Insights about Green Projects

The article “Green Projects” written by Dave Nielsen, discussed about how a green project could become a very beneficial project to pursue. First, let us define what a green project is, from the term “green” it implies that it is good for the environment; it is eco-friendly. Concatenating it with the term “project” it makes a collaborative enterprise, frequently involving research or design, that is carefully planned to achieve a particular aim, and that aim is to save Mother Earth.

Here are some words from one of the key thought leaders of having a Green Project, Tom Mochal: The world is going green. We are collectively realizing that we don’t have an unlimited amount of air or water or space to continue to utilize resources like we have in the past. Concerns over global warming merely serve as the central rallying point for an environmentally friendly movement that has been underway since at least the 1970s. On the other hand, most project managers don’t run these kinds of projects. Most of us deal with projects such as installing a new software package or upgrading network infrastructure. How can these projects become more environmentally friendly?

Mochal’s idea is very true. As I could remember in my lower years of being an IT student we were also taught about green computing; that we should pursue IT expertise into helping our environment. Now that I’m in my upper half of my study and having this course Project Management, I have come to realize and remember that as human beings we have the responsibility to take care of the world that’s giving a place to be alive. We were also told by our instructor/facilitator for the said course that it is better to make our class project to be a green project by promoting green computing.

Going back to Nielsen’s article, the provincial government was restricting on where solar farms can be placed. After reading the article, I searched a bit about that news and found that there was another news update about the solar farm in Ontario, Canada. October 21, 2009, a headline was released: Canada's largest solar farm opens in Ontario. That was indeed good news. Upgrading the province’s transmission and distribution systems are key parts of the government’s strategy to create jobs and facilitate economic growth embedded in the Green Energy and Green Economy Act. The government predicts that these upgrades will create 20,000 jobs in the province over the next three years. "The government’s announcement today offers every one of us the opportunity to become energy entrepreneurs by ensuring that any clean energy we produce, whether that is wind power, solar energy or biogas, will be able to feed into the electricity grid for a fair and profitable price" said Kristopher Stevens, Executive Director of the Ontario Sustainable Energy Association. "Now municipalities, First Nations, farmers and energy co-operatives can become power proponents, reducing greenhouse gases and smog while creating potentially thousands of jobs in their communities."

Security Problems - Multiprogramming and Time-sharing Environment

In a multiprogramming and time-sharing environment, several users share the system simultaneously. This situation can result in various security problems. Name at least two of these problems. Can we ensure the same degree of security in a time-share machine as we have in a dedicated machine? Explain your answer.

First, let us define these terms: multiprogramming and time-sharing environment, and security. Multiprogramming is a form of processing in which a computer holds more than one program in memory and works on them in round-robin fashion that is, by sharing out the processor's time so that each program receives some attention some of the time. This way of working is in contrast to using the processor to run one program at a time. Time-sharing is an approach to interactive computing in which a single computer is used to provide apparently simultaneous interactive general-purpose computing to multiple users by sharing processor time. So basically, time sharing is for multi-user computer systems. Further, time-sharing is the sharing of a computing resource among many users by means of multiprogramming and multi-tasking. A time-sharing environment supports multiple users simultaneously. The term originated in the 1960s when multiple terminals were first connected to a single mainframe, allowing programmers and students simultaneous access to computing resources. Security is making sure that files are not read or modified by unauthorized persons/programs which include technical, administrative, legal, social, psychological and political issues.

For the first question, because the data and resources are shared in the memory, one user can copy another user's program / memory space. This could be very detrimental if, for example, an administrator was running a decryption protocol, and another user stole the decryption program and/or key. If it is possible to copy someone else's file it may also be possible that an unauthorized user might modify data without owner’s permission, overwrite another program’s area in the memory. There are many types of intruders that would be the reason for the security issues one of them is a passive intruder, Passive -- read files without authorization; Active -- malicious, unauthorized changes; Casual prying; Snooping by insiders --personal challenge to break security (also by former insiders); Financial gain -- theft, blackmail; Espionage -- commercial or military; Virus or worm-- program, not a direct person, (usually) trying to do (usually) general damage via replication. Using system resources (CPU, disk space) without proper accounting causes the printer to mix output by sending data while some other user's file is printing; is also a problem that may arise.

