Nike Case - 1074 Words

Definition of WACC The Weighted Average Cost of Capital (WACC) is the rate at which the firm is expected to pay for capital raised by issuing debt and equity to finance its assets. It is the minimum return that the company should earn to satisfy the needs of the debt holders and shareholders of the company. It is calculated by proportionally weighing each category of capital such as common stock, preferred stock, long term and short term debts, bonds etc. It is the discount rate used to calculate the present value of the future cash flows when the risk pertaining to that particular cash-generating unit is similar to that of the overall firm WACC is calculated by multiplying the cost of each category of capital raised with its†¦show more content†¦Disadvantages * Relies on estimates which may prove to be different from the actual results * High sensitivity to a small change in inputs * Subjective inputs can result in bad estimates DDM=Do+(1+g)/Po)+g = .48+1+.05542.09+ .055=6.7% Nike does not pay substantial dividends and hence this model does not provide the best way of calculating the cost of capital. Therefore, we rejected this model because it does not project the true cost of capital. Recommendation: Nike’s share is currently undervalued at 42.09 when we calculate the share price using Kim’s discount rate of 8.4%. As the discount rate mentioned above does not reflect the true market value, we decided to estimate the stock price using the discount rate of 9.85% using the Weighted Average cost of Capital (WACC). This gave us a stock price of $56.81 meaning that the Nike Inc. is undervalued by $14.72 per share. Adding this stock to the fund would prove profitable in the long run as the stock looks highly undervalued at the moment. We can support our calculations with the qualitative aspect such as the decision of the senior management to take steps in revitalizing the company. Also, Nike has decsided to add more lines to its athletic-shoe productsShow MoreRelatedNike Business Case Study1380 Words   |  6 PagesEven though every company should act ethically correct, not everyone does and Nike is a great example of that. Nike is a company who grew fast and looked for a cheap way to manufacture their products, by manufacturing overseas. Nike had a strong start but when people started protesting the company and their name was being dragged, they acted fast to recover to be the huge business they are today. Background The company Nike was founded in 1962 by Stanford University business graduate, Philip KnightRead MoreNike Case Study Analysis1294 Words   |  6 Pages â€Æ' Introduction Nike, a multinational company is one of the top and well known athletic footwear and apparel producers in the world. It had established production plants in many countries and has many suppliers, distributors, and retailers worldwide. It is well known because of its engagement in international business and the amount of employment it had created around the world. Nike was criticized as a result of how it managed its expansion strategyRead MoreNike Ethics Case Study1215 Words   |  5 Pagesfrom mass ordering and mass production are opportunities Nike sorted to exploit. However, this is not with problems as might lead to loss of control, and moral concern like was the case with Nike raising concern relating ethical principle in business. In this paper, we shall be answering questions related to the complexities of expansion amid a globalize world drawing inspiration from â€Å"The Promise and Perils of Globalization: The Case of Nike†, a working paper presented by Richard M. Locke and AlvinRead MoreCase Study : Advertising Strategy By Nike Essay1081 Words   |  5 Pages Case study on Advertising Strategy by Nike As per Nike organization legend, a standout amongst the most well known and effectively perceived trademarks in promoting history was authored at a 1988 gathering of Nike s commercial office Wieden and Kennedy and a gathering of Nike workers. Dan Weiden, talking fondly of Nike s can-do state of mind, allegedly said, You Nike fellows, you take care of business. The rest, as is commonly said, may be (promoting) history. In the wake of staggeringRead MoreNike Case Study1112 Words   |  5 PagesCase Study- Nike 1. Discuss how Nikes growth can be attributed to its targeting of diverse market global segments. In the 1960’s Nike was only making running shoes. At this point in time not many people knew of Nike or the Nike swoosh. In order to increase brand awareness, they started paying athletes to wear their shoes. However, very soon Nike learnt that in order to be a global brand they needed to appeal to different market segments, not just athletes. Hence, they then decided to tapRead MoreNike Case Answers1120 Words   |  5 PagesNike Case Answers– Spreading out to stay together 1. When Nike CEO Phil Knight stepped down and handed his job to Bill Perez, he stayed on as chairman of the board. In what ways could Knight’s