Robert Hutchins Goddard :: biographies biography bio

Many of the the most important features of modern rockets, missiles, and even spacecraft use the principles pioneered by Dr. Robert Goddard. Before his work, many people didn't even believe thrust could propel a rocket in a vacuum and, because of this, he was ridiculed by the New York Times when he proposed that space travel with rockets was possible4. When he tried to tell the U.S. Army about the possibility of the Germans using rockets as weapons just before World War II, he was rebuffed. What he had warned became a reality however, when German V-2 rockets hit London. After the war was over, German scientists admitted that much of the design for the V-2 had been taken from Goddard's patents, which were publicly available4. Even though many people didn't take his work seriously, this didn't deter Goddard from the work he loved. He always kept working to advance rocketry, which he believed someday would be the means to travel into space. From his early experiments of measuring the thrust of solid fuel rocket engines on a bench with a ballistic pendulum3, to his last experiments with liquid fuel powered rockets that were over 20 feet long and traveled to altitudes of 9000 feet1, he forged the means to the space age. Before him, rocketry was relatively dead, while after him it was at the forefront of scientific research. Unlike when he first started his work, Dr. Goddard is now recognized for the important role he had in the fields of rocketry and liquid fuel propulsion. He is now known as the father of modern rocketry5. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland is named after him. He recently was named one of the 100 most important people of the 20th century by Time magazine4. In 1969, the New York Times even printed a piece acknowledging that Goddard had indeed been correct about thrust working in a vacuum. Robert Goddard's achievements 1,2 * First to explore mathematically the practicality of using rocket propulsion to reach high altitudes and even the moon (1912) * Received first U.S. patent in the idea of a multi-stage rocket (1914) * Proved, by actual test, that a rocket will work in a vacuum (1915)

How I Learned to Play the Guitar

How I Learned to Play the Guitar Guitar is one of the most popular musical instruments to learn because of its versatility and portability. When I was in high school, I had an abundance of leisure time. I wanted to do something meaningful and fun instead of wasting time on playing video games, so I decided to learn a musical instrument. Honestly speaking, I was a good singer; however, singing without a musical instrument to accompany me seemed strange. That is why I made up my mind to learn to play the guitar.Now I realize that I made a wise decision. To learn to play the guitar, I bought a guitar and a guitar pick. In addition, like playing other instruments, learning to play the guitar requires the love of music, perseverance, and patience. I learned some basic knowledge about the guitar and how to tune it. To illustrate, the neck of the guitar is divided by the strings from the left to the right and by the frets into sections from the top to the bottom. Moreover, every guitar has six strings and each string has a different size and note value.Each time before playing, I need to tune the strings. The tuning process is important for getting the right sound when I play. Next, I began to learn to play the chords, which are made up of different combination of notes. Each time I played the chords, a unique sound was created. The knowledge of the function of the frets and strings helped me identify the chords’ locations easily. There are a lot of chords on the guitar, but I could only memorize the most common chords.I could search for other chords online when I needed them. Now I can play the most important and fundamental five ‘major’ chords. I spend more than 30 minutes every day practicing without looking at the diagram of chords. At first, I strummed the strings slowly to see if all the strings rang clearly. When I could naturally play different chords, I would switch my fingers from one chord to another as quickly and precisely as possible. In this way, I could connect several chords together to make a song.There are many different types of scales, each with different characteristics, note patterns and musical qualities on the guitar. Playing improvisation means playing the scales in different orders. I also learned some techniques to enrich improvising, like mute, vibrato technique, advanced bend and so on. All the different techniques made improvisation fun and diverse. With the encouragement of my professor, I became very enthusiastic about playing the guitar. I carried my guitar everywhere and strummed notes whenever I was free.Before long, my fingertips developed calluses and the pain abated. Also, the more flexible and the stronger my fingers became, the easier I could play the chords. My fingers’ flexibility and strength turned out to be essential for improvisation on the guitar scales. At last, after learning to play the guitar for three months, I could play one of my favorite songs, ‘Time of Your Life’ by Green Day and some other songs with simple tunes. Then I quit my class and decided to learn to play the guitar by myself.Because I knew, practice makes perfect, in order to be a better and more skillful player, I had to practice more. I began to search music scores and videos online, and I followed them to learn new songs. Many uploaded videos on YouTube teach how to play different songs, and I benefited greatly from them. It took me some time to learn a new song, but the process was always fun and enjoyable. Even though I stopped going to the guitar class, I knew what to do and where to go to improve my skills. The most important lesson I learned about playing the guitar is that practice makes perfect.The only way to become a good guitar player is to practice every day. It has been said that professional guitar players practice 8 hours a day, so I knew there was a long way for me to go to become a good player. I am very delighted to say that I can play and sing qui te a few songs at the same time. It has been rewarding to learn to play the acoustic guitar, as it has opened up a whole new universe of expression, conversation and real pleasure. It also has been a great way to make friends, so it was worth making the effort to learn it.

