Thursday, October 31, 2019

GENENTECH Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

GENENTECH - Essay Example The leadership style establishes the success and morale of the personnel as well. The leadership style at the Genentech is that of a transformational leader. When the employees of a company bear a direct influence upon the achievement of that company transformational leadership is the greatest resource. A transformational manager is a leader who has the capacity to inspire (Aarti, 2012). Predictably, the description of leader is somebody who is capable of inspiring or motivate folks to execute duties. A transformational manager is a leader who exhibits this aptitude in addition with other skills. Transformational managers are supervisors that regularly ask many questions when speaking with their personnel. Transformational leaders make firm eye contact as well as stop everything to ensure the personnel understand that they are the focus of attention (Aarti, 2012). This style of leadership takes extra precaution to guarantee that the personnel are catered for as well as their wishes are met. A transformational manager is a leader who cares heeds their employees’ feelings. A successful transformational manager takes extra exertion to find out how the subordinates feel concerning changes, which are being fabricated, enquire for their judgment upon a range of matters, as well as attempt to inspire them to enhance their own state(AAAS, 2013). For this style of lead ership, its essence is to empower each specific worker to push tougher for their individual motives and not predictably because the firm says so. Genentech leaders endeavor to be leaders within their fields via their creative methodologies to scientific research, product development, commercialization and manufacturing (AAAS, 2013).To fulfill Genentech’s mission as well as remain within the forefront of its industry, leaders at Genentech continue to develop an atmosphere of full involvement, which allows the leaders to exploit the skills and knowledge of every employee. Managers at Genentech claim they gain irreplaceable resources from the personnel, partners and the clients by channeling their miscellany of thought, culture, style, perspective and skill set. These resources enable the leaders at Genentech to re-envision incessantly who they are and how the managers execute their work. According to the leaders at Genentech, those invaluable resources aid them to make new disc overies, resolve problems, develop high performing teams as well as develop their leadership. Therefore, the people they oversee set the leaders apart at Genentech (Hughes, 2011). At Genentech, leaders acknowledge that ultimately, miscellany means variances in the manner in which people act and think a cognitive miscellany, which is fashioned by the way people are (Hughes, 2011). Therefore, managers at Genentech are developing an environment whereby they are actively utilizing miscellany of experience and thought to enhance their team’s performance as well as innovation. Genentech’s diversity approaches focus upon the enrollment, development as well as retention of personnel of each background. Genentech afford a wide range of external and internal proficient development opportunities, personnel resource groups and mentoring programs (AAAS, 2013). Lino Gonzalez, a Scientist for Protein Chemistry at Genentech, asserts that he joined Genentech in 2001 because it is among the few finest places in the globe to do execute science. Gonzalez claims that the infrastructure, the people and infrastructure at Genentech are unparalleled, creating a productive field for quickly progressing a project plan from a notion to reality. Gonzalez asserts that it was evident that Genentech

Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Speaker’s notes Essay Example for Free

