaps distinguish between two types of employee turnover: Functional vs Dysfunctional turnover functional turnover serves to promoted ideas and methods and can thus renew a stagnating organisation (Carrell et al, 1995, 177). According to Hom and Griffeth (1995), functional turnover is more common than dysfunctional: In addition, high turnover is often less troubling in relatively low skill occupations; especially customer-service related ones (fast-food restaurants, telesales, etc). Kearns (1994) suggests this is because organisations want to harness short-term enthusiasm. Thus, empl oyee turnover may not be a bad thing, however, there is likely to be a point beyond which it is unhealthy. Taylor (2008) suggests this is a rate of 5-10%. The more valuable the employee to the organisation, the more damaging the resignation especially if he/she chooses to work for a competitor Indirect concerns/costs include:-Productivity losses,Impaired quality of service,Lost business opportunities, An increased administrative burden,Employee demoralisation Direct costs include: Recruitment costs (advertising, admin, etc),Induction/training costs,Other admin costs associated with new hires,Overtime/ cost of temporary workers,Reduced productivity during induction Taylor (2008)-The employee turnover decisi Evaluate existing job, Experience job dissatisfaction, Think of quitting, Evaluate expected utility of search for new job and cost of quitting, Decide to search for alternatives, Search for alternatives, Evaluate alternatives, Compare best alternative with present job, Decide whether to stay or quit, Quit on process Mobley(1977), ten stage model. There are ways to investigate why employees leave from the organisation.,Exit interviews (89%)Anon. exit questionnaires (28%),Word of mouth (25%),Extrapolate from staff attitude surveys (23%),Exit interviews external consultant used (2%),Surveys of ex-employees (rare) (CIPD survey 2009) Following ways are considered as most effective way to address staff retention.Realistic job previews, Job e nrichment, Workspace characteristics (environment), Induction practices, Leader-member exchange, Employee selection, Reward practices, Demographic diversity,Managing inter-role conflict (Hom Griffeth, 1995) Multinational Corporation has its facilities and other assets in at least one country other than its home country. Such companies have offices and factories in different countries and usually have a centralized head office. Nearly all dominant multinationals are American, Japanese, or Western European such as Nike, Coca-cola, Wal- Mart, AOL, Toshiba, Honda and BMW. MNCs may take any of four forms: a decentralized that has a strong home-country presence; a global and centralized corporation that can acquire a cost advantage through centralized production; an international company that builds on the parent companys technology or research and development; or a transnational enterprise that combines all three of these approaches. In the modern world the capabilities and the knowledge incorporated in an organisations human resources are the key to performance. So on both the cost and benefit sides of the equation, HRM is crucial to the survival, performance and success of the enterprise. For MNCs, the additional complications of dealing with multicultural assumptions about the way people should be managed and differing institutional constraints become important contributors to the chances of that success. A culture is a set of basic tacit assumptions about how the world is and ought to be that a group of people share and that determines their perceptions, thoughts, feelings and to some degree, their overt behavior. Culture manifests itself at three levels. The level of deep tacit assumptions that are the essence of the culture, the level of espoused values that often reflect what a group wishes ideally to be and the way it wants to present it self publicly and the day to day behavior that represents a complex compromise among the espoused value, the deeper assumptions, and the immediate requirements of the situation. (1996)(Sloan Management Review/fall 1996) Geert Hofstedes theory of cultural dimensions describes the effects of a societys culture on the values of its members, and how these values relate to behavior, using a structure derived from factor analysis. The theory has been widely used in several fields as a paradigm for research, particularly in cross-cultural psychology, international management, and cross-cultural communication. The original theory proposed four dimensions along which cultural values could be analyzed: individualism-collectivism; uncertainty avoidance; power distance (strength of social hierarchy) and masculinity-femininity. (task orientation versus person-orientation) With compared to UK Asian countries characterized by high power distance and week uncertainty avoidance. The HRM approach in Asia generally accepted as being humanists rather than materialistic. Therefore MNCs in Asia focus much concentration on personal growth and development of employees. In return for an organization creating opportunities, employees reciprocate with increased commitment and lower levels of absenteeism and turn over. (Ayree, Chen and Budhwar,2004) In European context highly focus on Individualism and masculine with low power distance and week uncertainty avoidance Hofstede,1980). Performance Appraisal Systems (PAS) basically aimed towards being achieving individual-level targets for employees and preparing cutting edges to identifying performance ratings for rewards. Individualism is more common in western cultures unlike Asian culture is more parental. Therefore western HR practice may be not measured the required standards in Asian MNC employees performance if it not ideally matched for the cultural and organisational targets. However some argues that the world is becoming more globalised, all aspects of business and HRM are becoming more alike which indicate the convergence divergence debate. In conclusion there is evidence to suggest that including the practice out line within this thesis organisational behaviours and tools can used to drive organisational and individual performance in Multinational companies. It is essential to have suitable recruitment and selection process, Performance Appraisal System and Staff Retention plan to ensure the right people, In the right place, at the right time with right attitude. Training and development is also vital to improve HR performance. In addition HR Specialists role will be more specific when these techniques applying in to multi cultural environments where people perceptions and behavioral patterns are different from each other.

