You’ve decided that you want to learn to play bridge. Every year thousands of people take up playing bridge – it’s fun, it’s sociable, it’s a challenge. But there are several different bridge systems. How do you decide which system to learn and what are the obvious differences?

There are two main systems that are played. Acol bridge and American Standard bridge. As a general rule, Acol is the system that is played in the UK, Ireland and Australia, whilst American Standard bridge is widely played around the world.

A wee aside – when I started learning I was convinced that Acol was an acronym and that each letter must mean something. It isn’t and they don’t! It’s named after the road in London where it’s originators used to meet and where they developed the system.

Many people learn to play bridge by attending classes. If you are going to join a class, then you probably won’t have a choice of which system to learn. If you then progress to joining a local bridge club, again you probably won’t have a choice and your club will play whichever system is widely used in your country.

It gets a little more complicated if you want to learn to play bridge online – and if you intend to join an online bridge playing community. Some sites offer a choice of systems. Some don’t. So it might be worth doing a little research and identifying the site where you want to play before signing up for your online lessons.

So what are the main differences?

The most obvious difference, lies in one part of the initial bidding. This makes it easy to decide which system is being played. It’s the point range required for an opening bid of 1NT (one No Trumps). In Acol bridge an opening bid of 1NT means you hold a balanced hand with 12 – 14 points. In American Standard bridge the same opening bid would mean your hands is balanced but contains 15 – 17 points.

The points are worked out in the same way. Before the bidding commences each player adds up the points in their hand. They count 4 points for each ace they hold, 3 points for each king, 2 points for each queen and 1 point for each jack.

The next difference comes if a player wants to make an opening bid of 1 of a major suit. There are four suits in a pack of cards, spades, hearts, diamonds, clubs. They are ranked in that order, with spades and hearts being the major suits and diamonds and clubs being the minor suits.

In Acol bridge a player will make an opening bid of 1 of a major suit if they hold 4 (or more) cards in that suit. So an opening bid of, say, 1 Heart, tells your partner than you hold at least 4 cards in that suit.

In American Standard bridge it is most common to play 5 card majors. In other words, an opening bid of 1 of a major suit tells your partner than you hold at least 5 cards in that suit. If a player only holds 4 cards in either major suit they will commonly make a minor suit opening bid – which just tells their partner that they don’t hold a 5 card major.

In AS bridge it is common to include length points when valuing your hand. This means adding one extra point for each card held above four in a suit. Acol bridge players rarely include length points. Both systems offer the opportunity to add shortage points (additional points for short or void suits) for some bids. AS players would then count shortage points instead of length points.

The 80-year old LEGO Group believes “only the best is good enough”, according to its founder Kirk Christiansen. Accordingly, it is registered to several key ISO standards including ISO 9001 (quality management), ISO 14001 (environmental management) and ISO 8124 (safety of toys).

When was the last time you opened a new LEGO kit and discovered missing pieces or instructions or anything less than satisfactory about the product and the total experience? The LEGO brand is vital to the LEGO Group and everyone knows how difficult it is to console children when their expectations haven’t been met. LEGO Group cannot afford this. ISO 9001 provides the necessary framework and guidelines to hold itself in check while meeting internationally-accepted best practices for running an effective Quality Management System.

LEGO is using ISO 9001 to hold its suppliers and global factories accountable to meet its quality standards and customer expectations. This is one of the benefits of the standard. The ISO certified company can call the shots when dealing with suppliers and have its pick of the litter. Ultimately, the customer wins. The standard is also being used to help fast-track global expansion.

LEGO is closely adhering to Section 7.2.3 of the standard called ‘Customer communication’. That is, LEGO is determining and implementing effective arrangements for communicating with customer in relation to:

1) product information

2) enquiries, contracts or order handling, including amendments, and

3) customer feedback, including customer complaints

The excerpt below is from ISO Focus+ magazines’ March 2010 issue, Volume 1, No. 3

Since 1991, the LEGO Group has implemented ISO 9001, which it regards as the ideal framework for structuring its global quality management system (QMS) – with LEGO factories operating in countries well aware of its requirements. Using ISO 9001 is an efficient way of implementing the quality management system at new production sites. All ISO 9001 requirements will usually be familiar to quality management staff at new sites, which enables the company to focus fully on the specific internal requirements. For the consumer, the quality management system ensures that each LEGO box contains the right number and type of building elements, which are crucial to delivering the promised LEGO building experience.

