Let me confess I did not know what this was until I saw this picture. Do you know what it is? What is it used for? Where it comes from? Do tell us more about this is you do know? Or, make a guess?
Saturday, July 4, 2009 at 7:10 pm under Pakistan News Prime Minister, Gen Kayan Call on President Zardari ISLAMABAD : Prime Minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani and Chief of Army Staff Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayan called on the President Asif Ali Zardari in the Presidency here today on Saturday.
لاہور(کرائم سیل)لاہورکے تاجر فیملی سمیت 5ماہ سے لاپتہ ہیں،کوئی سراغ نہ مل سکا۔تفصیلات کے مطابق مصری شاہ کے رہائشی شیخ صغیر ریاست گذشتہ 5ماہ سے زائدعرصہ سے بمعہ فیملی گھرسے غائب ہیںاور تلاش کے باوجود ان کاکوئی پتہ نہیں چل سکا۔
A young girl enrolls at the primary school set up by Mobilink at Mobilink Camp. Approx. 1,000 young boys and girls taking shelter in Mobilink Camp are receiving primary and secondary education. Established by Pakistan’s leading cellular network, Mobilink Camp is one of the largest private sector intervention of its kind for IDPs relief.
Saturday, July 4, 2009 at 12:26 pm under Pakistan Breaking news NJP Will Strengthen Free Judiciary: CJ Iftikhar ISLAMABADA : Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry said National Judicial Policy will strengthen free judiciary system in the country.
Adil Najam
For as long as I can remember, I have heard passionate arguments about whether the four provinces of Pakistan should be divided into multiple smaller provinces. The discussion has, once again, gained momentum. This time the focus is the Punjab and converting Southern Punjab into a separate province (a ‘Saraiki sooba‘).
The political optics of the situation remain in flux. The PML(N) has reacted to the current discussion with suspicion seeing this as a ploy by PPP to break the PML’s hold over the Punjab. The PPP has reacted, for the moment, with both President Zardari and Prime Minister Gillani saying that no such move is on the cards. That may well be so, and may well be subject to change, but my question for our readers today is whether — irrespective of political motives — creating a new province in Southern Punjab is a good idea or not? And what this may mean, if anything, for other provinces?
First, let me put my own cards on the table. The first time I wrote about this subject was back in the 1980s - in an op-ed in The Muslim I argued for a total of 6 to 8 provinces (each of the current four provinces being redrawn along lines consistent with historic, linguistic and cultural affinities). My most radical idea, then, was to reconsider the provinces not just along the lines of existing provinces but across existing lines (to use language as an example, Hindko, Sindhi, Seraiki, and Pushto speakers all straddle across current provincial lines). My motivation then, and now, stemmed from demographic concerns of concentration of populations, resources and, therefore, power in one province and the attendant feelings of peripheralization felt by other provinces. Importantly, this can - and has - led to a politics of fragmentation and distrust where it becomes too easy to evoke distrust and disdain through legitimate as well as exaggerated fears. There is also the concern about fewer provinces strengthening a provincial group identity at the expense of a national identity as well as of more local identities. Importantly, in the case of the Saraiki belt, the local identity sentiment for a separate province is the strongest reason to support such an initiative.
After writing that piece I remember having protracted conversations on this with the late Dr. Mahbub-ul-Haq who had been arguing for a much more elaborate scheme that woud end with there being 16-25 different provinces. Over the years I have become more and more sympathetic to his developmental argument: that creating smaller provinces will also de-centralize power and localize opportunities - each provincial capital requires a provincial capital infrastructure and create local employment and opportunities and therefore development opportunities get spread around the country rather than being centralized in a few locations.
I tend, therefore, to lean towards this idea. However, practical realities have tended to mute my enthusiasm somewhat. But, only somewhat. I realize, of course, the fracturous politics that will be unleashed in the process of redrawing provincial lines, even though my hope has been that the coalitional politics that will emerge for having more units will be, in fact, less fracturous than our current provincial frictions. There is also the practical matter that while in most of the country the affinities have long historical and cultural roots the demographics in urban Sindh are ‘modern’ and constructed through the traumas of sudden migration patterns. Not surprisingly, the resultant identity politics also tends to be more traumatic.
So, my own leanings on this are clear and I would certainly support a Seraiki province, even if a more elaborate redrawing of provincial units across the country were not possible at this time. Three reasons would make me support such a move: (a) it is a deep demand of the area itself and (b) it begins to balance out provincial distributions and (c) amongst the various cases for provincial redrawings this is clearly the strongest case for the clear cultural and historic affinities and this could serve as an important first step.