Marketing Research for Costa Cafe Essay

Costa Coffee is one of the most famous coffee chains in the UK. It was founded in 1971 in Italy by two Italian brothers: Sergio and Bruno Costa. Costa company which introduced the first Costa coffee shops in the UK in the early 1980`s, had as a main objective to create and serve the finest authentic Italian coffee. Costa became part of Whitbread PLC in 1995 and has followed an expansion program, so to become recognized nationally. Despite that figures, Costa faces some problems, related to their competitors. A recent survey conducted by Allegra Strategies indicated that Starbucks Coffee (one of the main competitors of Costa), has the highest consumer brand recognition of all the chains, being recognized by a staggering 77% of coffee shop visitors followed by Costa Coffee with 72%. Naturally the management of Costa is very concerned. As Marketing research agency, we are about to conduct a marketing research to identify who are the typical customers of coffee outlets and ascertain their needs, expectations and buying behaviour. The decision problem that Costa Coffee management is facing is why Costa is losing customers from its main competitors. An appropriate research design has been conducted. Justifications will be given in order to prove why specific approaches were used. Background research in order to fully understand the problem at hand has also been conducted. Furthermore, a questionnaire has been designed so as to help us identify the typical customers of branded coffee shops and view their opinions and perceptions concerning the coffee market. In addition to the questionnaire, an observation technique has been followed in order to have a better perspective of customers’ buying behaviour and compare the efficiency of different coffee shops. Moreover, in order to fully address the components of the research a focus group has been conducted as well. Research findings are properly analysed in the form of tables and charts and the results of observation and focus group have been clearly presented. According to our analysis Costa coffee is the second favourite coffee shop after Starbucks. The needs, expectations and buying behaviour of the typical branded coffee shops have been identified and presented properly. Therefore Costa coffee management team can use this data in order to make several conclusions and implement new strategies that will satisfy the needs and expectations of typical coffee customers and become the leading UK coffee shop as to attract as many typical Costa prides itself on providing a genuine Italian real coffee experience, particularly as real espresso coffee originated in Italy. Italian brothers Sergio and Bruno Costa established Costa in 1971.At that time they first started importing and roasting beans, which was long before the current growth in coffee bars. The brothers began roasting and grinding coffee for wholesale to the catering market. From the very beginning, Sergio and Bruno Costa insisted on slow roasting beans in a traditional Italian drum roaster to give a quality of coffee that is recognized by their customers as superior to others. Costa samples, tests and selects beans which have the best flavor characteristics, and which are suitable for their authentic style of roasting, whether as a single variety, or as part of their selected blends. As real coffee experts they have created their reputation from the expert blending of Arabica and Robusta coffee, which they import from Indonesia and Brazil. Only by the right blending can the Arabica beans be correctly balanced by Robusta beans to create a coffee with great aroma, body and golden cream. This unique combination of beans is the original Costa blend and is why coffee lovers always visit Costa stores. The recipe, acclaimed for producing great tasting coffee with a distinctively rich fragrance and taste, is their most prized secret. Beans from 6 specially selected Arabica varieties are combined with those from a single Robusta to create just the right amount of ‘edge’ for the perfect espresso. Costa Coffee Store Espresso is the authentic Italian Pick-me-up and from listening to lovers of real coffee, they tend to agree! The four factors that influence the making of the perfect espresso at Costa (4 Ms) are:  ·Miscela: The coffee blend  ·Macinatura: The grinding of coffee  ·Macchina: The use of the correct machine and equipment  ·Mano: The hand skills of the barista In addition they only slow roast beans, this process takes at least 18 minutes-far longer than is the case for the majority of roasters. Slow roasting provides a fuller flavor and significantly reduces the presence of harsh and bitter acids. The wide appreciation of their secret coffee blend led to the opening of the first coffee UK Costa stores in the early 1980’s. This promoted the popularity of coffee bean sales and revitalized the trend towards drinking authentic Italian espresso, cappuccino and other espresso based drinks. Many coffee companies specialize in only one element of the coffee supply chain. For example: importing only, roasting only, wholesaling or retailing only. At Costa, the coffee production process starts from the stage of importing  the beans, to taking control of the whole process to ensure that standards are applied at all stages. They