Field Trip To Observatoire De Haute-Provence Report

Field Trip To Observatoire De Haute-Provence Report Shaoshan Zeng Abstract A group of 9 students from University College London (UCL) will be visiting the Observatoire de Haute-Provence (OHP) in France between 14th February and 22nd February 2015. Students are expected to use the CCD camera on the 1.20m telescope to image two RR Lyrae variable stars: XY CVn and RR Gem. Also, students will use the Aurelie spectrograph on the 1.52m telescope to obtain high resolution spectra of bright spectroscopic binary systems within the spectral region 4070-4130Ã…. The main content of this report will focus on the observing facilities available at the OHP and background information of the objects to be targeted. And the last section of this report is the observing diary containing all the data obtained at the telescope. Contents Overview of l’Observatorie de Haute-Provence (OHP) Brief History Location Previous scientific work Observing conditions Observing Instruments The 1.20m Telescope The 1.52m Telescope The Aurelie Spectrogrph Scientific Programme for 1.2m Telescope Scientific Programme for 1.52m Telescope Targets RR Lyrae variable stars Spectroscopic binaries Observing Diary References Appendix 1. Light curves of RR Lyrae variables. Appendix 2. Finder Charts 1. Overview of l’Observatorie de Haute-Provence (OHP) History The observatory is owned by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and is funded by the Institut National des Sciences de l’Univers (INSU). Originally, OHP was built as a national facility for Frence astronomers in 1937 and later on in 1949, the facilities at the OHP were available to be used by foreign visiting astronomers. In 1943, the first astronomical observations were made with the 1.20m telescope and the first research paper were published a year later. 1.2 Location OHP is located in St Michel, near Forcalquier in the Alpes de Haute-Provence, south-east France. The coordinates of OHP are: Longitude = 0h 22m 52s E Latitude = +43 ° 55’ 46† Altitude = 650m Previous scientific work OHP has done some remarkable work on the detection of extra-solar planets. This studies started with the discovery of 51 Peg-b in 1995 using the ELODIE spectrograph on the 1.93m telescope and followed by many more discoveries such as Glises 876, the third closest known star to the Sun were found in 1998 and HD190228b was announced in 2000 as a giant planet orbiting the host star. In 2006, ELODIE was replaced by a stabilised high resolution spectrograph called SOPHIE at the 1.93m telescope of OHP. It is operated by using a large survey for search for northern extrasolar planets through the radial velocity method. Nowadays, SOPHIE plays a significant contribution to the follow-up of transiting exoplanet candidates from photometric surveys include SWASP, CoRoT and Kepler. 1.4 Observing Conditions The reason for OHP grounded on this site is mainly because the benefit of having higher probabilities on clear sky and favourable weather conditions throughout the year and the average atmospheric extinction at OHP is approximately twice that for ESO at La Silla. On average, about 60% of nights are considered to be suitable for astronomical observations. This can be showed by the yearly breakdown which based on a statistics made from 1965 to 2004: 170 nights are excellent conditions, 50 nights with very slight cloud and 70 nights are being partly cloudy. Despite of the weather conditions, the image quality is also the key factor to provide good observation. At OHP, the seeing disk is around 2 arcsec and can be lower down to 1 arcsec occasionally which compares to the image quality at ULO is about 4-5 arcsec. However, about 45 days per year on average (commonly in winter) cold wind flows from the northwest which is known as Mistral would cause the degradation of seeing, sometimes the quality of the seeing can severely decline to over 10 arcsec. But the advantage of having the Mistral winds is good weather usually follow as the winds usually clear up the sky. 2. Observing Instruments There are four main telescopes operate at OHP: 1.93m, 1.52m, 1.20m and 0.80m. Typically, 1.52m and 1.20m telescopes will be used to undertake studies during the field trip. 2.1 The 1.20m Telescope This is the first telescope installed at OHP and operates since 1943. It only has a Newton focus which is corresponded to a focus ratio of f/6. As an improvement, the telescope is now equipped with a CCD camera for direct imaging and photometry. It is usually operated for studies of variability of X-ray sources, imaging of galaxies and H II regions as well as the faint solar system objects. 2.2 The 1.52m Telescope This is the telescope that have been in use since 1967 at OHP and is used accompanied with the high resolution Aurelie spectrograph which is positioned at the Coude focus. Thus, most of the spectroscopic studies are carried out by using this telescope. The Coude focus is the only focus of this telescope and the focal ratio is f/27.6 which is almost identical to the 1.52m telescope at the ESO at La Silla. Even though it needed to be pointed manually, all other functions are automated. The telescope is equipped with a CCD camera, used from acquiring the target and automatic guiding. The camera has a field of view of 3’ x 4’. 