In the accounting world, there are sets of rules that are followed to make sure business is ran smoothly and orderly. In the United States accounts follow a set of rules known as GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles). It is known as being a rule based system. However, a larger population of the world follows the accounting standard known as IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards. Many countries follow this standard which is known for being more principle based. These countries use this method so they can understand each other’s methods and can identify what they are doing. While GAAP and IFRS are not too different from each other, they do have some major differences.

With IFRS being principle based, it leaves a lot of room for different interpretation that could lead to disclosures on financial statements that can influence a firm a lot. GAAP’s rule based principle keeps firms on track by having a clear cut list of rules that show them what they can and cannot report. This does not allow firms to do as they please and keeps everyone on the same page. Another difference between the two companies is the use of LIFO (Last in First out). This is an inventory method used that means the last inventory that is brought into the company will be the first sold. GAAP allows companies to choose between this or FIFO (First in First out). IFRS however does not allow companies to use LIFO and they must go with FIFO. In regards to developmental costs the standards differ again. GAAP always label these costs as expenses. Whereas IFRS has a criteria that if these costs match, they can then be capitalized instead of expensed. GAAP being a rule based standard, if does not give companies that many choices. Once an asset is recorded to its’ market value, there is no turning back on that amount even if it changes in the future. IFRS however says that if there is a change in the market value of the asset than they may reverse the write down and change it to its new market value.

Even though there are many differences between the two, why there is not a rule standard that is used worldwide. One reason is based off of the two standards both have. The United States believes that they should have a specific rule set and if it is broken then they know to go to the auditors and accountants to find the problem. IFRS allows for more freedom and prefers that they give companies more flexibility in how they approach their business. Another reason why the two will not merge is that IFRS likes to work on problems alone. They do not reach out to others and work with them to fix what is wrong. GAAP is opposite as they want others to come in and help if there is an issue they cannot solve. They have released standards and in those none of them coincide with what IFRS believes. This continues to show that they are different.

Finally, a major reason why the two will not join to become one is politics. Politics are big issue in a lot of areas and accounting does not avoid it. In the United States, giving up their rule set of GAAP to a foreign policy from outsiders that they did not form is not appealing to them. They believe that if they give it up then they are not protecting the investors in the country and leaving them liable for future problems. GAAP members also think that with a more principle based standard and not rule based there is a lot of room for companies to do what they want. It is uncomfortable for GAAP to have looser rules and let companies do as they please. They believe there is a lot of room for problems that can arise from this. Once asked about why they don’t converge, they responded that investors believe that “giving up their high quality standards should not be compromised for the sake of uniformity ( https://www.ifac.org/global-knowledge-gateway/business-reporting/discussion/does-ifrs-have-future-us ).” However there have been minor adjustments made to GAAP to close the differences between the two a little and they want to lessen the gap as much as possible without losing what they believe is to be right.

In conclusion, there are many differences between GAAP and IFRS. Both are set up to help companies correctly file information and do business in an efficient way while following standards. The differences between the two standards has become less but there is still a larger gap between the two. It will be interesting to follow the track of these two accounting standards and see if one day there will only be one set of standards.

What is a Deviation:

A Deviation is a departure from standard procedures or specifications resulting in non-conforming material and/or processes or where there have been unusual or unexplained events which have the potential to impact on product quality, system integrity or personal safety. For compliance to GMP and the sake of continuous improvement, these deviations are recorded in the form of Deviation Report (DR).

Types of Deviations:

1. Following are some examples of deviations raised from different functional areas of business:

2. Production Deviation – usually raised during the manufacture of a batch production.

3. EHS Deviation – raised due to an environmental, health and safety hazards.

4. Quality Improvement Deviation – may be raised if a potential weakness has been identified and the implementation will require project approval.

5. Audit Deviation – raised to flag non-conformance identified during internal, external, supplier or corporate audits.

6. Customer Service Deviation – raised to track implementation measures related to customer complaints.

7. Technical Deviation – can be raised for validation discrepancies. For example: changes in Manufacturing Instruction.

8. Material Complaint – raised to document any issues with regards to non-conforming, superseded or obsolete raw materials/components, packaging or imported finished goods.