Speaker’s notes Essay Slide 1 Information on the slide: As the first slide it should be in front of the audience while I present myself and my project. The slide is a comparison between students and wards. It is meant to kick start the attention of the audience, implying the students as future wards. The picture is taken from www.lao.ca.gov. What to address: After a brief introduction is made I make a short presentation on the picture, mentioning that both students and wards carry a gun for the same reasons, to feel safe. Slide 2 All presentations should have a clearly stated question or problem that they address. In our case we examine the questions: Is Juvenile Crime Rates Increasing? Is Juvenile Murder Rates Increasing? How do the Violent Crime Rates of Ohio relate to the whole country? It is time to mention the increasing rumor that juvenile violence is increasing throughout the US. In fact many researchers say that the statistics show that the juvenile crime rate is in fact decreasing in the US. (Snyder, Finnegan, Sickmund (1999)). We then turn our eyes to concentrate on Ohio, to see how the juvenile Crime Rate is developing there. Slide 3 This slide is the first in a series of statistical graphs. To compare the murder rate we include the number of juvenile murders in Ohio from 1995-2004. Juvenile Ohio murder graph: This Graph describes the Murders performed by juveniles under 18 over a decade. We can see that the number of murders have decreased during the last few years, it was especially low during the year of 1999. However, at the end of the graph we can see the Murder Rate starting to rise again during the most recent years. Data collected from: Federal Bureau of Investigation. Supplementary Homicide Reports 1980-2004 [machine-readable data files] In this diagram we see that the numbers of juvenile murder offenders are decreasing over the past decade, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the percentages of juvenile murder offenders are decreasing in comparison to adult murder offenders. To investigate this we need to look at the adult murder offenders and take out a percentage for the juvenile case. Slide 4 Here we investigate the number of adult murder offenders, a number that seems to be fairly stable. As a result of this we can see that the juvenile share of the Ohio murders have in fact decreased over the past decade. If looked at from a shorter perspective, we see that it has gone up a little the last few years, possibly indicating that it may continue to go up in the future. Data collected from: Federal Bureau of Investigation. Supplementary Homicide Reports 1980-2004 [machine-readable data files] Slide 5 For the rest of the country we see basically the same pattern. Data collected from: Federal Bureau of Investigation. Supplementary Homicide Reports 1980-2004 [machine-readable data files] Slide 6 If we compare the juvenile murder rates in Ohio to the rest of the country, we see that Ohio is slightly higher than the entire US murder rate. We can also notice that the juvenile murder rate is increasing more rapidly for Ohio. This means that the need to improve the situation is bigger in Ohio than in the country in general. Data collected from: Federal Bureau of Investigation. Supplementary Homicide Reports 1980-2004 [machine-readable data files] Slide 7 While violent crimes are a problem in the state of Ohio it is also a problem for each of the individual counties. It has been said that it is almost impossible to predict juvenile crime rates (Snyder, Finnegan, Sickmund (1999)) and in this picture (Snyder, Finnegan, Sickmund (1999), chapter5) we can see the crime rates in each county. Slide 8 What about crimes like Robbery, Rape and Car Theft? Slide 9 Since it has been impossible to locate statistics for all of Ohio as a state due to lack of data, we are forced to make a comparison on the counties. The counties with the highest population rate are Franklin Cuyahoga Hamilton Lucas Summit However, it is only possible to locate statistical data from Franklin, Lucas and Summit. These graphs include the crime rates of motor vehicle theft, aggravated assault, forcible rape, and robbery. The values are all in percentage, compared to the entire crime rate. When looking at these graphs it is clear that the general trend of violent juvenile crime arrests are decreasing or being fairly steady in all areas, with the exception of motor vehicle theft in Lucas that is increasing. This leads us to the conclusion that the rate of juvenile crimes are not increasing in Ohio, but in fact decreasing. Slide 10 Conclusion During the beginning of the 90’s the Juvenile Crime Rate was very high. Since 1996 it has decreased again, and even if we see a small upwards tendency, there is not enough statistical data to support the belief that the Rate will go up again. However, the crime rate is very high, and Ohio is above the rest of the country. Ohio’s Juvenile Crime Rate is also increasing more rapidly then the rest of the country, which calls for immediate action before we reach the high levels of aggressive crime that we saw in the 90’s.