2.3 The Aurelie Spectrograph The Aurelie spectrograph is a high resolution spectrograph that has been developed and installed on the 1.52m telescope in 1989 at the OHP. The goal of using such high quality instrument is to obtain spectra at very high resolutions over the spectral range of 3900 to 10000Ã… and because of the average seeing conditions at the OHP, the Aurelie spectrograph is also designed to obtain the largest optical efficiency and small amount of scattered light with an entrance aperture at about 3 arcsec wide. The detector attached to the spectrograph is called Thomson TH7832 which is a linear array CCD-like detector. The array is made of 2048 pixels of which 2036 are usable. The advantage of using this detector is: it is very clean meaning it exhibits no interference fringes or persistence effects and this would give the benefit to detect very weak absorption lines. 3. Scientific Programme for 1.2m Telescope The main purpose of this programme is to obtain images of two RR Lyrae variable stars RR Gem and XY CVn by using Cousins B- and V-band filters followed by calibrating these images with respect to stars of known magnitude near to the target star. This will be down over the course of 6 nights with 1.2m telescope. As a result, light curves of these stars will be obtained over several cycles of variation in order to calculate the pulsation period of each of the two stars. The light curve of XY CVn will be compared to that of RR GEM as the light curve of XY CVn is more symmetrical. From experience gained last few years (between 2003 and 2014) of UCL field trips who also completed the task with the same telescope, CCD and filters conclude that the exposure times should be around 1-3 minutes in each of the filter for RR Gem and because XY CVn is fainter than RR Gem, it requires longer exposure time of around 4 minutes in each of the B and V-bands. If the star has magnitude at around 11, a s ignal to noise ratio of at least 100 should be obtained with a 60 second or even shorter exposure in the V-band. The same signal to noise ratio is also kept for the B-band. Other than evaluating the result obtaining in the programme, observations of these two targets will also be compared to those obtained during the UCL field trip of 2000 to 2014. This should give more accurate calculated period and overtone modulation of the light curves to the stars. RR Lyrae stars are pulsating variables with about half the mass of the Sun but probably much older and hotter than the Sun. They belong to low mass Population II and they are abundant in globular clusters. RR Lyrae variables are special because they growing larger and smaller in size with their brightness changing significantly. In general, they have periods of 0.2 to 1 day and spectral types of A2 to F6 which have an average effective temperature of 7000K and a luminosity typical around 80 Lsun. Some of them have similar light curves to those of Cepheid variables and obey a period luminosity relation which is approximately: Log10 P = -0.85M + constant These properties make RR Lyrae variables become excellent standard candles as if the period of time it takes for an RR Lyrae to go through its cycle of brightening and dimming is known, then the absolute luminosity of that star can be estimated. The absolute luminosity shows how bright a star would be if it was a certain distance away from us. From this, the distance to the star can be determined if the measure brightness of the star appear to us compared to its absolute luminosity. 4. Scientific Programme for 1.52m Telescope For this programme, the Aurelie spectrograph on the 1.52m telescope will be used to obtain high resolution spectra of a selection of targets which are known to be spectroscopic binary systems that in the spectral region of 4070-4130Ã…. By analysing these spectra, weak absorption lines should be resolved to measure the changes in the radial velocity of a star by applying the cross correlation technique. Since the field trip group in 2006 and 2010-2014 also completed the similar task with Aurelie, the analysed results from this field trip will be compared to those obtained in previous years and hopefully this will result in an improvement of phase coverage for all of the systems, especially for targets with long period. By combining all the data sets, a number of physical parameters such as the mass ratio, the mass function, the period and the orbital eccentricity can be estimated for each binary system. As HÃŽ ´ (ÃŽ »4101Ã…) is included in the targeted spectral region, the appea rance of this line in obtained spectra also need to be investigated as it changes as a function of spectral type. In order to resolve the weak lines and measure their wavelengths accurately, a spectrographic resolving power of at least R = 40000 is required. Such high resolution that in use should also provide accurate information of radial and rotational velocities for each target. A wavelength coverage of at least 60Ã… is needed to include enough weak lines simultaneously and to make sure the continuum level outside the HÃŽ ´ line could be estimated. Despite of these, useful weak lines can only be obtain with a signal to noise ratio of at least 250 due to the fact that