import beans to their specification, roast beans in their own roaster to the highest standard, they create their own unique blends of the finest coffees, they package and distribute to their outlets to ensure the highest quality and freshest product. The aim is to create and serve the finest authentic Italian real coffee experience every time. When entering a Costa Store, with its Continental ambience, a coffee lover will not just be able to consume the finest cup of real coffee around, but will be able to buy all the necessary equipment and coffee products required to repeat the Costa experience at home. Costa is expanding, opening stores in many locations such as high streets, airports, railway stations, shopping centers, office developments and leisure complexes. The Costa Wholesale division is also expanding nationwide, promoting sales of roasted coffee and coffee equipment in hotels, restaurants, multiple catering outlets and supermarkets. Now Costa can be experienced by a greater number of people in more ways than ever before. Costa became part of Whitbread Plc in 1995 and immediately established Whitbread as the market leader in the premium coffee shop sector. Before Whitbread acquired the company, thus between 1978-1994 there were 41 Costa outlets selling coffee as well as coffee beans. The first store being established in Victoria station in London-where it still runs successfully keeping up to the traditional coffee preparation methods. Since then, Costa has embarked on a major expansion programme in support of its Mission†¦Ã¢â‚¬ To become recognized nationally as the people to come to for the best Real Coffee Experience†. The company’s four values encompass everything they believe, how they should behave and act:  ·Cuore-(Kwor-reh)-sharing a love for coffee, making and serving the best coffee in the world. The roasting and blending knowledge, the coffee making skills and the dedication to service.  ·Onore-(On-or-reh)-Individual responsibility and sense of personal duty. People who take pride in what they do, in being able to achieve sales and profit targets, maximizing the potential of available resources and maintaining an excellent standard of guest and customer service.  ·Eccellenza-(Etch-el-n-zah)-Making the perfect coffee every time. Costa’s skilled Baristas are trained to create a coffee masterpiece in every cap they serve, within a strong retail merchandise environment. Its due to this focus in training that Costa has become well known throughout the UK for a perfect coffee every time, with a stylish and contemporary Italian ambience.  ·Audacia-(Aw-dah-chee-a)-Being challenging and innovative. Taking initiative, tackling tough issues and looking at the business with a critical eye. Costa offers thoroughly rewarding and stimulating environment for people who have the ability to make things happen. 4 At the heart of Whitbread’s strategy is the drive to provide experience, which its customers enjoy, appreciate and consider good value for money. It is this strategy, which has taken the company from brewing, into pubs, pub food, restaurants, hotels, and Leisure and also into high street retailing. Some of Whitbread’s businesses include Bella pasta, Pizza Hut (UK) Ltd, TGI Fridays, The Dome, Cafe Rouge and David Lloyd Leisure. Recently, Whitbread Plc is stepping up the overseas expansion of its Costa coffee brand with plans to open at least 55 new stores across Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, and Bahrain5. At the time being, there are 265 stores worldwide including countries such as Dubai, Kuwait and Germany. Samuel Whitbread, a brewer, founded Whitbread Plc in 1742. It became a public company in 1948. Over the years, the company became a restaurateur, an hotelier and (in 1995) an operator of healthy and fitness clubs in addition to its original status of brewer and pub owner. At the turn of the millennium, Whitbread was the country’s leading restaurant operator, number one in budget hotels and sports, health and fitness, first in the pub  restaurant and a clear winner in high street coffee shops6. The UK is becoming a nation of coffee drinkers, with coffee overtaking tea as the most popular drink outside home.7 A decade or so ago an Englishman would have balked at the idea of sitting at a table in his free time with a coffee rather than a beer in his hand. Coffee was a work pick-me-up or a post-meal sober-me-up, its taste and aroma just trivial distractions.8 But times change. And as Britain has become more cosmopolitan, consumers have realised that coffee does get more sophisticated than a jar of Cafà © Hag and that sipping a cappuccino while chatting with friends does not make you weird. Or Italian.8 It is a fact that the UK branded coffee shop chain sector has evolved into a multi-million pound industry after experiencing explosive growth over the past 4-5 years.9 In March 2001 market research firm Mintel compiled Coffee Shops/ Bars, a snapshot of the branded coffee market.8 It estimated the market for branded coffee to be worth more than  £65million, a 16-fold increase on 1994.8 Moreover according to a management consultancy, Allegra Strategies, the branded coffee chain segment currently represents 20.5% of the total UK coffee shop market, and is forecasted to grow by a compound annual growth rate of 