Computer Ethics and Information Systems

â€Å"Computer Ethics and Information Security† a. Introduction The consideration of computer ethics fundamentally emerged with the birth of computers. There was concern right away that computers would be used inappropriately to the detriment of society compromising information security, or that they would replace humans in many jobs, resulting in widespread job loss. Ethics- Guidelines or rules of conduct that govern our lives, work, behavior and communication in both public and private undertaking. Ethics are a set of moral principles that govern an individual or a group on what is acceptable behaviour while using a computer.Computer ethics is a set of moral principles that govern the usage of computers. One of the common issues of computer ethics is violation of copyright issues. Duplicating copyrighted content without the author’s approval, accessing personal information of others are some of the examples that violate ethical principles. Security – is the deg ree of protection to safeguard a nation, union of nations, persons or person against danger, damage, loss, and crime. Security as a form of protection are structures and processes that provide or improve security as a condition.Information security means protecting information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, perusal, inspection, recording or destruction Computer Ethics- is a branch of practical philosophy which deals with how computing professionals should make decisions regarding professional and social conduct. b. Discussion Computer Ethics Ethics deals with placing a â€Å"value† on acts according to whether they are â€Å"good† or â€Å"bad†. Every society has its rules about whether certain acts are ethical or not.These rules have been established as a result of consensus in society and are often written into laws. When computers first began to be used in society at large, the absence of ethical s tandards about their use and related issues caused some problems. However, as their use became widespread in every facet of our lives, discussions in computer ethics resulted in some kind of a consensus. Today, many of these rules have been formulated as laws, either national or international. Computer crimes and computer fraud are now common terms. There are laws against them, and veryone is responsible for knowing what constitutes computer crime and computer fraud. The Ten Commandments of computer ethics have been defined by the Computer Ethics Institute. Here is our interpretation of them: 1) Thou shalt not use a computer to harm other people: If it is unethical to harm people by making a bomb, for example, it is equally bad to write a program that handles the timing of the bomb. Or, to put it more simply, if it is bad to steal and destroy other people’s books and notebooks, it is equally bad to access and destroy their files. ) Thou shalt not interfere with other people's computer work: Computer viruses are small programs that disrupt other people’s computer work by destroying their files, taking huge amounts of computer time or memory, or by simply displaying annoying messages. Generating and consciously spreading computer viruses is unethical. 3) Thou shalt not snoop around in other people's files: Reading other people’s e-mail messages is as bad as opening and reading their letters: This is invading their privacy. Obtaining other people’s non-public files should be judged the same way as breaking into their rooms and stealing their documents.Text documents on the Internet may be protected by encryption. 4) Thou shalt not use a computer to steal: Using a computer to break into the accounts of a company or a bank and transferring money should be judged the same way as robbery. It is illegal and there are strict laws against it. 5) Thou shalt not use a computer to bear false witness: The Internet can spread untruth as fast as it can spread truth. Putting out false â€Å"information† to the world is bad. For instance, spreading false rumors about a person or false propaganda about historical events is wrong. ) Thou shalt not use or copy software for which you have not paid: Software is an intellectual product. In that way, it is like a book: Obtaining illegal copies of copyrighted software is as bad as photocopying a copyrighted book. There are laws against both. Information about the copyright owner can be embedded by a process called watermarking into pictures in the digital format. 7) Thou shalt not use other people's computer resources without authorization: Multiuser systems use user id’s and passwords to enforce their memory and time allocations, and to safeguard information.You should not try to bypass this authorization system. Hacking a system to break and bypass the authorization is unethical. 8) Thou shalt not appropriate other people's intellectual output: For example, the programs you write for the projects assigned in this course are your own intellectual output. Copying somebody else’s program without proper authorization is software piracy and is unethical. Intellectual property is a form of ownership, and may be protected by copyright laws. ) Thou shalt think about the social consequences of the program you write: You have to think about computer issues in a more general social framework: Can the program you write be used in a way that is harmful to society? For example, if you are working for an animation house, and are producing animated films for children, you are responsible for their contents. Do the animations include scenes that can be harmful to children? In the United States, the Communications Decency Act was an attempt by lawmakers to ban certain