the equivalent widths of the weak lines are expected to be with several mÃ…. And more importantly, the total integration time of all of the start should be controlled to be 120 minutes or less because the resolution of orbital phase of 1.52m telescope would become poor if longer exposure time is used. Spectroscopic binaries involve two stars orbiting around their common centre of mass. These two stars are so close together that can only be seen as one object, and over period of time, there is Doppler shift change in the observing spectrum. In other words, if the star does exist in a binary system, they are of similar luminosity, each spectral line will twice over the course of one orbit, split into two, reach a maximum separation and then move back together again due to the Doppler shift caused by their radial velocity. Among all the targets, the star ÃŽ ± Uma is of particular interest as it has a long period of 44 years while other target stars have relatively short periods and has an orbit that is not clearly determined. It thought to have passed periastron in 2000, so it would be interesting to compare its measured radial velocity with that from spectral obtained during 2006 to 2014. 5. Target stars 5.1 RR Lyrae Variable Stars The stars that will be observing for the investigation of the light curves of RR Lyrae variable stars on the 1.2m telescope are shown below in Table 1 along with their coordinate, magnitudes and period. Table 1. Investigate RR Lyrae variable stars RR Gem is a type â€Å"a† RR Lyrae variable, it is well located for observation between UT 18:00 to 24:00 in late January to February at OHP. This light curve of this type of star will show a steep increase in brightness at first, the brightness will then gently fade away until a minimum is reached. The finding charts for RR Gem can be found in Appendix 1. (A1) and the calibration stars are shown in Table 2 below. Table 2. Calibration stars for RR Gem XY CVn is a type â€Å"c† RR Lyrae variable, it is well located for observation in the morning in January and February at OHP. Different to RR Gem, the light curve of this type of star is more symmetrical. The finding charts for both target stars can be found in Appendix 1. 5.2 Spectroscopic binaries targets The stars for which I am responsible for background research for the programme occurring on the 1.52m telescope are shown in Table 3 below. Table 3. Spectroscopic binaries targets Both of the targets are circumpolar which will never set throughout the night, this makes them easily observable in night time. For HR 4072, it would be best observed at around 0:00-1:00 UT and ÃŽ ¹ CrB should be best observed at 6:00-7:00 UT as these time will be the target just across the meridian i.e at their highest point in the sky. However, 6:00-7:00UT would correspond to 7:00-8:00 local time at OHP, would pass the sun rise time and the sky is bright already. Thus, target ÃŽ ¹ CrB can be observed in the early morning before sunrise when it still high up in the sky before crossing the meridian. The finding charts for both target stars can be found in Appendix 2. 6. Observing Journal References http://www.obs-hp.fr -the OHP website http://www.simbad.com -online star catalogue http://www.aavso.org/ -online database for variable stars, obtain light curves and finding charts 2015 UCL Field Trip Observation Plans (Stephen Boyle, September 2014) Appendix 1 A1. Finding Chart of RR Gem (AAVSO) A2. Finding chart of XY CVn (AAVSO)

Fun with Education Essay

In a general sense, ‘education’ means a form of learning process in which knowledge, skills, and habits of a group of people are transferred from one generation to the next through teaching, training and research. Accordingly, education aims at the physical, intellectual, spiritual and moral development of man. Education merely does not give knowledge to a human being and enabling him to earn his livelihood. But it does much more than this. Nowadays, what we can see the society as a future teacher is the students do not have an interest in learning by the way of ‘chalk and talk’ anymore. They prefer something new from the teachers which are more interesting and fun. One of the most effective ways is including games in teaching and learning process. Education can be fun through games. As a sports teacher, we can build our student’s potential. Games are a mean of keeping the body healthy and fit. Indeed, good health is the first condition of happiness in life so those who play games generally maintain good health. For example, sports teacher can create interesting games that can help students in building up their critical thinking skills besides physical strength. They can learn different types of skills such as throwing, passing, and kicking in sports like basketball, football and others. On top of that, education can also include songs which are forms of entertainment. In this way, we can make our class more interesting and students will be entertained. From the song lyrics, we can polish our student’s language and vocabulary besides making learning more fun. They can also learn to express their emotions through songs as songs can be a good cure for stress. Furthermore, education can be fun through role playing. We can involve our students act out a drama which may