post contains three assignments
Strength Training
Requires historical research. In order to understand the “current issues” of any topic, it is necessary to understand the past.
In the world of strength training, there are many philosophies about which practices provide the best results and why. Your
job is to examine some of these philosophies and describe how they are put into practice in contemporary settings. What
are the underlying theories as to why it is the best approach? What components of the historical progression of strength
training practice have shaped the formulation of this theory? What does the current body of literature say about the
efficacy of this theory? Summarize at least 2 studies/citations related to the approach you are discussing
2:Integration –
Causal Chains and StrategyThe case for this module involves putting together all you have learned about setting objectives
for each of the four perspectives, establishing measures and targets for them, and identifying action plans that might put
them into effect. As we noted in the introduction to this module, the trick in putting things together under the balanced
scorecard involves creating “causal chains” linking together the objectives in such a way that achieving one objective
makes it possible to achieve another in sequence. Thus, when we have a series of objectives defined for each of the
perspectives, we should be able to start with actions to achieve objectives in the learning and growth domain and
ultimately achieve objectives in the financial return/effectiveness domain. Our case here gives you an opportunity to put
together such causal chains and see how they might work.
But let’s start with some practical advice. Here’s a review of a recent book by Kaplan and Norton, the gurus of the balanced
scorecard, that discusses implementation strategies. While the review is interesting in its own right, even more interesting
is the wide variety of reactions to it from readers that follow the review; read through them quickly to get a sense of the
diversity of opinions surrounding this topic.
Silverthorne, S. (2008). Executing Strategy with the Balanced Scorecard. Retrieved May 17, 2010, from
https://blogs.bnet.com/harvard/?p=397&tag=nl.e713
Armed with your new sensitivity to implementation, you’re now better equipped to look at an example. A few years ago, the
journal Strategic Finance published a very interesting case describing the implementation of a balanced scorecard
approach in a bank:
Albright, T.; Davis, S.; & Hibbets, A. (2001, October). Tri-Cities Community Bank: A Balanced Scorecard Case. Strategic
Finance, 83(4), 54-60.Retrieved May 17, 2010, from the library: https://coursenet.trident.edu
Basically, you are to carry out the case analysis described in the article, with some slight modifications to the questions
posed in the article, as follows. Your complete analysis should involve 4-5 pages, responding to the numbered points
below.
Assignment Expectations:
What’s referred to as “Case A” in the article tracks the initial implementation of the balanced scorecard through the
establishment of the first set of objectives for each of the perspectives. As you’ll see, Table 2 in the article (p. 57) presents a
list of performance measures suggested by bank personnel as intermediaries toward the achievement of the three main
financial goals: loan balances, deposit balances, and non-interest income.
The first step is to categorize each of the performance measures in Table 2 as belonging to one of the four perspectives (to
start you off, we’ve put the three financial goals in the table already). Here?s a table that you can copy and paste into your
paper that might be helpful toward this end:
Learning/Growth
Internal Business Processes
Customer Service
Financial
loan balances
deposit balances
non-interest income
Then, following the procedure described in Figure 1 of the article (p. 58), you are to connect these objectives and measures
into two or more causal chains, indicating how the achievement of one objective leads to the potential achievement of
another such that ultimately one or more of the financial performance objectives are achieved. You can do this by drawing
arrows, or if this is too complicated, by simply specifying the chain in order. As noted, Figure 1 shows one chain; it is highly
recommended that you find two others rather than including this one as one of your two. There are numerous possibilities.
For each chain, please include a brief paragraph describing the logic of the chain, and why you see the objectives as
connected in the way you do. You’ll be graded on the effectiveness of your balanced scorecard logic, rather than on
whether or not you happen to stumble on any one of the chains that occurred to your instructor. This may seem like a
somewhat daunting task, but it’s actually kind of fun once you get the categorization of the measures into the proper
perspectives accomplished.
Once you’ve accomplished Case A, then you can move on to the second part of the assignment, Case B, which involves
looking at the implementation of the balanced scorecard approach and its apparent consequences. There are two sources
of information available to you here: Table 3 (p. 59), which lists the before and after performance of each of the branches
of the bank, and the interviews with bank personnel in each of the branches where the system was implemented (pp. 57-59).
Here’s what you need to do to accomplish this part of the exercise:
Review Table 3 in a comparative way and try to decide if there is evidence for the effectiveness of the balanced scorecard
approach in terms of improving the key financial measures. Remember, the balanced scorecard was implemented in
branches A-E , and not in branches F-J. To help you make this comparison, you can click here to access an Excel spreadsheet
that presents the Table 3 data for your use in this analysis. If you really get stuck in this process, you can click here to
access an augmented version of the spreadsheet that has already made some comparisons to help you out — but you’ll get
more out of the case if you try to run the analysis on your own from the raw data. The important part is to present a brief
but cogent analysis of the relative performance of the balanced scorecard branches versus the branches that did not use
the approach, using appropriate comparative numbers to support your argument.
Then, to finish the analysis, review the relative performance of the five implementing branches in relation to the
information you have presented in the interviews about how the balanced scorecard was used in each of the branches —
apparently, there were significant differences in implementation, and there are significant differences in the relative
performance of the branches (A-E). Briefly describe the relative performance of these branches, and any conclusions you can
draw about how the system was implemented in each of them.
Conclude with a brief statement of advice that you might give to the board of the bank about the use of the balanced
scorecard overall, and how it ought to be implemented to achieve maximum effectiveness, citing appropriate information
and data to support your argument.
Using 3 – 5 sentences to describe the
3:Political Scientists’
Theories following political scientists’ theories related to U.S foreign policy:
1. James M. Lindsay
2. John Ruggie
3. Samuel P. Huntington
4. Lawrence M. Mead
5. Jeffrey W. Legro
6. Fareed Zakaria
7. William Wohlforth
8. Jeffry Frieden
9. Graham T. Allison
10. Kenneth Waltz
11. Stephen Brooks and William Wohlforth
12. Bernie Sanders
13. Fredrik Logevall
14. Warren K. Leffler
15. John Ikenberry
16. Robert Jervis
17. John Mearsheimer from University of Chicago and Stephen Walt from Kennedy School of Government at Harvard
University
18. Michael Mandelbaum
19. Amy Zegart
20. John Lewis Gaddis
Short Essays – Using 6 – 8 sentences to answer each question:
1. What were some of the competing themes for American foreign policy in the immediate aftermath of the Cold
War? Which (if any) won out?
2. When did the Cold War end? Defend your answer relative to potential alternative answers.
3. Does the Vietnam War represent a profound failure of the foreign policy making process? Or did the system work?
4. What was the Bush Doctrine, and did it represent a fundamental change from the traditions of American foreign
policy?
Long Essays – Using at least 2 paragraphs to answer each question:
1. Did the outcome of the 2012 presidential election matter for the future of American foreign policy? Why or why
not? Discuss in reference to your instructor’s comments on campaigns (yes, it matters. Do a comparison between Obama
and Romney’s foreign policy) and elections as well as two other major theories of the above 20 political scientists.
2. Is U.S. foreign policy fundamentally different today than it was during the Cold War? Answer with reference to
three major theories of foreign policy of the above 20 political scientists, with at least one theory that would suggest it is
different and one that would not. Which is the most persuasive? Why?
historical research