Ethics Department for ABC Company (ABC)Ethics Department for ABC Company (ABC)

Assignment 3 1. Task You work in the Ethics Department for ABC Company (ABC). Your department is dedicated to advising its employees about their ethical obligations in the corporate setting. All communications you receive in this capacity are confidential. Luke, an employee of ABC, comes to you with the following scenario and asks for your advice. He wants to fully consider the situation. Your task is to advise him on all perspectives on the situation. Below are the facts that Luke provides to you. ***** Luke has been asked to work on a project that involves developing land recently purchased by ABC to build an adult entertainment retail store. According to the plan, the land is located on the corner of the neighborhood where Owen, Luke’s brother, lives. Luke knows that as soon as the plans for the store are made public, property values for the surrounding neighborhood will decrease significantly. ABC plans to publicly announce the project one month from today. Luke is concerned about his obligations of confidentiality to his company. However, Luke is also very close to Owen, who recently told Luke that he received an offer to sell his house at an “okay” price given the current real estate market. Owen is considering selling but hasn’t made any final decision yet. He wonders if he might get a better offer a few years from now when the real estate market improves. What is the ethical issue, why is this an issue, and what should Luke do about it? ***** For assignment 3, prepare a memo to the Ethics Department file that considers ONLY the following two theories that were discussed in class, in the online lecture on ethical reasoning, and your readings – The Golden Rule and Virtue Ethics. You may consider any of the resources provided in your text, and online lectures. However, it is advised that you DO NOT consult the internet. Your papers will be graded based on the required resources for GENB 4350. Additionally, most of the accidental plagiarism cases have arisen from students using internet sources and failing to properly cite the work used. Additionally, there are ethical reasoning steps discussed in your textbook. Keep in mind that not all of the concepts presented in these steps may be included in this memo (but eventually may be included in Assignment 4). Finally, remember that Assignments 2 and 3 are considered “drafts” for Assignment 4, which will require you to combine your analysis from both prior assignments into one paper.

analyze financial information and risks associated with an investment to expand an organization

Type of Paper:CourseworkTopic:Expansion Recommendationpages:3 pages / 825 wordsDiscipline:BusinessType of service:Writing from scratchFormat or citation style:APAPaper InstructionsPrepare either a 3-4 page report or a 12-slide presentation in which you analyze financial information and risks associated with an investment to expand an organization and make a recommendation on whether or not to invest in expansion.

Introduction
This portfolio work project will allow you to review information and risks associated with an investment to expand an organization. As this information will be shared broadly across the organization, you will have a choice in your final deliverable audience and will organize your deliverable to meet the needs of that audience.

Scenario
ZXY Company is a food product company. ZXY is considering expanding to two new products and a second production facility. The food products are staples with steady demands. The proposed expansion will require an investment of $7,000,000 for equipment with an assumed ten-year life, after which all equipment and other assets can be sold for an estimated $1,000,000. They will be renting the facility. ZXY requires a 12 percent return on investments. You have been asked to recommend whether or not to make the investment.

Your Role
You are an accounting manager. Your boss has asked you to review and provide a recommendation on the expansion based on information that has been provided.

Requirements
In preparing and supporting your recommendation to either make the investment or not, include the following items as part of your analysis:

Analysis of financial information.
Identification of risks associated with the investment. Consider:
How risky the project appears.
How far off your estimates of revenues and expenses can be before your decision would change.
The difference if the company were to use a straight line versus a MACRS depreciation.
Recommendation for a course of action.
Explanation of criteria supporting your recommendation.
Financial Information
As part of your analysis you might find that additional information from marketing, accounting, or finance would be useful in making an informed and well-supported recommendation. In a real workplace setting you would have the ability to ask for that information. However, for the purposes of this assessment, you can make assumptions about the values of that data or ratios in support of your recommendation.

Accounting worked with the marketing group to create the ZXY Company Financial Statements spreadsheet for the new products business and the new facility.

