Persecution :: essays research papers

The Growing Effects of Persecution   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Throughout the ages of Christianity, there have been many drawbacks to this cause. Many leaders among the Christian community were persecuted due to the disbelief of Christ being the Messiah among pagan worshipers, heathens, and even other credible religious leaders. This persecution more often led to death, or other horrifying results. But no matter what horrendous effects, there was always a brighter side causing the Christian faith to grow even stronger.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Because of Rome’s strictness in following the laws and rules, they were very tradition bound. Many of the Pharisees were determined that the Old Testament was the only acceptable basis of religious law that the people of Rome should follow. The believed that Elijah was the Messiah, and they were waiting for his return. They also didn’t expect a â€Å"Messiah† to act the way that Christ did, having anything to do with sinners was looked down upon. However, after Christ’s death and resurrection, the disciples were told to go out into the world and spread the good news of their salvation. This didn’t appeal to the Pharisees at all, and they immediately set out to stop this message of freedom. The religious officials continuously put Simon and Peter in jail, Stephen was stoned to death, and there have been accounts of John’s attempted murder in boiling hot oil. Many Christians were flogged, stoned to death, skinned alive, fed to lions, and many more gruesome things. Nero burned half of Rome and then blamed the Christians, he even dipped some in kerosene and then lit them on fire so that there was light for the sporting events. Peter was even crucified, but he didn’t feel he deserved to die the same way as Christ so he was crucified upside-down. Persecution was so bad that Christians were accused of having a â€Å"hatred for the human race,† cannibalism, and incest.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The response of the Christians has a lot to do with the influence upon the church. The Bible states in the book of Acts that after being beat by the Roman officials, Peter and James went out celebrating that they had been punished for spreading the news of Christ. After this event, and several escapes from prison due to divine intervention, Peter and the other Apostles were able to bring salvation unto many people. These events helped make the church what it is today. The church at this point in time was growing because of the faith that two groups of people displayed.

Managing with the Brain in Mind

strategy+business Managing with the Brain in Mind by David Rock from strategy+business issue 56, Autumn 2009 reprint number 09206 Reprint features special report 1 by David Rock Naomi Eisenberger, a leading social neuroscience Managing with the Brain in Mind researcher at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), wanted to understand what goes on in the brain when people feel rejected by others. She designed an experiment in which volunteers played a computer game called Cyberball while having their brains scanned by a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine. Cyberball hearkens back to the nastiness of the chool playground. â€Å"People thought they were playing a ball-tossing game over the Internet with two other people,† Eisenberger explains. â€Å"They could see an avatar that represented themselves, and avatars [ostensibly] for two other people. Then, about halfway through this game of catch among the three of them, the subjects stopped receiving th e ball and the two other supposed players threw the ball only to each other. † Even after they learned that no other human players were involved, the game players spoke of feeling angry, snubbed, or judged, as if the other avatars excluded them because they didn’t like something about them.This reaction could be traced directly to the brain’s responses. â€Å"When people felt excluded,† says Eisenberger, â€Å"we saw activity in the dorsal portion of the anterior cingulate cortex — the neural region involved in the distressing component of pain, or what is sometimes referred to as the ‘suffering’ component of pain. Those people who felt the most rejected had the highest levels of activity in this region. † In other words, the feeling of being excluded provoked the same sort of reaction in the brain that physical pain might cause. (See Exhibit 1. ) Eisenberger’s fellow researcher Matthew Lieberman, lso of UCLA, hypothesizes that human beings evolved 2 features special report Illustration by Leigh Wells Neuroscience research is revealing the social nature of the high-performance workplace. SPECIAL REPORT: THE TALENT OPPORTUNITY this link between social connection and physical discomfort within the brain â€Å"because, to a mammal, being socially connected to caregivers is necessary for survival. † This study and many others now emerging have made one thing clear: The human brain is a social organ. Its physiological and neurological reactions are directly and profoundly shaped by social interaction. Indeed, asLieberman puts it, â€Å"Most processes operating in the background when your brain is at rest are involved in thinking about other people and yourself. † This presents enormous challenges to managers. Although a job is often regarded as a purely economic transaction, in which people exchange their labor for financial compensation, the brain experiences the workplace first and foremos t as a social system. Like the experiment participants whose avatars were left out of the game, people who feel betrayed or unrecognized at work — for example, when they are reprimanded, given an assignment that seems unworthy, or told to take a pay ut — experience it as a neural impulse, as powerful and painful as a blow to the head. Most people who work in companies learn to rationalize or temper their reactions; they â€Å"suck it up,† as the common parlance puts it. But they also limit their commitment and engagement. They become purely transactional employees, reluctant to give more of themselves to the company, because the social context stands in their way. Leaders who understand this dynamic can more effectively engage their employees’ best talents, support collaborative teams, and create an environment that fosters productive change.Indeed, the ability to intentionally address the social brain in the service of optimal performance will be a disti nguishing leadership capability in the years ahead. Triggering the Threat Response One critical thread of research on the social brain starts with the â€Å"threat and reward† response, a neurological mechanism that governs a great deal of human behavior. When you encounter something unexpected — a shadow seen from the corner of your eye or a new colleague moving into the office next door — the limbic system (a relatively primitive part of the brain, common to many animals) is aroused.Neuroscientist Evian Gordon refers to this as the â€Å"minimize danger, maximize reward† response; he calls it â€Å"the fundamental organizing principle of the brain. † Neurons are activated and hormones are released as you seek to learn whether this new entity represents a chance for reward or a potential danger. If the perception is danger, then the response becomes a pure threat response — also known as the fight or flight response, the avoid response, and , in its extreme form, the amygdala hijack, named for a part of the limbic system that can be aroused rapidly and in an emotionally overwhelming way.Recently, researchers have documented that the threat response is often triggered in social situations, and it tends to be more intense and longer-lasting than the reward response. Data gathered through measures of brain activity — by using fMRI and electroencephalograph (EEG) machines or by gauging hormonal secretions — suggests that the same neural responses that drive us toward food or away from predators