help to improve their acting skills and self confidence. Indirectly, they will be able to express their thoughts through role-play in a form of voice projection, facial expression and also body language. Apart from that, they can strengthen their memorizing skills too. This is because they need to memorize their scripts. As we know, the world we are living today is technology dominated and everything can be done fast and furious. For examples, cell phones, instant coffee machine, one hour-photo shops and internet can help us to complete our task in a short time. In short, technology makes the world moves faster than the past. But, education does not have any shortcut for us to reach the destination. We must learn step by step. Practice makes perfect. So, we take time to achieve our goals in the field of education. In a nutshell, we can make education fun in many ways such as games and songs. Thus, we can make our classroom full of joy and students will not feel bored while learning from the teachers. Besides, students will be able to think out of the box. With this, the goals of ‘fun in education’ could be achieved.

Contact And Exchange Between Peoples And Cultures Essay

Occupation is not a victory, yet, discrimination and oppression evoke acrimony among the native people, which impedes European imperialists from conquering the native people. The Metis, a native group originally scattered across Canada as well as parts of the northern United States such as Montana, North Dakota and Northwest Minnesota. However, the Metis and other aboriginal groups suffered injustice in European colonialism, which is the main focus of this paper. The Aboriginal peoples were the original residents of Canada. It is a collective word for the diversity of the indigenous people. The word was incorporated in the Canadian Constitution Act of 1982 and concerns to the Inuit and the Metis people. The term aboriginal has provided a sense of unity among the indigenous peoples and also served the role of erasing the different historical, cultural practice, sovereignty and languages of over fifty countries that lived in Canada preceding to European colonization. It is believed that the Metis fatherly ancestry originated from different nationalities; Irish, French, English and Scottish while the mothers came from the Native Indian. So the Merits are of mixed blood. Nevertheless, the Metis were able to adopt both the European and the Indian culture through utilizing what was suitable to their necessities. However, the European colonization led to their suffering and injustice. During this time the Metis suffered prejudice, racism and injusti ce. The Relationship of the Metis To their Land and the Manitoba Treaty The Metis practiced the concept of communism, meaning personal ownership of land were prohibited. They resisted external pressures to abandon this concept. However, with the European colonization, the Metis was denied the freedom to live the way they wanted, thus, they were forced to abandon the communism concept. As a matter of fact, the Metis who had occupied the lands in North America for decades before the European colonization were deprived during the European colonization, which in turn is still today whereby the political and legal approached deprive Metis societies of fundamental human rights The European solidified their attitudes towards race in their experience with the Metis. The clash between England and Ireland went beyond rivalries between the two developing nations. This was a clash between the semi-nomadic pastoralist and those who were settled on the land as farmers and grew a sedentary culture. The treatment of the Metis people in Cnanda was extremely similar to the treatment of the other Aboriginal peoples. As a matter of fact, the European established a hierarchical view of the earth where the value of other communities was judged against the image of their own, whereby human beings were viewed as continuing through different regular and specific stages of growth ranging from savagery to civilization. Furthermore, it was not only a social philosophy, but a moral Christian obligation placed on the European to guide the Metis who was regarded as uncivilized beings to the pinnacle of civilization. The European presented the capital structure, which embroiled racial segregation. This was opposite to what the Metis and other Aboriginal groups practiced. As a result, this concept led legitimacy to the undertaking of the dominant power whereby the European dominated the Metis. Through racial segregation, the Europeans were able to push the Metis out of their land, and exert control over all the aboriginal groups in North America. Indeed, race became a social norm and an unquestioned reason to privilege. It was one employed with great insight against the Metis people in Canada. Thus, although most of the treaties had different positive effects in the aboriginals, most of them caused these communities a devastating effect. The treaties cost the Aboriginals a lot, including their land. Besides being forced to give up their culture, they ended up with a much smaller tract of land as a result of improper negotiations. Also, though the provision of education and health care has been cru cial in maintaining the