20.4%, from 1,532 units in June 2001 to 2,435 outlets by December 2003.9 High street coffee bars have sprung up with such voracity that there is now talk of over-saturation, particularly in the London area.8 With just one branded coffee bar per 65000 people the UK is still playing catch up with the US, where the penetration levels are one per 27000.10 Four operators who control 63% of the branded coffee shop market dominate the UK coffee scene.8 Whitbread-owned Costa Coffee with 300 sites and US giant Starbucks Coffee Company with 294 account for the lion’s share, outstripping Caffe Nero and Coffee Republic who have 107 and 85 outlets respectively.8 Furthermore, the fact that Starbucks now has sites in Sainsbury’s stores and Waterstones bookshops, while Costa Coffee can be found on Abbey National  premises, shows that the new coffee houses have been recognised by leading UK companies as adding value to the experience of visiting them.7 The competition is very high as coffee chains, like Costa coffee, Starbucks, Coffee Republic, Cafe Nero and Prà ªt a Manger struggle for the top. Costa coffee has been a victim of this hard competition and faces a number of problems. According to recent findings from a consumer research conducted by Allegra Strategies Ltd, Starbucks has the highest consumer brand recognition of all the chains, being recognized by a staggering 77% of coffee shop visitors followed by Costa Coffee with 72%.9 Naturally, the management of Costa Coffee is very concerned. Their decision problem is what must be done in order to serve more consumers with different segmentation criteria, so they can overcome their main competitors, and therefore become the number one branded coffee shop in the UK. 2.MARKETING RESEARCH QUESTION/ OBJECTIVE 2.1.Research Objective The main research objective is to identify who are the typical customers of coffee outlets and ascertain their needs, expectations and buying behaviour. 2.2.Component questions of this research:  ·What are the key demographics and psychographics of branded coffee shops customers in the major centres in UK?  ·What is customer’s opinion on various branded coffee shops? Has it changed throughout the years?  ·What are the main criteria people use to decide on which coffee shop to go?  ·What do customers look for and expect from a coffee shop?  ·Have customers habits changed towards coffee in the past and how? 2.3.Decision outcomes On completion of this research, Costa management will know the typical customers of coffee shops, their needs, expectations, buying behaviour and opinions towards various branded coffee shops. Based on the research findings Costa management can implement new strategies in order to gain more customers and therefore, overcome its competitors and take the lead of the branded coffee shop chain sector. 3.RESEARCH DESIGN The research project will be carried out in two main phases utilising both exploratory and descriptive research techniques. We will begin by using exploratory research techniques in order to conduct further background research, as well as gathering information for the research project as a whole. The key methods of exploratory research that we will use will be, conducting secondary research, observation and focus group. These techniques involve qualitative research methods as they rely on a great deal of interpretation by the researcher and also because they generally involve smaller non-representative samples. It is more the nature of how the research is gathered and interpreted than of size of the samples that make a study qualitative. The first phase of our research is exploratory in nature that will allow us to gain insights about the typical customers of coffee outlets, their needs, expectations and buying behaviour. This information will give us the opportunity to build a better questionnaire, one that respondents can understand. Secondary research will first be conducted to find background information from internal and external data in order to diagnose and understand more precisely the research problem and to formulate an appropriate research design. When the secondary sources of data fail to provide the information necessary to meet the research objectives, primary data is going to be gathered. Further an exploratory and qualitative research in the form of observation will be carried out. We want to understand coffee drinking behaviour and brand dynamics and the best thing to do is to get as close as possible to real behaviour as it happens. Observation will be carried out under normal conditions, in a controlled environment. Three or more different coffee shop chains will be subject to this technique. During this procedure we will observe coffee being ordered, served, consumed on its own with snacks or pastries, consumed in a group setting, with the mood and atmosphere changing, with different types of consumer drinking different brands. The queuing system, the hygiene of the coffee shop and employee’s actions will be also observed, so that we can get an overall picture of each coffee shop and point out its advantages and disadvantages. Within a full-scale project we would conduct three to six observations in different times of the day so an objective overall picture of each coffee shop will be formed instead of being judged by one observation