Saturday, October 26, 2019

Customer Satisfaction Research on Bank

Customer Satisfaction Research on Bank CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 COMPANY PROFILE HDFC bank was founded in august 1994. It was among the first companies to receive an ‘in principle’ approval from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to set up a branch in the private sector. The bank operated as a commercial bank under the liberalization policies of RBI. In February 2000, this bank experienced a merger with Times Bank owned by The Times Group (Bennett Coleman co.). This was the first merger between two private banks in India. 1 share of HDFC Bank was received by shareholder of Times bank for every 5.75 shares of their own. HDFC bank acquired Centurion Bank of Punjab on 23 May 2008 taking its total branches to more than 1000. The amalgamated bank came out with a base of Rs. 1, 22,000 crores and net advances of about Rs. 89,000 crores. HDFC Bank Limited provides banking as well as various financial services to different corporations, and middle upper income customers in India. The bank operates through three main divisions which are wholesale banking, retail banking, and treasury operations. HDFC also provides services like credit cards, debit cards, third party distribution, investment advisory services, card and automated teller machine (ATM) acquiring transactions, and depositary services. Foreign exchange and derivative products is provided by the treasury division. The bank also provides telephone banking, Net Banking, Internet banking, and mobile telephone banking services.It is the largest bank in India by market capitalization as of 24 February 2014. On January 2 2014, the market cap value of HDFC was found to be USD 27.00B, as compared to the credit Suisse group with USD 48.00B. It was promoted by the housing development finance corporation, a premier housing finance company of India set up in 1977. Some of the latest achievement of HDFC bank are: Table 1.1: Achievements of 2014 and 2013. 2014 Asiamoney Best of Best Domestic Banks-India. 2014 Dun Bradstreet- Mannapuram Finance Limited Corporate Award 2014 Best corporate in Banking Sector. 2013 Asiamoney Best domestic bank in India. Best local cash management bank in India. 2013 Institute for development and research in banking technology awards Best bank- managing IT risks. Best bank- best IT team. 2013 Businessworld Best bank in India. OBJECTIVE OF THE REPORT To study the satisfaction received by the customer form HDFC staff as well as technical staff in Noida region, Uttar Pradesh, India. To study the areas in which the customer from this particular region invest in. To know the problems faced by the customers. CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 3.1 Research design: Exploratory design has been selected as data has been collected from questionnaire as well as direct contact to understand the satisfaction level of the customer and to study the areas in which these customers prefer to invest their money. 3.2 Data Collection Method: Most of the data has collected from secondary sources whereas for conduct of research the primary data has been collected through a structured questionnaire wherein a total of 120 respondents took part out of which only 100 have been taken into consideration inorder to reduce the error. This data collected is from Noida region only and has been collected according to the convenience of the researcher. 3.3 Sampling The study mainly deals with the satisfaction of the customer in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India. The required data was collected through a pretested questionnaire administered on a combination of convenience andjudgment sample of 100 individual investors. Judgment sample selection isdue to the time. Respondents were screened and inclusion was purely on the basis of their knowledge about financial organizations, HDFC in particular. This was necessary, because the questionnaire presumed awareness of some basic terminology used in these organizations. The purpose of the survey was to understand where the interest of the customer lies when investing in these organizations depending on various like satisfaction, awareness level. Sample of the questionnaire is given in Annex. A. 3.4 Instruments Used: The primary data was collected through a structured questionnaire by interactions with investors through telephone and through emails. 3.5 Analysis: After the data collection, it was compiled, classified and tabulated manually with the help of the computer. CHAPTER 4: INTERPRETATION AND FINDINGS Why you chose HDFC? The survey was conducted to see whether the customers are happy with the service provided by the bank. The study is given below Graph 4.1 It was revealed that the customers were highly satisfied by the communication (80%) followed by the problem solving capabilities (75.24%) of the staff. The customers were not much satisfied by the reliability of this organization. Interpretation: the bank should focus on its ability to perform well consistently and increase responsiveness to attract more customers. Analysis of investors preference The survey was conducted to capture investor objective for investment in financial instruments, reveals the following. Graph 