3/26/2020 0 Comments My Philosophy as a Teacher :: Philosophy of Education Statement Teaching EssaysMy Philosophy as a Teacher I want that “A†assignment displayed on David’s refrigerator. I want Julie to recount that discussion about Elie Weisel’s Night to her friend on the bus, and I want them to feel enlightened and emotional about it. Years from now, I want to hear Jose tell his son about the class where he realized he wasn’t stupid and could write well. I want him to write a story about it. I haven’t taught a David, a Julie or a Jose yet, but one day I want to have that kind of effect on my students. No matter how a child feels about school, it plays a tremendous part in a child’s life. Teachers can brighten or burden a student’s day, every day, depending on how a teacher conducts her class and how she relates to her students. For this reason, I believe I must teach more than just English and more than that which can be measured by grades. I believe a good teacher can give a student the skills and self confidence that may propel that child through life. Whetting a child’s interest in learning and pushing a child to prove himself capable of obtaining and improving on his talents, is of vital importance. Having been a student for nearly sixteen years now, I believe that in order to be an effective conveyer of skills and knowledge, I must always plan, be organized, structured and make my expectations high and clear for my students. Whenever possible, I must streamline and simplify complex ideas in order to help students grasp new skills and concepts. Teaching freshly, creatively and entertainingly is also highly important. As an English teacher, I want to guide my students closely through their writing processes, emphasizing the revision process, which I find to be crucial in learning to write well. I want to help alleviate the intense stress that students sometimes feel about writing by making them write often. With practice, I hope to make writing feel natural and enjoyable for even my most English-hating students.
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Oxygen Consumption in Cellular Respiration Introduction Dormant seeds are seeds that are living but have a seed coat around them. They have all the supplies they need to process and have a metabolism, and they would be able to germinate if they were under the right conditions.1 Germination occurs when dormant seeds are placed in the right conditions to start to enlarge and open so roots start to protrude. Oxygen, water, temperature, and amount of light are all important factors for germination. For peas to germinate, they need a dark, warm environment after soaking in water. Cellular respiration is a metabolic process. Eventually, catabolic reactions are used to break down an organic molecule to release energy. Cellular respiration occurs through three stages: Glycolysis, the Krebs Cycle, and oxidation phosphoralation. Cellular respiration is aerobic, and glucose (C6H12O6) and oxygen (O2) go into the reaction, and through the process, carbon dioxide (CO2), water (H2O), and up to 38 ATP are produced. This means that during the process, the glucose is broken down and the oxygen is consumed. As this happens, carbon dioxide and water come out and energy is released into the cell. The general gas equation, otherwise known as the Ideal Gas Law, states: PV=nRT such that P is pressure, V is gas volume, n is the amount of gas molecules, R is the gas constant that remains the same and is measured in units of the other aspects, and T is temperature of the gas. The general gas equation is important because it shows that pressure and volume are inversely proportional in the molecules and temperature stays the same. Also, if the molecule number stays the same, but the temperature changes, the pressure and volume are directly proportional to temperature and one or both will change in the same direction. A respirometer measures how much oxygen is used during cellular respiration. The basic concept is, as oxygen from the air in the respirometer will be consumed in the reaction; the volume of the oxygen gas decreases, and the pressure decreases as well. When the pressure decreases, water from outside the respirometer will proportionally come into the pipette, and if the amount entering is measured, then the amount of oxygen consumed is the same. Potassium hydroxide solution reacts with carbon dioxide to form potassium carbonate. The carbon dioxide will be completely used in the reaction, so none will be left in the surroundings. In the experiment, the carbon dioxide that is produced will move towards the 15% KOH solution and will create the solid potassium carbonate. Therefore, any volume change is not related to the CO2. The purpose of the experiment is to determine how much O2 is used in cellular respiration. In addition, the different rates of reactions of germinated peas compared to dry peas is tested to determine if one is more efficient, and different temperatures are tested to see which has the greatest effect. It was hypothesized that the germinated peas will have a higher rate of reaction and therefore consumes more oxygen than the dry peas. Also, the peas in the warmer water will have a higher rate of reaction as well. Materials and Methods 50mL tube H2O Tub with 10° C Water Extra ice Tub with room-temperature Water 50 germinating peas 50 dried peas Glass beads Paper towels Six vials Six stoppers with glass calibrated pipettes attached Absorbent cotton Nonabsorbent cotton Dropper 6mL 15% KOH solution 6 weights Tape Thermometer The room temperature water tub was placed out before the experiment took place to insure that the water reached equilibrium. Ice was added to the water of the second tub to keep a constant temperature of 10° C. This temperature was maintained by adding ice when needed throughout the experiment. A tube was filled with 25mL of H2O. 25 germinating peas were added, and the water displacement was recorded. This was the volume of the 25 germinating peas. The peas were then placed on a paper towel to dry off. The tube was refilled, and 25 