Confessions of an ethical retailer.

I started Biome Lifestyle, a UK-based internet business, three years ago, to sell eco-friendly homewares. I thought at that time that the two principles we would work to were simple; they were style, and the need to work in harmony with the natural environment. It turns out that the world is rather more complicated than that!

Style is still a guiding light, of course, but the ethical principles we now work to are broader and much more complex than simple eco-friendliness.

Naturally the world’s ecology is vitally important to us all, and globalisation is not basically environmentally friendly. Apart from anything else, mass consumerism uses up our planet’s finite natural resources, and contributes to global warming.

Plus, mass farming uses massive amounts of pesticides and fertilisers, and industrial-scale production can produce industrial quantities of toxins.

But globalised consumption also has human side effects. It can lead to the ruthless exploitation of people in industrial sweatshops in poor countries, and to the impoverishment of the small-scale farmers who have to sell their goods to large-scale buyers in the developed world.

So now we have a checklist of questions that we ask ourselves when we are looking for new products. We start, of course, with the basic issue of whether our customers will like the “look” of the item. Will it look good in their home? But then we get down to the ethics of the story behind the product.

We look at the impact of its production and sale, to see if it damages the environment in any way, either by its use of local resources, or by the way it’s transported. We like the use of recycled materials, and the production of recyclable products. Sustainable sources of raw materials are important, as are properly managed forests. And transport to the UK by ship would always be preferred to airfreight.

We look at who makes it, and how they are organised. We won’t sell products where we don’t know the full story. We tend to favour co-operative or family unit production, because we feel that this reduces the probability of unfair exploitation. If we are thinking of sourcing from a company, we investigate their policies on pay rates, opportunities for training, and the position of the company in its local community.

We respect craftsmanship, so handmade items are important to us. It’s good to think that skills built up over generations can still produce products from traditional materials that look good in a 21st century home!

Often we find that the items our customers might want to see are produced far away, and are brought to the UK by a network of trading organisations. We always investigate the networks to see if the trade is fair to the producers. Sometimes we don’t need to check beyond their “Fairtrade” certificates. But the small-scale producers and importers we tend to deal with often cannot afford to invest in certification, so we do the checking our customers would want to do for themselves, and we make sure that the principles of fair trade are followed.

So a brief survey of our ethical hinterland today would show concern for fair trade, lack of human exploitation, renewable resources, use of recycled and recyclable materials, use of organic production methods, hand made products, production organised in cooperatives or socially responsible enterprises, and the elimination of “air miles” built into our range. Phew!

In retrospect, maybe all these principles should have been thought through from the start. But we do feel now that we are a full-spectrum business, and that’s a highly fulfilling thought to end on. english courses

Bagaimana perusahaan anda bisa bertahan menghadapi resesi.

No.1 dari 2 artikel.

Penurunan global

Dengan adanya gelombang resesi di seluruh dunia, kita bisa melihat bagaimana para pengamat, khususnya di Amerika dan Eropa, merespon. Sebagian besar terkesima mendengar kabar buruk ini. Sebagian besar lainnya tidak dapat membayangkan apa yang ada di balik penurunan ini nantinya.

Para politisi, terutama di Negara-negara demokrasi barat, mencari paket stimulus ekonomi yang dapat mempersingkat masa resesi dan menyelamatkan orang dari kehilangan pekerjaan, termasuk diri mereka sendiri!

Akan tetapi baik apakah rencana stimulus tadi akan "berhasil" atau tidak, penurunan global ini tetap akan berakhir pada suatu saat. Dan ada banyak pelajaran dari masa lampau yang bisa membantu kita saat masa pemulihan itu tiba.

Hal pertama yang penting diingat adalah satu hal ini: Pasti akan ada pemulihan! Jangan putus asa. Banyak bisnis yang akan berhasil menghadapi resesi. Mungkin tidak semua bisnis akan selamat, itu betul. Tetapi sebagian besar akan bisa bertahan dan justru tumbuh lebih kuat, lebih mapan dan dikelola dengan lebih baik.

Pelajaran kedua dari masa lampau yaitu bahwa kita perlu berhati-hati saat pemulihan dimulai karena banyak juga yang gagal di tahap awal pemulihan, hampir sebanyak mereka yang gagal di masa resesi.

