Kruse Kronicle

Un-Google Yourself

Wired: Un-Google Yourself

The mighty search engine has allowed us to do so many things. “Mighty” is the operative word, as these same search engines (usually the one that starts with a "G" and ends with an "oogle") can also curse us all. If you think about it, any schmuck can find out more about you than you’d like by typing only your first and last name.

Different folks certainly have different tolerance levels for their online persona and how public they want it to be, but thankfully, there are tips to ensure that your boss, your ex, or your mildly interested former friends can keep tabs on you on your terms.

Unfortunately, pleas to remove content on Google fall on deaf, mechanical Google ears. The best and easiest way to remove content from Google (and other search engines in the process) is to remove the content from the internet. This guide will show you how to make the best of the content that is there or how to remove it entirely. ...

Temporary Workers and the 21st Century Economy

Wall Street Journal: Temporary Workers and the 21st Century Economy

The surge in temp hiring is not a sign of a malfunctioning economy. It is the face of the future.

The White House is turning its nose up at last month's spurt in temporary work—the one bright spot in an otherwise grim jobs report. It claims that such work is proof that the economy is still malfunctioning. The truth is that this surge in temporary workers is not only good news for the economy, it's the future of the 21st century labor market. If Washington wants to jump start job growth for the 3.5 million white-collar workers who have lost jobs in this recession, it should start by scrapping the outdated legal and regulatory hurdles to temporary work.

I know something about this because I run a business that places talented individuals into temporary consulting and interim executive assignments. Amid the worst recession in decades, our business is up 70%. Yet there would be much more growth in this sector if Americans—from the White House down to the personnel department—stopped discriminating against temporary work as inferior or anomalous.

Today, demand for high-end temporary business talent is not focused on cost-cutting projects, as some might suspect. Instead, firms use temporary executives to drive innovation. In uncertain times, firms are simply more comfortable with deploying talent on a flexible basis.

Temporary work also boosts economic efficiency because not all executive roles require permanent staff. For example, one pharmaceutical company client took on a temporary marketing executive to help launch a new drug. The old way of doing this was to make a new permanent hire (or a small team) who would have been under-utilized after the launch. The availability of temporary staff who can get the job done quickly means that firms can rethink how work is organized.

Which brings us to another case for temporary work: Top business talent increasingly wants to work this way. In one situation, a VP-level executive we placed was developing his own new business. He valued the way a part-time senior role allowed him to support his family while he worked on his own project. For others, working in a series of temporary assignments may be their preferred full-time occupation.

Given the contribution that temporary work makes to the economy, it's time Washington embraced it. Here are three things the feds could do immediately to make it easier for firms and executives to work this way: ...

Agricultural developments bring 2.3 million out of poverty each year

Poverty News Blog: Agricultural developments bring 2.3 million out of poverty each year

A new study brings us very good news about the impact on agricultural research. Farming investment in sub-Saharan Africa brings around 2.3 million of the region's residents out of poverty each year.

Innovation and technology can do a lot, but the reports authors say that other developments are needed. Improvements in access to credit, and access to the same fertilizer and seeds that the Western World uses can help bring more people in Sub-Saharan Africa out of poverty.

From the Walta Information Center, we read more about the study on how agricultural research can help.  ...

India's Economy Shows Surprising Growth

Business Week: India's Economy Shows Surprising Growth

Spurred by an $80 billion stimulus package, the Indian economy grew by 7.9% in the third quarter as the nation's consumers displayed an appetite for spending.

India's $1.2 trillion economy may be among the world's first to come roaring out of the global recession, as government data showed it grew by 7.9% in the quarter ended on Sept. 30, the largest growth since the Indian government started releasing the figures in 1996. Industry grew 9.2%, compared with 5.1% in the year-earlier quarter. "These recent figures may well signal that the worst effects of the global financial crisis have passed for the economy," says Anuj Chande, head of the South Asia Group at Grant Thornton, which advises companies doing business in Asia.

The numbers, released on Nov. 30, have economists considering raising their estimates for full-year gross domestic product growth in India; the average estimate is currently about 6.5%. The government, meanwhile, has said it expects the Indian economy to grow by 7% to 8% by the end of the fiscal year in March 2010, and hit 9% the year after. "Our own 6.2% number for the current fiscal year is certainly looking on the low side," says Robert Prior-Wandesforde, Singapore-based Asia economist for HSBC (HBC).