dried peas were added. Glass beads were added until the same volume of germinating peas was reached. The peas and beads were placed on a paper towel to dry. The tube was refilled and only glass beads were added until the germinating peas volume was reached. The beads were placed on a paper towel to dry. The process of adding germinating peas, dried peas, and glass beads to 25mL of H2O was repeated so there were two sets of each. Next, the respirometers were created. Absorbent cotton was placed on the bottom of each of the six vials. One milliliter of 15% KOH was placed on the cotton, making sure that the sides of the vials remained dry. Nonabsorbent cotton was placed on top of the moistened cotton. For vial 1, the first set of germinating peas was placed on top of the cotton. Vial 2 had the first set of dried peas and beads, and vial three had the first set of only beads. Vial four had the second set of germinating peas, vial five had the second set of dried peas and beads, and vial six and the second set of beads. The stoppers with the pipettes were placed in each vial. A weight was attached to the bottom of each. Tape was placed across each tub to create a sling. The first 3 vials were placed in the tub of room-temperature water, and the last three were placed in the 10° C water tub. The pipettes of all were placed on the sling so that the vials were not completely in the water. After seven minutes, all the respirometers were submerged in the water so that the numbers on the pipette could still be read. After 3 minutes, the initial water amount was recorded for each vial. The temperature in both tubs was recorded. The water position was recorded for each vial in both tubs every 5 minutes for 20 minutes. Once done, the respirometers were taken apart, the cotton and peas were discarded, and the rest of the respirometers were washed and dried. The water in the tubs was discarded in the sink. Results It was hypothesized that the germinating peas would have a faster rate of reaction than the dried peas, and the ones in the room temperature water would have a better reaction rate than the ones in 10° water. The results support the hypothesis. As shown in Table 3, the difference column shows the initial reading minus the reading of the time for each vial, this represents how much water has entered into the pipette since the beginning of the experiment. If the water entered more, then the pressure inside the vial must have decreased, therefore the oxygen in the vial must have been consumed during the experiment. The germinating peas had much more of a difference than the dried peas. Therefore, oxygen was consumed must faster in the germinating peas than the dried ones. The hypothesis was correct. The glass beads were the control of the experiment, since there was no respiration taking place in those respirometers; therefore, if there were any outside forces affecting the experiment, they would be detected in this respirometer. In table 3, the difference in the initial and each time check was shown for beads. The pressure did change slightly in both the room temperature and 10° C water. This could be due to the temperature change of the air, resulting in the temperature change in the water and respirometer. According to the general gas law, if the temperature increases, the pressure or volume will also increase, and this would cause the water to leave the pipette. Therefore, the difference would be negative since there is less water in the tube than the initial amount. The corrected differences shown in Table 3 are found by subtracting the difference of the beads initial reading and reading at the moment from the difference between the initial amount and the reading of the moment of the peas. This is the amount of pressure just lost only due to cellular respiration. When the corrected difference is negative, that means that the pressure increased in the vial, as discussed above. The corrected differences in the 20° water are shown in Figure 1. The germinating peas increased a lot more than the dried peas, shown by the steep slope of the germinating peas in 20° C water. The dried peas actually had a negative corrected difference, which indicates either an increase in pressure or increase in temperature. Figure 2 shows the corrected differences in the 10° C water. The germinating peas still had a higher rate of reaction for cellular respiration in the colder water. The dried peas had a negative corrected difference, so like the ones in the room temperature water, this indicates either temperature of pressure increases around the respirometers. The hypothesis that cellular respiration would occur more in the room temperature respirometers than the 10° C water was correct. The germinating peas in the room temperature water consumed far more oxygen than the ones in the 10° water. As shown in Table 3, in the first five minutes, the germinating peas in the room water caused the pressure to drop .2 mL in the respirometer. The ones in the cold water only caused the pressure to drop .06mL, the big difference already shows that higher temperatures affect cellular respiration positively. Figure 3 shows the two germinating peas in the different water. The ones in room temperature water have a steep slope compared to the ones in the 10° C water. The curves indicate that the cellular respiration increased faster in the germinating peas in the room temperature water than the ones in the 10° C water. The difference between the two temperatures shows that the cellular respiration has an ideal temperature to achieve efficiency of the respiration, and that room temperature is better than 10° C water.