9. System Routing Deviation – raised to track changes made to Bill of materials as a result of an Artwork change.

When to Report Deviation:

A Deviation should be raised when there is a deviation from methods or controls specified in manufacturing documents, material control documents, standard operating procedure for products and confirmed out of specification results and from the occurrence of an event and observation suggesting the existence of a real or potential quality related problems.

A deviation should be reported if a trend is noticed that requires further investigation.

All batch production deviations (planned or unintended) covering all manufacturing facilities, equipments, operations, distribution, procedures, systems and record keeping must be reported and investigated for corrective and preventative action.

Reporting deviation is required regardless of final batch disposition. If a batch is rejected a deviation reporting is still required.

Different Levels of Deviation Risks:

For the ease of assessing risk any deviation can be classified into one of the three levels 1, 2 & 3 based on the magnitude and seriousness of a deviation.

Level 1: Critical Deviation

Deviation from Company Standards and/or current regulatory expectations that provide immediate and significant risk to product quality, patient safety or data integrity or a combination/repetition of major deficiencies that indicate a critical failure of systems

Level 2: Serious Deviation

Deviation from Company Standards and/or current regulatory expectations that provide a potentially significant risk to product quality, patient safety or data integrity or could potentially result in significant observations from a regulatory agency or a combination/repetition of “other” deficiencies that indicate a failure of system(s).

Level 3: Standard Deviation

Observations of a less serious or isolated nature that are not deemed Critical or Major, but require correction or suggestions given on how to improve systems or procedures that may be compliant but would benefit from improvement (e.g. incorrect data entry).

How to Manage Reported Deviation:

The department Manager or delegate should initiate the deviation report by using a standard deviation form as soon as a deviation is found. Write a short description of the fact with a title in the table on the form and notify the Quality Assurance department within one business day to identify the investigation.

QA has to evaluate the deviation and assess the potential impact to the product quality, validation and regulatory requirement. All completed deviation investigations are to be approved by QA Manager or delegate. QA Manger has to justify wither the deviation is a Critical, Serious or Standard in nature. For a deviation of either critical or serious nature QA delegate has to arrange a Cross Functional Investigation.

For a standard type deviation a Cross functional Investigation (CFI) is not necessary. Immediate corrective actions have to be completed before the final disposition of a batch. Final batch disposition is the responsibility of Quality Assurance Department.

If a critical or serious deviation leads to a CFI, corrective and preventive actions should be determined and follow up tasks should be assigned to area representatives. Follow up tasks should be completed within 30 business days of the observation of deviation. If a deviation with CFI can not be completed within 30 business days, an interim report should be generated detailing the reason for the delay and the progress so far.

After successful completion of the Follow up tasks Deviation should be completed and attached with the Batch Report /Audit report/ Product complaint report /Safety investigation report as appropriate.

What To Check During The Deviation Assessment:

QA delegate has to conduct a primary Investigation on the deviation reported and evaluate the following information

1. Scope of the deviation – batch affected (both in-process and previously released)

2. Trends relating to (but limited to) similar products, materials, equipment and testing processes, product complaints, previous deviations, annual product reviews, and /or returned goods etc where appropriate.

3. A review of similar causes.

4. Potential quality impact.

5. Regulatory commitment impact.

6. Other batches potentially affected.

7. Market actions (i.e. recall etc)

A very effective way to develop a winning answer is to break it down into pieces. This not only makes it easier to remember, but also ensures that the content has appropriate depth. Such sweeping answers help to distinguish between the average and the awesome. The following is a model answer about ethics and it is broken down into five simple pieces.

THE HOOK:

(Grabs the panel’s attention; a unique start to an answer)

“Ethics encompasses right and good behavior and as the foundation of our integrity, principles, and values, I personally view ethics as being a key component of police professionalism.

THE CORE:

(The main body of the answer; defines & describes the information needed)

Ethics are comprised of a combination of both personal and professional standards. These standards consist of morals, values, honesty, integrity, courage, principles, character, and honor. It’s these standards or lack of them that allow officers, through their decisions and behavior, to be highly successful or to fail. A common byproduct of strong ethical standards is great leadership. As a supervisor, my ethical standards will be closely observed and modeled. My goal as a supervisor is to insure that through my standards, my actions are synonymous-integrated-with those of my organization and as a leader, will engender these same qualities and successes to those under my command.