4.2 Most of the investors invest money for the purpose of future welfare followed by high growth, so company should suggest those instruments which have a positive return for their investment which will help in fulfilling both the objectives. Customers reasons for being a part of this organization Customers were asked about the reasons because of which they became a part of this organization, the study showed a following results. Pie chart 4.3 From the study it was found that 25% people joined this organization because of the image, 25% people because of the extra services and 45% mainly because of the normal services provided by them whereas only 5% joined this bank because of all the above factors. Best service provided by the bank This was done to get an idea of the service most liked/preferred by the customers. The result showed, Table 1.2 Service Respondents % of respondents Savings a/c 33 33% Fixed deposits 40 40% Current a/c 12 12% Demat a/c 0 0% Credit cards 0 0% Mutual funds 10 10% Loans 5 5% Graph 4.4 According to the results, the customers find fixed deposit to be the best service provided, followed by savings and currents a/c. not even a single customer opted for demat a/c or credit cards. Perception about the services of the bank The customers were given three choices and the result was recorded to know the problems with the services and how to solve them in order to provide better services from the next time. Table 1.3 Response No of respondents % of respondents Good 35 35% Average 55 55% Poor 10 10% Graph 4.5 The result clearly shows that 55 % found the service to be average whereas 35 % found to be good. The remaining 10% found the service to be poor. Satisfied with the dealing of bank officials. Dealing with the customer plays an important role in the organization and to check it, a report has been made. The results show, Table 1.4 Response No of respondents % of respondents Yes 30 30% No 25 25% To some extend 45 45% Pie chart 4.6 The pie charts shows that maximum customers were satisfied by the dealing to some extend whereas 30% were completely satisfied. Only 25% were not satisfied and asked to make appropriate changes. Problems faced regarding the bank? Table 1.5 Response No of respondents % of respondents timeliness 78 78% Customer relationship 12 12% infrastructure 10 10% others 0 0% Graph 4.7 Most of the customers face a problem with the timeliness (78%), whereas only 12 % and 10% people face problems with customer relationship and infrastructure respectively. Will you recommend this bank to any of your friends? Table 1.6 Response No of respondents % of respondents Very unlikely 8 8% Somewhat unlikely 30 30% Neither likely nor unlikely 17 17% Somewhat likely 35 35% Very likely 10 10% Pie chart 4.8 According to the result, around 40% of the people agreed to recommend this bank to their friends whereas 25 refused to do so. Rate HDFC bank in maintaining good customer relationship Table 1.7 Respondents No of respondents % of respondents Good 20 20% Average 57 57% Poor 23 23% Graph 4.9 The result shows perfectly that the customers found the service to be average in terms of customer relations. Overall satisfaction rating with HDFC Table 1.8 Respondents No of respondents % of respondents Very dissatisfied 2 2% Somewhat dissatisfied 9 9% Neutral 21 21% Somewhat satisfied 48 48% Very satisfied 20 20% Graph 5.0 Review from customers show that 48% are somewhat satisfied whereas 21 percent are neutral about the satisfaction level. Only 2% and 9% customer were very and somewhat dissatisfied respectively. 4.1 Findings Majority of the customers are satisfied with the service provided. Majority of the customers found the services to be average. They also found that the respondents are average in maintaining good customer relations. Majority of the customers are facing the problem of timeliness. The perception of the majority of the customers is good and are satisfied with the services and were ready to recommend the products of the bank. Majority of the customers are interested in fixed deposits, savings a/c, and mutual funds. Majority of the customers are satisfied with the dealing of the bank officials. The most important point is that, services provided by the banks attract customers. CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 5.1 Suggestions More stress should be given on advertisement and promotional activities. Banks should improve the efforts to make good relationship with the customers. Enhancing their services should also be an important task. Procedures should be made less time consuming. Banks should inform their customers about their extra services. 5.2 Limitations The research was carried out in a short period of 6 weeks because of which simple random and judgemental sampling is used. Limited sample size (100). The information might be biased because the information collected is given by the customer which doesn’t have any proof and depends upon different customers according to their satisfaction level. 