Clean Water Lens

Together DeShawn Henry and Jim Jensen learned that "difficult problems don't necessarily need complicated solutions."
 

Ocean Cleanup Array

Boyan Slat understands well the Tao (way) of oceans, and lets massive debris come to his Ocean Cleanup Array.
 

SoccketBall

"We're harnessing rotational energy. So as the ball is rolling around the field, we have a mechanism that's rolling with it ... [that's] transferring the kinetic energy into electricity," Jessica Matthews explains.
 

Sugar, sugar (3) Moderaton in all

"In the end, reducing the consumption of all sweet things is generally better for your health. Everything in moderation, right?"

~Vanessa Hill
BrainCraft
 

Sugar, sugar (2) Addicted to it?

"Sugar is an addictive food, but even if you like eating chocolates or donuts everyday, it doesn't mean that you're addicted. Very few people are."

~Vanessa Hill
BrainCraft
 

Sugar, sugar (1) Wired to love it!

"We seek out energy-dense food like sugar, because the sweet taste signals us lots of calories we need to survive... So we're kind of hard-wired to love sugar."

~Vanessa Hill
BrainCraft
 

Self Driving Cars (3) Enter, The Philosopher

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Enter, the philosopher; center stage, the engineer

A philosopher is perhaps the last person you’d expect to have a hand in designing your next car, but that’s exactly what one expert on self-driving vehicles has in mind.

Chris Gerdes, a professor at Stanford University, leads a research lab that is experimenting with sophisticated hardware and software for automated driving. But together with Patrick Lin, a professor of philosophy at Cal Poly, he is also exploring the ethical dilemmas that may arise when vehicle self-driving is deployed in the real world.

Gerdes and Lin organized a workshop at Stanford earlier this year that brought together philosophers and engineers to discuss the issue.

Reference:  How to Help Self-Driving Cars Make Ethical Decisions.
 

Self Driving Cars (2) Is Tesla Autopilot Flawed?

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So is Tesla positioning itself in a reckless manner?

[C3group president Doug] Newcomb says that Tesla is being “somewhat cavalier” in not fully acknowledging how the technology might be used. “With new technology, people are going to use it in ways that it wasn’t intended,” he says. “But in this case, you’re not talking about smart phone or a computer. You’re talking about a dangerous vehicle.”

Reference:  Drivers Push Tesla’s Autopilot Beyond Its Abilities.
  
More importantly, it sounds like this new Tesla Autopilot is flawed!
 

Self Driving Cars (1) An Ethics-Algorithm Quandary

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The title "Why Self-Driving Cars must be Programmed to Kill" is borderline headline porn, I'd say

The subtitle is better: "Self-driving cars are already cruising the streets. But before they can become widespread, carmakers must solve an impossible ethical dilemma of algorithmic morality."

Then, the article: What do you think?

Note: more thoughts to come!

Reference: Why Self-Driving Cars Must Be Programmed to Kill.
 

The starfish story makes a difference to children

I have always loved the classic story of a little boy who was throwing starfish into the ocean when he was approached by an old man. After observing the boy's actions, and a beach covered with helpless starfish, the man told the boy that he couldn't possibly save all of the starfish and that it didn't "make a difference." The little boy then picked up another starfish and explained: "it makes a difference to this one."

For a long time, I have wanted to depict this inspiring story through photographs. Recently, my wife and I took two of our grandkids to the beach in Southern California, told them about the boy and the starfish, and then watched them act it out in their own magical way.

The following video is the result. If you are inspired by this story, please pass it along and make a difference in someone's life today.

 ~Monte Stiles
 

The starfish story à la Rutger Hauer

Starfish Tango

Rutger Hauer's tender meditation on the starfish story, that Soledad O'Brien alluded to.
 

Soledad O'Brien moved by the starfish story

"We knew we could have a pretty big impact, if we could send a handful of girls to and through college," i.e. in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

References

Starfish Media Group
Starfish Foundation
 

Gary Becker - The Economist's Economist

A professor at the University of Chicago for more than 30 years, Gary Becker is a founder of the Chicago school of economics. A winner of the John Bates Clark Medal and of the Nobel Prize in Economics, he is also a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution.