Analyzing the Flesh and the Spirit by Anne Bradstreet Five Literary Criticisms Throughout history, there have been many religious faiths and practices that aim the same goal in different ways. One of them was Puritanism and the Puritan believed that the best way to gain admission to heaven was to focus on how sinful they were. Anne Bradstreet was the first Puritan figure in American Literature and in her poem titled The Flesh and the Spirit, she discussed Puritan practices. This essay will analyses the poem with 5 literary criticisms, including Marxist Criticism, Feminist Criticism, New Criticism, Reader-response Criticism, and Psychoanalytic Criticism. Starting with the Marxist Criticism, we need to look at the eras economic conditions first. Anne Bradstreet lived in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the colony was highly dependent on the import of staples from England. The Puritan dislike of ostentation led the colony to also regulate expenditures on what it perceived as luxury items. Items of personal adornment were frowned upon. In the poem, we see two characters discussing what kind of life people should have. The sister named Flesh tries to explain to her sister named Spirit that the World has everything that could keep them happy and content. Fleshs this kind of approach to the earthly goods is totally against Puritan believes. As the colony Bradstreet lived in already frowned upon luxury items, the sister Spirit says, My Crown not Diamonds, Pearls, and gold, / But such as Angels heads infold. Here, she means that she doesnt have a materialist personality. The poet, Bradstreet, reflects her colonys world-view for the economic matters in those lines. When we try to analyze this poem using the Feminist Criticism, we simply need to ask some questions regarding to poets sex, education, and then look at the characters. The poet was a woman. And when we read her biography, we see that she didnt attend any school but was educated by his father. This informs us that she lived in a male-dominant society because girls didnt attend school even if her father was a steward. The characters in the poem are also girls and they discuss religious matters. Here, the author breaks the male-dominant society and makes her female characters question the religious matters, especially the Puritanism. When the subject is religion, one shouldnt even question the most unimportant thing. But the sister Flesh questions it and all she says is totally against the Puritanism seen in the poets colony. Since the poet herself is a woman, we can assume that a woman discusses a religious practice in a male-dominant society. Analyzing a poem with New Criticism requires a person not to take background information of the poet, poets other works or the story in the poem into consideration. When we read what Spirit says about earthly goods and how she criticizes what Flesh claims that people need to enjoy them, we can understand that this poem reflects the Puritan beliefs. Words used in the poem belong to the English spoken at least 350 years ago. Metaphors were also used in the poem. The character Flesh is a metaphor for earthly items, such as diamonds, pearls, and gold. The poem is not also in a stanza form. It looks like a wall of text. This means that the poet didnt want to separate what is wanted to mean. It means that the poem is all about the same thing. Rhymes used in the poem also makes it sound better and that way it attracts readers attention. When I try to analyze this poem as a reader with the Reader-response Criticism, I can directly say that this poem is about Puritanism; therefore, religion. Since Spirit seems to be more dominant in the poem, the poets environment is a Puritan society. Id say this poem is not different than other religious poems because they all aim one goal: Heaven. It is the way they discuss what to do in order to go to Heaven. Flesh seems to be a sinner character whom readers should avoid. I dont know whether its okay to blame a character to praise a religion or religious practice, but this kind of behavior would make me more uninterested in that religion or practice. As the verses say, No Candle there, nor yet Torch light, / For there shall be no darksome night. they just sound to be impressive sentences that attract people to that religion no different than that of all religions have. To analyze this poem with the Psychoanalytic Criticism, we need to analyze the characters thoughts, their fears, and what they do to suppress their fears. When we look at what Spirit says in the poem, we can understand that her core issue is fear of God; thus, she adopted the Puritan beliefs in order to go to Heaven. On the other hand, Flesh is just opposite of Spirit. She displays everything that is against fear of God. This can also be interpreted to be an avoidance as her defense mechanism, since she tries to avoid any religious thoughts and want to enjoy all earthly pleasures. To sum up, this essay tried to analyze the poem titled The Flesh and the Spirit by Anne Bradstreet with 5 literary criticisms. With the Marxist Criticism, we looked at the eras economic conditions and tried to reflect Bradstreets colonys world-view for the economic matters in her poems verses. Using the Feminist Criticism, we tried to explain how Bradstreet broke the man-dominated society and used her female characters to discuss religious matters. With New Criticism, we tried to show figures of speech and what the poems form means. Reader-response Criticism was used to explain what the author of this paper understood from the poem. And finally, with the Psychoanalytic Criticism, we tried to identify characters core issues and their defense mechanisms.
Aligning Business Strategies and Project Management