types of content from Internet websites to protect young children from harmful material.That law was struck down because it violated the free speech principles in that country's constitution. T he discussion, of course, is going on. 10) Thou shalt use a computer in ways that show consideration and respect: Just like public buses or banks, people using computer communications systems may find themselves in situations where there is some form of queuing and you have to wait for your turn and generally be nice to other people in the environment. The fact that you cannot see the people you are interacting with does not mean that you can be rude to them. Ethical Issues :- †¢Computers in the Workplace Computer Crime †¢ Privacy and Anonymity †¢ Intellectual Property †¢Professional Responsibility †¢Globalization Computers in the Workplace. Computers can pose a threat to jobs as people feel they may be replaced by them. However, the computer industry already has generated a wide variety of new jobs. When computers do not eliminate a job, they can radically alter it. In addition to job security concerns, another workplace concern is health and safety. It is a computer ethics issue to consider how computers impact health and job satisfaction when information technology is introduced into a workplace.Computer Crime. With the proliferation of computer viruses, spyware, phishing and fraud schemes, and hacking activity from every location in the world, computer crime and security are certainly topics of concern when discussing computer ethics. Besides outsiders, or hackers, many computer crimes, such as embezzlement or planting of logic bombs, are committed by trusted personnel who have authorization to use company computer systems. Privacy and Anonymity. One of the earliest computer ethics topics to arouse public interest was privacy.The ease and efficiency with which computers and networks can be used to gather, store, search, compare, retrieve, and share personal information make computer technology especially threatening to anyone who wishes to keep personal information out of the public domain or out of the hands of those who are perce ived as potential threats. The variety of privacy-related issues generated by computer technology has led to reexamination of the concept of privacy itself. Intellectual Property. One of the more controversial areas of computer ethics concerns the intellectual property rights connected with software ownership.Some people, like Richard Stallman, who started the Free Software Foundation, believe that software ownership should not be allowed at all. He claims that all information should be free, and all programs should be available for copying, studying, and modifying by anyone who wishes to do so. Others, such as Deborah Johnson, argue that software companies or programmers would not invest weeks and months of work and significant funds in the development of software if they could not get the investment back in the form of license fees or sales.Professional Responsibility and Globalization. Global networks such as the Internet and conglomerates of business-to-business network connecti ons are connecting people and information worldwide. Such globalization issues that include ethics considerations include: †¢Global laws †¢Global business †¢Global education †¢Global information flows †¢Information-rich and information-poor nations †¢Information interpretation The gap between rich and poor nations, and between rich and poor citizens in industrialized countries, is very wide.As educational opportunities, business and employment opportunities, medical services, and many other necessities of life move more and more into cyberspace, gaps between the rich and the poor may become even worse, leading to new ethical considerations. Common Computer Ethics Fallacies Although computer education is starting to be incorporated in lower grades in elementary schools, the lack of early computer education for most current adults led to several documented generally accepted fallacies that apply to nearly all computer users.As technology advances, these f allacies will change; new ones will arise, and some of the original fallacies will no longer exist as children learn at an earlier age about computer use, risks, security, and other associated information. There are more than described here, but Peter S. Tippett identified the following computer ethics fallacies, which have been widely discussed and generally accepted as being representative of the most common. The Computer Game Fallacy. Computer users tend to think that computers will generally prevent them from cheating and doing wrong.Programmers particularly believe that an error in programming syntax will prevent it from working, so that if a software program does indeed work, then it must be working correctly and preventing bad things or mistakes from happening. Even computer users in general have gotten the message that computers work with exacting accuracy and will not allow actions that should not occur. Of course, what computer users often do not consider is that although the computer operates under very strict rules, the software programs are written by humans and are just as susceptible to allowing bad things to happen as people often are in their own lives.Along with this, there is also the perception that a person can do something with a computer without being caught, so that if what is being done is not permissible, the computer should somehow prevent them from doing it. The Law-Abiding Citizen Fallacy. Laws provide guidance for many things, including computer use. Sometimes users confuse what is legal with regard to computer