Aboriginal cultures, other benefits such as farm implements and the right to utilize land were much smaller compared to the tracts of lands given in their exchange. Furthermore, the implications resulting in the signing of treaties caused a large number of deaths among them. According to Miller (2000), prior to 1870, the Aboriginal population decreased by about 75percent under the hands of the European settlers. The Fur Trade Canada expanded in a unique manner whereby it traded fur with other countries. Fur trade played a significant role in creating boundaries, which still exist today because borders are grounded on its dissimilar resilience in the North America. As a matter of fact, the importance of the fur trade lies in its commitment of the geographic platform. Through this trade, the development of the Metis emerged with their own language and culture. Indeed, the trade depended on the productive skill and the organizational capabilities in the Metis people. Therefore, the Metis and the Indians regulated the fur trade and only traded when it was convenient for them to do so. Moreover, the Metis were sought to travel through canoe into the interior to carry out trade with the Indian community. The fur trade helped the European to penetrate to Canada, and as a result, they started assimilating the Metis community. They disregarded their culture, beliefs and norms and waged to change their culture as w ell as their behavior. The Metis were culturally undistinguished from other Canadainas. The Land Scrip During the 18th century in Canada, the government gave out scrip certificate giving the right holder to either a certain acreage of land or an amount of money that could be used to the buy on land. These certificates were given out to individual Metis to fulfill their claim to land ownership. However, most people did not get the scrip who eventually was the original inhabitants of the land, meaning that the entire Metis communities who had stayed on the land for decades were sidelined of their rightful heritage. Moreover, it was not only the manner in which the Metis was deprived of their original land. Likewise, the Juvenile Act of Manitoba was modified to permit Metis minors to sell or dispose of their script, thus creating an opportunity for abuse. The government also opposed to a powerful Metis constituency and enterprise interests desiring to gather vast tracts of land colluded to ensure that the Metis of the West of forlorn become landless people. The Metis was not included, fr ightened, swindled or made to kill of the land consisting rudimentary way that consecutive Canadians would follow to open up Canada. As a result, the Metis were forced to live on unutilized parts of the land, which is the reason that they were referred to as the â€Å"Road Allowance People† meaning that they were bound to make their geographical area on the government land on either side of the road. Louis Riel and the Manitoba Drawing from Louis Riel who was the founder of Manitoba and a Metis leader, it is clear that the Metis were harassed unjustly. Riel was murdered by the government for treason. He had united the Metis community and led to a famous Metis government that was central in taking Manitoba into Confederation, but his aim was to preserve the Metis community from the Canadian authority. Riel also led the Metis at the Red River whereby the Canadian government had appointed McDougall as the governor whose mission was to re-stake the Metis land. The Metis opposed him through Riel so as to preserve their cultural, social and political status of the Metis in the Red River as well as the Northwest. As a matter of fact, intermarriages between the Europeans and the Metis or the aboriginals was prohibited. Riel was considered a hero because he defended the Catholic faith and the French culture in Manitoba. It is for this reason that went back to North America after being in exile for four months in the United States. The British and the Canadian government did not support the Metis beliefs and wanted to establish the Protestant beliefs. Nevertheless, the opposition from the Metis through the influence of Riel did not last long when he was captured and executed. Riel was executed without any trial with British or Canadian law for his section in the Red River resistance. The Residential Schools Just like other Aboriginal peoples, the Metis were placed in residential schools over the course of a hundred years. These schools stripped children of their languages and culture so as to eliminate the Metis problem and assimilate them into the society. The Metis in residential schools survived sexual as well as physical abuses, loss of identity as well as language. As a result, many of the Metis children as well as other Aboriginal people’s did not survive at all. Indeed, there are still unrequited questions about how some kids vanished. Nevertheless, the current dispute resolution program in North America, especially Canada does not address the fundamentals harms suffered by Aboriginal peoples as a result of the Indian Residential Schools system that was expressly introduced to remove Aboriginal languages and culture, and to murder the Indian in the child. The government’s strategy for accomplishing its policy aim concerned removing