IOM and Migration

As migration becomes bigger and bigger in today's globalized world, being because of job opportunities, better future, violence, etc. the reality is that it becomes an issue for countries.

Now, taking into account that women are nearly the half of migrating people around the world, 49% [1], we come to a big issue. How to help migrant working women, specially today, when women have struggle to be equal with men. How to fight cultural issues, when in islamic countries women have a very different role than in western countries, for example. Plus, let's take into account things like the traffic of women, or forced migration. This disruption in women's lifestyle, with such an abrupt change that creates a big issue.

This is why the IOM has developed some programs, to try to fight all this issues:

· Protection of womens rights: Protects women from discrimination and irrespectful labour policies.

· Promoting policies that regulate the employment and recruitment of women migrant workers: It helps protect women from false, discriminatory employment contracts.

· The summit of Central American women united to fight against women trafficking. With the support of the UN

Even though this programs work, it's to really hard to fight all the issues attached to migration of women. But step by step a succesful accomplishment will be made.

References:

• IOM webpage: www.iom.ch

• [1] Taken from IOM webpage. http://iom.ch/jahia/Jahia/about-migration/facts-and-figures/lang/es

Images:

• Taken fromhttp://www.samuha.org/Page-20.htm

The Corporation

After watching the film The Corporation, many things come to your mind. Probably not the best ones, seeing that many companies in the world take advantage of many "technicalities", without doing ilegal things; but at to what extent this non ilegal actions are ethical? Some corporations simply don't care about ethics, or they do care, but do not consider it so important as profit. I think sooner or later this attitudes will come back and bite you in the a$$. Sort like Karma, sooner or later.

Let's answer a few questions, regarding this movie, proposed by my teacher Gina D'amato

1. Should corporations be entitled to the same legal rights as individuals? Where should the line be drawn?

• Let's say yes, because they took advantage of a technicality. But if they want same legal rights as individuals, they should have same legal duties. They should pay for the bad things they do. If they hurt someone, they should be judge as a individual. Or maybe a little bit harder, just because they are not mere individuals, they have more power than the majority of individuals, so there actions can reach far more than an average person. I think, that if they really want those legal rights, they should want the legal duties.

2.How can we ensure corporations are held accountable for their actions?

• Ensure? Very hard. Many corporations have so much power, that they can influence judges, juries, and politicians to take sides with them. The main point here is to have a non corrupted judicial system, and believe in it. Sometimes evidence is so clear that doing an unfaithful action will bring worst consecuences. Also, media should give importance to cases that show the crimes of corporations, making people aware of it, being objective, this can act as a pressure towards the people in charge of judging.

3. Should individuals (directors, employees, shareholders) bear any responsibility for the actions of a corporation? If so, to what degree?

• Yes they should, totally. They are representatives of the corporations, some of them don't know what is going on with it, they should. But other do know, or directly influence the corporations decisions. What happened with Enron for example. Where the highest ranking managers new what was going on, and tricked their employess by giving, selling or inviting them to purchase stocks of the company, just before it went bankrupt. They betrayed their employees, they did not have any ethics and many people lost all their lifetime savings. Probably this is a rare case, or not vey common, but my point is, that everyone involve in the corporation should respond for it's actions, taking into account the level of involvement and how directly or undirectly their actions influenced what happened.

4. What are the benefits of the corporate form? Could an alternative model offer these as well?

• -Corporate form gives you the opportunity of capitalising yourself. You have access to the stock market, even though is a good way to do it, you are giving the company to the people who buy those stocks. -Also, a great benefit if you have economic issues, is that as a corporation, you only respond for the assets the company has. So if you get sued for 1 million USD and you only have 500 thousand, you'll just pay that.-Being seen as an individual, with rights is also a big benefit.-A big corporation, can act as a big family. It creates a sense of belonging for the employees, a kind of culture.
• There are other models that offer other benefits, but restrict other. For example a partnership makes you give your assets in order to pay money issues, la the example we just saw. So is a matter of knowing what to want, sacrificing some things for others.