Notes about the financial information:

The expense line labeled SQF FDA Mandates refers to the costs of complying with Food and Drug Administration requirements.
Depreciation expense is calculated using 7-year life modified accelerated cost recovery system (MACRS).
Deliverable Format
Depending on the audience you choose to address, use one of the following options:
Report for a mid-management audience. Prepare a 3–4 page report detailing your recommendation and the information you used to make your recommendation.
Presentation for top leadership. Prepare a presentation of at least 12 slides detailing your recommendation and the information you used to make your recommendation. You may use your choice of presentation software. Include notes with additional details.
Keep in mind that your recommendation may be shared with others, so your materials should be designed for clarity and readability.

Related company standards for either format:
The recommendation report is a professional document and should therefore follow the corresponding MBA Academic and Professional Document Guidelines, including single-spaced paragraphs.
In addition to the report or presentation, include:
Title (slide or page).
References (slide or page).
Appendix with supporting materials.
At least two APA-formatted references.

hybrid equity financing

1. Sometimes preferred stock is referred to as “hybrid equity financing.” Identify and explain the features of preferred stock that give it the designation of “hybrid equity financing.”  (4 marks)

2.  What are the advantages and disadvantages of using the DCF model for determining the cost equity capital.

3.  Define the term ‘investment risk’. And give an example of a risk-free investment and a risky investment. Explain why an investment might be risk free and another is very risky.  (2 marks)

4.  What is meant by the diversification? And what benefits can be derived from diversification?

5.  The Metrics electronic Company is considering a three-year project to market a device that measure the number of calories used up by athletes based on a new technology. A market study indicates a 60% probability that demand will be good and a 40% chance that it will be poor. It will cost $5M to bring the new device to market. Cash flow estimates indicate inflows of $3M per year for three years at full manufacturing capacity if demand is good, but just $1.5M per year if it’s poor. The firm’s cost of capital is 10%.

(I)   Analyze the project by developing a decision tree for the project then calculate the projects expected NPV.

(ii)  Should the project be accepted or abandoned?

(iii)  What are real options in capital budgeting? Give two examples of the type of options available in capital budgeting.

(iv)  Why is the application of real options in capital budgeting is considered to be more effective than just only applying NPV to capital projects?

6.  You are an Investment Manager at Pegasus Securities and you are preparing for the next meeting of the investment committee. The committee requested you to assess the capital structure of Industrial Production Ltd a manufacturer of industrial products. The following information is available about the company in assisting you in making your assessment.

(A)  Cost of Equity – Suppose stock in Industrial Production Ltd has a beta of .80. The return on the market 12% percent, and the risk-free rate is 6 percent the firm’s last dividend was $1.20 per share, and the dividend is expected to grow at 8 percent indefinitely. The stock currently sells for $45 per share.

Determine the firm’s cost of equity capital using the:

i. SML approach

ii. Dividend growth model

(B)   Calculating the WACC

In addition to the information given in (b) above, suppose Industrial Production ltd has a target debt-equity ratio of 50 percent. Its cost of debt is 9 percent, before taxes. If the tax rate is 35 percent.

Determine the company weighted average cost of capital (WACC)

(C)  Flotation Costs

Suppose Industrial Production Ltd is seeking $30 million for a new project. The necessary funds will have to be raised externally. The firm’s flotation costs for selling debt and equity are 2 percent and 16 percent, respectively.

i. If flotation costs are considered, what is the true cost of the new project?

ii. If Industrial Production Ltd stock currently sells for $50 per share, and the dividend per share will probably be about $5. A shareholder argues, “It will cost the firm $5 per share to use the stockholders’ money this year, so the cost of equity is equal to 10 percent ($5/50).”

What is wrong with this conclusion?