5.3 Conclusion At the end I would like to conclude by saying that the Indian banking market is growing at an astonishing rate. HDFC bank have a network of 1142 branches and 3295 automated teller machines in 528 cities in India. The majority of customers are satisfied but the bank should target the unsatisfied customers. Even though the customers are aware about the services, the bank should try to create more awareness among people. HDFC should use printing as well as other media to do so. Formalities should be reduced to a minimum level as the customers feel irritated and the whole process becomes a burden on them. BIBLIOGRAPHY www.google.com www.hdfcbank/products/finance www.iloveindia.com http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDFC_Bank http://www.slideshare.net/ankurshrivastava3762/customer-satisfaction-level-in-hdfc-bank http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2002-11-16/news/27339334_1_sanjay-ralhan-primus-and-american-express-auto-finance ANNEXURE ANNEXURE 1: Questionnaire NAME ________________ AGE ___________________ GENDER_______________ OCCUPATION______________ EMAIL_________________ ADDRESS__________________ Why you chose HDFC? Resolve problems Communications Reliability Responsiveness What are your investment objective in HDFC bank? High income Stable income Future welfare Tax benefit High growth Reasonable income Retirement protection What are the reasons that attract you to be a customer? Image Services Products All of the above Best service provided by the bank are? Savings a/c Fixed deposit Current a/c Demat a/c Credit cards Insurance Mutual funds Loans What are your perceptions about the services of the banks? Good Average Poor Are you satisfied with the dealing of the bank officials? Yes No To some extend Any problems you are facing regarding the bank? Timeliness Customer relationship Infrastructure All of the above How likely are you to recommend the services to your friend or family? Very unlikely Somewhat unlikely Neutral Somewhat likely Very likely How will you rate HDFC bank in maintaining customer relationship? Good Average Poor What is your overall satisfaction with the company? Very dissatisfied Somewhat dissatisfied Neutral Somewhat satisfied Very satisfied

Friday, October 25, 2019

Pros and Cons of E-Commerce Essay -- essays research papers

Pros and Cons of E-Commerce   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Electronic commerce or e-commerce involves the buying and selling of products or services over the internet. Put simply, e-commerce means conducting business online. E-commerce software programs run the main functions of an e-commerce web site, including product display, online ordering, and inventory management. This software resides on a commerce server and works in conjunction with online payment systems to process payments. E-Commerce can help a small business off to a great start or can make it fizzle into bankruptsy. It can have a positive and negitive impact on the success of a small business.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  There are many pros to e-commerce. One factor is that e-commerce provides service and performance by offering a user-friendly experience. In a regular business, the retailers may have to go some way before achieving such a responsive goal. E-Commerce also provides an attractive website. The colors, graphics, and animation can help an e-commerce site become successful. The website can also influence the customers to purchase and return. Promotions, coupons, and discounts increase the chances for a customer to use the site more frequently. Websites can provide the customers with personal attention. The customer can personalize the website to better fit their likes and remove their dislikes. Purchase suggestions and personalized special offers can most of the time substitute person to person in...

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of DSM-IV TR Essay

DSM-IV TR, which stands for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th edition), Text Revision was published by the American Psychiatric Association in 2000 and serves as a guide book for many health professionals to diagnose a patient with a mental disorder. It also helps health professionals to determine what types of treatment could be carried out to help the patient. The latest DSM is widely used, especially in the USA and many European countries.1However, it may not be completely followed by health professionals as they know that there are some weaknesses of the latest version of DSM as well. This essay will discuss the strengths and the weaknesses of the latest DSM and new changes for the DSM-V, which is expected to be published in May, 2013. DSM’s strength would be that it standardizes psychiatric diagnostic categories and criteria2, making the diagnosis of a mental disorder relatively easier than it was in the past. It allows health professionals to diagnose a patient, use the DSM to give them possibly the best treatment and overall, help them to cure the patients if the disorder is curable. DSM also has statistical data such as the prevalence of a certain disease in different genders, age of onset of diseases, etc. This allows health professionals to have a very wide range of knowledge which may be very useful for diagnosis and treatments. Besides, the DSM allows a common language for discussing diagnosis. It provides clear criteria for certain disorders so that every clinician would come up with the same diagnosis. This makes sure that a person is not