Mine and Mind

Because there seems to be a disconnect between what many hospital management teams are saying and what they are doing, I decided to get to the bottom of the very term. Diversity comes from the word diverse, an adjective meaning unlike. Take a look around your own executive team – is there very much unlike amongst you?

Here’s some interesting news: Cedric Herring, a sociologist from the University of Illinois at Chicago, recently completed a study exploring whether or not diversity actually makes a difference to the bottom line. He examined data from 250 U.S. employers on diversity levels and business performance, and found that there was a direct correlation between diversity and business success.

“Those companies that have very low levels of racial and ethnic minorities have the lowest profits and the lowest market share and the lowest number of customers,” said Herring. “Those that have medium levels do better, and those that have the highest levels do the best.”

Instead of looking at diversity hiring as a win-win, many organizations see hiring people from different backgrounds, cultures and generations as an obligation. They think that having a certain number of minorities on board will mitigate potential PR disasters and keep pace with what other healthcare institutions may be doing. But it’s vital we move beyond mere obligation, and recognize that in addition to Mr. Herring’s findings, there are tremendous advantages to inviting people with different experiences to the executive table. These include:

Complimentary perspectives. Executives who have grown up in other countries approach their work with different ways of thinking. We in the U.S. are action-oriented, quick to make decisions and always on the go. Having people on your team who may be process-oriented (Latin countries, such as Central and South America, Spain, Italy and France), task-oriented (Northern Europe) or role-oriented (Asia and India) can often lend much needed balance.

Fresh ideas and approaches to old problems. Executives with different backgrounds bring different perspectives (see above) and different problem solving skills. A good example of this is Dr. Joy Draft, CEO of Georgetown Hospital in Washington, DC. She feels that her background as a critical care physician enhances her ability to establish priorities and allocate time and resources.

When asked how the physician in her surfaces, she says, “It does more so in the decisions I make about resources here at Georgetown and new programs we’re developing. What can we bring to the community that is needed and isn’t already here? That’s where the doctor in me comes out.”

Community Involvement. Healthcare organizations must do their best to reflect the demographic profile of the community they serve in their hiring practices, all the way up to the top. Doing so ensures strong community relationships, more effective outreach and wellness programs and a pipeline of potential employees who see the organization as a partner in the community and an employer of choice.

In summary, diversity isn’t just about meeting onerous obligations. It is about making changes, in the spirit of inclusion that will have a positive impact on your organization. If your organization struggles with adding minority leaders to the executive level, talk to others in your network that have been successful with their diversity initiatives.

And when you speak to them, ask them how they found their people and what the return on their investment in diversity has been. No doubt, you will be in for a good education. If you have made significant inroads in adding diversity to your team, let others know about it and offer to help. Now is the time to add some real diversity to your organization’s leadership team!

We love to chat about many things. People have different favorite topics to talk about. When you have a particular interest in mind, you look for those chats that will suit your needs best. If you like a mature chat, politics is definitely for you. Politics is a topic that many like to steer clear of. This is mainly because nothing conclusive emanates from it. It really does not matter where you are, politics will always spark different emotions. There are chats that have totally banned politics from discussions and there are those who specialize in political issues. There are very many chat forums which will host politics as their chosen topic of focus. Life is politics and, there is no way of avoiding it at some point in our lives. Therefore, the importance of politics cannot be underestimated. However, when you wish to engage in a political chat, there are several things that you need to consider. If you are chatting in chats where politics is common, there will be rules put in place to guide you. Therefore, the first thing before you engage in a political chat is to look at the rules.

Rules need to be followed for many reasons. It is through rules of a political chat forum that you will get to know what is acceptable and what is not. Just like a game, you need to know what to do so that you can gain as much as you can. In this case, rules will enable you know how to conduct it. Rules will also show you where trouble is and, you can avoid it. For example, you should never engage in personal attacks, you should never use insults to make your point heard and also you should never appear to demean any political figure or a figure in a different political context. In other words, rules are put in place to ensure that your conversations are mature. Criticism should be creative or constructive and, when you fully understand this, you are ready to conduct a political chat. Sometimes, politics seems to have no rules at all. It is difficult to establish the line which you should not cross. However, with proper adherence to rules, you should be in a position to chat appropriately.

A political chat should be based on honesty. You should avoid major propaganda. Also, you should not insight people or make people believe what you think. People you are chatting with will also have a keen interest in politics and chances are that they have their very own opinion. You should not be compelled to agree with anyone. Personal sentiments on politics will always differ to great degrees. You must know why you are chatting in the first place. Your aim might be to see what opinions of others are. You might also be looking for solutions. Also, chats will enable you understand some of the things you do not. Many minds have a way of dissecting issues and having a better or clearer understanding to issues. With the above tips on how to chat politically, you should have a mature chat.