are triggered by our perception of the way we are treated by other people. These findings are reframing the prevailing view of the role that social drivers play in influencing how humans behave.Matthew Lieberman notes that Abraham Maslow’s â€Å"hierarchy of needs† theory may have been wrong in this respect. Maslow proposed that strategy + business issue 56 features special report 3 David Rock ([email   protected] .com) is the founding president of the NeuroLeadership Institute (www. neuroleadership .org). He is also the CEO of Results Coaching Systems, which helps global organizations grow their leadership teams, using brain research as a base for self-awareness and social awareness. He is the author of Your Brain at Work (HarperBusiness, 2009) and Quiet Leadership: Six Steps toTransforming Performance at Work (Collins, 2006). Exhibit 1: Social and Physical Pain Produce Similar Brain Responses Physical hysic cal Pain ain solving; in other words, just when people most need their sophisticated mental capabilities, the brain’s internal resources are taken away from them. The impact of this neural dynamic is often visible in organizations. For example, when leaders trigger a threat response, employees’ brains become much less efficient. But when leaders make people feel good about themselves, clearly communicate their expectations, give employees latitude to make decisio ns, support people’s fforts to build good relationships, and treat the whole organization fairly, it prompts a reward response. Others in the organization become more effective, more open to ideas, and more creative. They notice the kind of information that passes them by when fear or resent- Illustration: Sam tion: Samuel Valasco muel Valasco Source: Eisenberger, Lieberman, and Williams, Science, 2003 (social pain images); Lieberman et al. , â€Å"The Neural Correlates of Placebo Effects: A Disruption Account,† : Lieberman, Science, (social Lieber rman â€Å"The N Neuroimage, May 2004 (physical pain images) mage, 4 features special report Social cial Pain ain Brain scans captured through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) show the same areas associated with distress, whether caused by rejection or physical pain. cingulate (highlighted social rejection or physical pain. The dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (highlighted at left) is associated with the degree of distress; the right ventral distress. prefrontal cortex (highlighted at right) is associated with regulating the distre ntal ess. humans tend to satisfy their needs in sequence, starting with physical survival and moving up the ladder toward self-actualization at the top. In this hierarchy, social eeds sit in the middle. But many studies now show that the brain equates social needs with survival; for example, being hungry and being ostracized activate similar neural responses. The threat response is both mentally taxing and deadly to the productivity of a person — or of an organization. Because this response uses up oxygen and glucose from the blood, they are diverted from other parts of the brain, including the working memory function, which processes new information and ideas. This impairs analytic thinking, creative insight, and problem Neuroscience has discovered that the brain is highly plastic. Even the most ntrenched behaviors can be modified. Status and Its Discont ents Research into the social nature of the brain suggests another piece of this puzzle. Five particular qualities enable employees and executives alike to minimize the threat response and instead enable the reward response. These five social qualities are status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and fairness: Because they can be expressed with the acronym SCARF, I sometimes think of them as a kind of headgear that an organization can wear to prevent exposure to dysfunction. To understand how the SCARF model works, let’s look at each characteristic in turn. eatures special report 5 ment makes it difficult to focus their attention. They are less susceptible to burnout because they are able to manage their stress. They feel intrinsically rewarded. Understanding the threat and reward response can also help leaders who are trying to implement large-scale change. The track record of failed efforts to spark higher-perfomance behavior has led many managers to conclude that human na ture is simply intractable: â€Å"You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. † Yet neuroscience has also discovered that the human brain is highly plastic. Neural connections can be reformed, new behaviors can e learned, and even the most entrenched behaviors can be modified at any age. The brain will make these shifts only when it is engaged in mindful attention. This is the state of thought associated with observing one’s own mental processes (or, in an organization, stepping back to observe the flow of a conversation as it is happening). Mindfulness requires both serenity and concentration; in a threatened state, people are much more likely to be â€Å"mindless. † Their attention is diverted by the threat, and they cannot easily move to self-discovery. In a previous article (â€Å"The Neuroscience ofLeadership,† s+b, Summer 2006), brain scientist Jeffrey Schwartz and I proposed that organizations could marshal mindful attention to create organizatio nal change. They could do this over time by putting in place regular routines in which people would watch the patterns of their thoughts and feelings as they worked and thus develop greater self-awareness. We argued that this was the only way to change organizational behavior; that the â€Å"carrots and sticks† of incentives (and behavioral psychology) did not work, and that the counseling and empathy of much organizational development was not fficient enough to make a difference. strategy + business issue 56 As humans, we are constantly assessing how social encounters either enhance or diminish our status. Research published by Hidehiko Takahashi et al. in 2009 shows that when people realize that they might compare unfavorably to someone else, the threat response kicks in, releasing cortisol and other stress-related hormones. (Cortisol is an accurate biological marker of the threat response; within the brain, feelings of low status provoke the kind of cortisol elevation asso ciated with sleep deprivation and chronic anxiety. Separately, researcher Michael Marmot, in his book The Status Syndrome: How Social Standing Affects Our Health and Longevity (Times Books, 2004), has shown that high status correlates with human longevity and health, even when factors like income and education are controlled for. In short, we are biologically programmed to care about status because it favors our survival. As anyone who has lived in a modest house in a high-priced neighborhood knows, the feeling of status is always comparative. And an executive with a salary of US$500,000 may feel elevated. . . until he or she is A Craving for Certainty he skills they have acquired, rather than for their seniority, is a status booster in itself. Values have a strong impact on status. An organization that appears to value money and rank more than a basic sense of respect for all employees will stimulate threat responses among employees who aren’t at the top of the heap. Similar ly, organizations that try to pit people against one another on the theory that it will make them work harder reinforce the idea that there are only winners and losers, which undermines the standing of people below the top 10 percent. 6 features special report ssigned to work with an executive making $2. 