Scenario You have worked at your current employer for 5 years. Recently your company merged with a much larger Boston accounting firm to improve efficiencies, increase revenues, cut costs and adopt best practices in the industry. After the merger, you find yourself on a team with four other individuals that you have never met. Each individual is from a different department: auditing, tax, corporate governance, legal and insurance. The purpose of your team is to reduce the number of employees in your department. Why is the change needed?

Who is better at multi-tasking? in business, employees are often asked to perform a complex task when their atten-tion is divided (i.e., multi-tasking). human factors (may 2014) published a study designed to determine whether video game players are better than non–video game play-ers at multi-tasking. each in a sample of 60 college stu-dents was classified as a video game player or a non-player. participants entered a street crossing simulator and were asked to cross a busy street at an unsigned intersec-tion. the simulator was designed to have cars traveling at various high rates of speed in both directions. during the crossing, the students also performed a memory task as a distraction. two variables were measured for each student: (1) a street crossing performance score (measured out of 100 points) and (2) a memory task score (measured out of 20 points). the researchers found no differences in either the street crossing performance or memory task score of video game players and non-gamers. “these results,” say the researchers, “suggest that action video game players [and non-gamers] are equally susceptible to the costs of dividing attention in a complex task”

If you were running a company, what are at least two things you could do to improve its productivity.

Nellie lumpkin, who suffered from dementia, was admitted to the picayune convalescent center, a nursing home. because of her mental condition, her daughter, beverly mcdaniel, signed the admissions agreement. it included a clause requiring the par- ties to submit any dispute to arbitration. after lumpkin left the center two years later, she filed a suit against picayune to recover damages for mistreatment and malpractice. [covenant health & rehabilitation of picayune, lp v. lumpkin, 23 so.2d 1092 (miss. app. 2009)] (see page 91.) 1. is it ethical for this dispute—involving negligent medical care, not a breach of a commercial contract—to be forced into arbitration? why or why not? discuss whether medical facilities should be able to impose arbitration when there is generally no bargaining over such terms.