As for the second question, probably not, since any protection scheme devised by a human can also be broken -- and the more complex the scheme is, the more difficult it is to be confident of its correct implementation, note that even in the case of dedicated processing, you still have security issues (most notably, physical access issues (repairmen, etc), and sanitizing media upon system decommission. In real computer security (as opposed to what's in your textbook, apparently), the answer to the second question is "No, it's not as secure”. A case can be made that to secure a system, multi-user operation is required, in order to support multiple roles (systems admin, security auditor, and user) - dedicated operations don't provide a suitable audit trail. Also, it's the rare multiprogramming system these days where the operating system is the weak link - even Windows provides enough security that your biggest threat is idiot and malicious users.

Hand held computer for work used by a…

Manager in a supermarket

First we must define what a supermarket manager does. In order to properly cater to the needs of customers, a supermarket must staff an expert, attentive management team. A supermarket manager may assume many different duties, such as supervising employees and store operations, taking inventory and ordering products, performing administrative and human resources work, or engaging in safety inspections and loss prevention. Most managers are very skilled at organizing merchandise, communicating with employees, and providing excellent customer service.

Given with those duties a hand held computer would be very helpful in accomplishing those tasks. For example in the inventory checking, it would be convenient and more accurate if the inventory would be checked using a computerized system. There are many inventory systems nowadays that a supermarket manager can use; so as an ordering system for the supplies of their products. Using that handheld computer, the supermarket manager can track the transactions within his palm’s reach (literally).

Delivery person for a courier service

A delivery person for a courier service operates vehicles to pick up and deliver messages, packages, and mail the customer wants to be delivered. Couriers are distinguished from ordinary mail services by features such as speed, security, tracking, signature, specialization and individualization of services, and committed delivery times, which are optional for most everyday mail services. A local example of this is LBC.

Here are some of the principal responsibilities of the delivery personnel:

• Follows instructions for pick up, transport and delivery of messages, packages, and mail the customer wants to be delivered. 

• Gives basic operating instructions to the customer at the time of delivery of the equipment. 

• Keeps records of pick-up and deliveries and obtains necessary signatures and receipts as requested by supervisors.

Having those duties, a delivery person could use a hand held computer in tracking all the deliverables on his truck. He could also use a finger print scanner to secure the identity of the receiver of his delivery.

Operating Systems ~ Categorized

• ·         Batch Systems

     SCOPE, an acronym for Supervisory Control Of Program Execution, was the name used by the Control Data Corporation for a number of operating system projects in the 1960s.

SCOPE for the CDC 6000 series

This operating system was based on the original Chippewa Operating System. In the early 1970s, it was renamed NOS/BE for the CDC Cyber machines. The SCOPE operating system is a file-oriented system using mass storage, random access devices. It was designed to make use of all capabilities of CDC 6000 computer systems and exploits fully the multiple-operating modes of all segments of the computer. Main tasks of SCOPE are controlling job execution, storage assignment, performing segment and overlay loading. Its features include comprehensive input/output functions and library maintenance routines. The dayfile chronologically records all jobs run and any problems encountered. To aid debugging, dumps and memory maps are available. Under control of SCOPE, a variety of assemblers (COMPASS), compilers (ALGOL, FORTRAN, COBOL), and utility programs (SORT/MERGE, PERT/TIME, EXPORT/IMPORT, RESPOND,SIMSCRIPT, APT, OPTIMA etc.) may be operated. The computer emulation community has made repeated attempts to recover and preserve this software without success.

     BKY - A batch-oriented OS for the CDC 6600 at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratories. Early 1970s.”  Professor Jim Mooney’s list of Batch Systems for Large Computer

• ·         Interactive Systems

Multics (Multiplexed Information and Computing Service) was an extremely influential early time-sharing operating system. The project was started in 1964.

It had numerous features intended to result in high availability so that it would produce a computing utility similar to the telephone and electricity services. Modular hardware structure and software architecture were used to achieve this. The system could grow in size by simply adding more of the appropriate resource—computing power, main memory, disk storage, etc. Separate access control lists on every file provided flexible information sharing and complete privacy when needed. It had a number of standard mechanisms to allow engineers to analyse the performance of the system as well as a number of adaptive performance optimisation mechanisms.