It's an interesting turnaround by the Indian economy, which spent the period from October 2008 to March 2009 on government-sponsored life support—some $80 billion in tax cuts and other benefits in the form of a stimulus. Without the stimulus, growth in those two quarters would have been less than 1%; the stimulus pushed it to 5.8%. ...

Why Introverts Can Make The Best Leaders

Forbes: Why Introverts Can Make The Best Leaders

"Most people don't know that I'm an introvert."

I hear this confession from surprisingly many successful executives. Quite a few, in fact, talk at length with me about their introversion, speaking candidly and often cathartically about their experiences. Most also admit that at some point in their leadership journey they've had to work to overcome being disregarded or misunderstood because of their quiet temperament.

How do these introverted leaders do it? How do they thrive in the extroverted business world? They seek to understand--and play to--their strengths.

It has been reported that a full 40% of executives describe themselves as introverts, including Microsoft's ( MSFT - news - people ) Bill Gates, the über-investors Warren Buffett and Charles Schwab, Avon's chief executive, Andrea Jung, and the late publishing giant Katharine Graham. Odds are President Barack Obama is an innie as well. What does that mean? That introverts, not just extroverts, have the right stuff to lead organizations in a go-go, extroverted business culture

Here are five key characteristics that help introverted leaders build on their quiet strength and succeed.

1. They think first, talk later. ...

2. They focus on depth. ...

3. They exude calm. ...

4. They let their fingers do the talking. ...

5. They embrace solitude. ...

I consistently test out as an INTJ on the Myers-Briggs Inventory ... Heavy on the N and T, light on the I and J. I gotta admit, sometimes I embrace Jean-Paul Sartre's observation, "Hell is other people." :-)

I think her assessment of introverted gifts is accurate but my experience is that most organization of any size need a variety of leaders who appreciate each other's gifts. The need is to be self-aware of what gifts we bring to the table and where we need to lean on the gifts of others.

No More Executive Bonuses!

Wall Street Journal: No More Executive Bonuses!

The problem isn't that they are poorly designed. The problem is that they exist.

These days, it seems, there is no shortage of recommendations for fixing the way bonuses are paid to executives at big public companies.

Well, I have my own recommendation: Scrap the whole thing. Don't pay any bonuses. Nothing. ...

... People pursue the job of chief executive for all kinds of reasons: the prestige of the position, the sheer pleasure of heading up a major company, the chance to make a real difference to an institution they cherish, and, of course, remuneration. When push comes to shove, do you think pay is more consequential to these people than the other factors? All this compensation madness is not about markets or talents or incentives, but rather about insiders hijacking established institutions for their personal benefit.

Too many large corporations today are starved for leadership—true leadership, meaning engaged leadership embedded in concerned management. And the global economy desperately needs renewed enterprise, embedded in the belief that companies are communities. Getting rid of executive bonuses, and the gambling games that accompany them, is the place to start.

I don't know that I'm fully persuaded but he makes some excellent points.

Cute Kitty

I showed this to my tabby, Isaac. He turned to me and said, "Try it and you lose a hand." :-)

The Poor Getting Richer?

Carpe Diem: The Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor Are Getting Richer; The Good Old Days Are Now

Steve Horwitz at the Austrian Economists blog has a good post based on Census Bureau data that were recently released on "Living Conditions in the United States, 2005." The chart above (click to enlarge) shows the percentage of all U.S. households owning various household appliances in 1971 and 2005, and the percentage of poor households (below the official poverty line) owning those appliances in 2005. The data show a significant improvement in living standards between 1971 and 2005, as the percentage of households with clothes dryers increased from 44.5% to 81.2%, the percentage of households with dishwashers increased from 18.8% to 64%, and the percent of household with air conditioners increased from 31.8% to 85.7%.

Related data from the Department of Energy (based on Census Data) in the chart show that the percentage of households owning two or more vehicles increased from 34.8% in 1970 to 57% in 2000, and has likely increased since then.

What's most impressive though is the comparison of the living standards of households living below the poverty line in 2005 to all U.S. households in 1971. ...

Land Rush in Africa

Business Week: Land Rush in Africa

Agribusiness and global investors are scooping up farmland. Are corporate farmers the new colonialists? 

Farmland in developing countries has become an unlikely object of investor fascination. Goldman Sachs (GS), and Morgan Stanley (MS) are each raising hundreds of millions of dollars for agriculture funds aimed at Africa and Latin America. Agribusinesses in the U.S. are leasing vast tracts of African land from which they expect to export crops and glean healthy returns. Arab oil countries, meanwhile, are vying for fertile acreage for fear their homelands are running out of water.