5 million. A study by Joan Chiao in 2003 found that the neural circuitry that assesses status is similar to that which processes numbers; the circuitry operates even when the stakes are meaningless, which is why winning a board game or being the first off the mark at a green light feels so satisfying. Competing against ourselves in games like solitaire triggers the same circuitry, which may help explain the phenomenal popularity of video games. Understanding the role of status as a core concern can help leaders avoid organizational practices that stir ounterproductive threat responses among employees. For example, performance reviews often provoke a threat response; people being rev iewed feel that the exercise itself encroaches on their status. This makes 360degree reviews, unless extremely participative and welldesigned, ineffective at generating positive behavioral change. Another common status threat is the custom of offering feedback, a standard practice for both managers and coaches. The mere phrase â€Å"Can I give you some advice? † puts people on the defensive because they perceive the person offering advice as claiming superiority.It is the cortisol equivalent of hearing footsteps in the dark. Organizations often assume that the only way to raise an employee’s status is to award a promotion. Yet status can also be enhanced in less-costly ways. For example, the perception of status increases when people are given praise. Experiments conducted by Keise Izuma in 2008 show that a programmed status-related stimulus, in the form of a computer saying â€Å"good job,† lights up the same reward regions of the brain as a financial windfall. The perception of status also increases when people master a new skill; paying employees more forWhen an individual encounters a familiar situation, his or her brain conserves its own energy by shifting into a kind of automatic pilot: it relies on long-established neural connections in the basal ganglia and motor cortex that have, in effect, hardwired this situation and the individual’s response to it. This makes it easy to do what the person has done in the past, and it frees that person to do two things at once; for example, to talk while driving. But the minute the brain registers ambiguity or confusion — if, for example, the car ahead of the driver slams on its brakes — the brain flashes an error signal.With the threat response aroused and working memory diminished, the driver must stop talking and shift full attention to the road. Uncertainty registers (in a part of the brain called the anterior cingulate cortex) as an error, gap, or tension: something tha t must be corrected before one can feel comfortable again. That is why people crave certainty. Not knowing what will happen next can be profoundly debilitating because it requires extra neural energy. This diminishes memory, undermines performance, and disengages people from the present. Of course, uncertainty is not necessarily debilitating. Mild ncertainty attracts interest and attention: New and challenging situations create a mild threat response, increasing levels of adrenalin and dopamine just enough to spark curiosity and energize people to solve problems. Moreover, different people respond to uncertainty in the world around them in different ways, depending in part on their existing patterns of thought. For example, when that car ahead stops suddenly, the driver who thinks, â€Å"What should I do? † is likely to be ineffective, whereas the driver who frames the incident as manageable — â€Å"I need to swerve left now because there’s a car on the rightâ €  — is well equipped to respond.All of life is uncertain; it is the perception of Relating to Relatedness given more control over decision making lived longer and healthier lives than residents in a control group who had everything selected for them. The choices themselves were insignificant; it was the perception of autonomy that mattered. Another study, this time of the franchise industry, identified work–life balance as the number one reason that people left corporations and moved into a franchise. Yet other data showed that franchise owners actually worked far longer hours (often for less money) than they had in corporate life.They nevertheless perceived themselves to have a better work–life balance because they had greater scope to make their own choices. Leaders who know how to satisfy the need for autonomy among their people can reap substantial benefits — without losing their best people to the entrepreneurial ranks. features special report 7 The Autonomy Factor too much uncertainty that undercuts focus and performance. When perceived uncertainty gets out of hand, people panic and make bad decisions. Leaders and managers must thus work to create a perception of certainty to build confident and dedicated eams. Sharing business plans, rationales for change, and accurate maps of an organization’s structure promotes this perception. Giving specifics about organizational restructuring helps people feel more confident about a plan, and articulating how decisions are made increases trust. Transparent practices are the foundation on which the perception of certainty rests. Breaking complex projects down into small steps can also help create the feeling of certainty. Although it’s highly unlikely everything will go as planned, people function better because the project now seems less ambiguous.Like the driver on the road who has enough information to calculate his or her response, an employee focused on a single, ma nageable aspect of a task is unlikely to be overwhelmed by threat responses. strategy + business issue 56 Studies by Steven Maier at the University of Boulder show that the degree of control available to an animal confronted by stressful situations determines whether or not that stressor undermines the ability to function. Similarly, in an organization, as long as people feel they can execute their own decisions without much oversight, stress remains under control.Because human brains evolved in response to stressors over thousands of years, they are constantly attuned, usually at a subconscious level, to the ways in which social encounters threaten or support the capacity for choice. A perception of reduced autonomy — for example, because of being micromanaged — can easily generate a threat response. When an employee experiences a lack of control, or agency, his or her perception of uncertainty is also aroused, further raising stress levels. By contrast, the perceptio n of greater autonomy increases the feeling of certainty and reduces stress.Leaders who want to support their people’s need for autonomy must give them latitude to make choices, especially when they are part of a team or working with a supervisor. Presenting people with options, or allowing them to organize their own work and set their own hours, provokes a much less stressed response than forcing them to follow rigid instructions and schedules. In 1977, a well-known study of nursing homes by Judith Rodin and Ellen Langer found that residents who were Fruitful collaboration depends on healthy relationships, which require trust and empathy. But in the brain, the bility to feel trust and empathy about others is shaped by whether they are perceived to be part of the same social group. This pattern is visible in many domains: in sports (â€Å"I hate the other team†), in organizational silos (â€Å"the ‘suits’ are the problem†), and in communities (†Å"those people on the other side of town always mess things up†). Each time a person meets someone new, the brain automatically makes quick friend-or-foe distinctions and then experiences the friends and foes in ways that are colored by those distinctions. When the new person is perceived as different, the information travels along eural pathways that are associated with uncomfortable feelings (different from the neural pathways triggered by people who are perceived as similar to oneself). Leaders who understand this phenomenon will find many ways to apply it in business. For example, teams of diverse people cannot be thrown together. They must be deliberately put together in a way that minimizes the potential for threat responses. Trust cannot be assumed or mandated, nor can empathy or even goodwill be compelled. These qualities develop only when people’s brains start to recognize former strangers as friends. This equires time and repeated social interaction. Once