• ·         Real-time systems

PikeOS is a microkernel-based real-time operating system made by SYSGO AG. It is targeted at safety and security critical embedded systems. It provides a partitionedenvironment for multiple operating systems with different design goals, safety requirements, or security requirements to coexist in a single machine.

If several programs having different criticality levels are to coexist in one machine, the underlying OS must ensure that they remain independent. Resource partitioning is a widely accepted technique to achieve this. PikeOS combines resource partitioning and virtualisation: Its virtual machine environments (VMs) are able to host entire operating systems, along with their applications. Since PikeOS uses paravirtualisation, operating systems need to be adapted in order to run in one of its VMs. Application programs, however, can run unmodified.

• ·         Hybrid Systems

NeXTSTEP is the object-oriented, multitasking operating system developed by NeXT Computer to run on its range of proprietary workstation computers, such as the NeXTcube, and later, other computer architectures. NeXTSTEP was a combination of several parts:

·         a Unix-like operating system based on the Mach kernel, plus source    code from BSD

·         Display PostScript and a windowing engine

·         the Objective-C language and runtime

·         an object-oriented (OO) application layer, including several "kits"

·         development tools for the OO layers

• ·         Embedded Systems

Magic Cap (short for Magic Communicating Applications Platform) was an object-oriented operating system for PDAs developed by General Magic. Tony Fadell was in charge of the platform. 

Magic Cap incorporated a "room metaphor", where the user navigated from room to room to perform various tasks (E.G. a home office to perform word processing, or a file room to clean up the system files). The interface resembled that of Microsoft Bob, though Magic Cap lacked an office assistant.

Several electronic companies came to market with Magic Cap devices, the most notable of which being the Sony Magic Link released in 1994 and the Motorola Envoy, also released in 1994. None of these devices were commercial successes.

Learnings from Technopreneurship 1

It was just last semester when we had our 1st elective, it was Technopreneurship 1. What is technopreneurship? That’s a common question for us students who took the subject and my initial answer was technology plus entrepreneurship, as the name suggests also. I later defined those two terms; technology, which means knowledge, an expertise, a know-how, or simply defined as applications of knowledge to human work while the other, entrepreneurship, means practicing of consistently converting good ideas into profitable commercial ventures or simply an enterprise or business. And so, my first definition of technopreneurship was technopreneurship is converting good ideas into profitable commercial ventures with the aid of technology, or simply having a business which is incorporated or has something to do with technology. We are information technology students and we are the most close to being one of those people engaged in technopreneurship; the so-called technoprenuers. A technopreneur is an entrepreneur who is technology savvy, creative, innovative, dynamic, dares to be different and take the unexplored path, and very passionate about their work. They take challenges and strive to lead their life with greater success. They don't fear to fail. They take failure as a learning experience, a stimulator to look things differently and stride for next challenge.

Mind Sets – Paradigm Shift
"Go to school, get good grades, land in a high-paying job." This is the usual mindset that most people have about formal education. Parents send their children to school with this mindset. Students imbibe this mindset and carry it with them until college. Most schools subscribe to and support this mindset. It is like a default mindset. We can formally call it the employment mindset."Go to school, get good grades, create and own a company."Use your knowledge, skills, core values, creativity and passion to create and innovate through technology. These statements offer an alternative mindset. We can formally call it the technopreneurship mindset. Technopreneurship is entrepreneurship in the field of high technology. It is the healthy interplay of technology ideas, technology skills, management skills and the entrepreneurial mindset. It starts with an idea, which when pursued, has the capacity to be transformed into a viable technology-based enterprise. The cultivation and nurturing of this alternative mindset can start in schools. A technopreneurship track in the IT curriculum can prepare students to be budding technopreneurs.

Having to know these mindsets I came to realize that it is indeed possible that after graduating from our course we could become more than an employee but we could be the employer. We have greater edge against others because we have the technology and today’s era is the technology era; the information era. There is so much opportunity out there that we can grab all we should do is go for it. We were so into the employee mindset that we forgot we could make an employer out of our selves; become a technopreneur.