Good or bad, ethical or unethical, corporations are a "necessary evil", because they are a huge, important part of the world economy, giving jobs, services, products and many other things to people, governments, etc. But they also have showned to bring bad things too.

Bibliography

-http://www.thecorporation.com/

Images

Taken from: http://beancounterblog.com/2008/12/11/the-corporation-a-business-film-review/

UBUNTU! yes it is present at the workplace

As the world changes, and globalization absorbs us, new ideas, concepts, views of things and many, many things come to our knowledge. Some can be seen as great, and others as really bad.

One that can really be seen as great, and very useful in many areas is the Ubuntu philosophy. Why? Because of its main idea of everybody together as a whole. This philosophy of harmony, is very useful in the work environment of a company. Adapting the idea that we are all together as one, is probably the idea for any company, that wants that every employee and every part of the organization works together as one.

We could say that Ubuntu philosophy is present in three aspect in the workplace.

• The way in which individuals relate within the organization and with others. Employees see their partners or co-workers as brothers and sisters, like a family that has to work together in order to grow and evolve. Their relationship are calid and respectful because they treat each other with respect in order to learn from everyone. They treat themselves between them as family members. In other words, the organization is seen as a home which involves a family that has to be united and supportive.

• The way an organization manages time is another aspect of the Ubuntu philosophy. In other cultures time is fragmented and has a price but in this philosophy time is seen as a whole which can be used to have a progress in the community and because of that community progress everyone will also have a live improvement. They don’t have money as a priority, their community is their priority. Everyone has to be and feel good.

• The decision making process is another aspect present in organizational philosophy. For them the collective welfare is the most important thing in the organization. They seek for profitability but as mentioned above they don’t have money as a priority. Their major priority is that everyone within the organization feels good and comfortable. When taking a decision everyone is involved and the most important thing is that it always seeks a favorable result for the community.

We may not even know it, but we probably are using some of Ubuntu's ideas. So you see, Ubuntu is not that unknown to us. For example “A person with Ubuntu is welcoming, hospitable, warm, generous, and willing to share" [1] If you are like this, then probably you have some Ubuntu in you.

References:

• [1] http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/7-22-2006-103206.asp

Image:

• http://www.zazzle.es/ubuntu_soy_porque_somos_camiseta-235421172116721211

METAPHOR

Sometimes, when you want to introduce your product to a new market, the best campaign is not using sexy girls, hot cars, or your typical sexy stuff. Sometimes the best campaign is to make your product mysterious, magical, something that captures people attention in a different way.

Let's say I found a emerald mine, and that I'm going to start to sell this product in Europe, being here where the people that can afford emeralds, and like them are located to a big extent. But I can not sell them as an ordinary Colombian Emerald, because it would be the same product. As you may know, Colombian emeralds are globally known, as very unique and very expensive. But how to sell them in a new way? How about if I create a metaphor of my emeralds being so unique, they are legendary.

I could say the following:

These emeralds used to belong to a powerful indigenous chief, who's secretely in love with the daughter of his enemy, in this case another indigenous chief of another tribe. He couldn't let anybody know, but on every solstice he made sure that the most amazing, mysterious and magical emeralds reached his loved hand, just to let her know how much he loved her. Nobody know what happened to those emeralds, because after a great war, the dissapear, along with the chief and his loved one.

Ok, so know let's see. We have the chief which shows power, money, but making it exotic. Second we have the fact that he is secretely in love with someone he couldn't be. This "traps"the people that are married, in loved, or have a lover, that will give them jewelry. This give an additional emotion to buying the emerald, and finally we have the general which is buying an emerald that has a mystery attach to it, making it more special.

This is a way to sell a product, but obviously using a good marketing campaign that has the general idea of the story.

