Saturday, December 28, 2019

Poverty Exposed in Elva Treviño Harts Autobiography,...

Life for young Elva Trevià ±o Hart was less than ideal and in her autobiography, Barefoot Heart she vividly explains the back-breaking work, financial hardships, and emotional struggles a migrant worker faces. Influenced by the struggles of day-to-day life, migrant work, school life, and society, Elva was shown over and over again what life would be like if she did not make an effort to change her predestined life. All too commonly people like Elva Trevià ±o who are born into poverty will remain living in such conditions for the rest of their lives; however, growing up in poor conditions will have a great positive influence the life decisions someone like Elva makes. Many people at one time or another will face some-sort of economic†¦show more content†¦The blue jeans were an embarrassment for her when she was around her white friends because they had a large hole. Sadly, being poor led Elva to be embarrassed many times throughout her young life. Her housing conditions wer e not much better than her holey jeans. The entire family lived in migrant housing which, unlike the Waldorf Astoria, is not known for its accommodations. â€Å"The coldness of the floor and the excitement of our new life made me jump out of my makeshift bed on the floor† (10). In reading that passage one might just see a little girl who is excited to start her new life, but what I saw was a little girl who had just slept on a cold floor all night. Despite how hard Elva might try to normalize the negative situations from her childhood they ultimately affected her life for the positive. Hard and honest work was instilled in all members of the Trevià ±o family by the time they were able to pick up a hoe. Modern day parents and many social workers would look at Apa like a slave driver working his wife and kids to the point of exhaustion on a daily basis. The Trevià ±o kids were not given the opportunity to have a carefree childhood. â€Å"He was taking a bunch of children to Minnesota, but he didn’t see it that way. My father knew nothing about children. He treated us like adults, expecting adult responses from us. We were a team going to work† (12). From a post-toddler age these kids were treated as adults and expected to work

Friday, December 20, 2019

Essay on Frida Kahlos Definition of Self - 1687 Words

Frida Kahlo is one of the most famous female painters to originate from the twentieth century, and for good reason. Her art is filled with beauty and creativity, but Frida’s main source of fame comes from the emotions that these paintings invoke, rather than the actual paintings. This is because Frida put herself into every painting she did, leaving traces of her presence all throughout this world and these traces remain long after her physical departure. Frida was a very peculiar and unique individual, hence, Frida’s definition of what a person is, or rather, what a self is, follows accordingly. The self is the reality that one conceives, and this self will live long after the physical body dies, continuing on as long as their†¦show more content†¦Also, it seems that the monkey on Frida’s shoulder is trying to dismantle this thorn necklace, so even with these other guardians or friends that Frida has transcended from her mind to the canvas she still exists in some from of anguish. To extrapolate one step further, Frida feels that no one can help her in this world of suffering, even if they desire to, and she is ultimately isolated in her own sense of reality. Throughout her career, Frida had shown many different themes of her life through her paintings. It seems clear, through analyzation of her paintings, that Frida lived something of a double life. Frida paints herself in distinctly different ways at times, sometimes she is a beautiful woman with strength like iron, and sometimes she is a frail damsel who has been broken already and will be broken again. Contrasting paintings include Self Portrait with Monkeys (Kahlo, 1) and Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace, Diego and I (Kahlo, 1) and The Love Embrace of the Universe, the Earth (Mexico), Me, Diego, and Mr. Xolotl (Kahlo, 1). All of these paintings show that not only is there a contrast in her personality, in fact, Frida’s is actually two different people, as sh e paints it. Frida’s double personality is most present (excepting arguably The Two Fridas, which will be mentioned later in this essay) in her painting Tree of Hope, StandShow MoreRelatedThe Double Self Portrait By Frida Kahlo1605 Words   |  7 PagesOn first impression, The Two Fridas(1939) by Frida Kahlo, is an image that appears grim and sad, with a gloomy atmosphere, set by the background, and a gruesome imagery seen through the open, bloody hearts. The double self-portrait is an oil and canvas image of a European and Mexican Frida. The European Frida’s dress is covered in blood from a cut heart vein, and both the women’s hearts are exposed, with European Frida’s appearing broken. The two figures are sat in the foreground of the image, withRead MoreLove as a Major Muse: Analyzing Frida Kahlos Relationship With Diego Rivera1054 Words   |  4 PagesFrida Kahlo is quoted as saying, I suffered two grave accidents in my life. One in which a streetcar knocked me down. The other accident is Diego, (cited by Botis 1). The love relationship between Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera is one of the most famous in modern art. Their relationship was tumultuous, which seemed to be a good recipe for creativity and artistic self-expression. It is a well-known fact that they had a passionate and stormy relationship, filled with great love and also betrayalsRead MoreArt as an Embodied Imagination22095 Words   |  89 Pagesthey ingest, and protect their environment. These personal motivations manifest a form of self-discipline (the disciplinary gaze has become an ordering principle of social life): the consumer adopts the perspective of his or her self, so it becomes natural to regard one’s body as a socially visible object that can and should be reconstructed to convey preferred meanings (Joy and Venkatesh 1994). In building a self-image and an identity, consumers engage in continuous processes (moral and otherwise)Read MoreArt as an Embodied Imagination22095 Words   |  89 Pagesthey ingest, and protect their environment. These personal motivations manifest a form of self-discipline (the disciplinary gaze has become an ordering principle of social life): the consumer adopts the perspective of his or her self, so it becomes natural to regard one’s body as a socially visible object that can and should be reconstructed to convey preferred meanings (Joy and Venkatesh 1994). In building a self-image and an identity, consumers engage in continuous processes (moral and otherwise)