continued presence on the board have created an informal structure that prevented Perez from achieving full and complete leadership of Nike? Answer: Informal structures are the set of unofficial relationships between organization members. Potential advantages of informal structures: ââ€" ª Helping peopleRead MoreNike Case Study1890 Words   |  8 PagesNike Presentation of Facts Surrounding Case Background on Football and the FIFA World Cup: Football (Commonly known as Soccer in the U.S.) was and still is the most popular sport in regards to viewership worldwide. In 2006 it was estimated that the sport of football was played by more than 265 million people, and continuing to grow (These estimates were up from 2000, estimated 42 million). Profession leagues exist throughout the world and the most popular teams were in Western Europe. The historyRead MoreNike Case Study1494 Words   |  6 PagesIntroduction: This paper is a case study of Nike Inc. I will give a brief overview of the history, products, company goals, company challenges, financial report and sourcing strategies. My main sources of information are internet databases, company annual reports, and financial articles. Company Overview: Nike Nike incorporated, the worlds leading designer and marketer of authentic athletic footwear, apparel, equipment, and accessories for a wide variety of sports and fitness activitiesRead MoreCase Study on Nike1252 Words   |  6 PagesCase Study Nike Introduction Good morning ladies and gentlemen and thank for taking the time to meet with us. Nike was founded on January 25, 1964 as Blue Ribbon Sports by Bill Bowerman and Philip Knight. The company officially became Nike, Inc. on May 30, 1978. Nike has various products which include footwear as well as other apparel that compliment the former. This accounts for 92 percent of the company’s revenue. The other 8 percent comes from equipment and non Nike brand products, such as ColeRead MoreNike, Inc. Case Analysis844 Words   |  4 PagesNIKE, Inc., is a company that was founded in by William Jay Bowerman and Philip H. Knight in 1964, and was originally called Blue Ribbon Sports, Inc. It’s name was changed to Nike, Inc. in 1971. It’s base of operation is located in Beaverton, Oregon. NIKE, Inc., is the world’s leading designer, marketer and distributor of authentic athletic footwear, apparel, equipment and accessories for a wide variety of sports and fitness activitie s worldwide. Entirely owned Nike subsidiaries include Converse

Disguise in Shakespeares Measure for Measure and Twelfth...

Disguise in Shakespeares Measure for Measure and Twelfth Night Disguise is a device Shakespeare employs frequently in both Measure for Measure and Twelfth Night. It allows a disguised character like the Duke of Vienna to glean information that would otherwise go unknown, and a character like Viola to take advantage of potentially beneficial situations. It gives these characters access to worlds that might otherwise be denied; for the Duke, he can now haunt assemblies / Where youth and cost a witless bravery keeps (1.4.9-10). For Viola, she might serve the duke (1.2.51) and thus hopefully keep company with Olivia, who also lost a brother. Disguise is especially appropriate in the†¦show more content†¦She hopes to serve Olivia so that, being in the same company as a woman who has also lost her brother, Viola might make [her] own occasion mellow (1.2.39) before she is delivered to the world (1.2.38). From the moment that she takes on this new appearance, however, her plans fall victim to the same excess that runs throughout the play. Instead of simply being in Orsinos favor and thus gaining access to Olivia, Viola quickly wins Orsinos devout affection. Valentine comments that Orsino hath known you but three days, and already you are / no stranger (1.4.1-4). Violas disguise achieves her purpose, however: Orsino tells her to address thy gait unto her, / ... stand at her doors, / ... Till thou have audience (1.4.15-18). While pursuing Olivia, though, Viola falls in love with the Duke, saying to him, Ill do my best / To woo your lady and then aside, yet a barful strife-/ Whoeer I woo, myself would be his wife (1.5.40-2). Viola is not the only one affected by her plan; Olivia falls in love with Viola, instead of with Orsino. In 2.2, Viola exclaims, Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness / Wherein the pregnant enemy does much (2.2.27-8). She laments the tangled state of affairs she has come in to: My master loves [Olivia] dearly, / And I, poorShow MoreRelated Comparing Mistaken Identity in Merchant of Venice, Comedy Errors, Twelfth Night and As You Like It1115 Words   |  5 PagesErrors, Twelfth Night and As You Like It   Ã‚  The ploy of mistaken identity as a plot device in writing comedies dates back at least to the times of the Greeks and Romans in the writings of Menander and Plautus. Shakespeare borrowed the device they introduced and developed it into a fine art as a means of