Hal terakhir yang perlu diingat yaitu bahwa kondisi pasar akan berbeda setelah resesi. Kesempatan-kesempatan baru akan muncul, dan peluang-peluang lama akan hilang selamanya. Lingkungan kompetitif akan berubah, dan teknologi baru akan muncul. Karenanya, manajemen membutuhkan pola pikir yang sangat fleksibel dan mampu memanfaatkan setiap kesempatan. Kita tidak akan bisa sukses bila kita berbisnis di masa depan, misalnya 2010, dengan cara yang sama seperti yang kita lakukan di tahun 2008.

Satu hal terakhir. Pada ekonomi baru pasca resesi kebutuhan akan bahasa Inggris di dunia bisnis akan semakin tinggi, jauh lebih tinggi dari sebelumnya. Hubungi Aim For English untuk mengetahui bagaimana kami bisa membantu anda. kursus bahasa inggris

Use it or lose it?

The trouble with learning a foreign language is that while you learn new stuff your brain is busy forgetting some of the stuff you thought you had already learned! So it would clearly be an advantage if we could slow down the rate of forgetting. Some writers compare memory with computer data storage. They urge that we adopt strategies to move information from short term memory to long term storage, maybe like moving data out of RAM and onto disc.

If only it were that simple!

The main strategy that seems to be advocated is repetition. Some writers say that there is a threshold level of repetition below which you won’t learn for the long term. That level is usually pitched in the high teens. So you need to hear a word or phrase, say, seventeen times before you can learn it. And if you don’t keep on using the word, they say, then you’ll lose it.

Sadly the truth is a lot more complicated. First, learning and forgetting are brain functions. We don’t truly understand the brain, and we understand hardly at all how memory works. Why, for example can I still recite a line of Latin poetry I heard once only, in class at school, more than 45 years ago? And why does my son, aged 30, remember the registration number of the first car he ever drove? These are not memories that he and I worked to preserve, nor have they ever been needed. Never used, but never lost.

Secondly learning and forgetting rates vary markedly, for unknown reasons, between people. They also vary at different times for the same person.

Thirdly there’s a big difference between the impact of hearing a word or phrase, and using the same word or phrase in the course of daily life. That’s not the same as repeating it in class or in a drill at home. Using in daily life means needing the word or phrase, calling it up from memory, using it, and getting an appropriate response from someone else.

For the vast majority of people, learning a foreign language is difficult. Forgetting it is easy. Successful language learners seem to be able to create personal strategies that match their learning styles and work for them at both ends of the process. Trouble is, everyone’s strategies are different, just as we and our styles are all different. So the only general conclusion to this brief discussion is that you should distrust any standard system that offers you quick results for little effort. There is a high probability that any “programmed” language course will not fit your optimum style of learning

Here are a few pointers to consider when you work out your own strategy.

First, be clear why you want to learn the language, and what you will gain by success. It’s a difficult thing, learning a language, so you need good motivation.

Secondly use all the possible means you can find to hear, speak, read and write the language. You need variety; stimulus of all your senses and exercise for all your brain functions.

Thirdly try to pace your work. Mix physical exercise with your mental endeavour. Do your language learning when you are wide awake, not tired, not stressed.

Fourthly, mix revision of past work into learning new things. You will always forget something, but your aim is to minimise the loss whilst you add to your total language capital.

And finally, get all the help you can. You don’t want to work alone; it’s hard to keep motivated and very hard to build any fluency in the language when you study alone. If you can afford it, go to a specialist language school with tutors who understand the importance of different learning styles and the problem of forgetting.

If you are lucky enough to live in Jakarta, here’s a school that understands all the problems and issues that I’ve been discussing.

kursus bahasa Inggris

A school like this one offers you a great opportunity to learn the world’s favourite language. Use it or lose it!

After the recession

What comes next?

Post recession planning should start now, not be delayed until business starts to improve.

It’s time now to think about what the world of business will be like after the recession, and how to configure your operations for the market you will face.

Cash control is the first essential. Businesses fail on the upswing out of recession, as well as during the recession itself. Mostly they have kept going during the downturn by a mix of borrowing, getting credit from their suppliers and keeping wages down. Then the climate for business improves; suppliers want to cut their creditors back to normal, staff want to see some reward for loyalty, and banks find big new exciting ways of investing their money, and want their older loans repaid.