ATTENTION PHRASE:

(Draws full focus of the panel to what you are about to say next)

As lieutenants, I’m sure you would agree that…

BRANCHING:

(Expands your answer; brings in collateral issues; represents seeing the bigger picture)

Supervisors who maintain and model strong ethics will serve to decrease mediocrity while increasing performance. Part of the value of my supervision will be in my ability to transform the concept of ethics into reality and in coaching my officers to make great decisions. By doing this, my actions will help to shield my officers from internal or external complaints, improve their professional image to public perception, and protect my organization from exposure to potential liability.

CLOSING:

(Prevents an abrupt stop; provides a smooth transition to the end of your answer)

Finally, having learned many lessons from the last fifteen years, perhaps one of the most difficult periods for law enforcement in recent history, ethics has never been as critical as it is today and will always be at the center of my leadership.”

This answer has 261 words and would take about 60-90 seconds to present. Compare this answer to your competitions, most of who usually begin and end their answer with only the core portion of the answer shown above. The difference, especially when delivered verbally, is like night and day. Test well!!

Globalization has greatly impacted the way accounting is being practiced worldwide. The reason for this is that laws are diverse throughout each and every country. U.S. accountants are required follow the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). Worldwide, there are currently over 115 countries using the International Financial Reporting Standards. Due to globalization the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has planned to have all U.S. companies using IFRS by 2015. (Kieso)

Accountants understand that global business will benefit best from a single set of accounting standards. The Financial Accounting Standards Board, a major source of the documents found within GAAP, and the International Accounting Standards Board, whom IFRS was issued by, have both stated that they will begin to merge GAAP and IFRS together by issuing a memorandum of understanding. This is often referred to as the Norwalk agreement and states that the two Boards will: make their existing financial reporting standards fully compatible as soon as practicable, and coordinate their future work programs to ensure that once achieved, compatibility is maintained. (Kieso) This merger of accounting standards will not be as easily done as said considering GAAP and IFRS do contain some major differences.

The first major difference between GAAP and IFRS is that GAAP is considered “rule-based” and IFRS is considered “principle-based”. The fact that GAAP is considered rule-based means that the research is more focused on the literature and the IFRS principle-based concept is focused on the review of the fact patterns. In a principle-based accounting system, the areas of interpretation or discussion can be clarified by the standards-setting board, and provide fewer exceptions than a rules-based system. (Forgeas) The SEC is trying to find the right balance between “educated” professional judgement and “guessed” professional judgement. (Forgeas) As long as there are these two sets of standards the same accounting situation can be done in different ways which will sway the legitimacy of financial statements. For example, GAAP follows both LIFO and FIFO methods to calculate inventory costs, but IFRS only follows the LIFO method. The allowance for the practice of different methods will certainly change how the financial statements are interpreted; swaying the judgement of the external users viewing the financial statements.

Other issues also stem from the conceptual differences of GAAP and IFRS. A few of these issues are how statement of income, earnings-per-share, development costs, and intangible assets are reported. Under GAAP, extraordinary items are shown below net income, but under IFRS extraordinary items are not segregated in the income statement. Under GAAP, earnings-per-share is found by averaging the individual interim period incremental shares, but IFRS does not take an average. Development costs are considered expenses following GAAP, but using IFRS development costs can be capitalized. (Forgeas) Intangible assets are only recognized if the asset will have a future economic benefit and has measured reliability under IFRS, but when it comes to GAAP intangible assets are recognized at fair value. (Nguyen)

Globalization has caused these issues to occur, because there are numerous companies expanding operations into other nations. Companies in the U.S. are off-shoring into other countries to lower costs, and to decrease the amount of regulations they are required to follow. The convergence of GAAP and IFRS is extremely important so those business transactions can be correctly reported. This brings up another issue; what about the education needed to execute so many changes to the accounting standards. There are roughly more than 650,000 Certified Public Accountants (CPA) in the United States; meaning that they would need to be slightly re-educated to practice the convergence of GAAP and IFRS. (Harper) Re-educating thousands of people will be extremely costly and in most cases it will not come down to the individual person paying for the training; this cost will most likely be added to the companies’ expenses. After training, companies will still have to transition into the new method of reporting; it will be required for multiple departments to change its processes. Once again, these modifications are always easier said than done and will take time to be finished.