Gary Becker - An Economic Approach

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Gary S. Becker received the 1992 Nobel Prize in economics for “having extended the domain of economic theory to aspects of human behavior which had previously been dealt with—if at all—by other social science disciplines such as sociology, demography and criminology.”

Becker’s unusually wide applications of economics started early. In 1955 he wrote his doctoral dissertation at the University of Chicago on the economics of discrimination. Among other things, Becker successfully challenged the Marxist view that discrimination helps the person who discriminates. Becker pointed out that if an employer refuses to hire a productive worker simply because of skin color, that employer loses out on a valuable opportunity. In short, discrimination is costly to the person who discriminates.

Becker showed that discrimination will be less pervasive in more competitive industries because companies that discriminate will lose market share to companies that do not. He also presented evidence that discrimination is more pervasive in more-regulated, and therefore less-competitive, industries. The idea that discrimination is costly to the discriminator is common sense among economists today, and that is due to Becker.

In the early 1960s Becker moved on to the fledgling area of human capital. One of the founders of the concept (the other being Theodore Schultz), Becker pointed out what again seems like common sense but was new at the time: education is an investment. Education adds to our human capital just as other investments add to physical capital. (For more on this, see Becker’s article, “Human Capital,” in this encyclopedia.)

One of Becker’s insights is that time is a major cost of investing in education. Possibly that insight led him to his next major area, the study of the allocation of time within a family. Applying the economist’s concept of opportunity cost, Becker showed that as market wages rose, the cost to married women of staying home would rise. They would want to work outside the home and economize on household tasks by buying more appliances and fast food.

Not even crime escaped Becker’s keen analytical mind. In the late 1960s he wrote a trail-blazing article whose working assumption is that the decision to commit crime is a function of the costs and benefits of crime. From this assumption he concluded that the way to reduce crime is to raise the probability of punishment or to make the punishment more severe. His insights into crime, like his insights on discrimination and human capital, helped spawn a new branch of economics.

In the 1970s Becker extended his insights on allocation of time within a family, using the economic approach to explain the decisions to have children and to educate them, and the decisions to marry and to divorce.

Becker was a professor at Columbia University from 1957 to 1969. Except for that period, he spent his entire career at the University of Chicago, where he held joint appointments in the departments of economics and sociology. Becker won the John Bates Clark Award of the American Economic Association in 1967 and was president of that association in 1987.

Reference:  Gary Stanley Becker
 

Gary Becker - Nobel Prize (1992)

Gary Becker

The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (1992)

Born: 2 December 1930, Pottsville, PA

Died: 3 May 2014, Chicago, IL

Affiliation at the time of the award: University of Chicago, Chicago, IL

Prize motivation: "for having extended the domain of microeconomic analysis to a wide range of human behaviour and interaction, including nonmarket behaviour"

Field: economic sociology, microeconomics

Contribution: Extended the domain of economic theory to aspects of human behavior which had previously been dealt with by other social science disciplines such as sociology, demography and criminology.

Reference: Gary S Becker - Facts
  

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (9)

"When you were a young man, you were often criticized for doing research that was in some sense immoral: immoral to the extent that economists shouldn't be thinking about these kinds of questions. You often put them in so much stark and dramatic terms; thinking of a child as a consumer durable, for example, didn't necessarily hit everybody well. How important is morality in terms of determining economic analysis? I mean, do you find that when you're doing economic analysis, the morality creeps in?"

~Interviewer Edward Lazear, asking Gary Becker
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (8)

Gary Becker speaks to the effects of educated women on the family: Their families have lower birth rates (i.e. fewer children), but the mothers invest more in teaching their children and helping them prepare for their schooling. So educated women, in Becker's language, are good at producing human capital. 

What about disadvantaged women and their families?
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (7)

Gary Becker studied the family as a fundamental, social unit: "Why do people stayed married or get divorced? How we can better understand changes in fertility rates? Why has the institution of the family changed so radically in recent decades?" This work is simply one area, through which people as a theme for Becker threads. In this clip, for instance, the topic is education and human capital.
  

