Assignment 1 - Critical Thinking University of Maryland University College Assignment 1 - Critical Thinking The Purpose of this paper is to apply the 10 steps developed by (Browne & Keeley, 2010) and I will apply those methods on the following memo. A memo was drafted by Ms. Mary Ford (personal communication, January 30, 2012) who is Director of Amalgamated Public Employees Union (APEU) Local No. 121 to Mr. Hector Fuentes the President of APEU Local No. 121 on the issue on New Mexico State Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) Outsourcing, proposed by the New Mexico Governor Gloria Gainor. This is response memo to the Governor’s (personal communication, October 20, 2011) letter informing the APEU Local No. 121 the intent to …show more content…
The value in the memo is that privatization of public services considered as “anti-American” as well as “assault on our unions” that protect the union workers. The author who is being with the union and author’s value assumptions is debatable. Author was biased to the union and expressed author’s point of view based on work experience as well as personal events that happened to author’s family members in the past. In the statement, the author believes that Governor’s action was going to affect not only to their current APEU union members but the whole America due to privatization. There is no clear demonstration or fact that privatization was “anti-American” and in some cases the privatization of public services helped the state with more money and the public service rendered efficiently and professionally (Kittower, 2007). In the memo outsourcing agents will accept lower wages than the current state employee wages, this will further lead to governors think to reduce the wages of all other state departments in the future. The author’s brother-in-law lost the job during the similar proposal of the outsourcing, and author strongly assumes that the governor’s proposal will have some of the union members lose their jobs, as well as reduction of the state government employee salary
Shadowbosses focuses primarily on Government employee unions and the negative effects that they have on the state and national levels of government in addition to the extra burden they create for taxpayers. Mallory Factor goes into depth about what the government employee unions are, what Shadowbosses are and who they are for America, the effects of the unions on the government, the benefits of right-to-work, and the massive amount of money the unions collect.
Beliefs, attitudes and values are three little words that have and make a massive impact on who we are as individuals, who we are as people, and even how the world is viewed by ourselves and others. A belief is something that individuals or groups think, such as believing in a god. Where a Value would be the living life in the ways a religion expects, this value will be made from the belief that the person or group has in their God. The attitude towards this would be the feelings, beliefs and behaviour tendencies towards this, for example praying, reading the holy book,
During that week Governor John K. Tener, in the last month of his term, released a legislatively mandated report that made history. The Report of the Economy and Efficiency Commission, for one of the very few times in Pennsylvania’s Chronicle, provided the public with a roster of all 5,152 state employees. The release of this document was a key milestone in the Commonwealth’s early 20th-century effort to improve its personnel management practices.
Specifically, researchers analyzed all the states on how well the government protects company employees and awards each state with a letter grade that best reflects government efforts in that state. Consequently, because of the lack
When the Judge admonished the Jury, he told them they must reach a unanimous decision beyond a reasonable doubt. The "hero" of this movie appears to be Henry Fonda, the first juror to vote "not guilty". He kept challenging the evidence by saying "isn 't it possible?"...that the evidence was wrong. Do some critical thinking on this...using a good paragraph answer if "isn 't it possible?" is the same thing as "beyond a reasonable doubt." Start with a “yes” or “no” and then eleaborate.
Mr. Herndon reported that Operations, before Public Program payments, were unfavorable to budget by $24.4m and unfavorable to prior year by $27m. Program payments were $42.9m that was favorable to budget and $58.9m favorable to the prior year. Delivery System Reform Incentive Payments (DSRIP) were favorable to budget $4M and unfavorable to PY $11.6M. Also, Mr. Herndon reported that Salaries and Wages were favorable to budget by $125K. In addition, Fringe Benefits were favorable to budge by $8.7M.