To know more and understand more what a technopreneur is our first activity was a film viewing. It was a movie about some great technoprenuers who were very successful in their field, the founders of Apple and Microsoft; Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, respectively, and so the film was “The Pirates of the Silicon Valley”. In the movie, it showed different factors that we could use a tips on how to become a technopreneur or what it takes to become one.
Be a risk taker.
"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And the most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
-Steve Jobs

When all is said and done and the dust has settled, it is the risk-takers who win in business and life. Every day entrepreneurs have to make decisions. Make the right decision and you could become very wealthy. You don't want to make a wrong move that could bankrupt you. It’s enough to stress out the calmest of us. It’s always going to have some uncertainty associated with it. If we could predict the future we would all be rich.
If you correct your bad decisions quickly you're on the right path to being a successful entrepreneur. They will also be less likely to repeat the bad decisions. And they will learn to trust their gut to figure out the right path.

..Be always hungry, hungry for brilliance.
“Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”
-Steve Jobs

With a reputation for being a hardnosed perfectionist, Jobs believes that having the best and the brightest workers behind him was one of his biggest success factors. “To turn really interesting ideas and fledgling technologies into a company that can continue to innovate for years, it requires a lot of disciplines,” he says. With little faith in the value of focus groups, Jobs relied on gathering small groups of people from a wide array of backgrounds to stimulate creative ideas within each other.
“Innovation comes from people meeting in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we’ve been thinking about a problem,” says Jobs. “It’s ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks he has figured out the coolest new thing ever and who wants to know what other people think of his idea.” Innovation, in other words, cannot be structured. It can be encouraged, but it must not be restricted.

Despite this, Jobs has a reputation for being tough on new ideas from his staff, typically rejecting the first idea that anyone proposes before even seriously considering it. He considers this part of the key to innovation. “It comes from saying no to 1,000 things to make sure we don’t get on the wrong track or try to do too much,” he says. “We’re always thinking about new markets we could enter, but it’s only by saying no that you can concentrate on the things that are really important.”

Next, we were introduced to the SEED model, SEED stands for Self Mastery, Environment Mastery, Enterprise Mastery, and Development of a Business plan. For the previous semester we were supposed to tackle the first two of the SEED model but because of the limited time we had only discussed one; the Self Mastery.

If You Master Yourself, You Can Master Anything
The self mastery component is an internal journey into an alternative mindset (which is technopreneurship) from the default employment mindset. Assessment exercises on inclinations towards technopreneurship are done as well as business idea generation exercises springing from what the participants personally love, hate, and are good at. This “self mastery” thing is an essential factor which could help us individuals to improve ourselves to become successful in the future; possibly, a great entrepreneur or technopreneur.

For us to master ourselves we were given tests as our tool in getting to know our selves.
First test, Personality traits: Personality traits are the relatively enduring patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that differentiate individuals from one another. The idea that traits cause organizational behaviors has in the past been a point of controversy (Davis-Blake, & Pfeffer,1989), primarily because it is difficult to reconcile behavior being changeable by organizational factors and simultaneously caused by stable individual differences. Being able to know ourselves lets us know our strengths and weaknesses. We should maintain our strengths or better improve them more. For our weaknesses, we should find a way to make those things as our strengths. It’s easy to say these things, but in reality it’s not that easy to apply, well maybe for others but mostly not. We are uniquely made by God, which makes us different from one another from the start. Then by the experiences and the environment that we gain from the past up to the present we change and still different from another. Even as indicated by the results of the personality traits we took, the numbers really vary.
Second test, IQ: IQ is the acronym for intelligent quotient, and refers to a score given for several standardized intelligence tests. The first of these was developed by French psychologist Alfred Binet in 1905. He constructed the IQ test, as it would later be called, to determine which children might need additional help in scholarly pursuits. Today, the IQ test is commonly based on some model of the Stanford Binet Intelligence scale.
The third test, EQ: EQ actually stands for Emotional Intelligence Quotient. Much like an intelligence quotient, or IQ, an EQ is said to be a measure of a person’s emotional intelligence. One particularly popular setting that employs attempts at measuring EQ is the corporate world. Many businesses utilize EQ tests to help their employees determine and measure their emotional responses to various situations. While most corporate EQ tests are administered on the basis that a person’s EQ can be modified or increased, there is dispute about whether emotional intelligence is standard or can be changed.
The fourth test, AQ: Adversity Quotient test help individuals become valuable at work. Basically, tests would not only measure a person’s ability but also people’s capability to deal with the work and deal with others. It is on the relationship of a technopreneur has to obtain. The test is more focused on situational basis, which is very helpful for a person to know his capability of becoming technopreneur.