peop le make a stronger social connection, their brains begin to secrete a hormone called oxytocin in one another’s presence. This chemical, which has been linked with affection, maternal behavior, sexual arousal, and generosity, disarms the threat response and We now have reason to believe that economic incentives are effective only when people perceive them as supporting their social needs. The perception that an event has been unfair generates a strong response in the limbic system, stirring hostility and undermining trust. As with status, people perceive airness in relative terms, feeling more satisfied with a fair exchange that offers a minimal reward than an unfair exchange in which the reward is substantial. Studies conducted by Matthew Lieberman and Golnaz Tabibnia found that people respond more positively to being given 50 cents from a dollar split between them and another person than to receiving $8 out of a total of $25. Another study found that the experience of fairne ss produces reward responses in the brain similar to those that occur from eating chocolate. The cognitive need for fairness is so strong that some people are willing to fight and die for causes hey believe are just — or commit themselves wholeheartedly to an organization they recognize as fair. An executive told me he had stayed with his company for 22 years simply because â€Å"they always did the right thing. † People often engage in volunteer work for similar reasons: They perceive their actions as increasing the fairness quotient in the world. In organizations, the perception of unfairness creates an environment in which trust and collaboration cannot flourish. Leaders who play favorites or who appear to reserve privileges for people who are like them arouse a threat response in employees who are outside their circle.The old boys’ network provides an egregious example; those who are not a part of it always perceive their organizations as fundamentally unfai r, no matter how many mentoring programs are put in place. Like certainty, fairness is served by transparency. Leaders who share information in a timely manner can keep people engaged and motivated, even during staff reductions. Morale remains relatively high when people perceive that cutbacks are being handled fairly — that no one group is treated with preference and that there is a rationale for every cut. Putting on the SCARF If you are a leader, every action you take and every ecision you make either supports or undermines the perceived levels of status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and fairness in your enterprise. In fact, this is why leading is so difficult. Your every word and glance is freighted with social meaning. Your sentences and gestures are noticed and interpreted, magnified and 8 features special report Playing for Fairness further activates the neural networks that permit us to perceive someone as â€Å"just like us. † Research by Michael Kosfeld et al. in 2005 shows that a shot of oxytocin delivered by means of a nasal spray decreases threat arousal.But so may a handshake and a shared glance over something funny. Conversely, the human threat response is aroused when people feel cut off from social interaction. Loneliness and isolation are profoundly stressful. John T. Cacioppo and William Patrick showed in 2008 that loneliness is itself a threat response to lack of social contact, activating the same neurochemicals that flood the system when one is subjected to physical pain. Leaders who strive for inclusion and minimize situations in which people feel rejected create an environment that supports maximum performance. This of course raises a hallenge for organizations: How can they foster relatedness among people who are competing with one another or who may be laid off? strategy + business issue 56 features special report 9 combed for meanings you may never have intended. The SCARF model provides a means of bringing conscio us awareness to all these potentially fraught interactions. It helps alert you to people’s core concerns (which they may not even understand themselves) and shows you how to calibrate your words and actions to better effect. Start by reducing the threats inherent in your company and in its leaders’ behavior.Just as the animal brain is wired to respond to a predator before it can focus attention on the hunt for food, so is the social brain wired to respond to dangers that threaten its core concerns before it can perform other functions. Threat always trumps reward because the threat response is strong, immediate, and hard to ignore. Once aroused, it is hard to displace, which is why an unpleasant encounter in traffic on the morning drive to work can distract attention and impair performance all day. Humans cannot think creatively, work well with others, or make informed decisions when their threat responses re on high alert. Skilled leaders understand this and act accor dingly. A business reorganization provides a good example. Reorganizations generate massive amounts of uncertainty, which can paralyze people’s ability to perform. A leader attuned to SCARF principles therefore makes reducing the threat of uncertainty the first order of business. For example, a leader might kick off the process by sharing as much information as possible about the reasons for the reorganization, painting a picture of the future company and explaining what the specific implications will be for the people who work there.Much will be unknown, but being clear about what is known and willing to acknowledge what is not goes a long way toward ameliorating uncertainty threats. Reorganizations also stir up threats to autonomy, because people feel they lack control over their future. An astute leader will address these threats by giving people latitude to make as many of their own decisions as possible — for example, when the budget must be cut, involving the peo ple closest to the work in deciding what must go. Because many reorganizations entail information technology upgrades that undermine peo- ple’s perception of autonomy by foisting new systems on hem without their consent, it is essential to provide continuous support and solicit employees’ participation in the design of new systems. Top-down strategic planning is often inimical to SCARF -related reactions. Having a few key leaders come up with a plan and then expecting people to buy into it is a recipe for failure, because it does not take the threat response into account. People rarely support initiatives they had no part in designing; doing so would undermine both autonomy and status. Proactively addressing these concerns by adopting an inclusive planning process can prevent the kind of unconscious sabotage hat results when people feel they have played no part in a change that affects them every day. Leaders often underestimate the importance of addressing threats to fairness. This is especially true when it comes to compensation. Although most people are not motivated primarily by money, they are profoundly de-motivated when they believe they are being unfairly paid or that others are overpaid by comparison. Leaders who recognize fairness as a core concern understand that disproportionately increasing compensation at the top makes it impossible to fully engage people at the middle or lower end of the pay cale. Declaring that a highly paid executive is â€Å"doing a great job† is counterproductive in this situation because those who are paid less will interpret it to mean that they are perceived to be poor performers. For years, economists have argued that people will change their behavior if they have sufficient incentives. But these economists have defined incentives almost exclusively in economic terms. We now have reason to believe that economic incentives are effective only when people perceive them as supporting their social needs. Status can also be enhanced by giving an employee reater scope to plan his or her schedule or the chance to develop meaningful relationships with those at different