While advocates demand that it diminishes expenses and expands profitability, others contend the inverse, taking note of that private contractual workers need to make a benefit and declaring that they are not as a matter of course being more gainful. Open area unions, of course, stubbornly restrict most privatization recommendations. They battle that private temporary workers now and again have submitted low offers with a specific end goal to win contracts, however later raised costs significantly. Advocates counter that privatization can be viable in the event that it presents rivalry. Once in a while the goad of undermined privatization might even urge neighborhood government laborers to wind up more
I think the reason that I decided to take this course this semester was the fact that I have always been a fan of mystery, thoughts, and analyzation. I must confess though that when I signed up for this course I had no idea that it would have a lot of writing involved. I have always been more of a fan of numbers and Science then I am of structuralizing sentences. So when I glanced over the course I started despairing a little. I was thinking that it was going to be more like those critical thinking handbooks you buy at dollar stores or at other random little places where you read a story of a situation and figure out who the killer was or what you are supposed to do to
This would be true critical thinking is a process; everything should be analyzed when it comes to making a decision. Now I agree with using critical thinking to solve some problems but not all. However, most situations depending on whether it is at home or work does not always require someone to think critically. I think that the way we think does affect how we handle certain situations on a daily basis. Most importantly it allows for effective communication.
A REVISION OF THE CURRENT IMPACT OF US LAW ON PUBLIC SECTOR (May focus on CRA, ADEA, FLSA, ADAA, IDEA, FMLA)
According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, many public agencies in the recent years followed the contracting-out trend (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2009). Currently, the private sector performs activities and functions that the public employee once executed. Some of the services that the government contracted include vehicle towing, health services, police protection, and solid waste collection. In 1995, a survey that was referred to the city managers of America’s largest cities revealed that only three of the 66 cities that responded to the investigation had not privatised any city services. Therefore, the problem not only translates to administration but staffing concerns by many managers.
In management positions, critical decisions are made every day, and these decisions affect many. However, some of the decisions made by the directorate personnel are inconvenient for the people that affect it. Moreover, city officials face this decision often when budget cut occur, and resources are scarce. This problem is being faced by a city in which they can no longer afford to pay for self-insure the employees’ health insurance benefits. This paper is going to explain the situation and the decision that the city is going through. Moreover, this document will discuss the satisfiers and dissatisfiers cause by the decision taken. As well, this paper will also analyze if the city should take into consideration the workers view on their decision since the state laws are not labor friendly. Also, this article will take the view of the workforce and analyze if striking is an option and what would be the consequences of doing it. Lastly, this document will choose one of the two approaches to organizational change, and it will describe why that approach would be useful for this scenario.
The interim human resources director and city manager of the city have been placed in a challenging predicament. With numerous forces pulling in opposite directions, making the right choices can become confusing. In this case, the mayor of the city is pushing for budget cuts and is even welcoming the idea of privatizing various public services. By switching to a private insurance system the mayor will be pleased, however the employees and unions will not be pleased. Though the city does not need to please the employees and can implement whatever policy they want, that does not suggest that they should not consider the implications it holds for their employees. By ignoring the needs and wishes of the workers, motivation and morale can decrease, and the possibility of a strike may even exist. Though the city planner and human resources director have made their decisions by choosing a private insurance company, there are several tools at their disposal that they can utilize to continue to motivate employees and implement this latest adjustment to health benefits without terrible backlash.
The interim human resources director and city manager of the city have been placed in a challenging predicament. With numerous forces pulling in opposite directions, making the right choices can become confusing. In this case, the mayor of the city is pushing for budget cuts and is even welcoming the idea of privatizing various public services. By switching to a private insurance system the mayor will be pleased, however the employees and unions will not be pleased. Though the city does not need to please the employees and can implement whatever policy they want, that does not suggest that they should not consider the implications it holds for their employees. By ignoring the needs and wishes of the workers, motivation and morale can decrease, and the possibility of a strike may even exist. Though the city planner and human resources director have made their decisions by choosing a private insurance company, there are several tools at their disposal that they can utilize to continue to motivate employees and implement this latest adjustment to health benefits without terrible backlash.
Some of the changes they noticed were they [(“laid off 1,500 employees, reduced employee’s pay, and decreased perks that the workers had previously enjoyed” (Nkomo, Fottler, & McAdee, 2012)]. In addition, SGA Industries changed the qualifications for labor positions which caused an increase in employee turnover. These changes prompted the workers to become interested in forming a union to address the changes in their work environment. They felt the union would advocate for their rights (Nkomo, Fottler, & McAfee, 2010).