The executives leading this hunt for farmland say they are boosting poor economies. Dominion Farms, based in Guthrie, Okla., leases 17,000 acres in Kenya near the village where President Barack Obama's grandmother lives. Dominion President Calvin Burgess boasts that his company provides employment for hundreds of local residents. "This area was a malaria-infested swamp before we got here," he says. Once Dominion is fully in gear, it plans to sell rice to African governments and export farm-raised fish to Europe.

But in Kenya, foreign land investors are beginning to stir resentment. Subsistence farmers and cattle herders complain that they are being displaced without compensation. In the Siaya District of southwest Kenya, families say Dominion hasn't offered as many jobs as it claims in the six years since it arrived. Villagers accuse it of polluting water and sickening farm animals—allegations the company denies.

Tensions are rising. ...

Fighting poverty in emerging markets

Economist: Fighting poverty in emerging markets

Lessons from Brazil, China and India

... Between them, Brazil, China and India account for half the world’s poorest people and an even bigger share of those who have escaped poverty. In 1981, 84% of China’s population was below the poverty line of $1.25 a day (in 2005 prices); in 2005 the share was just 16% (see chart). This amounted to a 6.6% proportionate annual rate of poverty reduction—the difference between the growth rates of the number of poor and the total population.

Nobody did as well as China. Brazil’s share of those in poverty fell by half from 17% to 8%, an annual reduction of 3.2%. India did least well, cutting the share below the poverty line from 60% to 42% between 1981 and 2005. This implies an annual reduction of 1.5% a year, though there are problems with Indian statistics; using different consumption figures yields an annual reduction of 3%, comparable to Brazil’s.

As Mr Ravallion points out, these figures do not mirror growth rates. Brazil cut poverty by more than India despite much lower growth, just over 1% a year in 1993-2005, compared with India’s 5%. If you calculate the rate of poverty reduction for each unit of GDP growth per person, Brazil did even better than China: the ratio is 4.3 for Brazil, 0.8 for China and 0.4 for India (0.8 if you use the adjusted consumption figures). Per unit of growth, Brazil reduced its proportional poverty rate five times more than China or India did.

How did it do so well? The main explanation has to do with inequality. This (as measured by the Gini index, also marked on the chart) has fallen sharply in Brazil since 1993, while it has soared in China and risen in India. Greater inequality dampens the poverty-reducing effect of growth.

Government policy played a big role in reducing inequality. Brazil’s main cash-transfer programme, called Bolsa Familia, provides help to 11m families, or 60% of all those in the poorest tenth. In contrast, social security in China is still provided largely through the enterprise system (ie, companies), so it tends to bypass those not in work. And government interventions in India are extraordinarily perverse. People in the poorest fifth are the least likely to have any kind of ration card (the key to public handouts), whereas the richest fifth are the most likely to.

Mr Ravallion concludes with some useful lessons. In all three countries, economic stability made a big difference for the better. China cut poverty the most, but did best early on, when agriculture was growing fastest. As growth shifted towards the cities and manufacturing, inequality rose. It might have done even better with Brazilian-style “progressive” policies. India had both growth and social policies, yet did worst because its policies in fact did rather little to help the poor. With its caste system, and bad state schools, India may be a more unequal society than the numbers alone suggest. Both Asian countries could learn some lessons from Brazil. But Brazil, in turn, will not be able to match China’s record in reducing the number of poor people without higher growth.

What if Everything Worked Like Health Care?

Watch the video.

Medieval Warm Period?

One of the frequent claims made by anthropogenic global warming theorists is that temperatures are warmer than they have ever been for at least the past couple of millennia.  Critics raise the Medieval Warm Period of the 12th and 13th centuries but proponents say that was a localized phenomenon, not a global reality. The IPCC report a few years ago abandoned using a graph present in its first two or three reports that should the earlier warming for the now famous and controversial "hockey stick" graph of which Al Gore has made so much:

Medieval Warm Period Graph

Hockey Stick Graph

Below is an interesting graph from an article, written in German and translated by Google, Unprecedented warming or unprecedented data manipulation? Scroll the graph below in the article to see an interactive map of the evidence that there was indeed a global Medieval Warm Period.