diagnosed with different types of disorders in different clinics.Thus, treating patients more efficiently. Compared to the older versions of the DSM, the latest DSM also has more subtypes and specifiers which increases the diagnostic specificity. As I mentioned before, this increases the chance of diagnosing a patient with the same disorder in different clinics, assuring that they are diagnosed with the correct disorder as misdiagnosing them could possibly lead to serious damage. For some disorders, such as bipolar disorder, there are severity indicators such as mild, moderate and severe as well. This helps clinician to decide the course of the treatment according to the severity of their disorder. This is one of the strength of DSM as using the same treatment for different severity of the same disorder will not be very appropriate or efficient. However, this severity indicator is absent in some disorders such as manic episodes which is one of the weaknesses of DSM-IV TR. These were some of the strengths of DSM-IV TR. However, we know that another edition of DSM, DSM-V is expected to be published soon. This is obviously because there are some, or many weaknesses in the current DSM with which people are not satisfied. One of the major weakness of the current DSM and probably all the older editions is â€Å"Cultural Bias†. DSMs are mainly published by anglo-Americans and most of the behaviour that is considered as â€Å"normal† in the DSM is actually what is considered normal by the anglo-Americans. That is, some of the behaviour that is considered as abnormal in the DSM might be considered as normal in other cultures. For example, in some cultures, people tend to put a lot of emphasis and values filial piety and due to that, they would behave in a way that might not be considered as normal by the anglo-Americans. Would that classify them as abnormal? What exactly is normal anyways? According to the DSM, it it, I believe, what is considered as normal by the anglo-Americans. This is one of the weaknesses of the DSM which is well-known and I think it is because of this reason that DSM might not be as popular in countries where the culture is much different compared to countries like the USA and many European countries. Another weakness would be that DSM promotes a mechanical approach to mental disorder assessment. The clinicians may focus excessively on the signs and symptoms of mental disorders and they might not put much emphasis on a more in-depth understanding of the clients/patients problems. This problem have improved but it is still a problem caused by the DSM. DSM-IV TR also does not consider patients subjective experience of a disorder. That is, the  approach is not a dimensional approach as there is no first-person report but rather, observations are usually carried out which may neglect the more somatic and psychological processes that underlie the symptoms (Flanagan, Davidson & Strauss, 2007).3 Also, DSM causes most clinicians to be primarily concerned with the signs and symptoms of a disorder rather than the underlying cause by giving a list of certain criteria for diagnosis. Another weakness and debate about the DSM is that it is an unscientific system and it is the opinion of a few powerful psychiatrists. This has raised a lot of questions and have caused people to question the validity and reliability of the diagnostic categories as well. The validity and reliability were especially questioned after the Rosenhan experiment in the 1970s in which it was concluded that the sane could not be distinguished from the insane in psychiatric hospitals. Thus, even though the reliability and validity has improved now when compared to the 1970s, it is still a weakness which I believe could not be entirely fixed. However, validity problems of the diagnostic criteria especially arise when children or adolescents are involved. For example, the DSM-IV TR criteria for bipolar and manic disorder were originally developed for adults but right now, after a few changes, it is used for children as well. This increases the chance of misdiagnosing children with bipolar disorder. This information is supported by the fact that in the last 10 years, there has been a 40%4 increase in the number of children diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It is believed that there is not a sharp increase in the number of children with bipolar disorder but rather that the clinicians have been applying the diagnostic criteria (which were originally developed for adults) much more aggressively to children.5This is one of the weakness of DSM-IV TR that needs to be improved in the future as the effects could be devastating. One of the weakness, which I believe is not very significant but still is a problem and which is actually questioned by people is the definition of the mental disorder. This was also mentioned in the lectures. According to DSM-IV TR, a mental disorder is â€Å"associated with present distress or disability or significant increased risk of death, pain, disability and important loss of freedom†. This raises the question.. what about those  individuals who engage in activities that threatens their lives but they actually enjoy it? Such as mountain climbers, scuba divers, etc. Obviously they are no considered