This list of how globalization effects accounting standards and the differences between GAAP and IFRS is certainly not all inclusive, but it does show how great of an impact it has. Though it may be difficult to converge the two sets of standards, it is undoubtedly for the better to make just one set of standards to be used in a potentially worldwide aspect. In conclusion, the transitioning process will take time to figure out the odds and ends of how to report specific financial statements, but it will make for an improved way of handling business internationally.

Forgeas. (n.d.). AICPA | http://www.IFRS.com. Retrieved April 13, 2015.

Harper. (n.d.). Retrieved April 13, 2015.

Kieso, D., & Weygan, J. (2013). Intermediate accounting (15th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

Nguyen. (2010, January 13). What are some of the key differences between IFRS and U.S. GAAP? Retrieved April 13, 2015.

In today’s increasingly safety conscious work environment, it is important to maintain Radio Frequency (RF) emissions to the lowest values consistent with practical considerations for manufacturing.

Exposure Standards

At a minimum, users of industrial RF and Microwave equipment should adopt internal RF emission standards that are at least as stringent as current federal OSHA guidelines. Check your state OSHA regulations for their compliance standards.

For owners and operators of industrial RF welders, heat sealers and pre-heaters as well as Industrial Microwave ovens and Industrial Microwave dryers, the relevant federal OSHA regulation is currently:

(Standards – 29 CFR) Non-Ionizing Radiation. – 1910.97

Used Industrial RF and Microwave Equipment

Industrial radio frequency and industrial microwave equipment of recent and reputable manufacture will be designed and built to comply with current standards, however, older equipment or equipment purchased used will not likely have shielding that would comply with today’s standards.

Used equipment or equipment that has had its shielding removed or modified may function yet expose operators to RF energy levels many times current standards. RF levels on control panels and surrounding metal structures can be high enough to burn personnel if touched while the RF is in operation.

Inadequately shielded industrial radio frequency equipment or industrial microwave equipment frequently interferes with, and may even damage, nearby electronics, especially if those electronic devices are poorly designed.

Page Two

When purchasing used equipment, the buyer rarely has the expertise or the devices necessary to test and evaluate the equipment prior to purchase. To the untrained eye, a machine may appear to be well shielded. However, that shielding may be completely ineffective if improperly designed or applied. Frequently, 40+ years old equipment will be retro-fitted with “shielding” to increase its saleability.

It should be noted that purchasing older equipment and retro-fitting it with effective shielding frequently costs as much as new equipment.

New Industrial RF or Microwave Equipment

New equipment emits a fraction of the RF energy that similar equipment did just a decade ago. Even so, the best designed and built equipment still requires maintenance.

Industrial RF and industrial microwave equipment is no exception. They are both electronic and mechanical devices and proper care is required. Proper maintenance of shielding, ground returns and neutralization is essential to prevent any degradation in performance, which could result in non-compliance. Maintenance programs should be coordinated with the manufacturer. A regular program of RF emissions testing will determine the effectiveness of maintenance and adjustments to shielding.

Users may purchase RF Survey / Industrial Compliance meters to check their equipment for leakage or may hire outside services to conduct regular surveys.

In order to maintain peak performance and minimum emissions, repair services should only be performed by a qualified industrial RF or industrial microwave service technician.

The book that is the subject of this review is Gold: The Once and Future Money, written by Nathan Lewis and published in 2007. Lewis, “formerly the chief international economist of a leading economic forecasting firm,” provides a thorough examination of using gold to support the value of a currency (the gold standard ), as well as a history of gold standards in the past and his arguments for returning to a gold standard from the international floating currencies now in use. The purpose of the book is to argue the case for a return to the stability of the gold standard, and to dispel the most common myths of the failures of past gold standards.

Lewis divides his book into three distinct sections. The first section, “Money in All its Forms,” provides much general economic and historical background of gold. Such topics are examined as the stability of gold, the differences between hard money and soft money, a history of various gold standards, taxes, and inflation, deflation, and the value of currency. Although much of the information presented in these chapters is very technical, Lewis breaks up the monotony of the discussion with historical events and anecdotes. In fact, one of the more memorable sections of the book is the history of the gold standard in ancient and pre-modern civilizations. One common feature of these stories is that civilizations, once the gold standard is abandoned, quickly march towards currency devaluation and destruction, but, if the gold standard is reinstated, there can be a return to normalcy.