After reading the Commencement Address of Steve Jobs, I was so touch though I’m not listening on act to where he said all of it but the essence of all the words of wisdom he stated there makes me feel that I’m present and unswervingly listening to him too.
Reading between the lines in the commencement speech of Steve Jobs, I concluded some lessons which can help me to continue what I’ve started and serve as inspirational words to me to chase everything I’ve coveted.

“You’ve got to find what you love.” It’s really, truly, absolutely and definitely true. You can never be on a place when you were just force to do so by someone or anyone else. You, yourself should be the one to be eager to do that thing because you love too. It’s just the same as taking a course in college, when you’re not interested to a course, you’ll never choose it. You’ll prefer to take the course you really love because that your fashion. It’s just concluding that everyone has its different place, different interest and different perspective in life. So you can never force yourself or even others to do things which they don’t want. Only oneself can bring him into his interests and do chase it someday.

The Steve Jobs’ Commencement address ended with four simple but powerful words of advice from the billionaire entrepreneur and that is to “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” To stay hungry which means to starve or to ask for more even if you already have what you want. And as a technopreneur we should stay hungry because if not we would probably become lazy and contented from what we have. And to stay hungry which means to reach your goals and be foolish enough to take risks for in that way you will only reach and achieve your goals in life. Steve Jobs’ commencement address is really motivating and it indeed inspires me a lot.

Our final requirement for technopreneurship was a presentation of our business proposal. It was not easy. Our ideas were rejected many times, just like Steve Jobs did to his staff. We had to be creative. We have to be unique, the idea should be fresh. That’s the thing that we kept saying onto our group even we were rejected many times. Basically new idea is a combination of old ideas. You need to have enough old ideas to come up with new ideas. That's why constant reading and observation are important. Sometimes when someone has launched a new product, you would say, "Hey! I thought about that before. That's my idea." You might have had thought about the idea but you didn't capitalize on it. Someone has done it before you.

Best of Globe..

Globe Telecom, commonly known as Globe, is a leading telecommunications company in the Philippines. Globe Telecom and Innove Communications rose up to meet their corporate customers demands for complete and relevant solutions, as well as integrated services with the creation of the Enterprise Business Group.

As technology rapidly changes, GlobeNet and GlobeData, the two brands under the Wireline Data Group of Globe Telecom, have fused into one powerful name to serve up integrated winning solutions for their respective customers. GlobeQUEST comes to fore, leveraging on both brands' capabilities and operational strengths. With GlobeQUEST, the Globe Wireline Data proposition materializes, that is to create relevant solutions for business customers based on ubiquitous, value-priced, high-speed data services over a nationwide broadband network.

Globe Telecom’s GlobeQUEST greatly helped DOLE's pineapple plantation in Polomolok, General Santos City. An article came up stating the GlobeQUEST’s partake in the success of DOLE. Here is a brief excerpt from the news article:

"Without technology, we couldn't survive," said Kevin Davis, president of Dole Philippines. "Now, the whole farm is mapped in GPS (geographic positioning system). Our workers can easily monitor which crops are ready for harvest, and which areas are ready for planting." added Davis.

Aside from monitoring the crops, another important aspect of operations in Dole is its plant-to-plant communication. A good communication infrastructure should be in place to ensure the efficiency of operations. For Dole Philippines, a glitch of any of their systems is not a risk they are willing to take.

In 2001, Dole itself was managing its telecommunications needs. But the company decided to focus more on food production rather than on maintenance of their network, so they signed GlobeQUEST to take care of their worries. "What GlobeQUEST did for Dole was to maintain its point-to-point regional network via international private leased line." said Ryan Pangilinan, GlobeQUEST manufacturing segment marketing manager.

However, this is still not as cost-effective as having all the regional networks connected to each other. Because of this, GlobeQUEST is currently migrating Dole's domestic and regional network to a Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS)-based Internet Protocol-Virtual Private Network (IP-VPN). "This enables any of Dole's domestic and regional sites to coordinate seamlessly, 24/7, through voice and data communications," said Pangilinan.