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (6)

In this clip Gary Becker speaks in an informed, thoughtful way about political systems and criminal justice vis-a-vis interest groups. The economic approach clearly has applicability across sectors and types of society, but this sort of systematic, analytic approach isn't just the purview of economics. It's an approach many other fields adopt, from social or behavioral science, to physics and technology. At the end of day, therefore, I as a clinical psychologist can tap my training in research and statistics, for example, and take that economic approach that Becker speaks to and undertake fully, without ever calling myself an economist.
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (5)

Gary Becker takes a thoughtful, intellectual, logical approach to understanding human behavior. In this light, he could very well be coming from a psychological perspective, not just (or not even) an economic perspective. In other words, I think his field of study doesn't matter as much as the measured, systematic approach he takes.
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (4)

Many (if not all) aspects of society - including law and crime - arguably have an economic implication, e.g. benefits and costs, and are therefore amenable to economic study. In this regard, Gary Becker was clearly one pivotal figure in this wider view and application of economics.
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (3)

"Why do we have different disciplines of economics, political science and sociology anymore? Don't we need to rethink these divisions that were carved out a century ago, and reorganize the American academy in a way that takes account of the fact all of these disciplines have changed, and none of the existing barriers make really any sense whatsoever?" inquires Ed Glaeser.

Gary Becker, receiving the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1992

Professor [Gary] Becker’s Nobel Lecture was his sharpest defense against these charges [i.e. that his "world was populated by a hyper-rational economic man, obsessed with maximizing his wealth"], and he recounted how he “tried to pry economists away from narrow assumptions about self-interest.” Instead, he said, “behavior is driven by a much richer set of values and preferences.” Purposeful decision making doesn’t mean that behavior is driven by financial concerns, but rather, in his view, “individuals maximize welfare, as they conceive it, whether they be selfish, altruistic, loyal, spiteful or masochistic," writes Justin Wolfers, with The New York Times.
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (2)

"Issues like Black-White differences, male-female type of differences, and other sort of differences are, number one, very important to the economy and, number two, economists have something to say about that. These is very obvious statement, but that was considered heretical and some unacceptable," explains Gary Becker.
 

Gary Becker - An Intellectual Portrait (1)

"We've [economists] changed really from being a field about subject to being a field about methodology, to being a field about approach. Of course certainly the general view is that you [Gary Becker] were the great figure moving us along that change," prompts Ed Glaeser.

A truly open, competitive market may reduce discrimination, but not quite eliminate it (rf. discrimination coefficient and nepotism coefficient).
 

Sadako Sasaki and a Thousand Cranes (5)

Perhaps a tribute to Sadako Sasaki

Sadako Sasaki, in her too short of a life and her way untimely death

Sadako Sasaki and a Thousand Cranes (4)

On August 6, 1945, the first-ever nuclear weapon was used. CNN's Ivan Watson has the details on how Japan remembered the horrific event.

"Many here today hope the horrific memories of 1945 will make people think twice, before taking the path to war."
 

Sadako Sasaki and a Thousand Cranes (3)

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"Thousand Cranes," by the jazz band Hiroshima, is a memorial to Sadako Sasaki, who was only 2 years old when the US dropped an atomic bomb in Hiroshima. That was August 6th 1945. Amazingly Sadako survived the devastation, and grew up seemingly normal and healthy. But nine years later, she came down with Leukemia.

The following is the story about her and a thousand cranes:

In August of 1955, after two days of treatment, she was moved into a room with a roommate, a junior high student who was two years older than her. It was this roommate that told her the Japanese legend that promises that anyone who folds a thousand origami cranes will be granted a wish and she taught Sadako how to fold paper cranes. [a] A popular version of the story is that Sadako fell short of her goal of folding 1,000 cranes, having folded only 644 before her death, and that her friends completed the 1,000 and buried them all with her. This comes from the book Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. [b] An exhibit which appeared in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum stated that by the end of August 1955, Sadako had achieved her goal and continued to fold more cranes.