Project management has become very important topic all over the world. Literature shows that more than 30 companies fail to accomplish its project with success due to misalignment between business strategies and project management. Many companies face this problem of missing link of business strategies and project management. Alignment is necessary for getting competitive advantage and goals of its business. Top management also play important role in alignment of business strategies and Project management. Keywords: Business strategies, project management, alignment, project portfolio management Introduction: Project management has become very important and also serves as core function in many organizations. Projects are any temporary activities that have starting and finish point, it has performance parameters. Projects face triple constrains (1) time (2) budget and (3) performance. It was assumed that for attainment of organizational goals one has to meet triple constraints of time, budget and performance. Project management plays a vital role in achieving organizational goals and considered as backbone of organization. Project management is knowledge that meets the requirements of projects. Project management plays important role in accomplishing strategies, business goals and desired outcomes. Organizations link their projects with business strategies to achieve the goals and objectives. Strategies are activities that guide and direct the use of the resources to accomplish the organizations vision and goals and sustainable competitive advantage. Mostly these components comprising the strategies of the business like internal analysis, organizational structures, control systems have strong links to project management processes and activities. Project management includes project portfolio management (PPM). PPM is about how organizations controls its projects and align them with business strategies. Many organizations are working on numerous projects and they are conscious to get maximum return of their business. PPM also includes the maximization profit which is main objective of all organization. Basically projects are bases of any organization to build up business strategy and project management relation. When organizations link their projects to their business strategy, they are better able to accomplish their organizational goals. Companies should align their business strategy with the project management action to implement the strategies in the projects. Such alignments are difficult because the objectives of business strategy are sometime not clear and well-communicated with project management. Misalignment may cause an organization to missing goals, communication gap and missing link of business strategy and project management. The lack of alignment of business strategy to the project management leads to the project failure and has adverse effects on organization performance as well. . There is need of systemic approach to align the projects with business strategy. So important in managerial challenges involved that aligning project management and business strategy and encouraging individuals to participate in using emerging strategies to create new ideas and renew existing strategies. Literature indicates that some factors that helps in creating link between business strategy and project management if there is any gap between the bridge of business strategy and project management that should be filled to achieve high returns and competitive advantages. As literature shows that SPL elements such as spirit, strategy, organization, tools and processes that elements should be align between business strategies and project management and in depth understanding of factors that are missing and relationship of these factors with business strategies and project management. Portfolio management play important role in project management and business strategy linking. Implementation of strategies with formulation, receive less attention than formulation so there should be proper emphasis on the implementation as well as. Therefore, this paper examines the linkage between business strategy, project portfolio management, and business success to finish the gap between strategy formulation and implementation and linking them in a bridge. There is seen a lot of importance of project portfolio management in evaluating, prioritizing and selecting projects in line with business strategy. It is choosing the right projects and important part of strategic management in organizations. So there are a few studies exploring single aspects of the linkage between strategies, project portfolio management. Business strategy describes the way in which a firm decides to compete in the market compared to its competitors and close the gap of these strategies with project management. Project Management: Project management has become an important issue for many corporations worldwide. Many implementations of project management have been successful, while others have been considered as failure. Projects in any organization have clearly became a central activity in many companies and considered as a backbone of organization and its success means a lot for an organization to prevail in the competitive arena. A project can be defined as a planned set of interrelated tasks to be executed over a fixed period and within certain cost and other limitations. Project management is often termed as the science and art of organizing the different project phases which may be launch of new service, a marketing campaign, building a an entire new floor of a building or a wedding. According to Milosevic and Srivannaboon (2006), the essence of project management is to support the execution of an organizations competitive strategy to deliver a desired outcome. Project management is defined as management that supports the execution of an organizations competitive strategy to deliver a desired outcome. Six-step approach can be helpful course that avoids the worst storms: Step 1: Identify the project Step 2: Determine the desired outcome Step 3: Describe each of the projects component tasks Step 4: Identify the key players. Step 5: Determine a time lines for each project component. Step 6: Review, revise and reallocate. Successful initiation of projects and its execution mostly depends upon strategy. Many companies are suffering from misaligned projects and a lack of a systematic approach to align project management with the business strategy. When organizations link their projects to their business strategy, they are better able to accomplish their organizational goals. Project strategy should be related to the projects goals and objectives in order to attain the preferred position in its competitive environment. Business Strategy: Strategy is defined by Patton White (2002) as a comprehensive set of actions or activities, which