I have been in this debate long enough to know that there can, and will, be many arguments against mine. So, lets please hear them. Is there a logic to redrawing provincial units? If so, why? If not, why not? I suspect it will not be so, but I hope people will focus especially on the longer-term national logic of such a move rather than whatever short-term political gains or losses this might mean to particular political operatives.
While Mobilink tends to lay off its employees in regards to reducing their overheads and by naming it ‘none-performance basis’, Mobilink also is spending millions of rupees on their lavish trip to international destinations.
An inside source confirms that a group of approximately one hundred people which include 3 Vice Presidents (traveling first class which is top most traveling cabin in a passenger aircraft) approximately a dozen Directors travelling Business Class, Senior Managers, Managers and selective Franchisees who left Pakistan yesterday for Bangkok – Thailand & Kuala Lumpur – Malaysia.
This is one of “those” trips where everything is paid for by the company including travel, accommodation, food & all sort of drinks, leisure & pleasure and is considered a standard practice in the company. Our source also confirm that approximately 19 million Pakistan rupees is being spent on this trip.
On one side company talks about reducing its costs and takes action by firing its staff and on the other side; the same company is taking its favorite people out on International destination for pleasure.
Copyright © 2009 ProPakistani.comFriday, July 3, 2009 at 3:25 pm under Sports News Pakistan vs Sri Lanka Series 2009 Schedule Pakistan Cricket Team will tour to Sri Lanka in June after 20 20 World Cup 2009 to play 3 match Test Series, 5 ODI and one Twenty20 international.
Radical Entertainment launched a fantastic game named Prototype on 9th June 2009 in North America and on 10th June they launched their number in Europe. Game is basically a sandbox-style action game but it differs from many aspects from other sandbox-style action games. Game was released on different counsels such as WINDOWS (PC), PS3 and XBOX 360 later on game was released in Australia.
Game has got very good response regarding its reception, well formed action and wonderful open ended game play. Game spot and other websites has given 8.5 or 9 grades out of 10. Critics have tried hard to find something bad but they couldn’t, there are some factors which frustrate the player and no doubt game is a bit similar to Resident Evil and Spiderman but ProtoType has got its own individuality and has something new and extra ordinary in it. Different kind of story and its reception makes game more interesting.
Storyline of the game is very interesting. Game is set in the city of New York where some sort of virus has attacked on the city and people are getting infected with that virus. In the game the main character is ALEX MERCER means you have to play as Alex. Story starts when Alex finds himself in the stage of Amnesia (a condition in which human memory do not works properly) in a genetic engineering company (GENTEK).
He wakes up and tries to escape from there in mean while he fights with soldiers. Alex finds that he has extra ordinary super powers in himself Alex has power to absorb the powers, skills and abilities in himself. Alex can take the shapes and all the skills of others and now Alex has to find out who was the responsible for his condition. In this game Alex has to fight with two enemies at a time one is the Special Forces named BLACKWATCH (Special Military Forces).
Alex uses all the powers and absorbing skills to find out the truth. Dana (Sister of Alex) gives Alex the people who can be useful to bring back his memory. During this Alex finds his ex-girl friend Karen, Alex didn’t know that she was working for BLACKWATCH – she injects Alex with cancer and then after a bit long Dr .Ragland helps Alex to get rid of Cancer.
After all this Alex finds that DANA is kidnapped well as the story goes ahead Alex finds out his past he finds that he was a employee of GENTEK and Alex was shot by the forces and the virus went into his body accidently and he becomes a person like this and the story continues because telling you the whole story could be a cause of interest minimization……..
Game is really different from other Sand-box Style games. 1st difference is that the player can change him into any character and can absorb the skills of any person even of his enemies. Combat system is quite well organized. Alex’s combos and way of tackling his enemies is very much appreciated by the players. Alex arms turns into the dangerous blades while absorbing the powers of others.
Critics found some mistakes in the game such as repetitive game play, they also declared the story line is weak but they admired the game. Most interesting part of the game is when Alex gets into flashback of his memory open ended play also pleasures the users and. In the game sometimes you have to fight with 3 enemies at the same time you have to battle with the Special Forces, choppers and the infected people.
You can earn bonus points from the missions and can new weapons and new abilities. Extra ordinary action speed of the character creates more excitement into the user and fighting with the tanks, choppers, enemies and zombies at the same time totally changes the definition of sand-box style…..
Minimum System Requirements for ProtoType
Official website: www.prototypegame.com
Click here to view the embedded video.
Click here to view the embedded video.
Click here to view the embedded video.