children from their families, puni shing them for speaking their aboriginal language and denying them the right to follow their spiritual teachings and traditional celebrations and failing to give them adequate education. In conclusion, from the above discussion, it is clear that the Metis as well as other Aboriginal communities in North America suffered injustices. They were killed because of their language and beliefs, disregarded because of their culture and mixed blood, they were racially segregated and denied their right to own land. As a result, they ended up in the Manitoba reserve with small parts of land and some none. Neither were their appreciated in residential schools whereby their kids were physically and sexually abused. And though all these things are known by the government, nothing much has improved in Canada for the Metis as well as other aboriginals. References Brown, D., & Kingston, O. (1992). Aboriginal governments and power sharing in Canada. Kingston, Ont.: Institute of Intergovernmental Relations, Queen’s University. First Nations in Canada. (1997). Ottawa: Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. Howe, P., & Bedford, D. (2007). Electoral participation of Aboriginals in Canada.Noble, T. (2008). Western civilization: Beyond boundaries (5th ed.). Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Rambaut, T. (1987). The Hudson’s Bay Half-Breeds and Louis Riel’s Rebellions. Political Science Quarterly, 135-135. Source document

Domestic and International HRM - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 8 Words: 2306 Downloads: 1 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Management Essay Type Compare and contrast essay Did you like this example? Introduction The world has become more globalised and more competitive than ever before, and as more firms begin to operate in the international marketplace there is an extensive search for different elements of competitive advantage (Beck, 2011). A major component of gaining an advantage over competitors could be in terms of human resource management and especially in international human resource management. The quality of management seems to be more critical in international, than domestic human resource management too, making it even more vital that firms are effective in this area (Monks et al., 2001). Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Domestic and International HRM" essay for you Create order Human resource management refers to those activities undertaken by an organisation to effectively utilise its human resources (Dowling et al., 2008: 3). These activities include those such as staffing, performance management, compensation, training and development and human resource planning. Indeed, human resource management is key for any organisation. Ozbilgin et al., (2014) assert that human resource management is a function which encompasses the methods of compensating, appraising, training and selecting employees within an organisation, as well as complying with health and safety, labour and equal employment laws. International human resource management can be seen as the worldwide management of these human resources (Brewster and Suutari, 2005). Schular and Tarique (2007:717) claim that the field of international human resource management is concerned with understanding, researching, applying and revising all human resource activities in internal and external contexts as they impact the processes of managing human resources. This essay will look at human resource management, and see what is similar and what is different when human resource management goes international. This is important due to the fact that there are many challenges in managing overseas activities for companies, and this is why the third section of this essay will be addressing the issue of best practice in international human resource management. Finally, the conclusion will draw these sections together to look at how the challenging aspect of international human resource management. The similarities between domestic and international human resource management This first section of the essay will look at the similarities between domestic and international human resource management. Human resource management is similar in both the domestic and international marketplaces as they have similar basic functions in businesses as mentioned within the introduction. All human resource functions have the key aim of to effectively utilising the human capital which is present within the organisation. Aswathappa (2008) asserts that human resource functions are basically the same whether they extend to several countries, or if they are specific to one single country. Regardless of the countries human resource managers are in, the HR manager still needs to plan the human resources, train and develop people, compensate them, hire the correct employees in the correct number, as well as maintain and motivate the workers in the company, and this still stands true whether or not this is in a domestic or global setting (Aswathappa, 2008). As well as this, the environmental forces which impact upon the functioning of a human resource department are the same, depending on if the business is global or domestic (Aswathappa, 2008). These all include