levels in the organization. The SCARF model thus provides leaders with more nuanced and cost-effective ways to expand the definition of reward. In doing so, SCARF principles also provide a more granular understanding of the state of engagement, in which employees give their best performance. Engagement can be induced when people working toward objectives feel rewarded by their efforts, with a manageable level of threat: in short, when the brain is generating rewards in several SCARF-related dimensions.Leaders themselves are not immune to the SCARF and cognitive problem solving reside in the lateral, or outer, portions of the brain, whereas the middle regions support self-awareness, social skills, and empathy. These regions are inversely correlated. As Lieberman notes, â€Å"If you spend a lot of time in cognitive tasks, your ability to have empathy for people is reduced simply because that part of your circuitry doesn’t get much use. † Perhaps the greatest challenge facing leaders of business or government is to create the kind of atmosphere that promotes status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and fairness.When historians look back, their judgment of this period in time may rise or fall on how organizations, and society as a whole, operated. Did they treat people fairly, draw people together to solve problems, promote entrepreneurship and autonomy, foster certainty wherever possible, and find ways to raise the perceived status of everyone? If so, the brains of the future will salute them. + Resources Reprint No. 09306 John T. Cacioppo and William Patrick, Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection (W. W. Norton, 2008): A scientific look at the causes and effects of emotional isolation.Michael Marmot, The Status Syndrome: How Social Standing Affects Our Health and L ongevity (Times Books, 2004): An epidemiologist shows that people live longer when they have status, autonomy, and relatedness, even if they lack money. David Rock, Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long (HarperBusiness, 2009): Neuroscience explanations for workplace challenges and dilemmas, and strategies for managing them. David Rock and Jeffrey Schwartz, â€Å"The Neuroscience of Leadership,† s+b, Summer 2006, www. strategy-business. om/press/article/06207: Applying breakthroughs in brain research, this article explains the value of neuroplasticity in organizational change. David Rock, â€Å"SCARF: A Brain-based Model for Collaborating with and Influencing Others,† NeuroLeadership Journal, vol. 1, no. 1, December 2008, 44: Overview of research on the five factors described in this article, and contains bibliographic references for research quoted in this article. Naomi Eisenberger and Matthew Lieb erman, with K. D. Williams, â€Å"Does Rejection Hurt? An fMRI Study of Social Exclusion,† Science, vol. 302, no. 643, October 2003, 290–292: Covers the Cyberball experiment. Naomi Eisenberger and Matthew Lieberman, â€Å"The Pains and Pleasures of Social Life,† Science, vol. 323, no. 5916, February 2009, 890–891: Explication of social pain and social pleasure, and the impact of fairness, status, and autonomy on brain response. NeuroLeadership Institute Web site, www. neuroleadership. org: Institute bringing together research scientists and management experts to explore the transformation of organizational development and performance. For more business thought leadership, sign up for s+b ’s RSS feeds at www. trategy-business. com/rss 10 features special report dynamic; like everyone else, they react when they feel their status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and fair treatment are threatened. However, their reactions have more impact, because th ey are picked up and amplified by others throughout the company. (If a company’s executive salaries are excessive, it may be because others are following the leader’s intuitive emphasis, driven by subconscious cognition, on anything that adds status. ) If you are an executive leader, the more practiced you are at reading yourself, the more effective you will e. For example, if you understand that micromanaging threatens status and autonomy, you will resist your own impulse to gain certainty by dictating every detail. Instead, you’ll seek to disarm people by giving them latitude to make their own mistakes. If you have felt the hairs on the back of your own neck rise when someone says, â€Å"Can I offer you some feedback? † you will know it’s best to create opportunities for people to do the hard work of self-assessment rather than insisting they depend on performance reviews. When a leader is self-aware, it gives others a feeling f safety even in un certain environments. It makes it easier for employees to focus on their work, which leads to improved performance. The same principle is evident in other groups of mammals, where a skilled pack leader keeps members at peace so they can perform their functions. A self-aware leader modulates his or her behavior to alleviate organizational stress and creates an environment in which motivation and creativity flourish. One great advantage of neuroscience is that it provides hard data to vouch for the efficacy and value of so-called soft skills. It also shows the danger of being a hard-charging eader whose best efforts to move people along also set up a threat response that puts others on guard. Similarly, many leaders try to repress their emotions in order to enhance their leadership presence, but this only confuses people and undermines morale. Experiments by Kevin Ochsner and James Gross show that when someone tries not to let other people see what he or she is feeling, the other part y tends to experience a threat response. That’s why being spontaneous is key to creating an authentic leadership presence. This approach is likely to minimize status threats, increase certainty, nd create a sense of relatedness and fairness. Finally, the SCARF model helps explain why intelligence, in itself, isn’t sufficient for a good leader. Matthew Lieberman’s research suggests that high intelligence often corresponds with low self-awareness. The neural networks involved in information holding, planning, strategy+business magazine is published by Booz & Company Inc. To subscribe, visit www. strategy-business. com or call 1-877-829-9108. For more information about Booz & Company, visit www. booz. com Looking Booz & Company Inc.  © 2009 for Booz Allen Hamilton? It can be found at at www. boozallen. com

Essay on Killing Chickens - 1041 Words

Killing Chickens Betrayal and loneliness are two of the hardest emotions to encounter in life. Nevertheless, at some point everyone will experience and be forced to deal with them. This is made even harder when they are caused by someone you love and trust. In Meredith Hall’s â€Å"Killing Chickens†, she uses various literary devices such as metaphor, simile, and imagery as she processes her husband’s affair and describes having to kill chickens. Hall’s literary nonfiction is based on the happenings of a specific day that was truly hard to handle after being deceived by ones she loved: I was killing chickens. It was my 38th birthday. My brother had chosen that morning to tell me that he had caught his wife – my best friend, Ashley – in†¦show more content†¦Ã¢â‚¬ËœBetter hide my surprise.’† Just as Hall identifies the chickens and her children, she explains, â€Å"I turned her on her floppy neck again and again. Corkscrewing her breathing tube, struggling to end the gasping.