guide and direct the use of the firms resources to accomplish the organizations vision and goals and enable sustainable competitive advantage. Turning strategy into action to operationalize strategic objectives to achieve competitive advantage includes in the strategic management. Several scholars suggest that the success of project should be considered in the context of the achievement of the strategic goals of the organization (Dietrich Lehtonen, 2005; Kenny, 2006) and that organizations are better able to accomplish their goals when they link their projects to their business strategy. To ensure strategies are translated into actions they should be operational and includes some of the characteristics like structuring an organization to support successful performance and enabling success through the way in which the various resource areas like people, information, Finance, IT, etc. of an organization. Better implementation of strategic plans results in the better performance of sales growth, earnings growth, deposits growth, return on assets, return on equity, return on sales and return on total invested capital than those companies that do not implement their strategic plans. However, in any organization there are different levels of strategies presented by different level of a business which includes Corporate Strategy: It involves high level of strategic decision making and purpose of this strategy is to achieve the expectations of the stakeholders. Business Unit Strategy: The purpose of this strategy is to achieve the competitive advantage for the services and products which are produced and the decisions in this level is concerned with the choice of products, gaining competitive advantage, to meet the needs of the customers and create new opportunities. Operational Strategy: Its concerned with the coordination and improvement of resources which results in the effective and efficient implementation of the business unit level strategy. Implementation of strategies requires actions and completing tasks, and should focus on how to realize these strategies. Implementation must include attention to the following key points: Executing the work requires allocation of resources such as funds, people, and equipment. Organizational resources are limited. Implementation process requires project supportive organizational structure. A project selection and priority system to ensure strong linking between projects and the strategic plan. Managerial challenges involves aligning project management and business strategy which encourages individuals to participate in using emerging strategies to create new ideas and renew existing strategies. There is no such research regarding the framework for aligning project management and business strategy comprehensively. The literature has highlighted that there are many projects which have been executed without implementing the strategies as it has been formulated by executives in the corporations level without the involvement of the project manager. Aligning Business Strategy and Projects: Aligning the companys projects to maximize their contributions to strategic objectives takes a highly coordinated effort. Integration requires a process for prioritizing projects by their contribution to the strategic plan. The organizations to become more competitive, efficient and profitable they will need a business and project management experts working together to attain the business goals. Both, business and project management experts will work towards aligning projects with business strategy. Alignment of business strategy and project management is a major concern for any organization. Such alignments are challenging because the objectives of business strategy are not always clear or well-communicated or consistent with project management actions. Misalignment may cause an organization to miss goals and objectives. Understanding the alignment may be one of the major challenges to effective project management process. Alignment is not a onetime task but it is achieved through progression, which demands dominant leadership, top management support, efficient communication, collaborative work environment, trust, proper prioritization, technological setup and comprehensive knowledge about the operations of the business (Luftman, 2000). In order to achieve desired outputs from the selected projects organization should have the ability to build up competencies and then allocate those competences to the preferred projects. To help make sure the corporate projects are aligned to corporate strategy following can be kept in mind: Is the corporation committed to using project management strategically? In most companies, hundreds of projects are underway at any given time so there must be corporate commitment to the art and science of managing projects Is there a policy of formally preparing project charters? Since projects are the means by which corporate strategies are executed, it is critical that they be guided by the original corporate philosophy, strategy, and intent. Project charters are the instrument for doing this. Is there synergy between the business group and those responsible for project implementation? There needs to be early involvement by project implementation people. While this principle may seem sound, the practice of it presents a challenge. First, business planning people may prefer to plan without the help of perceived outsiders. Then, theres a good likelihood that the right project people might not be sitting about just waiting to brainstorm and analyze the early stages of a business proposal. The value for the organization to aligning projects with business strategy in a research by the Athabasca University was conducted in more than 60 organizations around the world and results showed that there were some benefits the organizations which include: Saved money and resources Increased profitability Retained customers Increased market share Prioritizing a project on the bases of its contribution to strategic achievement does not provide guarantee of project success but consistent