use with what is reasonable behavior for using computers. Laws basically define the minimum standard about which actions can be reasonably judged, but such laws also call for individual judgment.Computer users often do not realize they also have a responsibility to consider the ramifications of their actions and to behave accordingly. The Shatterproof Fallacy. Many, if not most, computer users believe that they can do littl e harm accidentally with a computer beyond perhaps erasing or messing up a file. However, computers are tools that can harm, even if computer users are unaware of the fact that their computer actions have actually hurt someone else in some way. For example, sending an email flame to a large group of recipients is the same as publicly humiliating them.Most people realize that they could be sued for libel for making such statements in a physical public forum, but may not realize they are also responsible for what they communicate and for their words and accusations on the Internet. As another example, forwarding e-mail without permission of the author can lead to harm or embarrassment if the original sender was communicating privately without expectation of his message being seen by any others. Also, using e-mail to stalk someone, to send spam, and to harass or offend the recipient in some way also are harmful uses of computers.Software piracy is yet another example of using computers to, in effect, hurt others. Generally, the shatterproof fallacy is the belief that what a person does with a computer can do minimal harm, and only affects perhaps a few files on the computer itself; it is not considering the impact of actions before doing them. The Candy-from-a-Baby Fallacy. Illegal and unethical activity, such as software piracy and plagiarism, are very easy to do with a computer. However, just because it is easy does not mean that it is right.Because of the ease with which computers can make copies, it is likely almost every computer user has committed software piracy of one form or another. The Software Publisher's Association (SPA) and Business Software Alliance (BSA) studies reveal software piracy costs companies multibillions of dollars. Copying a retail software package without paying for it is theft. Just because doing something wrong with a computer is easy does not mean it is ethical, legal, or acceptable. The Hacker's Fallacy.Numerous reports and public ations of the commonly accepted hacker belief is that it is acceptable to do anything with a computer as long as the motivation is to learn and not to gain or make a profit from such activities. This so-called hacker ethic is explored in more depth in the following section. The Free Information Fallacy. A somewhat curious opinion of many is the notion that information â€Å"wants to be free,† as mentioned earlier. It is suggested that this fallacy emerged from the fact that it is so easy to copy digital information and to distribute it widely.However, this line of thinking completely ignores the fact the copying and distribution of data is completely under the control and whim of the people who do it, and to a great extent, the people who allow it to happen. Hacking and Hacktivism Hacking is an ambivalent term, most commonly perceived as being part of criminal activities. However, hacking has been used to describe the work of individuals who have been associated with the open -source movement. Many of the developments in information technology have resulted from what has typically been considered as hacking activities.Manuel Castells considers hacker culture as the â€Å"informationalism† that incubates technological breakthrough, identifying hackers as the actors in the transition from an academically and institutionally constructed milieu of innovation to the emergence of self-organizing networks transcending organizational control. A hacker was originally a person who sought to understand computers as thoroughly as possible. Soon hacking came to be associated with phreaking, breaking into phone networks to make free phone calls, which is clearly illegal.The Hacker Ethic. The idea of a hacker ethic originates in the activities of the original hackers at MIT and Stanford in the 1950s and 1960s. Stephen Levy outlined the so-called hacker ethic as follows: 1. Access to computers should be unlimited and total. 2. All information should be free. 3. A uthority should be mistrusted and decentralization promoted. 4. Hackers should be judged solely by their skills at hacking, rather than by race, class, age, gender, or position. 5. Computers can be used to create art and beauty. . Computers can change your life for the better. The hacker ethic has three main functions: 1. It promotes the belief of individual activity over any form of corporate authority or system of ideals. 2. It supports a completely free-market approach to the exchange of and access to information. 