Describe the key issues that affected the merger plan and its implementation.

Overview

An important aspect of a change management strategy is to consider how different alternatives may impact future outcomes. Organizations often use the business case method to explore strategic alternatives as it helps simulate a real situation. Such simulations help with identifying business issues and provide critical information that organizations can then use to arrive at their own conclusions.

The VP of business development has asked you to analyze other organizations that have gone through the exit process. Doing so will help you identify common risks, challenges, and best practices related to mergers and acquisitions and apply this knowledge to guide the change management strategy of the life sciences organization. For example, if two merging organizations have extremely different communication styles or organizational cultures, it may often lead to conflict between the management and the employees. The same is true when one organization is acquiring another organization. Therefore, it is important that you identify all potential risks and challenges and include the best practices to avoid similar conflicts in your organization after it has been acquired.

You have decided to research a business case that may help you learn from the experiences of another organization.

The focus of your analysis should be on change management and the associated best practices that impacted the transformation of the organization in the case.

Prompt

Review the case study Bumpy Road Ahead: The Automotive Interiors Merger That Wasn’t. Next, consider the following steps to complete your analysis of the automotive case and apply your findings from the case analysis to your work in the life sciences organization in the course scenario.

Specifically, you must address the following criteria:

Case Study Review

1. Provide a brief overview of the two organizations in the case study that addresses the following:
   1. Identify common characteristics of each organization.
   2. Explain how the products and services of the two organizations differ.
2. Describe the key issues that affected the merger plan and its implementation.
   1. What were the key issues related to organizational cultures and structural integration that created problems after the merger of the two organizations? Support your response with information from the case.
3. Evaluate the postmerger integration and change management strategies used in the case. Your response should address the following:
   1. How did the key decision makers respond to the challenges with the postmerger integration?
   2. What led to the challenges faced by the organization after the merger?
   3. Could these challenges have been prevented using different change management strategies? Explain.

Recommendations

1. Based on your findings from the case study, describe specific areas that may lead to post-acquisition risks and challenges for the life sciences organization in the course scenario. Support your response.
2. Recommend change management best practices the life sciences organization can use for managing post-acquisition integration in a planned manner and avoid the risks and challenges you’ve identified above.

Guidelines for Submission

Submit a 4- to 5-page Word document using double spacing, 12-point Times New Roman font, and one-inch margins. Sources should be cited according to APA style. Consult the Shapiro Library APA Style Guide for more information on citations.

Evaluate the probability and impact of each identified risk or problem as low, medium, or high.

Overview

In your role as a business development manager involved in preparing an exit strategy for the life science organization, you learned that employee attrition is one of the key risks to the proposed acquisition. In Milestone Two, you analyzed the employee data to evaluate this attrition risk and suggest retention strategies to mitigate it. Later, as you began preparing for the exit, the organization faced another challenge—the possibility of the buyer withdrawing from the sale. To mitigate this risk, you searched and planned for alternative buyers.

Management now wants to be more cautious about such risks. To avoid more unforeseen challenges in the process, the vice president (VP) wants you to identify and assess other current or potential risks the organization may face due to the proposed acquisition and recommend strategies to mitigate them.

In this assignment, you will perform a risk assessment using the fishbone method you learned about in this module.

Prompt

Write a report for the VP with risk assessment and mitigation recommendations for the organization in the scenario and its exit strategy.

Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria:

1. Risk Identification: Apply the fishbone method to analyze two other risks or problems the organization is facing. Your response should include the following:
   1. Identify two risks or problems to be resolved and create a fishbone diagram for each. Refer to the fishbone diagram template for help. Insert a screenshot or copy your fishbone diagram to your report.
   2. Identify one main cause and ancillary causes for each risk or problem.
2. Risk Evaluation:
   1. Evaluate the probability and impact of each identified risk or problem as low, medium, or high.
   2. Justify your evaluation of the impact and probability of each identified risk or problem. Provide rationale with supporting data.
3. Risk Mitigation: Recommend one way to mitigate each identified risk or problem. Support your response.