 

Men and women 'respond differently to danger'

BBC: Men and women 'respond differently to danger'

Men and women may respond differently to danger, a brain scan study suggests.

A team from Krakow, in Poland, used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to assess brain activity when 40 volunteers were shown various images.

Men showed activity in areas which dealt with what action they should take to avoid or confront danger.

But the study, presented to the Radiological Society of North America, found more activity in the emotional centres of women's brains.

The researchers, from Jagiellonian University Hospital in Krakow, carried out scans on 21 men and 19 women.

Brain activity was monitored while the volunteers were shown images of objects and images from ordinary life designed to evoke different emotional states.

Fight or flight response

The images were displayed in two runs. For the first run, only negative pictures were shown. For the second run, only positive pictures were shown.

While viewing the negative images, women showed stronger and more extensive activity in the left thalamus.

This is an area which relays sensory information to the pain and pleasure centres of the brain.

Men showed more activity in an area of the brain called the left insula, which plays a key role in controlling involuntary functions, including respiration, heart rate and digestion.

In essence, activity in this area primes the body to either run from danger, or confront it head on - the so-called "fight or flight response". ...

Interesting. When my dad was a science professor he used to take his students on an annual camping/canoe trip in the Ozarks. He used to tell ghost stories around the campfire. One time, the group was seated on logs arranged in semi-circle around the fire. At a critical moment in one of his stories he leapt across the fire, shrieking at the top of his lungs. He said what astonished him was that every one of the women dropped to the ground or fell off their seats. Everyone of the men sprang to his feet and ran four or five steps before regaining composure.

This article seems to correspond well with what I've read elsewhere that women (in the aggregate) tend to process the world more holistically while men tend to process the world in more compartmentalized ways.

(I always read the articles with caution. The comparison between any individual woman and man may not match the aggregate but there does seem to be aggregate differences.)

Generation Gap Narrows: Parents, Kids See Eye-to-Eye on More Things

Marketing Charts: Generation Gap Narrows: Parents, Kids See Eye-to-Eye on More Things

New cultural attitudes, the expanding role of technology and the current economic climate are narrowing the generation gap and drawing today’s American families closer together, changing how parents raise and regard their children compared with how their parents raised them, according to a recent study commissioned by Nickelodeon and conducted by Harris Interactive.

The study, entitled “The Family GPS,” found that - as Millennials become parents and Baby Boomers become grandparents -  today’s increasingly multi-generational and diverse American families are rapidly becoming united by an expanding set of values and converging tastes.

Generation Gap Ends, Family Fusion Begins

Today’s families are increasingly multi-generational - with kids, parents and grandparents living together in one household or in close proximity - and closer knit, often sharing the same interests and tastes. As a result, the study found that it is a top priority to seek and create opportunities to spend more time together, preferably in the home, which serves as the main hub for free time as well as family life.

Study findings about family time: ...

Medical School Graduates

Carpe Diem: Medical School Graduates

Do academic scientists share information with their colleagues? Not necessarily

Vox: Do academic scientists share information with their colleagues? Not necessarily

Sharing of information is critical to scientific progress, but scientists have private incentive to avoid disclosing research. This column analyses the benefits and costs of sharing, both one-to-one and with the general scientific community, and assesses how government funding and scholarly competition shape sharing decisions.

... Conclusion

These results suggest that increased government research funding is likely to promote information sharing. However, our analysis shows that this is only true to the extent that increased research funding relaxes competition. Increased funding makes it more likely that individual scientists working on a problem will receive funding, but it is also likely to draw more scientists to work on the problem.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to all the Kronicle readers!

In College Football, Home Field Advantage Often Overestimated

Physorg.com: In College Football, Home Field Advantage Often Overestimated

This year, many of college football's biggest rivalry games take place over Thanksgiving weekend. A win earns bragging rights for the year. Visiting teams are often thought to be at a considerable disadvantage, especially in the disruptive environment of a rival's home stadium. In terms of points, however, that disadvantage is probably less than they think. Recent research claims that commonly accepted figures overestimate the home field advantage in major college football. ...

... Over all 100 rivalries, the advantage of playing at home tended to cluster around 2.3 points. Kros found a similar result when calculating the median (the mid-point of an ordered list from worst loss to largest margin of victory) instead of the average for each situation.

"Something's showing up, I can tell you that," said Kros. "It's definitively different from zero."

Attempting to find a universal number for home field advantage is difficult for a variety of reasons, including the yearly turnover of players and coaches, the differences in team quality and the structure of the schedule.