3. It promotes the belief that computers can have a beneficial and life-changing effect. Such ideas are in conflict with a wide range of computer professionals' various codes of ethics. Ethics Codes of Conduct and ResourcesSeveral organizations and groups have defined the computer ethics their members should observe and practice. In fact, most professional organizations have adopted a code of ethics, a large percentage of which address how to handle information. To prov ide the ethics of all professional organizations related to computer use would fill a large book. The following are provided to give you an opportunity to compare similarities between the codes and, most interestingly, to note the differences and sometimes contradictions in the codes followed by the various diverse groups. Information SecurityInformation security means protecting information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, perusal, inspection, recording or destruction Information Security Attributes: or qualities, i. e. , Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability (CIA). Information Systems are decomposed in three main portions, hardware, software and communications with the purpose to help identify and apply information security industry standards, as mechanisms of protection and prevention, at three levels or layers: physical, personal and organizational.Essentially, procedures or policies are implemented to tell people (administrators, users and operators)how to use products to ensure information security within the organizations. Confidentiality Confidentiality is the term used to prevent the disclosure of information to unauthorized individuals or systems. For example, a credit card transaction on the Internet requires the credit card number to be transmitted from the buyer to the merchant and from the merchant to a transaction processing network.The system attempts to enforce confidentiality by encrypting the card number during transmission, by limiting the places where it might appear (in databases, log files, backups, printed receipts, and so on), and by restricting access to the places where it is stored. If an unauthorized party obtains the card number in any way, a breach of confidentiality has occurred. Confidentiality is necessary (but not sufficient) for maintaining the privacy of the people whose personal information a system holds. [citation needed] IntegrityIn information security, integrity means that data cannot be modified undetectably. [citation needed] This is not the same thing as referential integrity in databases, although it can be viewed as a special case of Consistency as understood in the classic ACID model of transaction processing. Integrity is violated when a message is actively modified in transit. Information security systems typically provide message integrity in addition to data confidentiality. Accessibility For any information system to serve its purpose, the information must be available when it is needed.This means that the computing systems used to store and process the information, the security controls used to protect it, and the communication channels used to access it must be functioning correctly. High availability systems aim to remain available at all times, preventing service disruptions due to power outages, hardware failures, and system upgrades. Ensuring availability also involves preventing denial-of-service attacks. Authent icity In computing, e-Business, and information security, it is necessary to ensure that the data, transactions, communications or documents (electronic or physical) are genuine.It is also important for authenticity to validate that both parties involved are who they claim they are. Non-repudiation In law, non-repudiation implies one's intention to fulfill their obligations to a contract. It also implies that one party of a transaction cannot deny having received a transaction nor can the other party deny having sent a transaction. Electronic commerce uses technology such as digital signatures and public key encryption to establish authenticity and non-repudiation. c. ConclusionImpact of Computer Ethics on Information Security The relationship between information security and computer ethics does not look, on the surface, readily obvious, and even appears remote. It is, however, credible. Culture, customs, trust and privacy that characterize security fall within the realm of ethics. Computer ethics alert information security management to ethical considerations and warn potential offenders of ethical consequences in situations where the technical tools or the legal measures fail.In these cases, an ethical decision may be helpful in bringing about a solution. Furthermore, this conclusion is consistent with the following premises with respect to technical controls, computer laws and computer ethics: †¢Premise 1: The information security management community has applied control tools to meet the information security objectives of safeguarding confidentiality against unauthorized access, upholding integrity and maintaining availability. However, detecting computer crime is difficult, because the act is either traceless or difficult to trace.Quantifying the damage is problematic since the victims all too often withhold reporting the crime for reasons including fear of recrimination and bad publicity. 8 Therefore, the technical control tools are ineffective, wi th respect to legal issues. †¢Premise 2: Computer laws have been enacted in various nations at an ever-increasing rate since the late 1980s, when business and the society at large were forced to face the magnitude and severity of damage not experienced prior to computer crimes. There has been a dramatic increase in specialized legislation to combat criminal behaviors related to computer crime, which include traditional crimes committed with the use of a computer and a variety of new, technologyspecific criminal behaviors spawned by the rapid emergence of computer technologies and the exponential expansion of the Internet. 