allocation of resources is also a major task (Hrebiniak, 2006). A key point to make sure the alignment between project management and strategy included as: to carry out the appropriately chosen projects in an efficient ways organizations should make sure that have ability to do deliver the projects and programs. Top management plays a major role in projects alignment. Role of Management: Management is of central importance for the success of projects. Pinto and Slevin (1998) suggested that all the researchers agree that absence of support from management especially top management and by important stakeholder are most important among all other factors. Hacker and Doolen (2007) role of top management was studied in the perspectives of vision of the project and alignment of the scope with business strategy and project sponsorship and its impact on the triple constraint of the project i.e. cost, performance and cost. Researchers various different views about the extent of knowledge of senior managers should be in relation to project management. Some researchers suggest to the technical expertise and knowledge about the projects necessary for senior managers to develop and implement projects. Others felt that determine the line of control and to make available all relevant resources for project managers are the main functions of the senior management. There are different methods of how senior managers can be involved in the project management process. One of the approaches is not to interfere in which the project manager to all the rights of the planning to the implementation of projects. Responsibilities of project managers and executive managers is that project managers are primarily responsible for projects that are being implemented while the executives of the strategic alignment of business functions and projects with the organizations goals. Top managers should possess same skills and expertise as do the project managers Top management must carefully analyze which project should be prioritized in the allocation of resources. Resource allocation is one of the critical parts of the project management. These resources include financial, human and other resources necessary for the successful completion of the projects. Top management should carefully analyze which project should be prioritized in terms of resource allocation. Resources must be allocated to projects that are aligned with corporate strategies of the organization. More simple criteria for prioritizing compliance can be or should do projects should receive the highest priority, then the strategic projects, and then the other. With the start of the training programs, coaching and mentoring for project managers, top management can help build leadership skills, so that they can manage project activities responsibly and effectively. Problems of Alignment: Often projects fail to support business strategies and business goals it is due to the missing link, so that it should be align. Some processes factors that affect the business strategies and projects linking such as communication, top management support, competency of project manager are some of the major factors are the necessary ones to consider which solves or even creates hurdles in the alignment process. Business directors and top management are responsible for the three processes such as business planning, portfolio management and prioritizing projects while the project managers are responsible for the process of planning and executing the projects. Prioritizing projects Portfolio management Business planning Project Project portfolio management, business planning and support of business manager to the project manager while project manager is responsible to handling the projects. Choosing project from the AMCs projects and aligning that project with the business plans and top managers suggestions. When these processes are aligned the strategic elements like goals, objectives, vision, mission, values and norms feeds the portfolio element, the portfolio element feeds the project management element like strategies, organization processes, culture, and the project management element feeds projects and the teams execution of project. But in many cases, these processes are not aligned; as a result, organizations may fail to tie their projects either to their business strategy or to their portfolio, which may cause them to terminate the project or to continue executing projects that do not contribute to the organizations goals, thus wasting important organizational resources. Project Portfolio Management: The project portfolio is defined as a group of projects that compete for scarce resources and are conducted under the sponsorship or management of a particular organization. The three main well-known objectives of portfolio management are, the following: maximizing the value of the portfolio, linking the portfolio to the strategy and the continuous monitoring/assessment of the portfolio. Project portfolio selection is an important management task activity of the organization, the project team should consider all details carefully to enhance performance of organizational assets and customize them with the strategic objectives of the organization, although there are usually several projects available for selection than can be completed within the physical and financial limitations of fixed, so choices must be made to make up a suitable project. Management problems are related to the following factors, selecting, portfolio strategy and appropriate plans. The following reasons can be related with the difficulties on managing, and on selecting, the proper projects to the portfolio a) no relationship between project selection: projects entirely with the organizations strategic goals are not related to the impact on organization performance b) poor quality portfolios: organizations, generally, applicable to underdeveloped ideas for projects selected is not fair quality. To work on the building, d) scarce resources, lack of attention and executive skills, resources properly balance, often causing pressure to multitask ; f) Information overflow and lacking quality of information: Regardless of the quality and sophistication of the portfolio selection and decision tools, it is fundamental to obtain the proper information to make accurate decisions; g) Decision making based in power: Usually the decision is an exercise of power, which means that there may be situations in organizations where decisions tend not to reflect the organizational future success. The portfolio management team is normally concerned and overwhelmed with issues like the prioritization of projects and the continuous distribution of personnel from the different projects to overcome the urgent crises. Although, most of the time, however, there are no resources available and when they were redistributed it often produced negative effects on unexpected places in the project portfolio. Project Selection There are more than one hundred tools and techniques for project portfolio selection hence it is not difficult for organizations to select suitable tools. It is important to adapt or develop an appropriate framework to evaluate project proposals and select a project portfolio which is aligned with the corporate strategy. Recent literature focuses on approaches rather than tools and techniques. Common principles from these approaches can be described as followings: Firstly, they suggest dividing the project proposals into subsets (Englund Graham, 1999; Sommer 1999; Cooper et al., 2001a; Rădulescu1 Rădulescu 2001; and Crawford etal., 2006). Each project subset can be a group of projects which will share the same strategic buck as discussed by Cooper et al (2001a) or different categories of projects which have similar characteristics (Crawford et al., 2005, 2006). This will help the organization easily compare projects by same criteria or same tools and techniques. This is similarly applicable to ensure the balance of the project portfolio. Framework by Englund Graham (1999) 4 steps producing interrelated outputs make this approach truly systematic. The 4 steps are described as follows: a. What the organization should do: Upon identified to lead the process, the team members start listing newly proposed and on-going projects. They, then, clarify or develop the expected goals of projects, taking into consideration of organizational strategies (vision, mission, objectives) and current as well as potential capabilities (either developed or acquired). It is advisable to classify projects into categories for the benefit of looking at projects from the view of big picture inclusive of out-of- the- box thinking, completeness, gaps, opportunities and compliance with strategy. Projects classified/organized into the strategic buckets (e.g. extent of product change: new- enhancement; and extent of process change: new incremental) enable the team focus efforts on selecting the best set of projects within the categories, which constitute the right and balance mix. In order to facility decision making process, a set of criteria with weight or score reflecting requirements of organizational objectives (e.g. market positioning, available capacity, etc.) should be determined, modified and agreed upon for comparison and choices of projects. b. What the organization can do: the team members critically screen and evaluate projects based on consolidation and analysis of current or historical data, as a result certain new projects will be eliminated and ongoing projects will be adjusted or terminated in respect of strategic priorities; availability of resources and technology challenges, etc. The authors describe the critical few with n screen subject to criteria sets agreed upon in step 1 e.g. screen 1- fit to goals; screen 2 market size, competence etc. c. Analyze and decide on projects: based on the comparison between resources available and resources required, projects are analyzed, prioritized and selected. The team should consider opportunity costs, project benefits before costs, return value when making decisions. With the sets of criteria agreed upon in step 1, the AHP (Analytical Hierarchy is recommended. Dedicated resources and contingencies should be committed to ensure the successful implementation of selected projects. Besides, communication loop should be developed and utilized to keep changes updated. d. Implement the plan: staffing and allocating committed resources for implementation selected projects. A database should be created for monitoring, reporting and sharing. The plan is used as a communication tool to help management team and those who are involved quickly respond to change and take corrective actions in terms of identifying new opportunities and leveraging resources. It can be interpreted that completion of the first 3 steps in this process reflects the achievement of the three goals determined in the project portfolio selection by Cooper (2005): step 1 with should representing project portfolio in alignment with strategy; step 2 with can representing portfolio value maximization using most effectively its resource and capability; step 3 analyze and decide representing right balance and mix of projects; and step 4 with implement belonging to the next phase of execution and management in project portfolio management. The 4 steps reveal a loop of continuous stages, which is recognized as systematic approach. Challenges in Project Portfolio Selection Organizations face many problems such as lack of information, unreliable data of cost, time to completion, availabilities of resource, and benefits of projects. Project proposals are randomly arriving, not at one time. This requires the model or process to be flexible so that organizations can select projects without waiting until annual planning meetings. In large organizations with many business units, each business unit has its own list of priority and preferences. Besides, project portfolio selection is not always rational but it is biased by human being factor such as lobbying. People resist when there is absence of strategy or vague strategy or they find difficulties in pursuing the strategies. Changes necessary for the aligning the projects with the strategy might win approval of all the members of the organization, but when it comes to implementation, no one will be ready to take the lead. Ten Reasons why Strategy Implementation Efforts Can Fail: 1. The so-called strategic plan is nothing more than a collection of budgets and vague directions that do not provide clear guidelines for action. 