political, cultural, economic and legal external constraints, and they can influence the way that human resource functions are carried out both in domestic as well as in global businesses (Aswathappa, 2008: 67). It can be seen that a human resource function in a business has one overriding objective, which is ensuring the effectiveness of an organisation through interventions such as multiskil developments, team building, motivation, performance management and talent retention. Regardless of if the company is a multinational one operating in ten different nations, or a domestic business these activities are still present and are the key tasks and requirements of the human resource function, and as such still require effective management by human resource professionals. (Aswathappa, 2008). The differences between domestic and international human resource management After looking at the similarities, the differences between these forms of human resource management will now be looked at. International human resource management can be seen as being characterised by more heterogeneous functions, greater involvement in employers personal life, different emphasis on managing training, and more external influences (Alhafaji, 1995: 90). International HRM managers are needed to be even more diligent due to the fact there is usually greater dissatisfaction in a multinational environment than a domestic one (Alhafaji, 1995). Dowling et al., (2008) assert that they find the complexity of operating in different countries and having employees from a range of different national categories is one of the key variables in differentiating international human resource management from domestic human resource management. These result in six factors which contribute to this complexity; more HR activities, the need for a broader perspective, more involvement in empl oyees personal lives, changes in the emphasis as employees consist of more expatriates who mix with locals, the exposure to risk and an increased range of external influences (Dowling et al., 2008). More human resource activities are needed in order to operate within an international environment, such as international tax, relocation and orientation as well as having more services for expatriates as well as language translation services (Dowling et al., 2008). These are all services which would not be necessary within the domestic market. There is also a need for a broader perspective as those HR managers who work in a domestic environment will normally administer human resource programmes for one national group of employees, these are all covered by one compensation policy and also taxed by the same national government (Dowling et al., 2008). In terms of risk, there are also more human and financial consequences of failing within the international marketplace, as opposed to in t he domestic market. Expatriate failure and the underperformance of employees on international assignments, for example, are very costly to international corporations. The cost of such employees is often three times as high as if they were to be working within their domestic market (Dowling et al., 2008). Keeley (2001) also asserts that there are difficulties in integrating host country national managers into the process of their subsidiaries that are abroad. In more recent times, major multinationals must now take into consideration the political risk as well as terrorism and the spending which is needed on protection against terrorism, in light of the 9/11 attacks in New York (Dowling et al., 2008). In International human resource management there are also more external factors, such as the types of government, the state of different economies and different generally accepted practices of doing business in the various companies where a multinational corporation may operate within ( Dowling et al., 2008). International human resource management also has more involvement in the personal life of its employees. For example, it is necessary for human resources to understand every aspect of compensation packages provided in the foreign assignment, and the department would need to know the readiness of employees family to relocate, as well as supporting the family in adjusting to life in a foreign country (Dowling et al., 2008). Harris et al., (2004) assert that another key difference is the cultural differences that are needed to be managed in international human resource management. With the increasing internationalisation of employment, employees in the same organisations now possess many different values and attitudes towards both work and their personal lives. There are many stereotypes inherent within these different cultures, such as Americans being work obsessed and the Japanese being overly polite (Harris et al., 2004). These national stereotypes show tha t different nationalities work in different ways, and it is therefore necessary that an international human resource manager has an awareness of these cultural differences, and that this can affect many different human resource functions such as recruitment and selection, as well as performance appraisal (Harris et al., 2004). Therefore, there needs to be care taken by international human resource managements on deciding whether to