Though she had plenty of free time during her days in the hospital to fold the cranes, she lacked paper. She would use medicine wrappings and whatever else she could scrounge up. This included going to other patients' rooms to ask to use the paper from their get-well presents. Chizuko would bring paper from school for Sadako to use.

During her time in the hospital her condition progressively worsened. Around mid-October her left leg became swollen and turned purple. After her family urged her to eat something, Sadako requested tea on rice and remarked "It's tasty". Those were her last words. With her family around her, Sadako died on the morning of October 25, 1955 at the age of 12.

Reference: Sadako Sasaki.
 

Sadako Sasaki and a Thousand Cranes (2)

Show her now that we do care
With a love that we all share
Send her a thousand cranes
Send her your thousand cranes

Show her now that we do care
With a hope that we all share
Send her a thousand cranes
Send her your thousand cranes

Thousand Cranes, by Hiroshima
 

Sadako Sasaki and a Thousand Cranes (1)

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I saw this image in a small photo album from a friend on Google+, and I immediately thought about the following lovely piece:

Innovation Nation: Liter of Light

The greatest form of helping people is to make yourself obsolete... You have to teach them how to solve things themselves.

~Illac Diaz
 

Innovation Nation: Hollow Flashlight

I believe that thermoelectricity is a great source of untapped, lost energy and I am researching methods of capturing it and using it for the human good. I believe it holds the hope of replacing batteries in certain low power applications, as well as powering flashlights. This will eventually have a significant effect on the pollution caused by used batteries in our landfills and water tables.

Currently, the major obstacle to the wide use of human heat energy, is the efficiency of the capturing and conversion technology. My own thermoelectric flashlight is currently under development to improve efficiencies and provide a brighter light. That is not an easy task and I am pitted against limits of current technology. We have made a small production run of the flashlights which are being tested and considered for mass production by a major manufacturer.

 ~Ann Makosinski
  

Innovation Nation: Cloth Electricity

Power Felt is a fabric, and it generates power from your body's heat and your body's motion... Now I don't see power as only what comes from that plug. I see power as mobile, power as dynamic, power as you, your emotion, the heat that you generate.

~David Carroll, Director of the Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials at Wake Forest University
 

The Aspen Institute: Social Impact Bonds

How and Why Philanthropy is Catalyzing the Development of a New Market

The Aspen Institute Program on Philanthropy and Social Innovation and Social Finance US are co-hosting an event to celebrate the launch of Social Finance's latest white paper, "Foundations for Social Impact Bonds: How and Why Philanthropy is Catalyzing the Development of a New Market."

Social Finance US will present the research findings followed by a panel discussion that explores the catalytic role foundations have played in the market and what role they may play as the market matures.

Speakers:

Tracy Palandjian, CEO and Co-Founder, Social Finance US
Surya Kolluri, Managing Director, Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Bill Pinakiewicz, Vice President, Nonprofit Finance Fund
Jane Hughes, Director of Knowledge Management, Social Finance US
Kippy Joseph, Associate Director, Innovation, Rockefeller Foundation (moderator)

The Aspen Institute: Social Justice

Generously underwritten by the Hurst Family Foundation, the Hurst Lecture Series features conversations with renowned and inspiring leaders for public audiences in Aspen.

Featuring Darren Walker, President of the Ford Foundation; interviewed by Jane Wales, Vice President of the Aspen Institute and Executive Director of the Institute's Program on Philanthropy and Social Innovation. The Ford Foundation is the second largest philanthropy in the United States with over $11 billion in assets and $500 million in annual giving. The foundation is based in the United States and operates worldwide, with ten offices in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Central and South America.

The Aspen Institute: Women Philanthropists

The original definition of philanthropy is "the love of humankind." Going back to the roots of this word, how are leading women philanthropists approaching giving with a humanitarian lens? What does it mean to be [women philanthropists] today, how did they create their philanthropic agenda, and how might these women influence a younger and broader generation of philanthropists?