So firms need to make sure that they don’t over-extend during the early days of returning prosperity. Tight control of cash remains essential, and expansion projects have to be financed very cautiously indeed. Over-trading and over-investment are the mistakes to avoid.

The good news is that there will be lots of opportunities to sell and get business. The bad news is that those of your competitors who have also survived will be leaner, fitter and stronger than they were. You are going to have to fight for your share of the opportunities. This means that your staff need to be on top of their game, your quality needs to be second to none, and your market intelligence must be sharp and clear.

In most cases the companies that prosper in the years after a recession will be those who kept their best people during the hard times, and made sure they were trained to take advantage of any opportunities that came your way. Good, trained people will give you your best chance of survival, as well as of expansion after the worst is over. They will keep your quality high, your market information up to date, and your customers happy.

The paradox is that some companies seem to risk their chance of survival and longer-term prosperity by letting people go who would have been their star performers in the post recession world. Worse, they cut back on training to conserve cash, and end up without the skills that would have led them through the risky post-recession recovery period.

Internationally, the training that companies put into their staff is the key factor in assuring success in the post-recession world. And training in the international language of business is an important core investment during the recession.

For companies in Jakarta, here’s a link to the best, and certainly the most focused English language training provider in your city.

Kursus Bahasa Inggris

Your post-recession future starts here!

We live in challenging times

An Article by the teachers at Aim for English. We know more than just the English language!

From the US to Iceland, from the UK to Indonesia, and from Peru to Japan the same message is flashing.

“There is a worldwide recession coming”.

More- it’s a recession that may be on a scale not seen for a generation, maybe not even for a lifetime. We all hope that the actions taken by governments around the world will reduce its intensity, and shorten the period of contraction. As I write we can also hope that the new young American President will lead his own country, and ours, swiftly back to prosperity. But the reality of today is that we live in challenging times.

So how on earth does a business cope with this kind of challenge? How does it survive? How does it manage?

There are three important things to remember. First, many businesses will survive. Secondly the businesses that survive will emerge stronger from the experience. And finally, the way to survive is to do the simple things better than your competition.

What are the simple things we all need to do?

Again, there are three.

First, keep focused on delivering the absolute best service you can to the customers you have. They have their problems too, and they need and will value all the help you can give them. More than this, in hard times the very best selling tool you have is the good opinion of your existing customers. In a recession the market is less forgiving, less liable to make allowances for bad service, more ruthless in cutting out poor suppliers.

Secondly, keep on selling. There’s going to be business out there, but it will be harder to find and much harder to win. Your selling tools need to be sharp. Your sales team must be highly trained and very highly motivated. Your marketing will have to be innovative, flexible, and sensitive to the changes in market mood. Your prices will need to be flexible, too, recognising that cash is tight everywhere.

Finally, keep your costs at the right level. Be careful with cost cutting, because there is a very real danger of damaging the level of customer service, and the market will be ultra-sensitive to that. Better to adopt a containment policy, capping cost growth until the sun starts to shine again. The really difficult thing about cutting costs is that it’s like surgery. It takes high-level skills if you don’t want to kill your patient. You should think of customer service as the main artery that keeps a business alive. Cut into it at your peril!

Here’s a firm that is helping Indonesian business to weather the financial storm. With its own costs under tight control, it delivers a level of service second to none in Jakarta. Its pricing is very competitive, helping its customers to conserve their cash. The product it delivers is the best English language training in town, without which the customer service teams of its clients would be far less able to cope with their own recessionary challenge.

All about AIM!

This is the place to learn English!

Where else can you find the best teachers, the latest technology, and a record for getting results that’s second to none? Only in Manggarai!

Maybe you want to study or work abroad. Perhaps you need to improve the English you use at work here in Jakarta. Whatever your objective, AIM is the place for you.

Learning English needn’t be a nightmare if you have great teachers to help you. Teachers who really understand your needs, and know how to make learning fun. Here at AIM we have the best team in Jakarta. Come and meet us, and we are sure that you will agree. Aim’s founders are all working teachers, so you can be sure that we really care about the quality of our work, and the results you will achieve.

Great teachers and keen students deserve the best materials and the latest technology. AIM’s materials are tailored to our students and their objectives. We don’t use a standard book or a formulaic course, because they are just not good enough.