† Just as Hall is making many attempts to kill the chicken, she is unable to do it until it finally gives in. This is the same way her husband has been treating her for the past ten years with all the rumors and suspicions until finally she reached a breaking point. The author uses a number of different literary devices to describe the hardship she feels such as metaphor, simile, and imagery. The author revels that her life and the chickens are not very different. â€Å"I felt her body break deep inside my own chest† (6). The way the chicken has t o be killed after being loved for so long is the same way Hall feels about being with her husband for so long and then having him cheat on her and leave her. â€Å"Guilt and fear tugged me like an undertow† (7). The chickens are being killed by the one that loved them and in the same way; Hall is killed by the one she loved: her husband. The author uses a numerous number of vivid imagery to describe the struggle she is going through with her husband leaving and her having to kill the chickens. â€Å"Her shiny black beak opened and closed, opened and closed† (5). The rumors and suspicions that the author’s husband was cheating on her would come and go, until it reached a breaking pointShow MoreRelatedAnalysis of A Savage Life Essay1085 Words   |  5 Pagesbutchers chickens every few years with some friends in order to make a small profit. She immediately describes the process: â€Å"we had decapitated, gutted, plucked, cleaned and swaddled each bird in plastic wrap for the freezer†¦for dinner that night we ate vegetables† (633). This declaration is powerful in that it shows Winckler does not find chicken appetizing after butchering it; she is conveying that most meat-eaters would be turned off by the process of slaughtering their own chickens. She remarksRead MoreThe Current State Of Americas Meat Industry1569 Words   |  7 Pageslive animals continue along the conveyor belt for processing. Accounts of live animals being skinned alive and going through immense suffering, despite the many measures that exist to prevent such incidents, reveal that these very well-organized killing machines are not able to ensure humane treatment at all times and for every individual animal. Pollan argues that transparency in the meat industry would hold businesses accountable to regulations and to the desires of the consumer as well as preventingRead MoreFactory Farming and Animal Cruelty581 Words   |  3 Pagesthing they can do to the poor helpless animals. Factory farming effects chickens, cows, pigs, and many other animals that are used for food, milk and eggs. One of the biggest organizations against factory farming is called Compassion Over Killing (COK). They go to great lengths to protest and inform people about animal cruelty. Chickens have to endure suffering that no living thing should have to go through. The egg laying chickens have to be forced into tiny cages without enough room to stretch theirRead More My Mom the Powerhouse Essay717 Words   |  3 Pagesoranges. To help feed the family, my moms father raised chickens. When it came time to eat a chicken, he would wring its neck, and it would flop all over the back yard before dying. My mother got attached to one chicken and made it her pet. She named it Miss Red. Miss Red would lay brown eggs, and my mom would collect them. My moms father killed all the other chickens for food, and he tried to avoid killing Miss Red, but she was the last chicken, and the family needed food. He waited until my mom hadRead MoreEssay on Food Inc - Rhetorical Analysis1329 Words   |  6 Pagesreally told is that he is an author with interest in mass produced foods, an attempt at ethos that falls somewhat flat. Instead of doing this however, a new industry has emerged: one that combines ammonia with hamburger filler for the companies, killing any strains of e-coli before they can reach the consumer. The film attempts to portray a deadly cycle, where untested solutions often produce deadly side-effects; which are in turn fixed with even more untested solutions, a technique that seems quiteRead MoreWhats Behind The Curtain?1178 Words   |  5 Pagesgreat animal suffering; for example the raising process of food chickens. These chickens are cooped up in dark rooms with thousands of other chickens. In these dark rooms, the chickens can barely even walk to their food and water dishes, and many chickens even die do to the severe conditions. Cows and pigs are treated just as badly as the chickens. In the movie, there is a clip where an injured cow to prodded and forced into the killing chamber so that the owners of the company can earn a little moreRead MoreLivestock And Our World : Where s The Beef1278 Words   |  6 Pageshens are larger in compari son to their white laying counterparts, so they require more feed, on average to produce the same quantity of eggs. Brown eggs are produced to meet consumer demand, because white egg laying chickens are more efficient than brown, blue, or green egg laying chickens. Another misconception is the labels put on eggs such as â€Å"free range† or â€Å"cage free.† These labels are very loosely regulated, if regulated at all, and any company can slap that label on an egg carton without trulyRead MoreThe Misunderstanding of Humans Relationship with Nature Essay1781 Words   |  8 Pagesdaily basis is chicken. Chicken is one of the most common types of meat that we eat. As the demand on chicken increase, prices increase too. Small independent businesses cannot reduce their prices since their production is limited. This led big businesses to be in the lead in mass production with their lower prices. As the chairman of Perdue farms, one of the biggest chicken farms in the U.S., Jim Perdue said: â€Å"I think things had to become bigger in order to keep costs lower.† As chicken productionRead MoreArgumentative Essay : Argumentative Synthesis1734 Words   |  7 Pagesbenefitting from factory farming. Companies such as KFC developed a demand for chicken which fueled the Tyson’s chicken company and also gave the opportunity for Perdue’s battery cages to grow (Fast Foods). Factory farming developed an industry that had animal producers and industrial suppliers, supplying and building off each other, causing a chain reaction. In this case, the factory farming not only benefitted KFC who needed chicken to supply their booming industry but also smaller companies such as Perdue’sRead MoreAssignment Questions On Organizational Change2419 Words   |  10 Pages such as mono sodium glutamate and aspartame. Even though they are approved by the FDA, it has proven that these additives lead to diseases and weight issues. For example, chicken breast used at McDonald s can contain a lot of negative elements such as modified corn starch and gluten from corn, which is also modified. Chicken should not be 60% made of corn; however, this is the negative reality. There are sever al negative aspects of consuming fast food, such as: it increases the blood pressure,

Pros and Cons of Sending Parents to Elderly Nursing Homes

Many adults have elderly parents who could benefit from living in a retirement home. However, it’s hard to decide to send an elderly parent to a retirement home because there are several other care options available. Furthermore, this decision can be made more challenging because most retirement homes have several pros and cons that should be fully considered beforehand. Here is a brief look at some of the most important pros and cons to consider before finding an elderly parent the right retirement home. Perhaps it can help you make a more informed decision about entering a retirement home. On one hand, sending an elderly parent to a retirement home provides elderly people and their families several benefits that are hard to overlook.