Innovation: Closer means closer!

"Animal lovers in the tech world have decided 'It's time to let technology bring us closer to our pets." What do they mean by "closer"? For example, keeping your dog actively engaged in an activity it loves (iFetch); monitoring its activity, like a Fitbit for dogs (Whistle); and staying connected with your dog via an intercom and treat dispenser (Petzi Connect). "Closer" to your pets presumably means you use such technology only when you have to be away, such as at work, on vacation, or perhaps on an errand. Which means that iFetch etc are only interim technology solutions and that otherwise "closer" means you're actually spending time with your pets.
 

Innovation: Multidisciplinary Outlook + Collaboration

Ekateryna Nova talks about how the current education system fails to reflect new research on what fosters innovation and creativity in schools. According to Nova, scientific and technological advances are driven by people with a broad range of interests – like biologists that study history or engineers that study art.* However, while working on a project linking innovation economics with British Columbia’s attitudes towards multidisciplinary studies, Nova found that the current system actually hindered collaboration between disciplines rather than promote it. In her TEDx talk, Nova talks about how this attitude is not only damaging the potential for innovation, but also works in contrast to career projections of modern times – where an individual is expected to switch careers up to seven times in their life time.

*Multidisciplinary outlook + consideration + collaboration is fundamentally what I propose in The Tripartite Model.
 

Innovation: Working Ecology + People Connecting

Innovation entails integrating technologies and other knowledge into a whole product, a whole technology platform, a whole business, a whole company and a whole ecology of enterprises. Innovation management focuses on the linkages and synergies among people, work units, knowledge systems, alliance partners, and inter-organizational associations that are necessary to create streams of new products and services. Innovation management is about creating and managing all these links. Tear down those silos.

First, CEOs must see the big picture, that is, of innovation as a system, and they must appreciate the value and importance of such an ecology. They assume the standard bearer for purpose: What is it that the company wants or needs to accomplish, and what are the reasons driving such want or need. Then, it's about their people talking with one another, forging relationships within and across functions, working through disagreements constructively, and collaborating in earnest to fulfill a shared purpose.

I argue that the foregoing is the crucial foundation for innovation, which underlie and enable Deborah Dougherty's innovation management model. In short, product, capability, business and strategy development, and integrating it all, require such basics as people talking, relating, and working together.

It may be easy for CEOs and their staff, consultants or professors to say, of course, these people matters are a given. However, CEOs et al. may be too quick to forge ahead with a model, process or toolkit, and essentially take these people matters for granted. But unless these matters are checked, worked through, and ensured, any model, process or toolkit is bound to fail.

 

USC Center: Philanthropy + Education Reform

This is a special presentation of the event, given to the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy Faculty.

Sarah Reckhow is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Michigan State University. Her research and teaching interests include urban politics, education policy, nonprofits and philanthropy, and racial and ethnic politics. Reckhow's work on urban schools has focused on policy reforms in New York City, Los Angeles, and Oakland. Her book, Follow the Money: How Foundation Dollars Change Public School Politics, examines the role of major foundations, such as the Gates Foundation, in urban school reform. Reckhow has also studied the role of philanthropy in developing metropolitan social safety nets in Detroit, Chicago, Atlanta, and Denver. This research was published in a report from the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program. She has recently published articles in Urban Affairs Review, Policy Studies Journal, and Planning Theory. Reckhow is affiliated with theGlobal Urban Studies Program at MSU, and she is a member of the MacArthur Foundation research network: Building Resilient Regions. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley in 2009. Prior to attending graduate school, Reckhow was a high school teacher in the Baltimore City Public Schools.