Should dads be in the delivery room?

BBC: Should dads be in the delivery room?

It was once imparted to the father over the phone, yet now it's men themselves who often tell their exhausted partner the sex of the child she has just delivered. But could men be more of a hindrance than a help in the delivery room?

French obstetrician Michel Odent says yes, and even blames fathers for an increasing rate of births by Caesarean section.

At a debate hosted this week by the Royal College of Midwives, Mr Odent will argue against what he dubs "the masculinisation of the birth environment".

The presence of an anxious male partner in the labour room makes the woman tense and slows her production of the hormone oxytocin, which aids the process of labour, so the French doctor contends.

This, he says, makes her much more likely to end up on the operating table having an emergency Caesarean section.

"Having been involved for more than 50 years in childbirths in homes and hospitals in France, England and Africa, the best environment I know for an easy birth is when there is nobody around the woman in labour apart from a silent, low-profile and experienced midwife," he says.

"Oxytocin is the love drug which helps the woman give birth and bond with her baby. But it is also a shy hormone and it does not come out when she is surrounded by people and technology. This is what we need to start understanding."

He will be debated by Duncan Fisher, a leading advocate for fathers, who, while pressing for more preparation for fathers, argues they are there because women want them to be - "and we should trust mothers' instincts". ...

The Market is Moral

Growthology: The Market is Moral

Nobel laureate Edmund Phelps (also a Kauffman grantee) published this stellar essay last month, which I belatedly read today:

The definition of economics with which most textbooks begin—“the study of the allocation of scarce resources”—is accurate but misleading, for it leaves out the most interesting part of the problem.

In truth, we are forever innovating to stretch our resources. Transportation was one of the scarcest goods during the first half of America’s nineteenth century, but by the end of the century the railroads had made it so abundant that the face of America changed irreversibly. That could be said today about information. Innovation makes scarce goods abundant. This quest to do better, to go farther, to extend our reach is part of what makes us human. There is more to economics than the desire to consume and to avoid risk.

Which brings us a step closer to connecting morality and economics. Morality, after all, is more than obedience to the rules of social conduct; to be moral is to foster the betterment of humankind. If we place innovation at the center of economics, then we in effect make a sweeping assertion about human nature—for we claim, at some level, that man is an innovator.

Amen!

How to Survive in an Unhappy Workplace

Harvard Business Publishing: How to Survive in an Unhappy Workplace

When you don't like your job, going to work every day can be a challenge. Your problem might be with a bad manager, that you constantly feel stretched to the breaking point, or that you are resentful about taking a pay cut. Or, the whole environment may just feel toxic. You might need to stay in your job because it provides health benefits, or maybe you're only staying while you look for another position. Whatever your reasons for being unhappy, you need to maintain your professionalism and prevent a bad attitude from sabotaging you.

What the Experts Say

Timothy Butler, Senior Fellow and Director of Career Development Programs at Harvard Business School and author of Getting Unstuck: How Dead Ends Become New Paths, believes there's something elemental about the statement 'I'm unhappy at work.'" Butler, whose research focuses on personality structure and work satisfaction, says that to understand your unhappiness, you need to turn towards that feeling of unhappiness, experience it in a deep way, and not try to solve things too quickly. He suggests observing the feelings and not expecting anything. You may just find yourself at a frontier, considering what you're going to do next. "The existential nature of unhappiness is a wake-up call," Butler says. "There's some part of the self that is not being heard, that wants your attention, and that's the issue."

Similarly, Joe Mosca, an associate professor in the Leon Hess Business School at Monmouth University, who specializes in human resources management and organizational behavior, agrees that looking within is the first step. "That may be hard for some people to hear," he suggests, because while it's true that sometimes people just don't match well with their jobs, employees tend to rationalize their job dissatisfaction rather than consider that they may be part of the problem. But if you are part of the problem, you may be part of the solution, too. ...

Wealth of Opportunity: Microfinance in Person

Unitus: Wealth of Opportunity: Microfinance in Person

"We are pleased to present  the complete 15-minute film, Wealth of Opportunity: Microfinance in Person. The production, completed in the fall of 2009, features African and Indian borrowers whose lives and futures have been transformed through microfinance. The project is a co-production by Unitus and NonFiction Media."

Wealth of Opportunity: Microfinance in Person from Unitus on Vimeo.

Changes in Share of World GDP

Mark Perry