Tradition, Religion Of Christian Churches

Christianity is the form of religion where people follow Christian denomination. To preach the Christian religion, people use to go for prayers in Christian church. Christian church are the worldwide traditions which represents the Christian faiths, preaches, worship, religion and saying of the god Jesus Christ. Christian church can be seen world wide and finds to be world wide spread religion. The followers of Christianity find a church through online church directory or any other church directory and make their prayers valuable. Online directory comprises of pictures, maps and other description about different Christian churches.

Christianity is spread world wide by the followers by preaching to the people regarding the religion, faith and saying of the god and also regarding the lord Jesus Christ. Christian churches can be classified as Catholic Church, Baptist church and Pentecostal church which comes up with different Christian church history church growth. Local church can be finded out in church directory for different states and different Christian classification. Christian church can be called or referred in different terms as it concept different for each individual.

Christian church expresses the ideas of different people and makes those ideas as shared one. They also share the faith, religion, saying with regards to the prayers and also bind with Christianity. Christian church comes up with wide church history and at also regarding its origin. Christian church finds its origin in roman and after realizing the value it has been spread world over. A Christian church becomes more important and essential place, which helps them to feel relaxed and share their thoughts and feelings with other people in the church.

Roman Catholic Church, Apostolic church, Lutheran church, charlotte church, Episcopal Church, Florida church, US church, Washington church and many other kinds of Christian church are available for people to have their prayers and services.Nowadays, large number of people started realizing the purpose and need of the religion Christianity and started going for different churches placed in different places and states. Even if people finds difficult to find out the church they required, they can seek the help of church finder or church ministry or through online church directory.

There are local churches available to facilitate the people with their prayers. Though Christian churches are classified as Baptist church, Pentecostal church and Catholic Church, they form under Christian churches. Generally, most of the people provide services to create broad Christian services and to have best resources for finding the local church or foreign churches located in different places of world. Church list are available and any festival are listed in the church to make the people share their joy and sorrow in church.

Role Of Government In Developing Entrepreneurs

ENTREPRENEUR

An Entrepreneur is an individual who efficiently and effectively combines the four factors of production. Those factors are land (natural resources), labor (human input into production using available resources), capital (any type of equipment used in production i.e. machinery) and Enterprise (intelligence, knowledge, and creativity.)

Entrepreneurship is often difficult and tricky, as many new ventures fail. is often . Most commonly, the term entrepreneur applies to someone who creates value by offering a product or service. Entrepreneurs often have strong beliefs about a market opportunity and organize their resources effectively to accomplish an outcome that changes existing interactions.

Business entrepreneurs are viewed as fundamentally important in the capitalistic society. Some distinguish business entrepreneurs as either “political entrepreneurs” or “market entrepreneurs,” while social entrepreneurs’ principal objectives include the creation of a social and/or environmental benefit.

The Enterprise can be set up in a designated industrial areas, where infrastructure facilities are available and is near to the market identified. It can also be set up in any other area depending upon nature of activity and local municipal rules.

Entrepreneurship is the practice of starting new organizations or revitalizing mature organizations, particularly new businesses generally in response to identified opportunities. Entrepreneurship is often a difficult undertaking, as a vast majority of new businesses fail. Entrepreneurial activities are substantially different depending on the type of organization that is being started. Entrepreneurship ranges in scale from solo projects (even involving the entrepreneur only part-time) to major undertakings creating many job opportunities. Many “high-profile” entrepreneurial ventures seek venture capital or angel funding in order to raise capital to build the business. Angel investors generally seek returns of 20-30% and more extensive involvement in the business. Many kinds of organizations now exist to support would-be entrepreneurs, including specialized government agencies, business incubators, science parks, and some NGOs.

CHARACTERISTICS OF AN ENTREPRENEUR

Entrepreneurs have many of the same character traits as leaders, similar to the early great man theories of leadership; Entrepreneurs are often contrasted with managers and administrators who are said to be more methodical and less prone to risk-taking. Such person-centric models of entrepreneurship have shown to be of questionable validity, not least as many real-life entrepreneurs operate in teams rather than as single individuals

• The Entrepreneur has an enthusiastic vision.
• The Entrepreneur’s vision is an interlocked collection of specific ideas.
• The overall blueprint to realize the vision is clear.
• The Entrepreneur promotes the vision with enthusiastic passion.
• The Entrepreneur develops strategies to change the vision into reality.
• The Entrepreneur takes the initial responsibility to cause a vision to become a success.
• Entrepreneurs take prudent risks.
• An Entrepreneur is usually a positive thinker and a decision maker.