only. In order to sufficiently address our component questions a focus group will also be conducted. The group will include a maximum of ten people excluding the moderator and observers. We feel that in a focus group â€Å"group members ‘feed’ off each other and creatively reveal ideas that the researcher may not have thought of or dared to tackle† . The focus group will be useful to us in finding out what the current customer’s attitudes and perceptions regarding coffee are, as well as their needs and expectations towards branded coffee shops in UK. Within a full-scale project we would used three  to five focus groups consisting of a maximum of ten people each simply because we would have no time restrictions, this would make the results from various focus groups a lot more reliable to interpret than having just one focus group to study. Once we have carried out exploratory research we will be in position to proceed with the descriptive research- using quantitative techniques-, which will help in formulating a decision for the research question. In order to get reliable information a survey questionnaire will be developed, † The questionnaire must motivate the respondent to cooperate, become involved, and provide complete, honest and accurate answers† . We will use questionnaires consisting of around eighteen questions each and will be given out to 30 coffee drinkers divided into 15 male and 15 female, who visit branded coffee shops in London. This research will be conducted outside Brent Cross shopping mall, Middlesex University and among friends, family and work colleagues. This form of quantitative research will give us a more refined response and allow us to make resource allocation decisions, because we talk to more people who represent a larger portion of the target population, making our research more reliable. This technique will also augment the observation and focus group results and provide primary information about the purposes of research. The population group for our research is defined as UK male and female coffee drinkers, who have been to coffee shop chains within the past three months. The element for this population will be men and women coffee drinkers aged between 17-75. The extent of the population will be all coffee shop customers within London. Finally the time frame will be within the past three months. For this research project we will use a non-probability sampling method as we do not have a complete list of our population, and therefore clearly understand that we risk not having a representative sample. The sampling  technique that we will use will be that of quota sampling, a non-probability sampling procedure that ensures that various subgroups of a population will be represented on pertinent characteristics to the exact extent that the investigator desires. Ideally our sample size should be determined statistically -probably 1000-, but our restrains will limit us to only 30 branded coffee shop customers . Within a full-scale project sample size should be determined by statistics, according to the market’s current situation. Even though we will carry out the research face to face the research administration method we would have used if this were a full scale survey would have been Mail surveys, simply because mail surveying remains a popular data collection technique in commercial marketing research. In fact, more and more people participate in mail surveys than any other type of survey research . On first consideration, mail appears to be an attractive way to collect data. There are no interviews to recruit, train, monitor and pay. The entire study can be sent out and administered from a single location. Hard to reach respondents can be easily surveyed and can fill out the questionnaires in their spare time and wherever they like, whether they are at work or in the comfort of their own home. Mail surveys appear to be convenient, efficient and inexpensive. Like self-administrated questionnaires, mail surveys encounter problems with not having an interviewer present. In particular, no one is there to probe responses to open-ended questions, a real constrain on the types of information that can be sought. However probing responses to open-ended questions will hopefully not be much of a problem for our questionnaire, as it only consists of one open- ended question. Response rates in mail surveys may run anywhere from less than 5% to more than 50%, depending on the length of the questionnaire, its content, the groups surveyed, the incentives employed, and other factors. Those who operate mail panels claim that response rate in the vicinity of 70%4. Response rates can be enhance by implementing strategies such as advance postcard or telephone call alerting respondent to survey, premiums such as  pencil, pen, key chain, coffee mugs etc, self-addresses stamped return envelope, personalised address and well written and personally signed cover letter, and drawings or prizes. Finally once we have gathered our data, we will then be in position to analyse the expectations, needs and buying behaviour of the typical coffee shop customers and make suitable recommendations to Costa Coffee management group as to how it can improve its outlets in order to gain a competitive advantage and become the number one branded coffee shop in the UK.