†¦show more content†¦Furthermore, many elderly people’s families have also had difficulty with staff members who are unwilling to work with clients’ families to resolve concerns. These problems can make it very frustrating to find the appropriate retirement home because it can be difficult to find a retirement home that has a staff that is willing to answer consumer’s questions about their services. Finally, many people also forget that some elderly people have trouble living in a retirement home. This is true for many reasons. For example, some elderly people are so independent that they have a hard time accepting help from others. Other elderly people have problems living in a retirement home because they have a hard time getting along with certain staff members because of personality differences. These problems can make it difficult for many elderly people to live in a retirement home because their personalities make it hard for them to live in some living situations. As you can see, there are many pros and cons to consider before entering a retirement home. This makes it important to research all of your care options before selecting the right option for your elderly loved one. Doing this will not only help you make a more informed decision for your loved one, it can also make a real difference in your elderly loved one’s overall quality of life. As a result, be sure to explore the pros of cons of entering aShow MoreRelatedThe Aging Population Of America9973 Words   |  40 Pagesillnesses that in the past resulted in a decreased life expectancy. In addition to needing more medical care, the elderly often relies on an informal network of friends and family to help them with their daily needs. Unfortunately, the number of unofficial caregivers is also expected to decline. In 2010, researchers estimated that there were seven potential caregivers for every elderly adult over age 80. This ratio will drop to four to one by 2030 and eventually fall to three to one by 2050, becauseRead MoreBohlander/Snell-Managing Hr24425 Words   |  98 Pagesdifferent countries that HR managers need to consider. objective Identify the characteristics of a good international compensation plan. objective Explain how domestic and international HRM differ. objective Reconcile the difficulties of home- and host-country performance appraisals. objective Discuss the staffing process for individuals working internationally. objective Explain how labor relations differ around the world. PART 6 Expanding Human Resources Management Horizons Read MoreHuman Resources Management150900 Words   |  604 PagesFastest Employment Growth, 1996—2006 Numbers in Thousands of Jobs Occupation Database administrators, computer support specialists, and all other computer scientists Computer engineers Systems analysts Personal and home care aides Physical and corrective therapy assistants and aides Home health aides Medical assistants Desktop publishing specialists Physical therapists Occupational therapy assistants and aides Employment 1996 212 216 506 202 84 495 225 30 115 16 2006 461 451 1,025 374 151 873 391 53Read MoreFundamentals of Hrm263904 Words   |  1056 PagesLevi-Strauss Mars Company McDonald’s Motorola Nabisco Nike Oracle Otis Elevator Principal Financial Group Priority Staffing Proctor Gamble Remington San Diego Zoological Society Sears Siemens Southwest Airlines Starbucks Sun Microsystems Target The Home Depot Transportation Safety Administration Tropicana Unilever UPS Volvo Wal-Mart Whirlpool Corp. Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc. Xerox And much more! About the Authors DAVID A. DECENZO received his Ph.D. from West Virginia University. He is the presidentRead MoreMarketing Mistakes and Successes175322 Words   |  702 Pagesyears old and were doctoral students at Stanford. Sergey was a math whiz, having completed his undergraduate degree at 19, and aced all ten of the required doctoral exams on his first try, and teamed easily with professors doing research. His parents’ backgrounds were rich in science and technology. His mother was a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. His father, Michael, taught math at the University of Maryland. Sergey was born in Moscow, but he and his family left the SovietRead MoreExploring Corporate Strategy - Case164366 Words   |  658 Pagesfollowed his drugs crack-down: If they say ‘we’re going to kill you’, you know what you’re up against. But the threats [from London’s East End drugs gangs] are much more sinister. The word is fed back that if the business is cut off, they will follow you home, go for your family, stab you or murder you.2 But Palumbo persisted in making his club a safer, cleaner environment. During the 1990s, he campaigned nationally against the use of drugs in youth venues. Thus the Ministry of Sound led in the transformationRead MoreStephen P. Robbins Timothy A. 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In 1979, he came off the dole queue to open the Goose and Firkin pub in London after raising a loan against his home. By 1988, he had built a chain of eighteen pubs, which he sold for  £6.6 million, intending to retire with his  £2 million share. But he could not resist going back into business and is now trading as Inn Securities and building up a chain of Hedgehog

The Liberator By Alberto Arvelo - 1089 Words

The Liberator, directed by Alberto Arvelo, is a historical biographical film documenting the life of Simon Bolivar and his struggle against the Spanish for equality in South America. Somewhat surprisingly, the cast is an incredibly gifted cast in comparison with other Latin American produced films with smaller budgets. Édgar Ramà ­rez was the main actor who played the role of Simon Bolivar in the film. Erich Wildpret played the critical role of Antonio Jose de Sucre. This prominent general was murdered near the conclusion of the film. The third major character in the film was actress Marà ­a Valverde. She played the supporting role of Maria Teresa Bolivar, Simon’s early wife (IMDB, The Liberator 2013). After opening with a coup against†¦show more content†¦The film documents many of the fights and journeys following the exile of Bolivar including a trek across the Andes Mountain Range in order to attack the Spaniards in Bolivia. After these journeys, the film de monstrates the political upheaval and consternation that arose due to the self-centered ambition of some political figures opposing a unified South America. These men instigated another revolution against Bolivar and his ideals and although the coup in the opening scene was not successful at that particular moment, betrayal eventually led to an implication of the Bolivar’s murder at the hands of the rebels. When this film was released in the US on June 15, 2014, there was a mixed reception from critics. Many questioned the historical accuracy of the film, primarily the portrayed death of Bolivar, Bolivar’s extensive journey over the Andes mountain range in the middle of winter in order to reach Colombia, and some other minor dramatic elements in the film that increase the intrigue and plot of the film. The major historical error in this film is in regards to Bolivar’s portrayed death. It is widely accepted that Bolivar did not die at the hands of murderous trait ors, but instead died from tuberculosis at age 47. In spite of this, many critics ranked the film

History of Management Theory Free Essays

Running Head: HISTORY OF MANAGEMENT THEORY History of Management Theory Troy Thompson 5409 Foxglove Drive, Bossier City, LA 71112 318-918-7413 Troythompson98@yahoo. com MSM 500 May 21, 2010 Class Instructor: Dr. David Bouvin Ellis University Introduction People and processes are the main elements under management purview, and it is interesting to learn how managerial philosophy pertaining to these two elements has evolved from the Industrial Revolution throughout the Progression Era and into the modern workplace. We will write a custom essay sample on History of Management Theory or any similar topic only for you Order Now The purpose of this paper will focus on Frederick Taylor’s Scientific Management, also known as the Taylor System, and Elton Mayo’s Human Relations business models and how they relate to this managerial evolution. Both Taylor and Mayo were iconic masterminds who lit the torch of innovative management for America to progress out from days of uncontrolled process variation and unethical human treatment towards a new beginning of quality management and human respect in the workplace. The primary sources examined are Chapter 1 of Frederick Taylor’s The Principles of Scientific Management, and The Encylopedia of the History of American Management, Elton Mayo. Both sources will guide this paper in the direction of modern day relevancy. The Taylor