The network is built over a fully digital, nationwide backbone using Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH), Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM), and Internet Protocol on both fiber optic and digital microwave technologies. International connections are made using GlobeQUEST-owned capacity on APCN2 (Asia Pacific Cable Network 2), JUCN (Japan-US Cable Network), C2C, and CUCN.

"GlobeQUEST provides Dole with inter-connectivity with our offices worldwide. Since we export perishable goods, it is a big help to have seamless collaboration with the other regional offices," said Jonah Edrolin, telecommunications, automation, and management information manager at Dole Philippines. "It helps us keep track of what stocks we need to replenish so that we could deliver faster."


Another amazing contribution of Globe in the M-commerce industry is GCash.
It is one of the most impressing from the onset, Globe G-Cash was envisioned as an integrated mobile payment system. A year since its introduction, the first wireless, cashless and cardless payment service in the country has made the convenience and reliability of M-Commerce.

Globe is working with CGAP to create ecosystems or mini-economies with multiple locations for people to transact with GCASH, their mobile banking service, via SMS messaging. Through intensive marketing, targeted customer education, and rapid sign-up and accreditation of retailers, the project will bring mobile phone-based payments and money transfer services for the first time to three predominantly low-income rural provinces. A total of 80,000 GCASH users in the three pilot provinces are expected to be reached, with greater success than would otherwise be possible without CGAP’s support.

In one of the interviews of the President of G-Xchange, Inc. (a part of the Globe Telecom’s companies), Rizza Maniego-Eala last November 25, 2008 to tell more about GCash that this is just the latest in a series of innovative efforts by Globe to expand financial services using mobile phones.


Here is her interview by Jim Rosenberg:


Jim: How far would you say GCASH has evolved in terms of developing ecosystems for mobile commerce?

Rizza: Today, GCASH has over 6,000 domestic outlets in the Philippines servicing our 1.9 million GCASH subscribers. Recently we renewed our partnership with The Rural Bankers Association of the Philippines (RBAP) to further expand existing mobile phone banking services of rural banks. Using the GCASH payment platform and developed with RBAP’s Micro-enterprise Access to Banking Services (MABS) program, the convenience of mobile banking, many rural banks are using GCASH integrated into their operations benefiting the bank by being able to reach more clients and provide an additional channel for accessing the various financial services offered.

We’ve also begun a pilot transfer program for Filipinos in Hawaii, Singapore, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates that allows them to send Western Union mobile money transfers directly to friends and family who are GCASH subscribers in the Philippines. The cross-border service supports low-principal and high-frequency remittances at much lower rates.



Jim: Describe the importance of pricing for the lower income segment of the market.

Rizza: In the Philippines, the greater portion of the population lives at or below poverty line. In spite of this, there are over 60 million mobile phone subscribers and around 98% are on prepaid services. GCASH benefits the lower income segments because it reduces the transaction fees and costs to send and receive money. GCASH requires only a mobile phone and a one-time SMS-based registration, with a minimal charge of U$0.02 (P1.00) per transaction. Subscribers can do their transactions at home instead of traveling several kilometers to rural banks to pay or do their banking transactions.

Jim: For those of us who are less familiar with the Philippines, describe the importance of remittances to the country, as well as to your business.

Rizza: The Philippines received international remittances worth an estimated $16 billion (this year alone) constituting about 13% of our GDP. The continued growth of remittances to the Philippines plays an integral role in the strength of the financial sector and our economy as a whole. The Philippine domestic remittance profile is also growing although it is quite tough to find third party data estimating the size of this market. As both international and domestic remittances form a large part of our country’s economy, we continue to look ways in which GCASH can provide low-priced, secure and easily accessible solutions for our growing merchant partner-base and various consumer segments.

Jim: What are the benefits of GCASH to your partners on the ground – banking agents?

Rizza: GCASH is all about convenience and lower transaction costs. For partner establishments, GCASH has the potential of reducing costs and promoting efficiency. Since transactions are electronic, their processing capabilities are automated thereby reducing manual handling and potential reducing back office costs. The reduction of operating cost could translate to increased margins, better value passed on to our partners’ customers, or both. Utilizing GCASH to help in our partners’ automation and increased access to more customers requires almost zero capital expenditure on their part.