Leadership in Company XYZ

Leadership in Company XYZ
Instructions

You have been recently promoted to lead a new division of Company XYZ. This company is known for its team-oriented atmosphere, and your boss has raved about some of your natural leadership qualities. Your first task is to assemble the best team possible from the potential candidates found below. An explanation of the skills–motivation matrix can be found on p. 39 in your textbook. Read each description, and provide the following information in a minimum three-page double-spaced document (not including the title and references pages):

  1. Classify each team member into one of the four matrix areas.
  2. Discuss the reommended action for each employee depending on his/her classification.
  3. Distinguish if your role as the leader will be a facilitator, coach, or a combination of the two.
  4. Examine which team competencies would benefit from shared leadership. 1= high skills, low motivation; 2= low skills, low motivation; 3 = high skills, high motivation, 4 = low skills, high motivation)
  5. Directions:
  6. You have been recently promoted to lead a new division of Company XYZ. This company is known for its team-oriented atmosphere, and your boss has raved about some of your natural leadership qualities. Your first task is to assemble the best team possible from the potential candidates listed below. An explanation of the skills–motivation matrix can be found on p. 39 in your textbook. Read each description, and provide the following information in a two- to three- page document:
  7. 1. Classify each team member into one of the four matrix areas.
  8. 2. Discuss the recommended action for each employee depending on his/her classification.
  9. 3. Distinguish if your role as the leader will be a facilitator, coach, or a combination of the
  10. two.
  11. 4. Examine which team competencies would benefit from shared leadership.
  12.     Candidate
  13.      Description
  14.     Alice
  15.  Alice has been a great asset since joining Company XYZ. She is responsible for improving some of the old processes and is involved in many training initiatives due to her extensive knowledge and skills. Alice consistently provides great results and strives to do her best.
  16.    Bill
  17.    Bill has shown that he will do whatever it takes to contribute to the team, and he often goes the extra mile when given a task. However, the result is not always up to par due to some lagging skills.
  18.    Chris
  19.   Chris has not displayed much drive, and his skills have been questioned by other members of Company XYZ. Although other team members have questioned his skills, he gets along well with everyone.
  20.  Low
  21. High
  22. Skills
  24.    Doug
  25.   Doug is a member of three committees and is always eager to learn. He has only been with the company for a year, and he believed that joining a few committees would give him a chance to learn more. He has shown some improvement, but he could use more training in some key areas.
  26.    Erica
  27.    Erica has displayed that she has what it takes to contribute to the team, but her results have declined lately. Her skills have never been questioned by anyone, but her willingness to perform at a high level has been questioned.
  28.    Lisa
  29.   Lisa is one of Company XYZ’s top performers, and many employees view her as a natural leader. She is always willing to learn a new task and usually masters the task in a very short period.

How is appreciation communicated?

  • After completing the lecture and reading assignments, write a 3-page minimum (750 words) paper describing your understanding of appreciation where you work? How is appreciation communicated? As a future leader how would you show appreciation of your employees in an effort to motivate them? Using Hebrews 12: 1-2 responded on how the Bible guides us in the area of leading others. Provide and explain workplace examples.  o Requirements: Each paper submitted in this course must have a title page and a reference page. You are expected to reference and cite a minimum of two scholarly sources in each paper. Proper APA format must be followed.

Create benefits website content that addresses mandatory benefits, discretionary benefits, and alignment with a company’s organization strategy. 

Your manager has asked you to create the content for the updated benefits website for your company. The existing website was missing important information about mandatory and discretionary benefits and, more importantly, did not align with the company’s organizational strategy—this one is a must. Your manager wants current employees and new hires to understand how the company’s benefit offerings reflect and support the company’s vision, mission, and organizational strategy.

Instructions

The website content should include information on both mandatory and discretionary benefits that are commonly offered in your industry. Use the Benefits Website Content Assignment Template [DOCX] to complete the assignment, which includes the following:

  1. Write a short overview of the company that includes the organization’s vision, mission, and values.
  2. Identify a minimum of three mandatory employee benefits.
  3. Provide the legal justification crucial to understanding the mandatory benefits offered.
  4. Identify a minimum of three discretionary employee benefits.
  5. Provide related information that is crucial to understanding the discretionary employee benefits offered.
  6. Evaluate how the discretionary and mandatory benefits align with the company’s organizational strategy.