USC Center: Philanthropy + Global Health

The USC Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy Conversations on Philanthropy series:

Philanthropy and Global Health

Featuring:

Barbara Bush
Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Global Health Corps

Cara Esposito
Executive Director
Leonetti/O'Connell Family Foundation

Esther Wachtell
Founding Member, Board of Advisors
The Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy

James M. Ferris
Director
The Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy

Barbara Bush is CEO and co-founder of Global Health Corps. Before joining GHC, Barbara worked in Educational Programming at the Smithsonian Institution’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, where she supported design thinking programs for high school students and faculty across the US. She has worked for Red Cross Children’s Hospital in Capetown, South Africa and interned for UNICEF in Botswana. She has traveled with the UN World Food Programme, focusing on the importance of nutrition. Barbara is a member of UNICEF’s Next Generation Steering Committee, and is on the Board of Directors of Covenant House International, PSI, Friends of the Global Fight for AIDS, TB, and Malaria, and the UN’s Social Entrepreneurship Council. She is a Draper Richards Foundation Social Entrepreneur, a World Economic Forum Young Global Shaper, and a fellow of the Echoing Green Foundation. Barbara was named one of Glamour Magazine’s Women of the Year in 2011 and one of Newsweek’s Women of Impact in 2013. Barbara Bush graduated from Yale University with a degree in Humanities in 2004.

The Center recently introduced the Conversations on Philanthropy series as a means to bring together different decision makers from philanthropy – foundation leaders, individual donors, and family foundation trustees – along with experts in a field to discuss a specific issue of keen interest to the philanthropic community. These Los Angeles based discussions are aimed at bringing together different segments of philanthropy in an attempt to bridge fragmentation within the sector and leverage the power of the sector’s pluralism.

USC Center: Philanthropy + Public Policy

Mission

The Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy promotes more effective philanthropy and strengthens the nonprofit sector through research that informs philanthropic decision-making and public policy to advance community problem solving.

An Engaged Research Center

Since its inception in 2000, The Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy has emphasized research and analysis as a means to deepening the understanding of complex issues in philanthropy and to ensuring important topics are addressed by the field. By conducting groundbreaking studies and widely sharing the findings, the Center provides in-depth knowledge of philanthropy’s changing landscape as well as strategies for action. This empowers philanthropic decision-makers, policymakers, and civic leaders with the information and insights needed to create meaningful change, both independently and collectively.

The Center benefits from its vantage point on the West Coast, where philanthropy continues to grow faster than in the rest of the country and where new models and forms of giving are emerging. As an integral part of the University of Southern California’s Sol Price School of Public Policy, the Center draws upon the University’s intellectual assets – its interdisciplinary strengths, its commitment to linking theory with practice, and its community involvement – to develop innovative approaches to complex societal challenges. The Center plays an instrumental role in the School’s focus on governance and public problem solving, in the process bolstering philanthropy’s influence and impact in the region, nationally, and worldwide.

Advancing the Field of Philanthropy

From its studies on new philanthropists and California foundations to its analysis of foundation strategies for public policy engagement, the Center’s research is rigorous, relevant, and accessible.

To advance the field of philanthropy, the Center’s enduring intellectual agenda focuses on three principal areas:

The Changing Landscape of Philanthropy: The Center examines the motivations and strategies for philanthropic behavior; new structures for philanthropic activity; and the impact of emerging trends on philanthropy, nonprofits, and the communities they serve.

Philanthropic Strategies for Public Problem Solving: The Center studies ways that philanthropists and philanthropic institutions are becoming more strategic in their efforts to problem solve by influencing public policy and by working together and in partnership with government and business.

Philanthropic Stewardship and Leadership: The Center explores issues of accountability and stewardship in philanthropy as well as public policies that shape and influence philanthropic decision-making.

Convening Leaders to Inform and Inspire

The Center is the premier venue for high-level discourse on philanthropy in southern California, bringing philanthropically minded individuals together to share experiences, to learn from each other, and to inspire one another to greater heights. By promoting a dialogue about philanthropy’s role in public problem solving and by helping to establish networks among those working to improve our communities, the Center is providing philanthropic leaders with the knowledge and insights to think differently about how best to effect meaningful, lasting change for institutions and individuals across the region and beyond.

Distinguished Speakers Series: The Center’s hallmark Distinguished Speakers Series enables leaders from different vantage points – philanthropists, foundation executives, and policymakers – to share their views on philanthropy and public policy, stimulating conversation about emerging trends in philanthropy and their public policy implications.