2. The strategy does not correspond to market realities because it has been developed by strategic planners with no grass roots input. 3. The strategy does not enjoy support from and commitment by the majority of employees and middle management because they do not feel consulted in the development of the strategy. 4. Middle management does not think the strategy is the right one, or does not feel it has the requisite skills to implement it, so it sabotages the implementation. 5. Insufficient top management time is spent on communicating about, selling the new strategic direction, and managing the organizational changes involved. 6. No provision is made for developing the new skills and competencies required by the employees successfully to make the transition and operate within the new strategic direction. 7. No provision is made for instituting the appropriate organizational systems for the selection, motivation and reward of people in accordance with the new strategy. 8. No provision is made for creating a close fit or coherence between the business-level strategy and the various functional-level strategies that can operationalize it. 9. There are factions in the organization which disagree with the strategy because if implemented it would reduce their power and influence, so they sabotage it by deliberate actions or inactions. 10. No attempt is made to analyze the culture of the organization and identify Literature review examines four selected models that assist organizations in bridging the gap between organizational strategic objectives and project management: Model #1 Model of strategic project management is comprised of four main aspects of higher-level project management practices: 1. Strategic alignment of project: This practice refers to the extent to which an organization ensures that the projects it pursues are directly tied to the organizational strategy. This is very important in terms to see whether the project going to start is intact with the strategies of the organization for its successful implementation. 2. Project portfolio management. This practice refers to the identification of a project investment categorization scheme to assist the organization with prioritizing projects. Project portfolio management forms one of the building blocks in relating projects to strategy and can be considered as a key driver for aligning projects or programs to organizational objectives. It also helps in prioritizing and in the selection process of a project for its successful alignment. 3. Program management. The Project Management Institute (2004) defines the concept of program management as the centralized coordinated management of groups of projects to achieve the programs strategic objectives and benefits. Program management practices are inherent within the pursuit of strategic project management and are demonstrated as the management of groups of projects and the management of interactions between projects (portfolio coordination). 4. The business results of projects. Since projects are financial investments, organizations should estimate and measure project impacts on organizations from a business results perspective which may include return on investment, sales growth etc. Model #2: Project managers contribute to competitive advantage due to their skills in managing relationships and an organizational willingness to foster these skills and leverage them throughout the organization, and learn from them how to manage people and relationships across organizational functions and boundaries. Greens model of strategic project management is based on the constructs of competitive advantage, strategic capabilities and tacit knowledge management. Model #3: Model suggests that adopting strategic project management to select, manage and support multiple projects gives companies the best chance of moving the organization forward by keeping the company vibrant in the marketplace and returning maximum value for shareholders. Further, it identifies the following key characteristics of strategic project management: 1. Alignment of the following key business processes: strategic planning, strategic goal setting, and enterprise project management 2. Functions as a well-managed portfolio of investments as it: (a) allows for the most effective use of constrained resources; (b) ensures a high return on investment since projects are managed collectively; (c) it maintains alignment between the projects and the organizations short, medium and long term goals 3. A new management process embedded between strategic planning and project execution that manages project investments strategically and combines business planning and management with project management best practices Model #4: The term strategic project management as the management of those projects which are of critical importance to enable the organization as a whole to have competitive advantage There is a gap between aligning project management competencies to the selection of projects that will give organizations a competitive edge. Specifically, strategy is formulated at the senior management level and for it to be implemented; it should be broken down into discrete projects. Project management becomes a source of competitive advantage when an organization outperforms other companies through the experience and knowledge built up over time through managing projects. Also, project management yields competitive advantage through the actual selection and prioritization of projects that organizations engage in and secondly, through implementation and execution of the projects. Furthermore, project portfolio management is essential and the prioritization of projects should be based |