Note: The numbered assignment requirements outlined above correspond to the grading criteria in the assignment scoring guide, so be sure to address each point.

Format

This course requires the use of Strayer Writing Standards. For assistance and information, please refer to the Strayer Writing Standards link in the left-hand menu of your course. Check with your professor for any additional instructions.

The specific course learning outcome associated with this assignment is:

  • Create benefits website content that addresses mandatory benefits, discretionary benefits, and alignment with a company’s organization strategy.

Evaluating How Advertising Affects Consumer Behavior

  1. Week 6 Assignment – Evaluating How Advertising Affects Consumer Behavior
    Overview
    For the remainder of the assignments, you will take on the role of a marketing manager. You may use the same product you chose in Week 4. Consider the factors affecting marketing strategy and evaluate the product and its emotional impact based on its brand messaging.
    Instructions
    Write a 4–5-page strategy brief that incorporates the following:

    1. Situation Analysis: Describe the effect the current product brand has on consumer behavior.
    2. Problem: What is the customer need that the product is promoted to resolve?
    3. Alternatives: What changes to the marketing mix (product, price, place, and promotion) are needed to improve the product’s emotional appeal to customers?
    4. Recommendation (Marketing Strategy): Design a strategy for the target market that will positively alter the customer’s product view.
    5. Describe how consumer behavior will be affected by the target market strategy.
    6. Use four sources to support your writing. Choose sources that are credible, relevant, and appropriate. Cite each source listed on your source page at least one time within your assignment. For help with research, writing, and citation, access the library or review library guides.
    7. This course requires the use of Strayer Writing Standards. For assistance and information, please refer to the Strayer Writing Standards link in the left-hand menu of your course. Check with your professor for any additional instructions.
      The specific course learning outcome associated with this assignment is:
    • Evaluate how consumer decision-making behavior is influenced by advertising and brand messaging.
  2. By submitting this paper, you agree: (1) that you are submitting your paper to be used and stored as part of the SafeAssign™ services in accordance with the Blackboard Privacy Policy; (2) that your institution may use your paper in accordance with your institution’s policies; and (3) that your use of SafeAssign will be without recourse against Blackboard Inc. and its affiliates.
  3. Institution Release Statement

Europe Periods: Baroque, Neoclassicism, Romanticism

Unit 9. Reading and Writing: Europe Periods: Baroque, Neoclassicism, Romanticism

(click on above link to access reading assignment)

Writing Assignment:
Summarize the study of the painting of Caravaggio and Caravaggisti in 17th-Century Europe.

Writing Assignment for Unit 9 Reading & Writing should include: FIVE summary Paragraphs of the 5 Topics from the reading assignment. (5 paragraphs required)

Write five summary paragraphs; one for each topic in the reading assignment.

Relate important points topic-by-topic.

Each summary paragraph should have space between paragraphs.

A run-on paragraph cannot be graded.

Do not use headers or ‘quotes’ from the reading assignment.

Do not use ‘I’, ‘me’, ‘my’ in writing summaries.

Do not cut and paste or copy any of the text in the reading assignment and then change it because TURNITIN will read it as copying and not as original.

TURNITIN SIMILARITY SCORE SHOULD BE 0% – if you are summarizing in your own words…

Take notes in your own words and then summarize.

Summaries that are too close to the original text will receive little or no credit.

OTHER ANSWER SOURCES ARE NOT ACCEPTED.

(It is important to see what you think about what you have read, and viewed. You must be original!)

You must attach the file as a WORD document: if you do not have WORD you can get an online version through BC or download OpenOffice and save the document in WORD format. Check for the DUE date for each assignment. To post: Follow the directions and then go to “Submit Files” then “Add a File”, “Upload” then “Add” then, “Submit”.

How to check your turnitin % score:
When you submit your writing assignments you will see your Turnitin % score after the paper has been submitted; you can click on it to review what is similar. If you need to make changes to your assignment you can but would have to submit a new file with the changes (the system allows for more than one submission as long as it is submitted before the deadline / the most current submission is graded). If you are submitting the assignment too close to the deadline there is no time to check your score and make changes; it’s important to work ahead so if needed you have time to make changes. The Writing Assignment is open for 9 days (check the course schedule for dates and times).