AIM’s technology is cutting-edge. Say goodbye to language tapes and poor quality recorded sound. Forget copying things down from a whiteboard. Say hello to the Internet, surround-sound and the world’s best electronic whiteboard. Bring your laptop to download notes from our wifi network, or use one of our in-house PCs (we’ve got plenty for everyone!).

Your decision to improve your English means that you will be making a major investment in your time, your energy and of course in your cash. At AIM we understand that your commitment has to be equalled by ours. That’s why we have great teachers, unique materials and the latest technology. All waiting for you.

To find out more, or get in touch with the team at Aim, click: kursus bahasa inggris

Welcome to the 21st century learning environment!

Most people reading this will have experience of learning a language in two ways.

By far the easiest was when you were a baby. Babies have an unbelievable ability to absorb and permanently remember their mother tongue. Unfortunately we only get one chance to do it this way, and then the ability disappears. So you have already used your one shot at the easy way. Sorry. And a bit more bad news is that as you get older you will find language learning progressively more difficult.

You will also have learned a foreign language at school. Here you were in a large group, perhaps of 30 students, with your teacher explaining grammar, writing things on a board, pronouncing words and leading repetitious drills. You will also have spent time wearily copying things down into a book and trying to learn it at home. If you were very lucky you will have had access to a “language laboratory”, where you could do more repetition. It is highly probable that you found the whole language learning experience tedious, difficult, stressful and inefficient. That’s pretty much the standard response to the standard system of teaching languages.

Some people are good at hearing, learning and mimicking sounds. Others are great at remembering visual things. Some people learn by repetition of words, some by using the language in context. The sad thing is that most people don’t even know their special strengths because they went through a standardised system as a student at school, or even in a specialised language school. In fact, all the “standard” approaches to language learning miss the essential point; that there is no such thing as a standard human being. The huge range of differences between us is part of the reason why we find life interesting.

So any effective system of language learning has to be one that caters for variety. Variety of interests, variety of motivations, and variety of learning styles. This will always be a challenge.

After all, one teacher, one whiteboard, one lesson…how do you build variety into that? Great teachers can do it!

The good news is that our knowledge of how people learn (and our ability to cater for their various learning styles) have improved by leaps and bounds over the recent past.

We know that stress gets in the way of learning. So any language school has to provide a relaxed, comfortable informal environment where students are happy to be. You need refreshments at intervals, exercise at intervals, and great teachers all the time. You also need to be in a group, but not 30 strong!

Another thing we know is that new skills are easier to acquire if they are interesting, and can attach themselves to skills you already have. For example, the fact that you’re reading this means that you are computer-literate. Most language students today are highly skilled digital users. So using computers and MP3 players to record language comes naturally to you. Digital surround sound is your norm. And sitting at a pc to review notes is more efficient than the drudgery of re-reading handwritten notes.

Today’s students can download their notes directly from an interactive whiteboard that converts your own or your teacher’s scrawl into print and adds in materials pulled off the Internet. The download may be to a school pc or your own laptop or PDA, using a wifi network. There is no doubt that learning a language is a serious task, but all this technology makes the process more stimulating, doesn’t it? And research has shown that we learn much better if we feel engaged and stimulated.

kursus Bahasa Inggris

So here at last are the key elements of language learning in the 21^st century. Of course you need great teachers who understand the need to cater for human variety. Then you also need a relaxed environment that de-stresses the process. And you need to exploit digital technology to absorb some of the drudgery and make your learning process more stimulating. Now…. where can you find all this under one roof?

December's 50 hour IELTS preparation course will be starting soon at AIM.

Limited places available.

For Rp 2,050,000 you will get:

• All of the tips, tricks and strategies you'll need to succeed in the IELTS test
• Plenty of opportunity to practice IELTS tests before you take the real thing
• Experienced IELTS preparation teachers
• Custom designed IELTS preparation course book - developed by Aim, and designed specifically for Indonesian students.
• All courses finish with a full 'Simulation IELTS test' to estimate your potential in the real test.

The details

• 25 X 2 hour Classes, Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 6.30pm-8.30pm
• 50 hours over 9 weeks
  
• Some IELTS preparation classes may be held on Saturday, if requested.
• Like all courses at Aim, our public IELTS preparation classes are very small, with 7-9 students in each class. We believe that this is vitally important for IELTS preparation, as the amount of attention you will receive and the opportunities for you to participate are maximised.