expressing theme as well as furthering comic relief in his works. Shakespeares artistic development is clearly shown in the four comedies The Merchant of Venice, As You Like It, Twelfth NightRead MoreDisguised characters in plays1131 Words   |  5 Pagesthemselves as men in Shakespeare’s plays. Shakespeare used these disguises to his advantage, especially the woman characters. What other purposes did Shakespeare have for writing disguised characters into his plays? More times than not, these disguises led to trouble, confusion, and misplaced affection. Shakespeare’s use of disguises taught not only the characters in involved but the audience that appearances can be deceiving and that everything is not as it seems. Shakespeare’s best-disguised charactersRead MoreCommon Features of a Shakespeare Comedy1745 Words   |  7 Pagesfiance has been unfaithful through mistaken identity. Characters also play scenes in disguise and it is not uncommon for female characters to disguise themselves as male characters, seen in Portia in the Merchant of venice. Shakespeare’s 17 comedies are the most difficult to classify because they overlap in style with other genres. Critics often describe some plays as tragi-comedies because they mix equal measures of tragedy and comedy. For example, Much Ado About Nothing starts as a Shakespeare comedyRead MoreThe Twelfth Night: A Happy Ending? Essay1501 Words   |  7 Pagesdegree of expectation with the genre of comedy that despite whatever difficulties appear within the play, by the end these will be resolved and the play will have a traditional happy-ending with a marriage or a celebration in the final scene. The â€Å"Twelfth Night† is no exception to this rule. Despite problems of confused identities and sexualities, the play ends with marriage for the major characters because they â€Å"have learned enough about their own foolishness to accept it wisely, and their reward, asRead MoreWilliam Shakespeare s Twelfth Night1436 Words   |  6 Pagesliterature that I recall reading in s chool. Shakespeare’s unique style of writing has had a great influence on our society. One of his famous plays, Twelfth Night, was modernized by director Andy Fickman and made into a movie called, She s the Man in 2002. Although the film and the play have different scenarios, it was recreated with many similarities. Andy Fickman used many of the same characters and ideas, but in different situations. In Twelfth Night and She’s the Man the main characters bothRead More Comparing the Love of Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night and the Bible4838 Words   |  20 Pagesenemies. (Matt 5:44) Shakespeares Biblical knowledge is well known and he was certainly familiar with these concepts as he wrote his plays on the subject of love. By looking closely at his works, we can analyze the nature of true love. In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare gives an example of true love overcome by tragic fate. His star-crossed lovers are so madly in love with each other that they cannot live with out being together. (RJ Prologue, 6) By contrast, in Twelfth Night the characters are soRead MoreDisguise And Shakespeare s The Merchant Of Venice And Twelfth Night Essay2103 Words   |  9 PagesThe concept of disguise has been known and used since the beginnings of drama, but this concept was most famously known for being used in plays written by the biggest playwrights of the Elizabethan era— especially for being used in William Shakespeare’s plays. What do we mean by disguise? In broad terms, it would mean pretending to be something that one is not. The concept of disguise can mean changing behavior, or hiding intentions, the most frequent form of disguise is the change of ones personalRead MoreThe Dramatic Importance of Act 1 Scenes 1 and 2 of William Shakespeares Twelfth Night4384 Words   |  18 PagesThe Dramatic Importance of Act 1 Scenes 1 and 2 of William Shakespeares Twelfth Night The title Twelfth Night seems to suggest that Shakespeare, who wrote the play around 1602, wanted it to be performed on the twelfth day after Christmas; the festival of the Epiphany. This day formally marked the end of the Christmas season, which at the time was celebrated as a special festival. In addition to eating, drinking and generally over indulging, the performance of plays wasRead MoreWisdom in Twelfth Night Essay2738 Words   |  11 PagesBeyond Seriousness to Wisdom in Twelfth Night      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Shakespeare seems preoccupied with madness and folly in Twelfth Night. The word fool and its variants (foolery, foolish, and so forth) appear eighty times in the play, and the word folly occurs seven times. There are, in addition, other means of indicating foolishness such as Marias Now, sir, thought is free (1.3.67). As Feste suggests, Foolery ... does walk about the orb like the sun; it shines everywhere (3.1.39-40). Read More Female Direction of Shakespeares As You Like It Essay1783 Words   |  8 Pagesrevolve around the idea that gender matters, but it does not matter any more than age, politics, socio-economic concerns, or any other defining characteristics found in any given person. Female directors tend to want to stretch the meaning in Shakespeares plays, be radical, new, and expansive. Female directors gravitate toward a conception of the show filled with characters that happen to be specific genders, not gendered people who happen to be individuals. This makes the theme of the play revolve