Copyright © 2009 ProPakistani.com
Downsizing is sub function of Selection & Recruitment, and it has been in practice since long, actually we don’t know when exactly it was discovered. Downsizing is mostly done when there arises a need, but that’s not the only rule, we have seen organizations downsizing even when need was not in place.
Recently, in USA alone, hundreds of thousands of professionals lost their jobs and leftover are highly insecure. Corporations continue to cut jobs and in fact they are eyeing current fiscal year by evaluating recessions’ performance to decide the future of employers. Such a situation is called “workforce optimization in response to economy decline”.
In last two years, we observed that in Pakistan recession hit couple of sectors including banking and advertising. Resultantly, both the sectors optimized their workforce on large-scale, in which most of the banks limited their operations.
I believe before I discuss downsizing conditions, let me first discuss that what recession actually is and its impact on workforce?
What is Recession?
Recession is crunch of economy for more than 6 months consecutively with a decrease in production of goods and services by the people of the country. So in particular, every product and service oriented organization is dependent on the external customers.
As in the decline of economy customer will not be willing to buy a particular product or service because of future uncertainty in the market and eventually all this result into a burden on a particular organization. This burden is equalized by downsizing, as this is assumed the most liquid way to save some bucks.
So, if you understood what recession is and how it gets started and how it comes to an end. Then let me start the topic that why companies do downsizing.
In Pakistan, we have not seen usual downsizings curve as it happened in rest of the world; reason could be that we have not been affected by recession that badly, as the western countries..
Downsizing for the sake of Team Sizing
Recently, we have seen some drastic downsizing in many industries of Pakistan. People claiming it downsizings, but I believe we better call it “Team Sizing”.
Team sizing is the concept that is usual with the change of leadership – as the new leaders comes into an organization, he/she brings in new strategy, vision and concept of a team with him. These new things are sometimes beneficiary for in-groups (like minded) and non-beneficiary for out-groups.
This is common practice that managers take their teams to next destinations whenever they switch the jobs or given new assignments and they also believe that their success is only because of their teams.
That’s what actually happened in banking sector, upon the change of leader, his/her team got changed, as he took it with him/herself, or the HR kicked the whole team out of the play land.
Again, this is not hard and fast rule, but we have observed this happening on many occasions.
Now let me discuss downsizing because of “Non-Performance”:
Now days, professional organizations are much busy in retaining the workforce instead of lay-offs, because of the cost they incurred on developing a single personnel for a particular job. So, when they do “Cost Benefit” analysis they get to know that it’s more feasible retaining an individual instead of laying him/her off. For the purpose corporations conduct proper research on these particular non performers for answering a question that why they are not performing well? And on the basis of findings they designed specific programs like:
Particular example that I want to quote here is of AT&T :
AT&T developed an alternative to downsizing called Resource Link, which is a temporary unit within AT&T composed of AT&T general management and technical professionals. These associates perform much of the work that AT&T previously contracted out. They work on a contractual basis for the various AT&T business units backfilling vacant positions, supporting temporary peaks in workload, providing specialized support, importing needed expertise, or providing cross-business unit experience.
Participants are AT&T associates who have been declared excess by their business divisions, or associates who have volunteered to broaden their experiences and opportunities. Approximately 600 associates participate; over one-half are volunteers who chose to work in Resource Link. This pool of employees is cost effective and helps to balance staffing needs with business needs (AT&T, 1994).
Conclusion:
Like above, there are lots of best practices available around us to take the litmus test before doing anything like downsizing. Organizations have particular policies for downsizings in intense times. But just informing of non performance and giving a job dismissal letter at spot is not an ethical practice in all over the world.
There is lot of work to do before lying off someone from job, instead of just informing that “You are no more with us!” “They follow ILO in giving 3 months’ salary in advance”, but why don’t they follow ILO in obeying other particular sections.
Organizations need to think about developing particular department for personnel’s development – most commonly known as “HRD” Human Resource Development Department or Organizational Development Department to conduct semi annually skills performance assessments and many other best practices instead of that rigged “Performance Appraisals” .
I know couple of organizations in Pakistan which are working on Organizational Development in the particular industries, but still they need transparencies and complete implementation of best practices in particular cases in the organizations. “The Next Challenge for the whole world is to build Human resources instead of laying offs as world is already scarce with built in talent professionals”.
This is also fact that with recession, lay-offs are common to observe as most of the companies do not have good profits in achieving their targets, so particular remedy for remaining at the same profit or at bit low profit point is to lay-offs, but again it is in the case of recession not in the case of non-performers.
Copyright © 2009 ProPakistani.com
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