Call now to reserve your place.

Need more information about IELTS at Aim? Click here

The Eco Road to Economic Recovery

There’s one major worry in the current economic crisis.

Not “Shall I lose my job?” Not even “Will the banks keep my savings safe?”

But “What short-cuts will we take to get the world’s economy growing again?

All round the world companies are failing or cutting back output, and people are having to survive on much less income than they had last year. In developing countries people are going hungry. In the developed world some very rich people now have fewer billions to worry about than they did before. And more poor people are dependent on state assistance than before.

At least our planet is getting a break from relentless ruin. Fewer people working in industry, driving their cars and trucks about, making steel and aluminium, and turning their heating or cooling systems onto maximum, means that less fossil fuel will be burned in the next year or two than was forecast last year. You can see the indications of this now, in falling oil and commodity prices, and falling deep sea shipping rates.

There’s an eco downside as well, however. News from the UK this past week, for example, was of a small company recycling cardboard that has hit the buffers because demand for toys in the USA has dropped. The toys- all of them!- would have been made in China and packaged in boxes made from recycled cardboard, including some shipped from the UK. So the global recession is hitting global recycling already, and China isn’t even in an official recession yet. More hits on local eco efforts are very likely in the months to come.

The really big danger is that in their efforts to “kick-start” the world economy, the world’s politicians will relax their previous attitudes to carbon emissions, on the basis that economic recovery is more important than the greening of the world economy. It isn’t, of course, it’s just more immediate. But politicians find it very difficult to focus on the long term important issues when the newspaper headlines are screaming about today’s trouble.

In the western democracies the financial crisis is dominating the news, and politicians don’t want to risk their possible non-election by seeming not to act. So there will be a huge temptation to throw money at immediate projects, and damn the consequences. Or to relax environmental rules to help struggling businesses save on costs. Or to cut taxes on fuel to help struggling families.

But now would be the perfect time for government to put resources into eco projects. Major economies should focus their anti-recession spending on the green agenda. No one will complain about extra resources being focused on job creation in new eco industries at a time when every job counts. The global recession is a perfect excuse for finding the extra funds to do this.

It’s also the perfect time for a decisive shift in private consumption towards eco goods, and away from mass-produced environmentally damaging products.

Biome Lifestyle is a UK-based retailer which has the environment at the heart of everything it does. Some of the stories behind its products are inspiring. All of its products avoid the pitfalls of the mass produced, environmentally damaging, stuff you find on the High Street. And all its suppliers are the kind of businesses that will grow without damaging our precious planet in the process.

Find out more about Biome by clicking: ethical products

Tips from Aim – Excel in TOEFL iBT

Number 1: Comparison and contrast

Comparison and contrast is a big part of the TOELF test. Your ability to recognise and communicate these relationships is examined across all parts of the test: in reading, listening, speaking and writing. Let's look at how you can do this, and how to avoid mistakes.

Remember that the iBT is an examination of communication in academic English. This test is asking you to explain the relationships among ideas in written or spoken information. Comparison and contrast implies that similaries or differences exist between several subjects. A likely conclusion would be that either the subjects are more similar or more different, or that one is better than the others.

You will probably never find that the subjects are of equal value. For example, a listening exercise on high-tech lifestyles looks at positive and negative ideas about mobile phones and email. It would be a mistake to jump to a conclusion that they are simply both good and bad. Although the speaker mentions many positive aspects of instant communication, he actually feels that the negative consequences are more important. He thinks that many people don't have time to be creative because they're too busy answering messages. You are asked to see this conclusion.

Comparison means looking at similarities, while contrast focuses on differences. Comparison signals include also, both, similarly, like, comparable, the same and likewise. Contrast signals include but, however, unlike, differences and on the other hand. In addition, please do also listen for changes in intonation that add ideas or suggest opposing opinions. Some relationships are implied, that is, not stated directly. Sarcasm and irony are used, because that's how we naturally use English. Lots of practice helps students with this challenging task.

Students often incorrectly assume that two items must be of equal value because they are being contrasted. Perhaps a preference for harmony, or simplicity in teaching, has led to this. In academic life, you'll hardly ever find two options equally good. It's similar in the TOEFL test. Many questions ask you to make a choice. Do it, and support those choices with reasons and details. You'll be a star. Contact Aim for more details on effective TOEFL iBT preparation