standardise the processes in human resource departments around the world, or choose to localise them dependent on the area even though this initial setup may be more costly and complex, but could be more effective in the long run. Best practice in international human resource management The need to develop best practice within international human resource management is becoming increasingly important, as more and more enterprises turn international and expand worldwide to tap into growing markets (Geringer et al., 2002). Stiles and Trevor (2006) attempt to identify the ways in which multinational organisations should manage their people in companies which are diverse in terms of the culture and geography that they encompass. This is because expanding internationally requires the attention of the company to have both global standards, as well as local market sensitivity, and this was seen as one of the marks of best practice within international human resource management (Stiles and Trevor, 2006). They move on to say that across all the organisations studied it was important to have rigorous and selection procedures, as well as training and development across all levels of the company, and developmental appraisal as well as performance linked pay (Stiles and Trevor , 2006). Other best practices included having flexible job design, team working as well as two way communications within the company. Values based employment practices were seen as important, and these enabled having a successful cultural fit of employees within the company, which increased commitment and retention in the organisation (Stiles and Trevor, 2006). Overall, it can be seen that when trying to achieve best practice within international human resource management, that it is important for organisations to focus on local knowledge, but with also ensuring there is a centralised HQ-centric view of the world in these departments too (Stiles and Trevor, 2006). However, Stiles and Trevor (2006) conclude by saying that it is not enough for organisations to simply adopt best practice, or to attempt to develop innovative solutions in isolation. Instead, the formulation and execution of these needs to be aligned with business needs at all levels, both on a corporate level and loca lly. These also need to be not only integrated with other human resource practices but with all the various human, social and organisational elements in the organisation that effectiveness is dependent on. This can be seen as the responsibility of the leadership within the company, as leadership capability is central to the effective management of human capital (Stiles and Trevor, 2006: 52). As well as this, Marchington and Grugulis (2000) assert that searching for a best practice is problematic. This is because, according to their studies there are times when asserted best practices appear contradictory messages. This is due to the fact that human resource practices are not universally applicable. They move on to state that in presenting the argument for the adoption of best practice HRM, the nature of the employment relationship itself is over simplified and distorted (Marchington and Grugulis, 2000: 1121). Therefore it could be argued that there is no generic, one size fits all b est practice of international human resources that can be applied to every multinational organisation. Instead, organisations need to consider how each process would impact and effect their specific company and its needs. Conclusion Human resource practitioners and researchers are becoming concerned with the shift towards more globalised businesses, and the impact that this has on international human resource management (Kiessling and Harvey, 2005). This is becoming even more of a pressing issue as multinational enterprises themselves have realised that human resource management can play an extremely important role in gaining and retaining a competitive advantage (Schuler and Jackson, 2005). It has been seen in this essay that there are a number of differences between international and domestic human resource management. These are differences which are large enough to have a sizeable and quantifiable impact upon an organisation if they are not taken into account. The main differences identified are the fact that there are a wide range of problems such as international taxation and dealing with expatriates and an assortment of different cultures in international companies that domestic human resource managers w ould not need to deal with. However, similarities still exist, and the main function of the human resource department, to effectively create organisational effectiveness through effective management of employees in the company, remains the same regardless of how many countries the company may operate in. It was also seen that there is no best practice in regards of international human resource management, due to the fact that companies are not the same in how they operate and the employees in them. Therefore, organisations need to consider how different policies and procedures would impact their employees before implementing them. Bibliography Alhafaji, A. (1995) Competitive global Management. Florida: St Lucie Press. Aswathappa, K. 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