10 However, despite the additional new laws, prosecution is deterred because the legal proceeding is a tardy, time-consuming and expensive process, even when there are well-justified intentions to proceed with legal action.Also, legislation always lags behind the event such that either no appropriate laws are found or the new law is too late for the case in ha nd. Hence, computer laws are at best a deterrent to computer crime, not a guardian of information. †¢Premise 3: Computer ethicists assert, on the one hand, that special ethical issues are raised because computers are special technology, and query, on the other hand, why there should be computer ethics since, for example, there is no such thing as telephone ethics even though the telephone is a special technology that makes a profound change on the way individuals communicate with others. 1 However, information security is worthy of ethical consideration as many decisions in information technology affect a wide range of stakeholders. National and international computer societies have promoted codes of ethical practice and even written these codes into their constitutions. As technology advances, computers continue to have a greater impact on society.Therefore, computer ethics promotes the discussion of how much influence computers should have in areas such as information securit y, artificial intelligence and human communication. As the world of computers evolves, computer ethics continues to create ethical standards that address new issues raised by new technologies. Reference http://www. isaca. org/Journal http://plato. stanford. edu/entries/ethics-computer/ http://www. cmpe. boun. edu. tr/~say/c150/intro/lit10. html

Natural sciences Essay

Knowledge involves acquaintance with truth, principles or facts as with a certain subject or a branch of learning. People have various perceptive of knowledge. There are those who belief that knowledge is found in many forms which must be proven with evidence. It is possible to doubt everything that exist because it is a misconception or it may be seen as an illusion. Doubt is important in knowledge because learning through from the senses or through the senses can be deceptive. For example, senses can deceive because one may smell something sweet and senses deceive that it is going to have sweet taste. However, this is wrong because not everything that smells sweet taste sweet. Dreams are also deceptive as they are just false delusions because occasionally when one is asleep one is deceived by the illusions in dreams. These are just ways that knowledge through the senses can deceive. Therefore, it becomes necessary to doubt everything so that one can get the true knowledge. So as the proverb hold doubt is key to knowledge. Knowledge creates doubt and doubt pave way for gaining more knowledge. If its is not for doubt then there would be no knowledge or the knowledge that would be available would be one that is not complete knowledge (Urdahl, pg 27-29). In natural sciences, scientists have a lot of experience with doubt and uncertainty. This is experience that is very necessary in gaining knowledge in natural sciences. When one does not know the answer to a problem then this can be termed as ignorance. Then one has a hunch as to what the results are, for example, of an experiment, then it means that one has uncertainty. When one is darned sure of what the result would be then it means that one has some doubt. Therefore, it is paramount important that in order to have progress it is important to recognize the ignorance we have in natural sciences and leave room for doubt. This is because scientific knowledge is a body of statements, which have varying degrees of certainty. The degrees vary from being unsure, nearly sure and none absolutely certain. Doubt is a good thing in natural science because if one knows the answer or thinks that one knows the answer then it becomes easy to fail to seek more knowledge about that particular subject. Doubt helps to come out of that emotional attachment that people have in certain beliefs or from the theory of determinism. Example of areas where doubt has assisted in gaining and verifying knowledge is in the assumptions in relativity that inertial mass and gravitational mass are equal. In order to show that they are not the model has to be revised. Scientists have engaged in refining their ability to measure the two. It is the doubt that has developed in this area that has made the scientist revise this model until they have realized that inertial mass and gravitational mass are different at finer degrees. Therefore, they doubt has made it known that the two are not equivalent as has been held in the past. In this case, it is not that the same experiment is repeated but the real key to this is to look at the statements and test if they have been examined to the extent that they should. Doubt allow the use of new tools in scientific experiments which allow new discoveries which do away with the old ideas or theories. Science in this case becomes a process of doubt. Natural scientists are always nor sure and this is the reason as to why they repeat the steps in experiments in order to make sure that it is right. Another area where doubt has necessitated growth of knowledge is in the evolution theory. At the beginning people had strong belief that creation theory was the one that provided call the knowledge about the evolution of human being. However, as knowledge grew people started to doubt some aspects of the evolution theory and developed other theories such as the Darwinian theory of evolution. This is a theory which resulted out f the doubts about some of the aspects of the former theory. This is not the end theory because doubts in some aspects of the evolutions theory have also led to development of some other theories (Axtell pg 87-88). Doubt has also contributed to increased knowledge in other areas, for example, in social science and history. There are two areas that information collected or knowledge gained depends on research or theories which were