In the second section of the book, “A History of US Money,” Lewis examines the history of currency in America, from the time before the Revolutionary War and its hyperinflationary results, to the numerous competing currencies of the new country, to the pseudo-gold standard of Bretton Woods, to the current floating dollar. Interestingly, the US was “the sole major power to stick to the gold standard” through World War I, and this is one of the reasons for its post-war boom in the 1920’s. And after World War II, the strong US dollar was used as the new gold standard through the Bretton Woods system, whereby other major nations pegged their currency values to the dollar, which was in turn pegged to gold. Obviously, this system was not a true gold standard, and it broke down in 1971, and currency values have floated since then. Lewis also discusses the relative success and failures of various Federal Reserve chairmen, such as monetarist Paul Volker throughout the 1980’s, and the gold standard advocate Alan Greenspan through the late 1980’s, 1990’s and into the beginning of the twenty-first century.

The final part of the book “Currency Crises around the World,” is an examination of modern currency crises faced by nations, mostly in the 1900’s and early 2000’s. The first country Lewis discusses is Japan, focusing on the period after the Second World War and the nation’s amazing rise to economic prosperity. Through low taxes and low interest rates, Japan was able to improve the strength of its currency against gold and encourage economic growth to become the third-largest economy in the world. It has only been recently, since leaving behind many of its pro-growth policies, that Japan has experienced a long recession. As Lewis states, “Japan’s two great periods of economic success, from 1868 to 1914 and from 1950 to 1970, were both eras in which floating currencies were replaced with hard currencies.”

Other currency crises that Lewis looks at include the Asia Crisis of the late 1990’s and Russia, China, Mexico, and Yugoslavia. Throughout his evaluations of each of these events, Lewis points to various recurring themes. In each of these countries, the falling value of the currency caused economic hardships, and their responses to these crises directly affected the countries’ ability to recover or their worsening financial conditions. Lewis points out that lowering taxes and encouraging private enterprise had far greater stimulating effects than raising taxes and higher government deficit spending. Also, in countries that received loans and “advice” from the International Monetary Fund, the currency tended to weaken even further, prolonging any economic recovery. Countries that began IMF programs and later abandoned them experienced a rate of recovery faster than that resulting from the IMF program, and countries that accepted no help from the IMF and instead lowered taxes and interest rates experienced little hardship and fast recovery.

In fact, some of these themes play out throughout the book, as Lewis examines the policies of various countries in various times of economic hardship. When countries experience a loss in the value of their currency, it is far better to return to a stable currency. Thus, Lewis sees most of the conventional economic wisdom used by central banks as misguided, from targeting interest rates to encourage growth or relying on higher taxes, wage and price controls, and government deficit spending. The most important tool of central banks that Lewis examines is their ability to create or destroy base money, by selling or purchasing government bonds. This adds or subtracts from the supply of money, and is more easily managed and a stronger indicator of the health of the currency, according to Lewis.

Lewis’ book provides strong arguments and common sense examples that support a return to a gold standard for the US dollar and other currencies worldwide. Far from there being shortcomings of the gold standard, Lewis shows that inflation and currency devaluations have resulted from countries abandoning the gold standard at various points in their history, most often during times of war. Various arguments to explain the actions of the economy and currency values have been proposed over time, with the result being the current strategy of central banks to manipulate the economy through monetary and fiscal policies, rather than pegging the value of the currency to gold. These new techniques, according to Lewis, have failed and will continue to fail, as they give central banks the excuse that they are not in control of the currencies of their nations. This is a mistake, and the current era of worldwide floating currencies will come to an end; the only question remaining is how difficult and voluntary the transition will be.

IPC is a networking organization, advocacy arm and not for profit repository of electronics industry standards. It provides a variety of networking events where industry leaders, technocrats and business people involved in the electronics industry can meet, learn and share ideas. In addition, the organization gathers and organizes industry standards with respect to materials, processes and inspection having to do with the assembly, testing and sourcing for the electronics industry. It is in this last area where industry consensus has driven training programs for recognizing and demonstrating skills and knowledge of these standards in an industry-wide effort for the formalization of training programs. These IPC certification programs are important to maintaining the integrity and consistency of the build quality of electronic assemblies across a variety of industries and applications. In the area of PCB assembly, there are a variety of formalized IPC certification programs. They are enumerated and given an overview below:

IPC-A-600- The IPC-A-600 Acceptability of Printed Boards documents the standard for PCB workmanship quality, giving comprehensive acceptance criteria with full-color illustrations and photographs showing all types of printed board surface and internal conditions.