Thursday, December 12, 2019

Cisco It Fiasco free essay sample

The main purpose of an ERP system is to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions within an organization. ERP systems also aim to simplify the sales process by automating the entry requirements and making it easier for different business functions to access the information. The systems can run on a number of hardware or network configurations; however, they usually use a database as a warehouse for information. 2. At the start of the case, Ciscos information systems are failing, yet no one steps forward to lead the effort to replace them. Why is this? Why were no managers eager to take on this project? At the beginning of the case, Cisco’s information systems were failing because they were experiencing exponential growth and the IT systems that were in place could not provide the reliability and maintenance for this magnitude of growth. Companies that experience this kind of growth usually make decisions based off the status quo and assume that what has worked in the past will continue to work going forward. In addition, with such sizable growth, implementing changes to the company’s information systems can have substantial effects on the continued success of the company, making any recommendation for change extremely daunting. Coupled with the fact that most people are change averse, no one wanted to run over the legacy systems Cisco already had in place so they just tried to continue to Band-Aid the issues with system replacements. Managers were not eager to take on this project because if its importance and its stature. As stated in the case by Pete Solvick, â€Å"you know, careers are lost over much less money than this. † (Course Reader p. 126) These types of projects when approved and implemented usually go one of two ways; people are either praised for their success or blamed for their failure, therefore not only was the project extremely expensive, but it carried the additional burden of job security for those in charge. In addition, a project of this magnitude also requires a significant amount of ime and resources by every department within the organization, thus managers would be weary to take the lead on a project like this because it would impede on the resources they have for their other responsibilities and job functions. 3. What would you change in the Cisco organization to enable enterprise-wide IT systems (as opposed to the situation pointed out in question 2 above)? In order to enable enterprise wide IT systems it is crucial to create a culture that fosters innovation and rewa rds recommendations for continuous improvement on business processes. Focusing on long-term growth objectives and encouraging managers to become active in participating in improvement projects will increase their buy in and alleviate any stress of the negative consequences that most associate with projects of this stature. Initiating monthly progress meetings to determine how the companies’ processes are facilitating their growth and overall corporate strategy will help elevate any issues that need to be promptly addressed. It would also be beneficial for executives to appoint task forces for continuous improvement projects and present these positions as opportunities for future career growth. . Cisco was highly successful with its ERP effort. What accounts for this success? What were the most important things that Cisco did correctly? What could they have done better? Cisco began the successful implementation of the ERP system right off the bat by establishing a strong partnership with KPMG and choosing the right people for the Cisco team. It i s crucial with projects of this magnitude to get the right people in place before you decide what direction you are going and Cisco made it a point to build the strongest team possible. Furthermore, the team reached out to industry professionals to gain as much knowledge as possible by leveraging the experience of others, which assisted them in picking the right vendor. After choosing the vendor, contracting based on capability instead of configuration proved to be extremely helpful after cutting over. This alleviated a lot of additional costs that could have come from modifications that were made once they realized the systems flaws and constraints. Internally, the support from top management in making the project a top riority company wide, reiterated the importance of the transition, which in turn fostered support from everyone in the organization. In terms of the development and implementation, the use of cross-functional teams proved to be very effective in giving the project team an all-encompassing view of each business functions requirements for the new system. The steering committee also broadened the view of the project while simultaneously indicating the importance placed on the project’s success. Lastly, the approach Cisco used, rapid iterative prototyping, proved successful because it allowed them to build off of a series of phases, which enabled them to uncover issues along the way and address concerns or modification requirements during the design process and take a proactive approach to risk management. However, Cisco could have allocated more time in the planning process to predict some of the modifications required such as the â€Å"data warehouse† and the support package. Additionally, Cisco could have improved on CRP3, the testing phase. Spending more time on testing the system and using varying sizes of data would have allowed them to realize that the hardware architecture and the sizing needed to be adjusted to support their business. 5. List and describe the pros and cons of standardizing IT components. The pros for standardizing IT components are that it simplifies business processes and eliminates each business function from making decisions based solely on what is most optimal for that specific unit. It allows you to dictate how you want to process to flow and ensure that each business function is speaking the same language. It also enables the company to eliminate customization within each business function with the desired results of creating a seamless work flow. Additionally, once implemented, a standardized IT system it is less costly and requires less resources if you have standard products. On the other hand, business processes are different among the different business functions. Therefore by eliminating customization, each business function is forced to change the way processes are handled, and in an extreme situation, this could lead to ineffective processes or the system proving unable to support your processes without customization. 6. List some take-aways from this case that would be helpful to a manager who finds himself in a prominent role for an enterprise-wide IT project (need not be ERP)? There are many important take-aways from the case; however, one of the main advantages to a uccessful IT project is ensuring you have a strong team in place and that you establish a strong partnership with any third party companies used as well as vendors. Companies will not always have every expertise needed for specific projects, so taping into the knowledge and leveraging the experience of industry experts will always give you a better understand of what you are getting in to. Gaining support from top management as well as the enterprise as a whole is also cruci al to a successful implementation. Projects of this stature require significant time and multiple resources therefore having everyone on board to assist when necessary can smooth out workflows and ensure that issues are taken care of promptly. From a system standpoint, the most important take-away is the necessity for balance between a customized and standardized system. While it is beneficial for the enterprise as a whole to have a standardized IT system for simplicity purposes, it is required to have some level of customization to ensure each business unit is being supported by the system. Over standardizing the system can make individual business processes burdensome to a point where the overall system no longer supports the business as a whole. On the other hand, over customizing the system alleviates the burden from each individual business unit; however, each unit is now operating differently creating unnecessary tasks and non-value added work for the organization. Therefore, it is crucial to have a balanced system that will support each individual business unit as well as the enterprise as a whole.