constructed in the past by various scholars. However it becomes tricky to use such kind of theories to their full because history and social sciences are dynamic. For example, the society change as time moves. Therefore, this is also in the same way that the theories are supposed to change. For example, if theories that were constructed in the fourteenth century are used in the twenty first century then there is no doubt that the theory would contain a lot of faults because of the changes that have occurred in the society. People have developed in their way of reasoning as in these days there are more sources of information than in the past. Reason is one part of gaining knowledge that enhances the development of doubt. This is because it is after deductive reasoning that a person is able to develop hypothesis that proves some knowledge as relevant or irrelevant (Gotschl, pg179-180). Historians do their research and base most of their research on the researches that were conducted in the past. The information in the research where they base their research would be biased or exaggerated. This is what cause doubt and enhance new research to be conducted regarding some issues. Despite the fact that some people are emotionally attached to some believes doubt has made them to relent some of their believes. For example, different ethnic groups have their own myths about where they originated or who is their god or where their god lived. In traditional society people had strong emotional attachment to these beliefs (Chang pg 581). However, as time has passed people have developed doubt about these believes to develop other believes. This is because most of the beliefs in the traditions are not well reasoned and are also biased to particular ethnic people. People have developed other believes that are more inclusive of other ethnic groups all over the world. This has risen out of the doubt that people have some of the things that happened in the past (Lamm Norman pg 11-12). Despite that knowledge plays a key role in knowledge I think that knowledge or truth is a fixed situation because truth is not questionable. So if true knowledge is out there to be discovered or to be learned then it means that when we know or acquire knowledge then there should be no room for doubt. I also think that knowledge depends mostly on human perception. Natural sciences have more upper hands in investigating the truth. However these sciences are still subjected tout human brains. Curiosity is also key to knowledge rather than doubt. Human beings are always curious to know more about their nature. The curiosity allows them to make discoveries and also strive to find the truth. Looking critically at the discoveries that have been made in the past it is out of curiosity that this has happened. This curiosity leads to knowledge, which then leads to wisdom. Doubts make us to know hat our knowledge is correct instead on believing in something blindly. However I do not feel that doubt makes us to make any discovery or learn anything that is new to us. It is curiosity that allows us to acquire new knowledge more quickly. Work cited Axtell Guy. Knowledge, belief, and character: readings in virtue epistemology, 1st edition, Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Chang Larry. Wisdom for the Soul: Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing, Gnosophia Publishers, 2006. Gotschl Johann. Erwin Schrodinger’s world view: the dynamics of knowledge and reality Vol 16, New York, Springer, 1992. Lamm Norman. Faith and doubt: studies in traditional Jewish thought, 3rd edition, KTAV Publishing House, Inc. , 2007. Urdahl Halvor. Key of Knowledge, New York, Kessinger Publishing, 1998.

Algae Lab Essay - 695 Words

Jeanine Campa Biology 101 10/20/2010 Ecology-Interspecific Interactions Lab Intro: Ecology is the study of how organisms interact within their environment. Every species interacts with its surroundings, whether it’s within their populations, community, ecosystem, etc. In this lab, we will be comparing two different species and how they grow alone as well as together, in the same environment. More specifically, in this lab, we will be dealing with one of the most important ideas in ecology, the niche. Due to this concept, we can study the environmental circumstances the organism can handle, the essential resources it will need to survive, and how it will obtain these resources. â€Å"Different species can hold similar niches, and the same†¦show more content†¦The carrying capacity determines the population level of a species according to the limiting resources, Algae is one of the most diverse and interesting organisms on the planet. This is because there are over 10,000 unrelated species of organisms that contain chlorophyll and live in large bodies of water or moist land. Keeping a count of population size gives us a good indication of how certain species grow and interact with one another. By using two different species of Algae we can determine what types of interactions the two can encounter. The two species tested were Closterium and Micrasterias algae. We labeled them as species 1 and 2. The purpose of this lab is to determine whether the selected algae species will demonstrate competition or resource partitioning with the coexistence of each other versus alone. At the end of this lab we should be able to determine which species upheld the best under all of these circumstances. Methods: This lab was performed with two different types of algae, Micrasterias and Closterium. Within our groups, we counted how many of each species there were to begin with. 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