IPC-A-610- The Acceptability of Electronic Assemblies is the standard published by the IPC for assembled PCB inspection criteria. It is the source for end product acceptance criteria for consumer and high reliability printed wiring assemblies.

IPC-A-620- The Requirements and Acceptance for Cable and Wire Harness Assemblies, is the industry consensus standard for cable and wire harness fabrication and installation. Classes of products are defined and include criteria for Defect, Process Indicator, Acceptable and Target conditions to support the collection of visual quality acceptability requirements for each class.

IPC J-STD-001- The IPC J-STD-001 Requirements for Soldered Electrical and Electronic is the specification for electronics manufacturing. The standard describes both methods and materials for producing quality soldered interconnections. The standard emphasizes process control and sets industry-consensus requirements for a broad range of electronic products.

IPC 7711- The rework training and certification program offers your company the money-saving alternative: fix it yourself!

IPC 7721- This program revolves around the physical repair of printed circuit boards that is the pad, trace, laminate and through hole repair.

Others are being developed in the areas of box builds and fiber optic connectivity amongst others.

The IPC certification program appears as a multi-tiered program with the highest level are the master instructors, employed by independent training centers. These master instructors are the backbone of the IPC certification training program.

Standardized Recipe Ideology

A standardized recipe refers to a particular standard-of-use of certain metrics in cooking – Standard sizes, time, temperature, amount, etc. Abiding by this rule creates uniformity in kitchen produce, whether or not it is tangible or intangible.

The idea of a standardized recipe is definitely not alien to many of us anymore. In fact, it has been very widely used around the globe and there are certain metrics to a standardized recipe that we must follow. In the kitchen, a standardized recipe is a crucial part of standardizing dishes, ingredients and elements in a restaurant that might lead to gain or loss during operational hours. Certain restaurants benchmark standardized recipes in their kitchen, some do not. There are pros and cons of using standardized recipes.

Benefits of having a Standardized Recipe

1. Creates an absolute standard in kitchen produce and cooking activities.
2. Allows smooth transition between different kitchen staffs.
3. Maintains food quality and food standards during kitchen operational hours.
4. Guiding tool for newcomers to the kitchen.
5. Refresh minds of kitchen staff after some time. (Eliminating guesswork)
6. Referral material should there be any disputes.
7. Base for costing when kitchen costs are calculated.
8. Be a great guide to implementing a new menu should there be any need.
9. Planning and costing purposes when a particular event needs accounting/kitchen control auditing.
10. Prevents raw food leftovers (with good Kitchen Control)

Cons of having a Standardized Recipe

1. Inconvenient – This can be from the Head Chef keeping the list of standardized recipe in his room and had it locked or having three big books of standardized recipe and need kitchen staff to flip over one by one to get everything done. Inconvenience is the number ONE factor that led to kitchen staff not using standardized recipes.
2. Time consuming – This is also one of the reasons why standardized recipe are not followed. During peak hours, a kitchen do not have time to waste, and every second counts.
3. Better variations – Some Chefs prefer to follow their centric of taste, some are just worship their own believes. This could cause a problem when there is no proper training provided and Kitchen Control.
4. Rules are meant to be broken – There are always different people/consumers around your restaurant. What’s important, the customers. When standardized recipes are not tested regularly on the restaurant, inaccurate information may be provided in the standardized recipe. Solution: Leave room or space for food/cooking variation. This usually happen when the Head Chef is not properly organized or trained well for his position.
5. A secret no more – Some restaurateurs or Chefs frown on making a book of standardized recipe because they want to protect their food knowledge. This is a classic perception: Someone comes by, takes all the recipe and leave the restaurant after a month.
6. When it’s gone, it’s really gone – At certain times in a restaurant, a piece of recipe sheet can get lost. When it’s lost, there will be a slight havoc in understanding as the Head Chef needs to take action immediately. On another situation, it can also be ‘stolen’ or ‘retrieved’ as management of the restaurant changes, and/or someone steals the particular information, or the restaurant faces mishaps like kitchen on fire.

Standardized recipes do not necessarily have certain standards that you need to follow. There are many ways to actually personalize your standardized recipe, keep them into your book and use them for referrals in the future. Alternatively, you can also save them into your computer, and organize them well. Whatever it is, standardized recipes serve good purposes in a kitchen – Take the time to actually follow the steps, and you might just get happier guests/customers.