Technical Paper free essay sample

Describe the company network, interconnection, and communication environment. In order to support their growing business, Global Finance, Inc. (GFI) has taken necessary actions to ensure their network remains fault tolerant and resilient from any network failures. GFI has acquired network devices in order to support their network and maintain interconnection among their employees and customers. The World Trade Organization defines interconnection as: â€Å"Linking with suppliers providing public telecommunications transport networks or services in order to allow the users of one supplier to communicate with users of another supplier and to access services provided by another supplier, where specific commitments are undertaken. † (Blackman Srivastava, 2011) As technology has changed and competition has intensified, many forms of interconnection have evolved. All involve the linking of networks to enable customers of one network to communicate with customers of another network or to have access to services offered by another network operator. GFI’s network interconnects their employees to their customers through Internet and telecommunications. GFI employees are able to connect to their customers through two adjacent, non-competing telephone networks that interconnect so that subscribers on one network can call those on the other. Traditional wireline telephone and new wireless mobile carriers interconnect so that subscribers of the traditional phone service can call wireless subscribers, and vice versa. New competitive local telephone carriers allows GFI to interconnect with the incumbent carrier so they can attract subscribers in the common service territory, and enable those subscribers to call subscribers on the incumbent‘s network. (Blackman Srivastava, 2011) GFI’s successful communication with their customers is required in order to conduct daily business transactions. GFI’s network makes it easy for employees in one department to communicate with employees in another department through numerous Access Layer Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN) Switches. GFI employees are directly linked to the Internet in a manner that allows them to interact with customers through their website. Assess risk based on the Global Finance, Inc. Network Diagram scenario. The risk assessment process is needed to identify risks that need to be treated within an organization, as well as to provide strategies and methods that are most appropriate to treat these risks. Because many organizations are poorly aligned between their risk exposure and their risk appetite, it is important to engage in the risk assessment procedures. These procedures can help an organization prevent risk exposure and determine if their current operations will result in an increase or decrease of market value and owners’ wealth. As a result of the economic crisis, and the recent increase in corporate failures, organizations can now learn from the mistakes of others. In an effort to demonstrate the importance of successful risk assessment and alignment implementation it is necessary to examine GFI’s network closer. GFIs success is dependent on their network. The network is fairly stable with very few outages due to network failure. To ensure the network operates successfully GFI has hired a small team of network engineers to keep up with the network growth and the bandwidth demand by the company employees and the clients. However, the company has not hired any security personnel who can take care of the operational security responsibility. Not having a secure network leaves the network open to vulnerabilities and compromises the daily flow of business. The trusted computing base (TCB) internal network in the Global Finance, Inc. Network Diagram hosts the company’s mission critical systems without which the company’s operations and financial situation would suffer. The Oracle database and email systems are among the most intensively used application servers in the company. GFI cannot afford system outages because its cash flow and financial systems heavily depend on the network stability. GFI has experienced DOS network attacks twice this year and its Oracle database and email servers had been down for a week. The recovery process required GFI to use $25,000 to restore its operations back to normal. GFI estimated the loss from these network attacks at more than $100,000 including lost