Salt And Sand Lab Report Essays

Salt And Sand Lab Report Essays Salt And Sand Lab Report Paper Salt And Sand Lab Report Paper Evaporation is a process where two liquids or solid mixed into a liquid can be separated. To separate two liquids mixed together, the liquid is boiled over a Bunsen burner until one liquid is completely evaporated. To separate a solid within a liquid, the liquid is completely evaporated and a solid will remain, which is called a residue. Procedure/Data: 1. Preheat a clean evaporating dish for 5 minutes; then cool and mass the dish. Mass of empty dish: 28. Egg 2. Set scale to zero after placing an 80 or 100 ml beaker on it; then add the mixture given to you into the beaker and record the mass of the mixture. Mass of mixture: 2. Egg 3. Add 15. Ml of water to the beaker; stir well and filter the contents through filter paper into the pre-massed evaporating dish. 4. Add 5 ml of water to the beaker, stir well and filter the evaporating dish. 5. Set up an evaporation set up and heat the contents in the evaporating dish, over a wavy flame to avoid splashing, until all water is evaporated. 6. Allow dish and residue to cool; identify the residue. 7. Mass the evaporating dish with the residue and find the mass of the residue. A mixture is a combination of two or more pure substances in which each pure substance retains its individual chemical properties. The sand and salt is a mixture because it can be separated by evaporation and filtration, into its monuments without changing their identities. Some processes that can be used to separate mixtures would be filtration, fractional distillation, crystallization, and sublimation. 2. Elements in a compounds can only be separated by chemical processes, while components of a mixture can be separated by physical processes. 3. The five common methods that can be used to separate various types of mixtures are filtration, fractional distillation, evaporation, sublimation, and chromatography. Evaporation is the changing of a liquid into a gas often under the influence of heat. A mixture of a solid and liquid can be separated y evaporation. Filtration is a technique that Uses a porous barrier to separate a solid from a liquid. A liquid and solid (heterogeneous mixture) is the type of mixture that can be separated by filtration. Sublimation is the process during which a solid changes vapor without melting (without going through liquid phase). Two solids are the type of mixture that can be separated by sublimation. Fractional distillation is a physical separation technique that use based on differences in the boiling points of the substances involved. Two liquids are the type of mixture that can be separated by distillation. Chromatography is technique that separates a compound of a mixture dissolved in either a gas or a liquid. A mixture of a gas or liquid state can be separated by the use of chromatography. 4. Chromatography is a method that could be used to separate the components of the ink in a marker. This separation can be achieved when the pigment is dipped in a liquid and the different colors will behave differently, causing them to travel at different speeds. The ink separates because each pigment has a different attraction to the liquid. 5. To separate the heterogeneous mixture comprised of sand, iron fillings, salt, and poppy seeds the first thing that an be done is to use a magnet to attract the iron fillings from the mixture. Next, water should be added to not only dissolve the salt into the water but to cause the poppy seeds to float, making it easy to take them out. Then mix the sand, salt and water together to make a mixture of salt and water. Now with sand and salt water left, filtrate the mixture to allow the salt water to pass through the filter paper and the sand will stay behind as residue. Finally, evaporation should be used to evaporate all the water from the mixture leaving salt behind as residue. 6. Filtrate is what passes through the filter paper when using filtration. The salt water was the filtrate in this lab. Residue is what is left behind, or is stayed back.

visual impairment essays

visual impairment essays " People catergorized as visually impaired range from individuals with mild visual losses to those with low vision to those who are totally blind" (Winzer,370). Vision impairments does not necessarily mean a total loss of sight. Some visually impaired person can detect light, others can see shapes and forms, and others can see nothing at all. Generally, many different problems that interfere the retina to form image or the transmission of retinal images to the brain can cause blindness or vision impairment. It can be heredity or caused by disease or damage after birth. In some cases a specific reason cannot be determined. There are four major types of vision impairments. The first type are refractive errors. It is cause by the change of shape or size of the eyeball, conera or the lens. Myopia (short-sighted) and hyperopia (long-sighted) are two common examples. People with myopia or hyperopia cannot focus image accurately on the retina. Another example is astigmatism, it is caused by the abnormal curve shape of the cornera or the lens. And it can cause distorted or blurred vision. The second type are ocular motor problems. It is caused by irregular movement of the ocular muscles that control the movement of the eyeballs. It leads to the inability for the eyes to control focusing objects. Strasbismus is an example. This condition effects about 2 percent (2 out of 100) of all young children. Strabismus is a lack of coordinated muscle movement or focusing ability between the eyes, causing the eyes to point in different directions. One or both eyes may turn inward (crossed eyes) or outward ("walleye"). The eyes, the brain area that controls vision, and the muscles attached to the eyeball are involved. It result in the child that looks in certain directions, double vision (sometimes), vision in one eye only, with loss of depth perception. Strabismus can affect both sexes, all ages, but it usually begins during ear ...