To date, G-Cash has earned the following awards:

· GSM Awards: Best Mobile Messaging Service; Feb. ‘05

· Mobile News Asia: Most Innovative Mobile Operator Service; June ‘05

· GMA (Global Messaging Awards): Best M-commerce Service Application; June ‘05

· A gora Awards: World Class Excellence in Phil. Marketing; Nov. ‘05

· MCEA (Marketing Communications Effectiveness Awards): Gold prize in the Most Effective

New Service Introduction category; Aug. ‘05

Indeed G-Cash has gone a long way in so short a time. Still the biggest innovation to date,

G-Cash’s promise of payments for products and services at the speed of an SMS continues to

excite the imagination of Filipinos everywhere. Its ease and convenience also makes G-Cash a

popular upgrade for many companies, helping to boost productivity when they enter the arena

of mobile commerce.

“(The support) of G-Cash will go a long way in sustaining much-needed projects such as disaster

relief and rehabilitation, blood donation drives, and barangay-based disaster preparedness

training programs.”

-Sen. Richard Gordon, Philippine National Red Cross, Chairperson

“We’re looking forward to implementing RBAP Text-a-Payment because it reduces costs, eliminates

cash-in-transit risk, and brings direct cost savings to our clients.”

-Benedict Romualdez Tudtud, Rural Bank of Mandaue, Inc, Member of the Board of Directors

“Remittance services are not always readily available in rural areas, and G-Cash helps TelOf

facilitate such services,”

-Atty. Graciano Sitchon, TelOf, Executive Director.

“Mas mabilis ang G-Cash kumpara sa ibang money transfer, secure[d] pa (G-Cash is faster compared

to other money transfers, plus it’s secure).”

-Arwin Reyes, a registered G-Cash subscriber.

Managerial Roles by Mintzberg - The Social Aspect of Leadership

Management expert Professor Henry Mintzberg has argued that a manager’s work can be boiled down to ten common roles. According to Mintzberg, these roles, or expectations for a manager’s behavior, fall into three categories: informational (managing by information), interpersonal (managing through people), and decisional (managing through action).

1. Informational Roles. By virtue of interpersonal contacts, both with subordinates and with a network of contacts, the manager emerges as the nerve center of the organizational unit. The manager may not know everything but typically knows more than subordinates do. Processing information is a key part of the manager's job. As monitor, the manager is perpetually scanning the environment for information, interrogating liaison contacts and subordinates, and receiving unsolicited information, much of it as a result of the network of personal contacts. As a disseminator, the manager passes some privileged information directly to subordinates, who would otherwise have no access to it. As spokesperson, the manager sends some information to people outside the unit.

♦ Monitor -gathers internal and external information relevant to the organization;
♦ Disseminator - transmits factual and value based information to subordinates;
♦ Spokesperson - communicates to the outside world on performance and policies.

2. Decisional Roles. Information is not an end in itself; it is the basic input to decision making. The manager plays the major role in a unit's decision-making system. As its formal authority, only the manager can commit the unit to important new courses of action; and as its nerve center, only the manager has full and current information to make the set of decisions that determines the unit's strategy. As entrepreneur, the manager seeks to improve the unit, to adapt it to changing conditions in the environment. As disturbance handler, the manager responds to pressures from situations. As resource allocator, the manager is responsible for deciding who will get what. As negotiator, the manager commits organizational resources in real time.

♦ Entrepreneur - designs and initiates change in the organization;
♦ Disturbance Handler - deals with unexpected events and operational breakdowns;
♦ Resource Allocator - controls and authorizes the use of organizational resources;
♦ Negotiator - participates in negotiation activities with other organizations and individuals.

3. Interpersonal Roles. As figurehead, every manager must perform some ceremonial duties. As leader, managers are responsible for the work of the people of their unit. As liaison, the manager makes contacts outside the vertical chain of command.

♦ Figurehead - performs ceremonial and symbolic duties as head of the organization.
♦ Leader - foster a proper work atmosphere and motivates subordinates
♦ Liaison - develops and maintains a network of external contacts to gather information;

REFERENCES:

http://management.atwork-network.com/2008/04/15/mintzberg%e2%80%99s-10-managerial-roles.htm

csdl2.computer.org/comp/proceedings/hicss/2000/.../04937055.pdf