Guidelines for Submission

Submit a 2- to 4-page Word document using double spacing, 12-point Times New Roman font, and one-inch margins. Sources should be cited according to APA style. Consult the Shapiro Library APA Style Guide for more information on citations.

Describe the level of measurement for each variable included in the data set (nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio)

Scenario

You are currently working at NCLEX Memorial Hospital in the Infectious Diseases Unit. Over the past few days, you have noticed an increase in patients admitted with a particular infectious disease. You believe that the ages of these patients play a critical role in the method used to treat the patients. You decide to speak to your manager, and together you work to use statistical analysis to look more closely at the ages of these patients.

You do some research and put together a spreadsheet of the data that contains the following information:

· Client number

· Infection disease status

· Age of the patient

You need the preliminary findings immediately so that you can start treating these patients. So, let’s get to work!

Background information on the Data:

The data set consists of 70 patients that have the infectious disease with ages ranging from 40 years of age to 87 years of age for NCLEX Memorial Hospital.

Requirements:

1) Answer the questions below in a PowerPoint presentation.

2) Include the summary calculations and the formulas in your slides either symbolically or from Excel. Do not round your results.

3) Show calculations in your Excel spreadsheet.

Submit both the PowerPoint and Excel files.

PowerPoint Presentation Requirements

Slide 1

Title

Title Slide

Slide 2

Overview

Provide a brief overview of the scenario you are given above and the data set that you will be analyzing.

Slide 3

Classification

Classify the variables in your data set.

· Which variables are quantitative/qualitative?

· Which variables are discrete/continuous?

· Describe the level of measurement for each variable included in the data set (nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio)

Slide 4

Measures of Center

What are the measures of center and why are they important? Describe each individually and list any advantages or disadvantages that each may have.

Slide 5

Measures of Variation

What are the measures of variation and why are they important? Describe each individually and list any advantages or disadvantages that each may have.

Slide 6

Calculations

Show your results for the following calculations. Include formulas used in Excel. Include units of measurement for each.

· Mean

· Median

· Mode

· Mid-range

· Range

· Variance

· Standard Deviation

Slide 7

Confidence Intervals

Show your responses for the following questions:

· What are confidence intervals?

· What is a point estimate?

· What is the best point estimate for a population mean? Explain.

· Why do we need confidence intervals?

Slide 8

Confidence Intervals

Construct a 95% confidence interval for the population mean ages of the patients. Assume that your data is normally distributed and σ is unknown.

Show results for the following calculations in constructing the confidence interval. Include formulas used in Excel. Interpret the confidence interval.

· Critical Value

· Margin of Error

· Upper and Lower Bounds

Slide 9

Hypothesis Testing

Perform the following hypothesis test based on the claim that the average age of all patients admitted to the hospital with infectious diseases is less than 65 years of age.

Write the null and alternative hypothesis symbolically and include the following additional information:

· Which hypothesis is the claim?

· Is the test two-tailed, left-tailed, or right-tailed? Explain

· Which test statistic will you use for your hypothesis test, z-test or t-test? Explain.

Slide 10

Hypothesis Testing

Continue the hypothesis test based on the claim that the average age of all patients admitted to the hospital with infectious diseases is less than 65 years of age.

Show your results and formulas used for the following calculations:

· Test Statistic

· Critical Value

· P-value

Slide 11

Hypothesis Testing

Complete the hypothesis test by explaining the following:

· Decision to reject the null hypothesis or to not reject the null hypothesis.

· Explain your decision using the critical value method.

· Explain your reasoning using the P-value method.

· Restate your conclusion in non-technical terms.

Slide 12

Conclusion

Conclude by recapping your ideas by summarizing the information presented in context of the scenario.

· Include the mean, standard deviation, confidence interval with interpretation, and result of the hypothesis test.

· What conclusions, if any, do you believe we can draw as a result of your study?

· What did you learn from the project about the population based on this sample?

· What did you learn about the specific statistical tests you conducted?