System Before the Taylor System, factories during the Industrial Revolution concentrated on meeting the demand agriculture commerce from both home and abroad (Montagna, 1981). The focus was not necessarily on quality or the treatment of human labor (Montagna, 1981). Instead, the environment reflected heavy-and-go forms of process flow combined with poorly supervised labor. With his engineering mind and passion for efficiency, Taylor responded to these inadequacies and began his efforts of applying mathematics and engineering principles to eliminate unnecessary effort in operations. The Taylor System gave birth to the following management practices: Incentive-Driven work performances, Time-Motion Studies, Centralized Management, Task Specialization, and Quality Control (Taylor, 1911). All these adoptions gave rise to a new management school of thought centered around a more productive work place, which Taylor considered to be â€Å"maximum prosperity† (Taylor, 1911). Taylor firmly believed in developing â€Å"captains of industry† rather than waiting on natural-born leaders to come along (Taylor, 1911). He also recognized a need for more involvement from the supervisors in the workplace to help eliminate what he referred to as soldiering, or, laxed employee output. He said, â€Å"The 30 percent to 100 percent increase in wages which the workmen are able to earn beyond what they receive under the old type of management, coupled with the daily intimate shoulder to shoulder contact with the management, entirely removes all cause for soldiering† (Taylor, 1911). As the turn of the twentieth century neared, the progressive landscape begged for more efficient business practices (The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, line 16). This was the optimal time for the principles by which operational capacity could be measured, analyzed, streamlined, and controlled to take hold. This system then became a cornerstone on beset of the Great Depression and followed by future management theorists from then on after. One criticism of Scientific Management is that it demanded top-performance in every worker and near perfect throughput on the production line, developing into a quasi authoritarian-style form of bureaucracy. Workers were afraid to out-produce one another on the basis of peer pressure (Taylor, 1911). Taylor’s system was based on good intention, but just lacked understanding of the human side to the workplace. This left room for the work of Elton Mayo to yield fruition. Elton Mayo (Human Relations) Elton Mayo became famous through the Western Electric Company research project. The initial purpose of the project was to find ways to improve worker productivity. He and his team looked at how lighting, rest breaks, room temperature, etc. ffected worker productivity (Mayo, 2006). Through his research, he found a distinct discovery knows as the â€Å"Hawthorne Effect†, which described an increase in output by workers who perceived that they are being watched and studied somehow (Mayo, 2006). Mayo viewed the Hawthorne Effect as a symptom of a bigger issue. He then diverted from his original hypothesis of physical factors to the examination the socio-political factors. What he found was that employees valued acceptance by their peers more than anything else (Mayo, 2006). Also unique about Mayo’s observations was the paradigm-burst that employees were not motivated primarily due to compensation, but were motivated primarily due to job satisfaction; this, of course, was a stark difference in Taylor’s theory that men were motivated best when they were given wages that were commensurate with their skill level. In support of Mayoism, as his principles later became known for, I applaud his principles of human relations that captured the essence of the Progressive Era in that they advanced employee respect in the workplace. Due to his influence, business leaders began to ask the question, what can be done to make our employees happier? New policies were adopted such as exit interviews, participative problem solving, and most novel of all – human relations (Mayo, 2006). Conclusion The essence of Taylor and Mayo’s legacies are of human ingenuity applied to enhance work settings, in terms of both people and processes. The best form of both elements can be seen in today’s business strategy of continuous process improvement, which is a group effort to optimize key processes in an organization. From Six Sigma, to Gantt Charts, to Brainstorming, to Exit Interviews, it is hard to imagine a work setting without the production techniques these two management gurus inspired. For example, the Air Force has embraced a culture of innovation called Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century (AFSO21). Through AFSO21, Airmen are encouraged to look at the way they do business and think of ways to make their areas more efficient, more safe, energy-saving, and effective. Many Fortune 500 companies have also incorporated continuous process improvement into their business mantra as a result of business management education guided by the wisdom of Taylor and Mayo. References American Society of Quality. http://www. asq. org/learn-about-quality/history-of-quality/overview/industrial-revolution. html Mayo, G. (2006). In Encyclopedia of the History of American Management. http://www. credoreference. com. libraryproxy. cardean. edu/entry/contham/mayo_george_elton Montagna, J. (1981). The Industrial Revolution. http://www. yale. edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1981/2/81. 02. 06. x. html#c Taylor, F. (1911). The Principles of Scientific Management. New York: Harper Bros. , 1911: 5- 29. http://www. fordham. edu/halsall/mod/1911taylor. html The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers. â€Å"The Progressive Era. † Teaching Eleanor Roosevelt, ed. by Allida Black, June Hopkins, et. al. (Hyde Park, New York: Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site, 2003). http://www. nps. gov/archive/elro/glossary/progressive-era. htm How to cite History of Management Theory, Papers

Artificial Sweeteners free essay sample

Artificial sweetners. Artificial sweetners have been in use for over one hundred years. A low calorie substitute for sugar it is used in many ways. Like it or not artificial sweetners are used in may low calorie products. Its no surprise that in todays weight conscious world people in an effort to lose weight will switch to these sweetners without a thought as to how these products have been made.. The soft drink industry has capitalized on dieting with their lines of soft drinks eg diet coke, diet pepsi,diet tonic water etc, all these diet drinks use sugar substitutes such as aspartame, saccharin or sucralose to sweeten their beverages and keep the calorie count low, In many cases diabetics use these substitutes to control their sugar intake. Artificial sweetners are also found in ice cream canned fruit Saccharin also known as â€Å"sweet n low† was the first artificial sweetner to be discovered by a researcher in the basement of a chemistry building. We will write a custom essay sample on Artificial Sweeteners or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page A researcher had fallen asleep with a cigar hanging out of his mouth – the cigar fell into a petrie dish , setting a chemical reaction into motion Saccharin is not only the oldest but it is the most challenged sweetner on the market. Saccharin has no calories is several hundred times sweeter than sugar, used in canned fruits, ice cream . Studies suggest that it is a mild carcinogen with rats showing high rates of bladder cancer after being fed this sweetner. The only advantage is that saccharin doesn’t convert to glucose in the body making it a popular choice of diabetics, However, it is a chemical that must be metabolized and eliminated from the body. Saccharin is not considered safe depending on the amount consumed and the overall health of the consumer. Especially of concern would be young children, teenagers pregnant women.