How to be your own boss

How to be your own boss If you’ve ever had a job with a boss, you’ve probably had at least one of these thoughts at some point, especially on frustrating days: â€Å"I could be the boss, and do it better.†Ã¢â‚¬Å"Why don’t I do that?†And there are a few different ways to â€Å"do that.† One is to rise through the ranks, being a rockstar and getting promoted until get to that place where you’re in charge (though you’ll likely still be accountable to some level of management no matter what). The other way, the true independence route, is to say goodbye to working for others, and go into business for yourself. It’s not the easiest career path, or for everyone, but if this is truly your goal then we can help you figure out how to get started.Are you truly ready?Being your own boss sounds great, but if you’re not in a personal space where you’re mature or capable enough (yet) to handle the potentially large demands of running your own bus iness, it’s important to be honest about that up front. Management consultant Steve Tobak recommends starting with an honest assessment of how you are as an employee to see how well you might function in a situation where you’re depending on yourself to get everything done. For example, people who focus on responsibilities over branding and who seek achievements over power will likely be more successful when it comes time to assume responsibility for every aspect of a business. If you’re seeking to become your own boss just to be a boss (and not necessarily to take on additional responsibility), then this career change might not be the right move for you right now.It comes down to your personal temperament as well. If you do better when given a particular set of goals and benchmarks by someone else, you might struggle a bit when you need to generate those yourself. Or if you struggle with discipline and keeping on task during the workday, there’s a risk t hat the lack of outside constraints may feed your worst tendencies to procrastinate. Definitely ask yourself questions like:How do I respond to high-pressure situations?Do I get angry or upset easily?How effectively do I organize my to-do list and manage my time?How do I set boundaries in my life between work and personal space?Creating your own business requires a lot of honesty about your goals and your reality, as well as a lot of good old-fashioned hustle, since you don’t have the framework of an established company to handle things for you. You’re about to be the boss, but you’re also about to be Human Resources, the CFO, the IT department, and the one on the hook for every business decision. If that level of responsibility makes you a little queasy at this point, then maybe it’s best to table the idea for now and revisit in the future. But if you’re still thinking â€Å"bring it,† it’s time to start formulating your business pla n.Design a plan.Your next step should be deciding explicitly what it is you’ll be doing in your entrepreneurial business. Branding is great, but it comes later. The core business has to come first, so a solid plan is essential in making the decision to go rogue. Ask yourself these questions:What kind of service or product are you providing?Who will be your customers?What are you promising to those customers?What sets you apart from potentially similar vendors competing for the same customers?What are your short- and long-term goals for the business?What strategies do you have to achieve those goals?If you need help coming up with a business plan, there are a number of free and premium services online that can help you craft it, like LivePlan or Microsoft’s Dynamics 365. Every new business is a leap of faith, but you put yourself in a better position with the more information you have about your target audience, your market, and how you plan to develop your business bas ed on the market.Do a test run.Before you take the leap, think about doing a â€Å"soft launch† by creating your business as a side hustle, or a part-time commitment. This is a way of figuring out if this is the right path for you before you’ve committed fully to the idea of ditching your current path for the new one. Plus, it lets you start building a customer base and getting a real sense of what the market is really like- information that will be invaluable when you get to planning to do this full-time. Take a set amount of time to work on your business part-time, and then re-evaluate whether it makes sense to take it full-time. Sure, you’ll be in for a busy few months while you’re working on both, but consider it an essential research process to test the viability of your plan.Consider the money.Before you do anything drastic like quitting your current job, it’s important to do your homework on some baseline financial issues. Finances are an in credibly important consideration here- after all, this is your livelihood. And you’ll be the one writing the paychecks, so there’s not a lot of room for error here if you want to be able to keep your personal finances afloat. Gather your personal financial records and your favorite calculator, because it’s time to answer some brutally honest questions:Are there startup costs associated with your business idea? Will you need to buy specialized equipment or technology? Will you need to buy or rent a workspace? How much money would you need to have up front just to get started?What are the week-to-week operating costs?How long are you