Determine whether there is sufficient evidence to support the claim of a linear correlation between the magnitudes and the depths from the earthquakes. Explain.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the probability of a magnitude 6.7 or greater earthquake in the Greater Bay Area is 63%, about 2 out of 3, in the next 30 years. In April 2008, scientists and engineers released a new earthquake forecast for the State of California called the Uniform California Earthquake Rupture Forecast (UCERF).

As a junior analyst at the USGS, you are tasked to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to support the claim of a linear correlation between the magnitudes and depths from the earthquakes. Your deliverables will be a PowerPoint presentation you will create summarizing your findings and an excel document to show your work.

Concepts Being Studied

• Correlation and regression
• Creating scatterplots
• Constructing and interpreting a Hypothesis Test for Correlation using r as the test statistic

You are given a spreadsheet that contains the following information:

• Magnitude measured on the Richter scale
• Depth in km

The PowerPoint presentation should answer and explain the following questions based on the spreadsheet provided above.

• Slide 1: Title slide
• Slide 2: Introduce your scenario and data set including the variables provided.
• Slide 3: Construct a scatterplot of the two variables provided in the spreadsheet. Include a description of what you see in the scatterplot.
• Slide 4: Find the value of the linear correlation coefficient r and the critical value of r using α = 0.05. Include an explanation on how you found those values.
• Slide 5: Determine whether there is sufficient evidence to support the claim of a linear correlation between the magnitudes and the depths from the earthquakes. Explain.
• Slide 6: Find the regression equation. Let the predictor (x) variable be the magnitude. Identify the slope and the y-intercept within your regression equation.
• Slide 7: Is the equation a good model? Explain. What would be the best predicted depth of an earthquake with a magnitude of 2.0? Include the correct units.
• Slide 8: Conclude by recapping your ideas by summarizing the information presented in context of the scenario.

Along with your PowerPoint presentation, you should include your Excel document which shows all calculations.

Should we aim to preserve the use of both mental terms and physical terms? Why or why not? 

1. According to the Mind/Brain Identity Theory, do mentalistic terms like “belief” or “pain” compete with physical terms like “neuronal impulse” or “synaptic cleft”? Should we aim to preserve the use of both mental terms and physical terms? Why or why not?

2. Reconstruct Descartes’ first argument for dualism. Is it valid? If not, why not? (Are the premises true? Is the conclusion true? Explain your answers.)

3. Descartes’ first and second arguments for dualism both appeal to the same principle: namely, Leibniz’s Law. Will the same objection suffice to undermine both? If not, why not?

4. What is a propositional attitude? Give three examples that aren’t discussed above.

5. Consider the following set of propositions: (1) “Linda remembers receiving an autograph from Muhammad Ali.” (2) “Linda does not remember receiving an autograph from Cassius Clay.” • Do these propositions contain any reference to propositional attitudes? If so, which? • Do these propositions attribute any properties to objects? If so, which objects? • What conclusion, if any, can you derive from these two propositions? (Does it follow that Muhammad Ali and Cassius Clay are different people?

6. Descartes says that he can conceive of himself being a disembodied spirit (that is, having a mind but not a body). What does conceiving of something mean? Does Descartes’ claim entail that it is possible for him to be a disembodied spirit? (See discussion of conceivability and possibility in Chapter 8.)

7. Is a statue identical with the stone it is made of? Is an organism identical with the collection of cells in its body? Can Leibniz’s Law be used to show that either of these claims of identity is false?

8. In the Sixth Meditation, Descartes argues that he is essentially a thinking thing. An essential property of a thing is a property that the thing must have if it is to exist. Could Descartes be deprived of thought and still be Descartes? Could Descartes have been born without the capacity of thought and still be Descartes? If Descartes can’t doubt that he thinks, is that enough to show that Descartes is essentially a thinking thing?

9. It was suggested in this chapter that we understand causality best when there is a physical signal that passes from cause to effect (the electricity example). However, the fact that “absences” sometimes cause suggests that causality need not involve a physical signal. For example, suppose a patient dies because his doctor fails to give him medicine. There is no “physical signal” between the doctor and patient in this case, but there is causation. Does this point solve the objection to dualism that concerns the nature of causality?

