Strategic Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 2

Strategic Management - Essay Example Conclusion 11 References 13 1. Introduction The evaluation of an industry’s performance is commonly developed using a series of criteria. The conditions in the industry’s environment, in all its aspects, have a key role in understanding the industry’s perspectives for a long terms growth. The use of theoretical frameworks and models can also help to check the status of an industry, either in the short or the long term. Current paper focuses on the evaluation of global automotive industry in regard to a particular aspect: the industry’s supply and demand chain. The sector matrix framework has been used for exploring the issue under examination. Two well known theoretical frameworks, the Value Chain Analysis model of Porter and the Product-Commodity Chain of Gereffi have been used for developing an effective sector matrix framework, as aligned with the needs and the challenges of the particular industry. It is proved that the current performance of automotiv e industry in terms of supply/demand could be improved by controlling rapid expansion so that time is available for responding effectively to the needs of each market. 2. The ‘sector matrix’ framework – description and characteristics The sector matrix framework used for the evaluation of the automotive industry would be based on the following fact: economies worldwide are not equally developed. More specifically, there are economies that have been able to promote technological advances and commerce, achieving an important growth (Cohen 2012). Reference should be also made to countries with quite low economic and commercial performance; these countries have not managed to follow global technological advances (Cohen 2012). The evaluation of the performance of the automotive industry globally would be based on the perception that economic growth around the world is not equally; therefore, the findings of the sector matrix analysis would be related primarily to deve loped and emerging economies that have the potential to support the development of automotive industry. Another issue that should be taken into consideration when developing the sector matrix related to the automotive industry is the following one: the specific matrix is based on different market and organizational elements; these elements are also included in other theoretical frameworks, such as the Porter’s Value Chain analysis (Graph 1) and the Gereffi’s Product/ Commodity chain. The use of these frameworks when developing the sector matrix analysis of the automotive industry would increase the credibility of findings. The elements of these two frameworks are briefly discussed below. Graph 1 – Porter’s Value Chain analysis framework (source: Bachelor of International Management) The Value Chain Analysis of Porter is presented in Graph 1, above. According to this framework, ‘each company can be represented by a Value Chain’ (Overbeck 2009, p.26). This Value-Chain is consisted by a series of activities that can be characterized either as primary or support activities (Overbeck 2009). The activities that are of critical importance for the supply chain of an organization are the primary ones (Overbeck 2009); still, the support activities are necessary for the effective development of primary activities (Overbeck 2009), meaning that primary activities may face problems and delays in case that they are not combined by the support activities, as included in the Porter’s framework. Among the activities included in the

Compassion and Media Representations of Suffering Essay

Compassion and Media Representations of Suffering - Essay Example Compassion Cultivation The decision on how these images are going to be used and how a story is going to be told are left to the decision of the journalists and the editors. These decisions are influenced by different factors which include cultural standards of the primary audience and the expectations of advertisers. The end product is almost always geared towards what will be warranted as interesting by more people in order to attract more advertisers. Media produce materials that evoke compassion because compassion is what calls audience attention. Media positions the audience from a spectator’s point of view, a passive audience that is powerless when it comes to the doing something against the sufferings of victims of natural disasters and manmade crimes. To establish a more intimate relationship between the news content and the audience, media use personal stories that are highly focused on the civilians. Their losses are highlighted, their tears take the places of actual body count and political analysis. By putting feeding the audience the suffering of people who are supposed to be innocence and the fact that audience are unable to do anything to mediate the suffering, the media creates distant suffering. The audience are being conditioned to take into consideration the condition of strangers thousands of miles away. This framework of distant suffering has been so powerful that it has connected politics, audience, and non-profit organizations towards one cause. The growth of technology has afforded more news organizations and even ordinary citizens to access and distribute news and other information. The internet has also stretched the rules on the extent of suffering one may show. More importantly, this continuous flow of information on suffering has heightened the audience’s compassion because of the reinforcement of the fact that they are ultimately powerless to change to anything and even with the privilege of knowing and watching, they cannot do anything. The audience is not anymore allowed to detach themselves from the fate of other people or take refuge in ignorance because they are never safe from the information. Compassion Fatigue Moeller (1999) believes that this formula is also the cause of compassion fatigue. The continuous drive to heighten emotion and ignite interest from the audience is compromising the very essence of journalism. Journalism is supposed to uphold truths and facts without favouring any side. Journalism is about information dissemination. All of these take an inferior place over profitability. As media companies fight for audience, they continue to raise the stakes on how they present their stories without crossing the legal bounds. As a result, the media companies resort to sensationalism. The result is the ever growing concern on the accuracy of information that the audience obtains and the proper emotion that news is supposed to evoke. Chouliaraki (2006) discussed how adventure news e mbodies this situation. She mentioned three critical current events: shootings in Indonesia, a boat accident in India and ‘biblical floods’ in Bangladesh. All of these were given no more than one minute of air time. Important information was also not mentioned in the ‘breaking news’ portion and was not presented in the proper context of the event. This treatment results to a lack of framework for the audience to understand the weight of the event. Th