ADVANTAGES OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Every successful entrepreneur brings about benefits not only for himself/ herself but for the municipality, region or country as a whole. The benefits that can be derived from entrepreneurial activities are as follows:

1. Enormous personal financial gain.
2. Self-employment, offering more job satisfaction and flexibility of the work force.
3. Development of more industries, especially in rural areas or regions disadvantaged by economic changes, for example due to globalization effects.
4. Encouragement of the processing of local materials into finished goods for domestic consumption as well as for export.
5. Income generation and increased economic growth.
6. Promotion of the use of modern technology in small-scale manufacturing to enhance higher productivity.
7. Encouragement of more researches/ studies and development of modern machines and equipment for domestic consumption.
8. Development of entrepreneurial qualities and attitudes among potential entrepreneurs to bring about significant changes in the rural areas.
9. Freedom from the dependency on the jobs offered by others.
10. The ability to have great accomplishments.

CONTRIBUTIONS OF ENTREPRENEURS

1) Develop new markets.

Under the modern concept of marketing, markets are people who are willing and able to satisfy their needs. In Economics, this is called effective demand. Entrepreneurs are resourceful and creative. They can create customers or buyers. This makes entrepreneurs different from ordinary businessmen who only perform traditional functions of management like planning, organization, and coordination.

2) Discover New Sources Of Materials.

Entrepreneurs are never satisfied with traditional or existing sources of materials. Due to their innovative nature, they persist on discovering new sources of materials to improve their enterprises. In business, those who can develop new sources of materials enjoy a comparative advantage in terms of supply, cost and quality.

3) Mobilize Capital Resources.

Entrepreneurs are the organizers and coordinators of the major factors of production, such as land labor and capital. They properly mix these factors of production to create goods and service. Capital resources, from a layman’s view, refer to money. However, in economics, capital resources represent machines, buildings, and other physical productive resources. Entrepreneurs have initiative and self-confidence in accumulating and mobilizing capital resources for new business or business expansion.

4) Introduce new technologies.

Aside from being innovators and reasonable risk-takers, entrepreneurs take advantage of business opportunities, and transform these into profits. So, they introduce something new or something different. Such entrepreneurial spirit has greatly contributed to the modernization of economies. Every year, there are new technologies and new products. All of these are intended to satisfy human needs in a more convenient and pleasant way.

5)  Create Employment.

The biggest employer is the private business sector. Millions of jobs are provided by the factories, service industries, agricultural enterprises, and the numerous small-scale businesses.

PROMOTION OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Entrepreneurship  was potential to support economic growth and social cohesion, it is the policy goal of many governments to develop a culture of entrepreneurial thinking. This can be done in a number of ways: by integrating entrepreneurship into education systems, legislating to encourage risk-taking, and national campaigns

Many of these initiatives have been brought together under the umbrella of Global Entrepreneurship Week, a worldwide celebration and promotion of youth entrepreneurship, which started in 2008.

FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE

Financial assistance is available from institutions such as Nationalised Banks, Small Industries Development Bank of India, Regional Rural Banks, National Small Industries Corporation, State Financial Corporations etc. depending upon the project requirement and promoters background. Financial assistance has two components. Loan for fixed capital is used to acquire Plant and Machinery, land and building. Working capital loan is used to meet day to day operational cost of the production. State Financial Corporation and National Small Industries Corporation generally provide working capital. However under a package assistance, State Financial Corporations also provide a composite loan covering plant and machinery and working capital.

The general conditions for getting financial assistance are:

• Eligibility criteria
• Technical /Economic viability
• Promoters contribution
• Capacity to repay loan
• Collateral securities/guarantee

THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT IN SUPPORTING ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in market economies are the engine of economic development. Owing to their private ownership, entrepreneurial spirit, their flexibility and adaptability as well as their potential to react to challenges and changing environments, SMEs contribute to sustainable growth and employment generation in a significant manner.

SMEs have strategic importance for each national economy due a wide range of reasons. Logically, the government shows such an interest in supporting entrepreneurship and SMEs. There is no simpler way to create new job positions, increasing GDP and rising standard of population than supporting entrepreneurship and encouraging and supporting people who dare to start their own business. Every surviving and successful business means new jobs and growth of GDP.