as abnormal but according to the definition of the DSM, they are considered as having a mental disorder. But we know that this is not correct. Thus, there is a problem with the definition of the word ‘mental disorder’. There are many other weaknesses as well such as with Personality Disorder diagnosis. It is believed that the description of symptoms is very broad. This means that patients diagnosed with the same disorder could actually have very different clinical presentations. For personality disorders, DSM uses a categorical approach6. However, it would be better to use a dimensional approach so that the different types/ degree of disorder could be distinguished and thus, could be given different and more efficient treatments. Another major weakness of the Axis II personality disorder is that there is a very high degree of overlapping or co-occurence with each other. This is also a problem for Axis I mental disorders.7 There are many other weaknesses with specific disorders of DSM especially about the diagnosis criteria and some other issues such as whether ‘Paraphilias’ should be included or not. Most of the major ones has been discussed above. Now, the new changes for DSM-V will be discussed. There are many new changes for the DSM-V. I will mainly mention those that are related to the weaknesses mentioned above. However, the new changes are discussed, the 4 principles behind the current process for revising DSM should be discussed. (Obtained from APA DSM-V Development’s official website) 1) Clinical Utility- the manual should be useful to those who diagnose and treat patients with mental illnesses 2) Recommendations should be guided by evidence 3) DSM-V should maintain continuity with previous editions whenever possible 4) No priori restraints should be placed on the level of change permitted  between DSM-IV and DSM-V From these 4 principles, it becomes clearer to us why DSM-IV is being revised and what changes should be expected. One of the changes is that in order to better assess the severity of symptoms, a dimensional assessment will be included. For example, other factors such as sleep quality, mood, etc will be considered regardless of the diagnosis. This will help to reduce the problem of â€Å"mechanical approach† as mentioned before. They will also help to address symptoms that are not included within the diagnostic criteria for specific illnesses (e.g. the problem of insomnia for patients diagnosed with Schizophrenia). DSM-V might also include something that could solve the problem of how to handle patients with co-occuring disorders, which is a major weakness of DSM-IV TR. Besides that, DSM-V will also have improved diagnostic criteria that are not precise in DSM-IV TR. Also, a few words would be changed as well in the new DSM. For example, the word â€Å"Mental Retardation† would be changed to â€Å"Intellectual Disability†.   Another change that would also be included would somehow, indirectly address the problem of cultural bias. In the new DSM, careful consideration would be given to the gender, race and ethnicity. This, I believe could help to lessen the severity of the cultural problem as mentioned before. Besides that, another ‘proposal’ is that, the criteria should be more stringent for the diagnosis of bipolar disorder in children. This also addresses one of the weakness mentioned earlier. This is a very important proposal as I believe it is not very humane to misdiagnose children with â€Å"Mental Disorders†. It could affect their life significantly. Another major changes is in the assessment and diagnosis of personality disorders. As mentioned before, a dimensional approach will be used rather than a categorical approach. This can help to determine the different severities of disorders and determine the ‘subtypes’ more accurately. Overall, it would make the diagnosis much more accurate and thus, more  efficient treatment could be used. These changes were mainly in response to the weaknesses mentioned above. Other changes include creating a new category called â€Å"Behavioural addiction†. This category is solely based on gambling. Internet addiction was also proposed. However, due to the lack of research in that field, it was rejected. This shows that they somehow followed principle 2 which emphasizes on the importance of evidence. Another category called the â€Å"Risk Syndromes† is also being considered. This will help clinicians identify earlier stage of mental disorders. The category of substance abuse and dependence will be removed and it would be replaced by a new category called â€Å"Addiction and Related Disorders†. This is done to help clinicians distinguish between similar types of disorders more easily and lower the chance of misdiagnosis (e.g. dependence is often confused with compulsive drug-seeking behaviour addiction). 8Another change is that the criteria for some eating disorde rs such as Anorexia Nervosa has been improved. Overall, the diagnostic criteria for many disorders has been improved and a dimensional approach is being used in DSM-V rather than the categorical approach used in the previous editions. All of these changes, together with many other minor ones, aim to improve the diagnosis process and thus, ensures that people are saved from misdiagnosis (which could lead to devastating effects) and so that they can receive better treatment which would increase their chances of being cured (if the disorder is curable). Bibliography Berman, J. (n.d.). Understanding the DSM-IV TR. Retrieved on 15th March, 2013, from http://www.ceuschool.com/librarydocs/SOC222.pdf Dombeck, M., Hoermann, S., Zupanick, E.C. (2011). Personality Disorders: Problems with current diagnostic system. MentalHelp. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=569 Flanagan, E., Davidson, L. & Strauss, J. (2007). â€Å"Issues for DSM-V: Incorporating Patients’ Subjective Experiences.† Am. J. Psychiatry, 164(3), 391 – 392. Kleinplatz, P.J., Moser. C. (2005). DSM-IV-TR and the Paraphilias: An Argument for Removal. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://www2.hu-berlin.de/sexology/GESUND/ARCHIV/MoserKleinplatz.htm Kronemyer, D. (2009). Phenomenological Psychology. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://phenomenologicalpsychology.com/2009/06/how-can-dsm-iv-be-improved-as-it-transitions-to-dsm-v/ American Psychiatric Association. (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th ed., text rev.). Washington, DC. Bipolar Disorder in Children. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipolar_disorder_in_children Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders DSM-5. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 13 from http://en.wikipe dia.org/wiki/DSM-5 DSM-5 development: Frequently Asked Questions. American Psychiatric Association.Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://www.dsm5.org/pages/default.aspx Rosenhan Experiment. Wikipedia. Retrieved on 14th March, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Emailing a Literary Agent

Emailing a Literary Agent Emailing a Literary Agent Emailing a Literary Agent By Maeve Maddox In the old days writers could send out their queries and fantasize for weeks about acceptance before getting that crumpled little self-addressed envelope with its bad news back in the mail. Nowadays, thanks to email, we can be zapped with rejection in a matter of minutes! Nevertheless, email queries are a boon to writer and agent. They save time, paper and postage. Not to mention unproductive fantasizing. Much email writing breeds carelessness in most of us so its a good idea to pay special attention to any email we direct to a literary agent. Here are some guidelines. Subject line: Put something meaningful in the subject line. For example, a meaningful subject line for a query about a novel called It Was A Dark and Stormy Night would be Query: It Was A Dark and Stormy Night. Contact information: The usual place in an email for contact information is at the end, after your name. However, in this case its a probably a good idea to let the agent know immediately whose query is unscrolling before him. Just put the same contact information at the top left of the email that you have after your name at the bottom. Greeting: Use the same salutation you would in a letter. Do your homework. Address your query to an individual, not an agency. Find out if the honorific is Mr. or Ms. Avoid Email Speak: Dont pepper your query with abbreviations like BTW or LOL. Think business letter. Write the email as if you were going to mail it the old-fashioned way. Formatting: Keep your email query brief. Avoid long screeds of words. Break it up into short word groupings. I hesitate to say paragraphs. In web writing proper paragraphing is not always an option when the goal is to present easy-to-read clumps of words. And above all, DONT WRITE IN ALL CAPS! Correct spelling and usasge: Most emails are composed on the fly. We open Compose, dash off our message and hit Send. Thats not the way to handle an email query. A single misspelling or misused pronoun can shoot you down with the agent. Write your query in a word processor. Use the spell checker. Run it out and scrutinize the hard copy. When your query is error-free, then and only then paste it into the email and hit Send. Tone and Style: Be businesslike. You can be cordial without being chummy. Dont try to crack a joke. Jokes have a way of coming out all wrong in an email. And as for emoticons. Puhleez! 🙂 Attachments: Unless the agent has asked for an attachment, dont send one. Most people, not just literary agents, maintain a strict policy of not opening attachments from strangers. Links: Given the tiny bit of space allowed by an email to present ourselves, its tempting to want to include links to sites that tell more about us or showcase our writing. Its probably not a good idea. All the agent wants in this first approach is the gist of your proposal and an idea of your professional credentials. By all means, place a link to your professional website after your name at the end of the email, but dont pepper the body of the email with links. The OWL at Purdue offers general guidelines at Email Etiquette. Business managers who would like to draft an email policy guide for their employees will find 32 rules of email etiquette at a site called Emailreplies.com. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Freelance Writing category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Homograph ExamplesDoes "Mr" Take a Period?40 Irregular Verbs That Can End in â€Å"-t†