able to go without a paycheck, if your business is slow to develop? Do you have enough savings to get you by?Will you need to hire employees or contractors, or will it just be you? If it’s the latter, what can you afford to pay them?It may be that after your financial analysis, you find you aren’t quite ready to quit you r job and go it alone just yet. And that’s okay- it gives you more time to plan, set goals, and lay the groundwork for your business. What’s not quite right for now be much more viable in a year or two.Decide who’s on your team.Another essential element is your support network. Your company may be just you at first, and that’s a lot of pressure. What friends or family do you have in place to help provide a balance for that? Do you have people you trust who can listen to you and help you talk through decisions and provide valuable feedback?You should also start building your network in general, both using online social networks like LinkedIn and joining professional associations in your field. There are also organizations that specifically support small business owners, so you should do a little digging online to see if there are any specific to your field or your state/city/town.Build your brand.Self-marketing is going to be one of the best tools you have at your disposal as you get started with a new business. Creating dedicated social media profiles (apart from your personal ones) on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and whatever-platform-comes-next is a no-brainer. And make sure you stay engaged in those accounts, posting new content and updating the world on your achievements, expertise, and services.You’ll also need a website- ideally, one designed professionally. There are lots of hosting services that also help you build your sleek, functional site. This is not a job for your cousin’s friend’s roommate who wants to test out his design skills. Once you have your own URL and platform, you can use a blog, photo gallery, portfolio, and email to do outreach to potential customers.Get ready to make the transition.This is not the time for burning bridges, so you need to think about a careful transition from your current job to your entrepreneurship. This is especially true if your new company will be in th e same field. People talk, and other people who make ugly exits will be talked about. No matter how disgruntled you may be in your current gig, it’s important to exit gracefully. That means figuring out a timetable for quitting (potentially more than the standard two weeks) to figure out how to disentangle from your job. You may also want to consider asking your current boss if you can go part-time for a transition period. If that’s not an option, then a traditional exit is fine. You’ll need to give notice, and write a resignation letter. You don’t have to explicitly say what you’re doing next- â€Å"pursuing new opportunities† covers it.During this transition period, you should also see if there’s any fine print in your employment contract about pursuing clients or competitive job opportunities. Some companies have a â€Å"non-compete† clause that tries to limit what former employees can do in the same field.So what do you thi nk? Are you ready to make the transition from employee to boss? Or if not right now, is it something you can see in the near-ish future? We wish you all the best, entrepreneurs, and would love to hear what’s worked for you (and what hasn’t) in pursuit of being your own boss.

Technology Acceptance factors of Cloud Computing Assignment

Technology Acceptance factors of Cloud Computing - Assignment Example This addition of behavioural taste to information system requires systems to be developed consideration large number of factors that are expected to have direct or indirect impact on human acceptance and usage of technology. For the purpose, different models have been devised highlighting different factors that directly influence the process of technology acceptance and adoption. Some of the models and associated factors are as follow: Technology Acceptance Model is the pioneer in determining the fact that acceptance of system receives direct influence from the motivation level which in turn is influenced by large number of factors in the external environment. TAM 1 has highlighted two factors which are: Perceived usefulness in general is defined as the probability in terms of future or perspective user’s ability that using a new technological system or application will enhance user’s ability to perform better or giving optimum results (Davis, Bagozzi, and Warshaw, 1989). Moreover, users are more likely to adopt those technologies from which there is expectation that it will increase their performances in terms of carrying out work in their walks of life. Perceived ease of use is another factor that affects the use of technology in teaching and learning environments (Davis, 1989). It deals with the future user’s perception or an expectation that his desired targeted system is likely to be free from efforts and hassles (King and Re, 2006). It is usually defined as the ability of an individual in order to carry out some work or taking some decision is mainly influenced by others (in general people who are closer to him). Or in other words the action or decision that particular individual opt to take because of his perception of what other people might think of him is called subjective norm (Fishbein and Ajzen 1975, p.