Kurtz 1 Lauren Kurtz Professor Hugh Turner BMGT198F April 5 2010 Microsoft s Unlimited Potential Traveling the world has always been a passion of mine because I have been blessed with parents who enjoy bringing my brother and I along for the journey through life The first thing that stood out to me about Microsoft that I was not already familiar with about the company was it s six global operations corporate regions North America Latin America Europe Middle East and Africa Japan Asia Pacific and China Another passion of mine is doing service work which I know that Bill Gates has become more involved with over the years It was not until reading this article however that I realized The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was actually independent of the Microsoft Corporation In addition to this Foundation Microsoft has been taking part in and initiating many other community service opportunities since the early years of 1983 One major example of the company s giving abilities was a very early project where 434 employees assembled 17 000 for the United Way Giving Campaign Another main example of Microsoft s charitable ways is when 82 9 million was raised in gifts and donations being distributed to more than 15 000 nonprofit organizations locally and globally in the year of 2007 Both of these instances prove that Microsoft was founded in a generous path and has not stopped giving back to the world to this day Being a part of a living learning program on campus called CIVICUS has opened my eyes to a world where citizenship is essential This is how I connected to Microsoft s citizenship Kurtz 2 mission where their three goals described were demonstrating responsible business practices improving security privacy and Internet safety and advancing the knowledge economy Not only was the company focusing on the United States though it was branching out to a global economy When Thailand needed Microsoft s assistance in 2003 to provide software for the PCs being distributed to low and middle income families the company accepted the business proposition The eventual product that they created was called Windows XP Starter Edition a system designed to be simpler for inexperienced computer owners to operate After a great deal of research Microsoft discovered considerable potential in rising markets This potential grew into a project benefiting approximately forty million people in exactly 139 countries The systems focused on software for beginner users that was modified to permeate a more local sense of navigation in the system It was after this time that Microsoft took advantage of it s unlimited potential An idea struck Bill Gates and the company to meet the technological needs of the next five billion people by branching out Main aspects of this plan included affordable attainable and reasonable technology as well as focusing on underprivileged communities Another concentrated point of this plan was to adjoin and create closer relationships between local governments with educational institutions Microsoft believed that this arrangement would also help create and encourage more jobs and business opportunities The most amazing part of all of this I believe is that Microsoft did not get lost in this sole project The company continued to create and maintain other citizenship activities I believe that this proves how talented and ambitious the company is despite whatever they simply appear to be Reading about Microsoft s effort to continue to enrich their role in citizenship was not only encouraging but also reassuring It is comforting to know that a company with such a large impact on the world has such positive goals in mind Kurtz 3
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