10. Would the discovery of perfect correlations between certain mental events and physical events (say, between experiences of pain and c-fiber firings) be evidence against dualism? Why or why not?

11. What are the two central arguments that advocates of the Mind/Brain Identity thesis typically appeal to when defending their position?

12. Why might someone doubt that the Principle of Uniformity is a surefire guide to which theories we should pursue? Do you think this skepticism is well-founded, or is it just another example of philosophers’ penchant for “radical doubt”?

13. Suppose we observe a perfect correlation between some mental property (like feeling pain) and some physical property (like having one’s c-fibers fire). Apply the Surprise Principle (Chapter 3) to see whether this observation strongly favors the identity theory over dualism.

14.In the passage from Principles of Natural Philosophy quoted in this chapter, Newton defends the Principle of Parsimony by saying that “Nature does nothing in vain.” Is this idea consistent with what we now know about natural selection (Chapter 6)?

15. The Principle of Parsimony is often thought to be relevant to the question of whether God exists. Formulate and evaluate an argument for atheism that makes use of this principle.

16. On the companion website, the psychologist U. T. Place defends the identity theory, but does not mention the Principle of Parsimony. He does so by describing a situation in which the correlation between two events justifies the conclusion that the two are identical. Evaluate Place’s argument.

17. What would it mean for something to be a first cause without being God? What would it mean for something to necessarily exist without being God

18. Aquinas seems to commit the Birthday Fallacy when he argues that, if every natural event has a cause, then there must be one “first cause.” Why is this line of reasoning fallacious? Can you think of another example of the Birthday Fallacy?

19. Why does Aquinas think that it is “inconceivable” that the world is infinitely old? Do you think his argument is plausible? Why or why not?

20. Why, if at all, do you think it might be helpful to reflect on unsuccessful arguments for the existence of God? Explain your answer.

21. Which of the four arguments discussed above do you find most convincing? Why? Problems for Further Thought

1 I formulated Aquinas’s proofs by having him talk about objects that exist in “nature” (in “the natural world”). What does “nature” include? Does it include just the things we can see or hear or touch or taste or smell?

2 In discussing Aquinas’s third proof, I talked about Charlie the atom as an example of a thing that is both eternal and contingent. Could something exist that is both necessary and noneternal? It would exist at some time in each possible world, though it would not exist at all times in the actual world. Can you give an example of such a thing?

3 I criticized Aquinas’s third argument by discussing numbers, which I claimed exist necessarily. Can the argument be reformulated so that this objection no longer applies?

4 I criticized Aquinas’s fourth argument by discussing “maximum stupidity.” Can Aquinas reply to this objection by claiming that stupidity is just the absence of intelligence?

Identify a disease and describe how you could design a “drug” based on an antibody.

Antibodies have been used in drug development in targeting specific tissues and part of the normal humoral immune response. Recently, new anti-cancer antibodies have been developed as a new type of chemotherapy agent.

1. Identify a disease and describe how you could design a “drug” based on an antibody.
2. Describe how this drug could enhance the immune response.
3. Explain why this could be an effective treatment for that disease.
4. Identify both, advantages and disadvantages, to this strategy.

Please be sure to validate your opinions and ideas with citations and references in APA format.

What other options do you have to avoid taking out a car loan?

Many people find managing their money a difficult task. Their use of credit cards and loans early in their adult years can prevent them from acquiring financial health in their lifetime. It is tempting to spend money you have not yet acquired once you are no longer a student trying to make ends meet.

Be sure to complete the learning content for the Unit 7  topic “Financial Health” and the two referenced activities before attempting to engage in this discussion.

Note: To view the content for an already completed topic, double click on the topic’s circle in the learning map. A new page will appear. Under the Actions area select review from the drop-down options; this will open the topic with content. The practice and quick practice options only offer questions.