Plague which swept China to Europe 

Plague which swept China to Europe

For this reading response, we’ll be looking at the plague, which swept from China to Europe. In Europe, there were several instances in which Jews and/or entire Jewish communities were blamed for the plague and either sentenced to death or slaughtered as a result. There are some accounts of this found here in “The Black Death and the Jews: 1348-1349”:  https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/jewish/1348-jewsblackdeath.asp

The sources have a few different perspectives, so it is important to think about motive. The Catholic Church officials said that the Jews were not responsible for the plague, but the individual authorities did not always uphold that perspective. As you review the source, what do they suggest about the role of the church and motives for the persecution of the Jews? What other kinds of responses did Europeans have to this outbreak and what motivated them? Consider how these responses fit in with the broader European culture and European conduct during the Crusades.

One page single space!

A Distant Mirror

Pulitzer Prize winning author Barbara Tuchman wrote a book in 1978 entitled “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”. In it she recounts how the 14th and the first half of the 15th centuries give us back two contradictory images. An “Indian summer” of the Middle Ages–a still glittering time of castles, cathedrals and chivalry, and a dark time of ferocity and spiritual agony, a world plunged into a chaos of war, fear, famine, and the Plague. The title is referencing how the catastrophes of that transitional time and the contemporary world of the 20th century (or in our case the 21st century) shows disturbing similarities. Here are several revealing excerpts from her work:

“When the gap between ideal and real becomes too wide, the system breaks down.”

“Human beings of any age need to approve of themselves; the bad times in history come when they cannot.”

“An event of great agony is bearable only in the belief that it will bring about a better world. When it does not, as in the aftermath of another vast calamity, disillusion is deep and moves on to self-doubt and self-disgust.”

“Disaster is rarely as pervasive as it seems from recorded accounts. The fact of being on the record makes it appear continuous and ubiquitous whereas it is more likely to have been sporadic both in time and place. Besides, persistence of the normal is usually greater than the effect of the disturbance, as we know from our own times. After absorbing the news of today, one expects to face a world consisting entirely of strikes, crimes, power failures, broken water mains, stalled trains, school shutdowns, muggers, drug addicts, neo-nazis, and rapists. [today we could add economic woes, political divisions, prevalence of poverty in much of the world, fears of terrorism, cyberattacks]. The fact is that one can come home in the evening–on a lucky day–without having encountered more than one or two of these phenomena. This has led me to formulate Tuchman’s Law, as follows: The fact of being reported multiplies the apparent extent of any deplorable development by five- to tenfold (or any figure the reader would care to supply).”

While using the above statements as a launching point for your essay engage in a discussion of the crisis thesis of the late Middle Ages. Write an essay explaining the significance of the various crisis—political, social, economic, and religious–facing Western Civilization in the 14th and 15th centuries. Be sure to cite details the textbook while giving arguments to support your answer.

The essay should be 1,200-2,000 word essay. In the body of your work, try to answer at least THREE of the following questions with references from the textbook while demonstrating historical analysis. This list is meant to serve as a sort of outline and guide for the essay.

1. Describe the benefits and costs of the Mongol Empire.
2. How does living in and experiencing the Age of COVID inform our understanding of the 14th century Black Death–socially, economically, biologically, etc.
3. Revolts in Europe (Jacquerie, English Peasants, Ciompi Rebellion).
4. Why is it correct to consider this time an era of exploration and globalization?
5. What caused the rise of national monarchies in England and France in terms of the Hundred Years War? or discuss the emergence of Russia?
6. What was the condition and role of religion and the Church during the period under consideration (think about Avignon papacy, the rise of piety, heresies, spiritual crisis, etc.)?
7. What are the implications of the emergence of vernacular literature and culture in the Late Middle Ages? Think Chaucer and Dante, among others.