There are three (3) common ways of writing a recipe:

1. Paragraph-style recipes
2. List-style recipes
3. Action-style recipes

Paragraph Style Recipes This way of writing a recipe is classic – And they serve their own purpose in writing that way. There are many pros and cons to this kind of writing style, and we’d like to leave it up to you to figure it out. Anyway, here’s an example of a paragraph-style written recipe:

Put your skillet on the pan and turn on the heat to low. Now take a bowl, crack 2 fresh eggs inside and add in some salt and pepper. Next, grab a whisk and start beating it until it’s mixed or quite fluffy. When your skillet is hot enough, add in 1 tbsp of oil, and swirl the oil around. You’ll notice the oil runs faster on hot pans. When your pan and oil is hot enough, turn on the heat to high and pour in your eggs. Leave the heat on high until your eggs (at the side of the pan) forms a solid texture. At this time, reduce your heat to low. When your egg is cooked enough, flip it over and top it off with some ikan kering! Voilá!

Paragraph-style recipes can work at certain extent. Be sure to choose your methods of writing well.

List-style Recipes The list-style writing of recipes is one of the easiest, practical and most common ways of writing a recipe. This method consist of two sections – The header, and footer. Header consist of different elements such as recipe title, temperature, yield, time, etc, while the footer contains methods to use these ingredients. An example of list-style recipes:

-Eggs with Ikan Kering 2 no Eggs

-1 tbsp Oil

-Ikan kering

1. Heat up your pan in low heat, crack two eggs into a bowl and add seasoning. Whisk well.
2. When your pan is hot enough, add in your oil and wait until it’s hot.
3. Pour it in and turn your heat to high, until you see the sides of your eggs are actually solid in texture.
4. Reduce your heat to low, and cook the eggs well. Flip over.
5. Top it off with some crumbled ikan kering and voilá!

Action-style recipes Action style recipes has been known as the killer way of listing recipes, amount, methods and ingredients in a very organized and well-mannered. The first step will usually contain ingredients and methods limited to only a particular food preparation, and the list continues and combines with step two and three. Here’s an example:

Action-style recipes can be very directive and you can add in more information to your liking. Choose which is best for you and your audience, then pick the right one and give them value.

Standard Elements in a Standardized Recipe Although we may see certain standard recipe metrics in a standardized recipe that may be both relevant and irrelevant to you, there are certain practical usage to it, and customizing your standardized recipe a good way to go when you need to emphasize certain recipe metrics in a recipe sheet. In a way, always think of your end-users rather than yourself.

Common Recipe Elements in a Standardized Recipe

1. Ingredients
2. Temperature
3. Equipments & Utensils Needed
4. Amount
5. Method
6. Media (Picture/Video)

These metrics are the basics – But what makes a better Standardized Recipe is to actually explain in detail what is the outcome, what should you avoid, what should you do and not do, etc. While these may be too long to squeeze into your methods area or the miscellaneous box in the action style recipe, you should include a section to it.

Recommended Standard Recipe Elements to Add These recommended standard recipe elements are absolutely optional and should only be included at selected times. Note that most recipes require only the simplest of steps to take, and portrayal of information should be as concise, clear and to the point as possible.

1. Taste – At what degree should this dish taste like, and how you can stretch its seasoning properties from there.
2. Precautions and Warnings – Precautions while handling these food mix or cooking methods.
3. Tips & Advice – Best way to beef up preparation methods and cook well without the need for practical training.
4. What to do while waiting – Important steps or methods to follow or take while waiting cooking or preparing a food ingredient or food ingredient mixes, etc.
5. Alternatives – Alternatives to this cooking method, or that food ingredient which might not be available in certain areas of the world. Should there be any alternative ways to do it, it should be pointed out.
6. Halal status – Halal status is very important. Certain foods are pre-packed in a non-halal manner, or foods containing pork-based materials used in preparation or alcohol usage. For example, rum flavoring. Comes in halal and non-halal.
7. Garnishing recommendations – This should be included and portrayed after recipe methods.
8. Miscellaneous information – This information should be portrayed at the very bottom of the recipe, stating ways on how to prepare and cut this meat, or measure the intensity of cooking in the meat. This could also serve as a section where you throw in a combination of Taste (No. 1) and Tips & Advice (No. 3).