Instructions:

• Complete the two financial health activities (The True Cost of a New Car and  The True Cost of Credit Card Use) presented in Unit 7 Topic “Financial Health” related to spending money you do not have.
• Share your experience with “The True Cost of a New Car” activity with your peers
  • Change the size of the loan, years to pay it back, and the interest rate three (3) to four (4) times.
    • Start with the lowest loan amount you might need for your new care and increase by $5000 to $10000 each turn.
    • Start with a 3% loan (entered as .03) and increase by one (1) or two (2) percent each turn.
    • In each case choose between 5 and 7 years to pay it back.
  • Describe one of the monthly payments you would have to make based on your selections.
    • Loan amount?
    • Interest rate?
    • Years to pay it back?
    • Monthly payment?
    • Total car cost?
  • Discuss the potential impact a car payment of that size might have on your monthly budget.
    • Describe the other monthly expenses you would have to remove or reduce to make your payments.
    • Why Is or isn’t the car worth the sacrifices you might have to make given the size of the monthly payments?
  • What other options do you have to avoid taking out a car loan?
• Share your experience with ” The True Cost of Credit Card Use” activity with your peers
  • Consider the following scenario:
    • You spend an extra $50 a month using a credit card for the first year after graduation to make ends meet.
    • The interest rate charged by the credit card company is 18%.
    • The minimum payment you are required to send each month is $20.
  • Now consider the real cost of that $50 dollars a month by the end of that first year provided to you in the exercise.
    • How might the continued use of a credit card to fund an extra $50 of spending per month affect your long-term financial health?
    • Describe two ways you could avoid the long-term consequences of spending more than you have on a regular basis.

Please be sure to validate your opinions and ideas with citations and references in APA format.

What was the most difficult experience for you or one or more of the dying person’s loved ones watching the process of death?

Review the information on death and dying. Complete the following:

• Reflect on your experiences with death and dying. This could be during the death and dying of a loved one, or something you saw or read about in a work of fiction.
• Discuss your thoughts on death.
  • How does this topic make you feel?
  • Why?
• Reflect on the major changes that occur in the weeks, days, and hours leading up to death.
• Describe the dying person’s most difficult experience.
• What was the most difficult experience for you or one or more of the dying person’s loved ones watching the process of death?
• Using an external source and your own experience (if you have had one), offer advice on how to help a dying person experience death.

Please be sure to validate your opinions and ideas with citations and references in APA format.

explain the state of race relations and racial attitudes in America during the U.S. Mexican War; what specific actions did the U.S. military forces take in Mexico that prove many among the American forces were racist?

Use A SHORT, OFFHAND KILLING AFFAIR as your prime source of evidence and YOU MUST CITE SPECIFIC PASSAGES WITH PAGE NUMBERS FROM THIS BOOK to earn a passing grade on this question. ONLY USE COURSE MATERIALS.

1.)       In A Short, Offhand, Killing Affair, author Paul Foos contends that the American military army and volunteer forces that invaded Mexico represent an accurate cross section of American society and American views on race and ethnicity during the 1840s.  Utilizing Foos, explain the state of race relations and racial attitudes in America during the U.S. Mexican War; what specific actions did the U.S. military forces take in Mexico that prove many among the American forces were racist?  Provide specific examples from the book that might be indicative of how Americans viewed the Mexican people, as well as other peoples they perceived as racially different.

Next, utilize your course book to detail a few instances of how the racial attitudes described by Foos during the 1840s set the tone for the way Americans continued to deal with people they perceived as different (African Americans, Asians, Hispanics, and Native Americans) from the end of the U.S. Mexican War to the end of Reconstruction in 1877.  You may also discuss, if you like, immigration’s impact on how America struggled over the issue of who should be included in American society and who should be excluded based on race and ethnicity.

discuss how the north and south diverged from from one another from the 1790s to the end of Reconstruction in 1877. 

PART I –

1.)        The tension between the north and south played a defining role in shaping early American society.  For this question, discuss how the north and south diverged from from one another from the 1790s to the end of Reconstruction in 1877.  Discuss three events happened that caused this tension?  Who were the major figures in both the north and south, and what specifically did they argue?  I recommend that you discuss two of the following: the 1) political, 2) social, and 3) philosophical differences that emerged between the north and south, and explain why these societies ultimately proved so incompatible.