Pygmalion Effect

“One's expectations about a person can eventually lead that person to behave and achieve in ways that confirm those expectations” (taken from http://www.users.muohio.edu/shermalw/edp603_group2-f00.html )

If you believe so hard in something, it might just become true. We have heard a lot of histories about succesful actors, football players, basketball players, scientists, politicias, etc. All of them, have something in common, and is that they say that is because they believe so much in something, that it became true. The Pygmalion Effect tell us that if an expectation placed on a person is high, that person will perform better, just because they want to achieve that expectation.

A very good example would have to be Forrest Gump. This, being a great movie, shows us how anyone can achieve great things, no matter what their situation is. Yes, it's movie, but still it can appy to many things.

Forrest Gump has well below average intelligence, but still manages to do so many things. Finishing school, going to college, going to the army and fighting in Vietnam, being a ping pong champion, owning a shrimp company, being shareholder of Apple. All this because his mother told him that he can be whatever he wants to be, and being less intelligent, in a way, help him, because he doesn't understand that a person with his condition "can't" do a lot.

So you see, believing big, sometimes let's you achieve big.

Taken from : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLkNPjbaPTk

Organizational Behaviour

As part of this week topic, we will talk about Organizational Behaviour, and after seeing Mr. Nick B. Meyer conference "Dealing with Cultural Differences", we will discuss the importance of this topic.

But what is Organizational Behaviour? If we want to be really technic about it is: "The study of individual behavior in an organizational setting. This includes the study of how individuals behave alone, as well as how individuals behave in groups."[1] This simply means on how people or individuals behave in an organization, based on their cultural background.

The problem here begins when certain people of a certain culture, work in an organization of a different culture. This creates a "confrontation", that if not developed adequately can become a real problem for the organization.

For example, lets say that a Japanese car company, opens a subsidiary in India, because salaries in India are lower and workers are qualified to do the job required. The Japanese company opens the production plant with 100% Indian workers, except for the managing staff which is Japanese. In Japan Power Distance (PDI) is 51, in India PDI is 77 [2]. This means that India is a more unequal society. You may say that Japan is also very unequal, but if you travel to India, you'll find a very large differences between the persons that have the most and the persons that don't have anything. The gap between rich and poor is very big, compared to Japan.

Continuing with the example, in Japanese culture it is very normal for the regular worker to give ideas to the upper levels of the organization, regarding any type of problems or ideas that he or she notices, and this is not only from the lower part of organizations, in the upper part, the managers expect for workers to bring them this ideas. Imagine the Japanese managers sent to India for this case in particular, expecting the Indians to come up to them and tell them anything, when in India, regular workers see the managers so far away, that they wouldn't even talk to them because of fear and respect to higher power. Managers would never learn what is going on in the company and workers will feel harassed by theire bosses.

A situation like this one, will be very hard for an organization, that's why organizations have to study cultures, and understand them, in order to acknowledge that there are situations that can exist, that can be prevent for the sake of the company. That's the importance of Organizational Behaviour.

Bibliographical References:

[1] Reference for Business. (2010). Encyclopedia of business. Retrieved from: http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/management/Ob-Or/Organizational-Behavior.html

[2] Statistics taken from http://www.geert-hofstede.com)

- Images taken from www.gettyimages.com

3 BLOGS

After having a look at different topics on thebobs.com, these were 3 blogs that I found interesting:

1. Name: Falta contra el balón

URL: http://www.futbolred.com/blogs/falta_contra_el_balon/

*Football blog, with a humoristic and irreverent look to this sport. I had seen it before, and fortunetely it was on the website. I love football and this guy sure makes it fun.

2. Name: Atlético Nacional

URL: http://www.eltiempo.com/blogs/atletico_nacional_-_orgullo_paisa_pasion_y_gloria_del_pueblo_colombiano_sentimiento_nacional/?id_blog=3127

*A blog of the best team in the world. I'm a huge fan of Atlético Nacional, and this blog helps me to know what's going on with the team, from a different perspective, a fan perspective.

No need to say, best blog of all.

3. Name: Int'l Relations +

URL: http://andreaprigio.hd1.com.br/Intl+/Home.html

*Good blog about International Relations. The interesting themes make it appealing for students like me, who are studying international business.