customer confidence. GFI’s failure to incorporate proper firewall devices at Internet access points can be linked to DOS network attacks and Oracle database and email servers being down. Network security is just as important as securing the company’s web site and related applications. Networks, because of the sensitive data they usually give access to, are one of the most targeted public faces of an organization. Here are the top 5 network security vulnerabilities that are often omitted from typical reviews, and some tips to avoid making the same mistakes: †¢Network Security Omission #1: Missing patches—all it takes for an attacker, or a rogue insider, is a missing patch on a server that permits an unauthenticated command prompt or other backdoor path into the web environment. Network security personnel should be extra careful when applying patches to servers but not applying any patches makes it too easy for attackers. Solution: Follow network security best practices by updating the operating system and any other software running on it with the latest security patches. Too many incidents occur because criminal hackers take advantage and exploit un-patched systems. (Beaver, 2013) †¢Network Security Omission #2: Weak or default passwords—many web applications, content management systems, and even database servers are still configured with weak or default passwords. Who would need file inclusion or SQL injection when the file system or database can be accessed directly? Solution: Change and test for weak passwords regularly and consider using a password management tool. Implement intruder lockout after a defined number of failed login attempts. (Beaver, 2013) †¢Network Security Omission #3: Misconfigured firewall rulebases—One of the biggest, most dangerous, assumptions is that everything is well in the firewall because it’s been working fine. Digging into a firewall rulebase that has never been analyzed will inevitably turn up serious configuration weaknesses that allow for unauthorized access into the web environment. Sometimes it’s direct access while other times it’s indirect from other network segments including Wi-Fi – parts of the network that may have been long forgotten. Solution: Start with the organization’s security policy; one that reflects the current situation and foreseeable business requirements. After all, the firewall rulebase is the technical implementation of this security policy. Review it regularly and keep it relevant. (Beaver, 2013) †¢Network Security Omission #4: Mobile devices—Phones, tablets, and unencrypted laptops pose some of the greatest risks to web security. Think about all the VPN connections, cached passwords in web browsers, and emails containing sensitive login information that you – and likely everyone else responsible for managing the web environment – have stored on mobile devices. The use of unsecured Wi-Fi via mobile devices is the proverbial icing on the cake. Solution: Instill clear data management rules for all employees and make mandatory data encryption part of your security policy. This is becoming even more important with employees connecting their personal devices to the corporate network. (Beaver, 2013) †¢Network Security Omission #5: USB Flash Drives—the dangers of these portable devices have been known for long enough. But still, all that Edward Snowden reportedly needed to walk away from the National Security Agency building with a cache of national secrets was a USB flash drive. USB drives are also one of the most common ways a network can get infected from inside a firewall. Solution: Have clear security policies regarding personal storage devices including who can use them and in what places. Restrict the computers that can read USB flash drives and help prevent unauthorized access by encrypting the data as soon as it hits the device. (Beaver, 2013) Whether accessible from inside or outside the network, these commonly-overlooked security vulnerabilities are likely putting GFI’s web environment at risk today. The smart approach to minimize the risks is to perform in-depth web vulnerability scans and manual analysis like and also ensure that everything else that touches the web environment has been properly reviewed. (Beaver, 2013) Before a firm embarks on the task of conducting a risk assessment, it is important to establish the risk appetite of the organization, meaning its capacity to take on risk to meet its organizational objectives. There are four basic steps that stakeholders of the organization can approach to establish a risk appetite statement. The stakeholders of an organization generally include shareholders, board of directors, management, employees, customers, suppliers, and even taxpayers and voters. The four steps involved in determining an organization’s risk appetite play a fundamental role in preventing derailment from strategic goals, culture, market, regulatory requirements, and financial sensitivity. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 42-46) Step 1 in the process is to develop strategic objectives at an enterprise and operating unit level. Some of the objectives stakeholders will consider include market share, competitors’ strategic direction, reputation in the marketplace, earning stability and growth, investor returns and expected returns, regulatory requirements, capital adequacy, and external credit ratings. Because organizations have very diverse stakeholders, it is common to have conflicting opinions regarding the objectives, risks, and expectations; however, stakeholders’ are generally concerned with maintaining business growth, profitability, and earnings stability, ensuring regulatory compliance, being an employer of choice, and being a good corporate citizen. Furthermore, as time passes, the needs of organizations change, thus it is important to revisit the objectives, business plan, risks, and expectations. For example, if an organization’s growth target increases within a year, then the risk appetite would need to be reconsidered and adjusted to reflect the increase in risk and capital requirements. Additionally, the business plan should also be revisited so that it reflects the new risk appetite statement and outlines how the organization will meet the objectives and shareholder’s expectations. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 42-44) Step 2 is to align the risk profile to business and capital management objectives. To accomplish this, the organization must determine the risk capacity, meaning they must identify how much risk is currently being taken and how much risk is still needed in order to meet the desired goals and align the risk profile to the business plan. Step 3 involves determining the risk thresholds at an enterprise and operating level. To accomplish step 3, the organization must identify the tolerance ranges for specific risks. These tolerance ranges should be identified to ensure that the appetite of the organization remains within the bounds of the business plan. In addition, these measures break down high-level risk appetite into actionable measures and help ensure that appropriate reporting and monitoring processes can be put in place for the effective management of these risks. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 42-45) Finally, step 4 is to formalize and codify the results of the risk appetite and provide a formal risk appetite statement. This statement should then be approved by the board and then communicated to the organization. To ensure quality performance amongst the organization, it is important to assess performance in terms of compliance with the risk appetite. The organization should also have standard risk and incident reporting procedures in order to successfully monitor breaches of risk appetite and tolerance at all levels of the organization. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 42-45) Although determining the risk appetite might seem like a lengthy process, there are significant advantages for the organization. A risk appetite statement gives managers an improved understanding of what risk management means, and thus helps them apply risk management more effectively. Additionally, risk appetite helps an organization determine the capacity to take on risk, allocate risk management resources, define risk limits on new business ventures, and develop more knowledgeable risk reporting. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 46-47) Risk assessment is the process in which an organization identifies, analyzes, and evaluates risk. Risk assessments are the basis for risk management within an organization. They are valuable tools for organizations because they provide guidelines and understanding of risks, their causes, consequences, probabilities, as well as solutions. Risk assessments provide risk information to stakeholders and can help them understand the nature and impact of risk. They can also help determine whether an activity or project should be undertaken, how to maximize these opportunities, and to establish prioritization within risks in order to choose between different options. Additionally, risk assessments help determine if certain risks should be treated, as well as compares the pros and cons of different risk reduction techniques. Although risk assessments are very valuable, they are not to be considered a stand-alone activity and should be used in conjunction to other elements of the risk management process. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 47-49) Organizations should have a process in place for conducting risk assessments. Risk managers are accountable and responsible for conducting risk assessments within an organization. They should understand the objectives and goals of the organization and should know how risk assessment integrates to them. Risk managers should know how to define risk criteria and should have various methods, techniques, and resources for conducting risk assessments. Additionally, risk managers should know what risks are acceptable and how unacceptable risks should be treated. In other words risk managers should know how to effectively change the probability factor in the occurrence of the risk, and they should also know how to effectively change the effects of the risk. Finally, risk managers should know the process for risk identification, which is the process of finding, recognizing, and recording risks. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 49-52) Risk analysis is the process where risk managers analyze the risk assessments and determine whether risks need to be treated and what strategies and methods are most appropriate to treat these. It involves identifying the causes and sources of the risk, the consequences and probabilities, and the effectiveness of existing controls to determine the level of risk. (Cernauskas Tarantino, 2011, pp. 52-53) Examine whether your risk assessment methodology is quantitative, qualitative, hybrid, or a combination of these. The risk assessment approach taken to evaluate and determine the risks within GFIs network was based on the hybrid method. This approach combines some elements of both the quantitative and qualitative assessments. Sometimes quantitative data is used as one input among many to assess the value of assets and loss expectancy. This approach gives the assessment more credibility due to the hard facts presented but it also involves people within the organization to gain their individual insight. The disadvantage of this approach is that it may take longer to complete. However, a mixed approach can result in better data than what the two methods can yield alone. (Vanderburg, 2010)

Men Should Be As They Seem Essays - Othello, Michael Cassio, Iago

Men Should Be As They Seem ?Men should be as they seem? By Mike Hourie The four main characters in the play Othello represent four different character traits of manhood: Roderigo, the failure; Othello, the hero, yet the insane lover; Cassio, the noblemen; and Iago, the villain, yet the strongest character of the play. Of these four characters Roderigo reveals the weakest character traits. Iago effortlessly profits from Roderigo's deficiency in a intelligence, in fact Iago himself said he would not waste time and effort on ?such a snipe?(I iii 387) except for ?sport and profit.? Towards the end of the play Roderigo reveals some traits that might classify him as a man with a spine. He finally stands up to Iago and threatens to expose the conspiracy against Othello and Cassio, but ultimately his flaws overpower his virtuous traits and he is persuaded by Iago to kill Cassio instead. Likewise, Othello is the tragic hero of the play but his character is also weak. Jealousy is Othello's major downfall. He reveals his insecurities in the scene where he strikes Desdemona and calls her a ?devil?. Similarly, in the brothel scene, Othello's insecurities arise when he cruelly questions Desdemona. He condemns her as a ?simple bawd? and a ?whore?, which he has no real proof of. Iago also easily manipulates Othello, like Roderigo, throughout the play. Othello is naive. He demonstrates that a few well-placed suggestions can alter his train of thought, such as when Iago was talking to Cassio and made Othello believe that the lieutenant was speaking of Desdemona instead of Bianca. On the whole, Othello was a weak character and a naive man. In contrast, Cassio's character is strong. He spoke about Othello with dignity and grace, which no other character in the play does. Also, Cassio showed extreme loyalty to the Moor. Cassio's only flaw is that he temporarily lost his power of reasoning when he was drunk and let himself be manipulated by Iago. All in all, Cassio is a good example of how a man should act; with dignity and honor. Likewise, Iago's character is also strong. He is an intelligent man as can seen in the soliloquy where he is hatching a plan to frame Cassio ?to get his place ?(I iii). In the soliloquy Iago's intelligence is revealed in the statement ?How, How? - To abuse Othello's ear / That [Cassio] is too familiar with his wife.?(I iii 396-39). Iago used his intelligence to think of a plan to frame Cassio and bring down Othello at the same time. Iago is also a confident man. Throughout the soliloquy Iago is confident ?That the moor ?Will be tenderly led by the nose./ As asses are ? (I iii 401- 404) and will be easily manipulated. However, if Iago had used his good character traits for good he would have been the hero of the play instead of Othello. On the whole, Shakespeare did an excellent job on setting the character traits for the male characters in the play: Roderigo was the ?snipe?; Cassio, the noble gentleman; Othello, the fallen ?noble Moor?; and Iago, the intelligent, confident and arrogant self-made villain. All the Characters in the play had some good traits but each of them had an appalling attribute that led to their downfall. Shakespeare