Therefore, designing a comprehensive, coherent and consistent approach of Council of Ministers and entity governments to entrepreneurship and SMEs in the form of government support strategy to entrepreneurship and SMEs is an absolute priority. A comprehensive government approach to entrepreneurship and SMEs would provide for a full coordination of activities of numerous governmental institutions (chambers of commerce, employment bureaus, etc.) and NGOs dealing with entrepreneurship and SMEs.  With no pretension of defining the role of government in supporting entrepreneurship and SMEs, we believe that apart from designing a comprehensive entrepreneurship and SMEs strategy, the development of national SME support institutions and networks is one of key condition for success. There are no doubts that governments should create different types of support institutions:

i)                    To provide information on regulations, standards, taxation, customs duties, marketing issues;

ii)                   To advise on business planning, marketing and accountancy, quality control and assurance;

iii)                 To create incubator units providing the space and infrastructure for business beginners and innovative companies, and helping them to solve technological problems, and to search for know-how and promote innovation; and

iv)                 To help in looking for partners. In order to stimulate entrepreneurship and improve the business environment for small enterprises.

Training

Basic training differs from product to product but will necessary involve sharpening of entrepreneurial skills. Need based technical training is provided by the Govt. & State Govt. technical Institutions.

There are a number of Government organisations as well as NGOs who conduct EDPs and MDPs. These EDPs and MDPs and are conducted by MSME’s, NIESBUD, NSIC, IIE, NISIET, Entrepreneurship Development Institutes and other state government developmental agencies.

Marketing Assistance

There are Governmental and non-governmental specialised agencies which provide marketing assistance. Besides promotion of MSME products through exhibitions, NSIC directly market the MSME produce in the domestic and overseas market. NSIC also manages a single point registration scheme for manufacturers for Govt. purchase. Units registered under this scheme get the benefits of free tender documents and exemption from earnest money deposit and performance guarantee.

Promotional Schemes

Government accords the highest preference to development of MSME by framing and implementing suitable policies and promotional schemes. Besides providing developed land and sheds to the entrepreneurs on actual cost basis with appropriate infrastructure, special schemes have been designed for specific purposes like quality upgradation, common facilities, entrepreneurship development and consultancy services at nominal charges.

Government of India has been executing the incentive scheme for providing reimbursement of charges for acquiring ISO 9000 certification to the extent of 75% of the cost subject to a maximum of Rs. 75,000/- in each case. ISO 9000 is a mechanism to facilitate adoption of consistent management practices and production technique as decided by the entrepreneur himself. This facilitates achievement of desired level of quality while keeping check on production process and management of the enterprise.

Concession on Excise Duty

MSME units with a turnover of Rs. 1 crore or less per year have been exempted from payment of Excise Duty. Moreover there is a general scheme of excise exemption for MSME brought out by the Ministry of Finance which covers most of the items. Under this, units having turnover of less than Rs. 3 crores are eligible for concessional rate of Excise Duty. Moreover, there is an exemption from Excise Duty for MSME units producing branded goods in rural areas

Credit Facility To MSME

Credit to micro, small and medium scale sector has been covered under priority sector lending by banks. Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) has been established as the apex institution for financing the MSME. Specific schemes have been designed for implementation through SIDBI, SFCs, Scheduled Banks, SIDCs and NSIC etc. Loans upto Rs. 5 lakhs are made available by the banks without insisting on collaterals. Further Credit Guarantee Fund for micro, small and medium enterprises has been set up to provide guarantee for loans to MSME up to Rs. 25 lakhs extended by Commercial Banks and some Regional Rural Bank.

Policies And Schemes For Promotion Of MSME Implemented By State Governments

All the State Governments provide technical and other support services to small units through their Directorates of Industries, and District Industries Centres. Although the details of the scheme vary from state to state, the following are the common areas of support.

1. Development and management of industrial estates
2. Suspension/deferment of Sales Tax
3. Power subsidies
4. Capital investment subsidies for new units set up in a particular district
5. Seed Capital/Margin Money Assistance Scheme
6. Priority in allotment of power connection, water connection.
7. Consultancy and technical support

Government of India runs a scheme for giving National Awards to micro, small and medium scale entrepreneurs providing quality products in 11 selected industry groups of consumer interest. The winners are given trophy, certificate and a cash price of Rs. 25000/- each.

CONCLUSION

Government accords the highest preference to development of MSME by framing and implementing suitable policies and promotional schemes like policies and promotional schemes, providing incentives for quality upgradation, concession on excise duty and provides technical supportive services. Thus Government play supportive role in developing entrepreneurs.

R.Yuvarani

M.Phil Scholar

Department of Commerce,

Periyar University, Salem-11.