Forums and Roundtables: The Center organizes national forums to bring together prominent thought leaders, researchers, and decision makers for in-depth analysis of the varied dimensions of philanthropy, as well as emerging trends and prospects. The Center also holds smaller roundtable discussions with renowned experts on key issues in the field, based on commissioned papers and research reports.

Conversations on Philanthropy: The Center has initiated a series that brings together the various segments of philanthropy – foundation executives, family foundation trustees, and individual donors – along with noted experts to discuss issues of keen interest such as the arts, children and youth, and the environment.

Leadership Exchanges: The Center provides intimate settings where like-minded individuals – from CEOs of L.A.’s largest foundations to groups of new donors who are developing strategies for greater impact – can meet with their peers to discuss critical challenges they face in their philanthropic work.

Shaping the Future

In its remarkable short history, the Center has set a new standard in cutting-edge scholarship that explores the nexus of philanthropy and public policy and informs nonprofit, business, and government leaders as they seek to address the myriad of challenges facing diverse communities. Building on its expertise, the Center also educates the next generation of sector leaders by infusing its work in the School’s nationally ranked educational programs in philanthropy and nonprofit management.

Working with its partners, The Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy will continue to pioneer the future of philanthropy. As we move forward,we aim to heighten philanthropy’s impact by expanding its knowledge base and translating research findings into practice; by overcoming fragmentation in the field to leverage many voices; and by forging stronger connections and deeper relationships that transcend the nonprofit sector.

Through its research and commitment to driving the conversation around these issues, the Center will help to transform philanthropy in its scope, reach, and impact, making a crucial difference in the quality of life in communities everywhere.

Reference: The Center on Philanthropy & Public Policy.

I scanned the Forbes channel on YouTube for videos on philanthropy, which I can write about in this blog.  But only two suited my interests, so I kept searching.  I stumbled upon the USC Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy.  The Core Algorithm, first and foremost, works off of a solid conceptual framework - Theory of Algorithms.  As a practical applications model of that framework, The Core Algorithm emphasizes gathering together and conversing; weighing key issues, problems or challenges and agreeing on ends in mind; creating the roadmap for truly reaching these ends; and taking concerted, effective action to reach these ends.

What I highlighted in the foregoing remarks give me reason to be very excited about this Center.  Other than my more holistic approach to understanding weighty issues that concern people across the world - that is, the Tripartite Model that draws not just on science but also on art and religion - the Center's charter resonates quite well with The Core Algorithm and Theory of Algorithm.  I look forward to knowing more about their efforts and perhaps to collaborating in these efforts.
 

Children at risk in the Gaza Strip

The Gaza Strip, located between Israel and Egypt, has been a recurring hotspot for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for years. With half of the population in Gaza being children, UNICEF reports that almost 60,000 are in need of immediate psychosocial care due to the deep emotional impact of the current violence.

Many of us away from such tragedy and trauma can only imagine what these dear children have endured.  What succor and sustenance for them?

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Syrians and Iraqis at a border camp

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR] was established on December 14, 1950 by the United Nations General Assembly. The agency is mandated to lead and co-ordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve refugee problems worldwide. Its primary purpose is to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country. It also has a mandate to help stateless people.

Since 1950, the agency has helped tens of millions of people restart their lives. Today, a staff of more than 9,300 people in 123 countries continues to help and protect millions of refugees, returnees, internally displaced and stateless people.

Reference:  The UN Refugee Agency.

It isn't just the citizens of one country in turmoil, but also the citizens of another country in turmoil, who seek refuge in the millions.  We live in such a progressive, privileged world, that one hopes this sort of displacement and hardship would never have to happen.
 

What does it take in Syria?

Take Action

In 2013, the heads of UN agencies sent a message saying “ENOUGH” to the crisis in Syria.

But the crisis continues — it enters its fifth year on 15 March.

With no end in sight, we ask what does it take for those with political influence to end this senseless suffering once and for all?

Join IN

Join us and express your frustration about the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Syria, and send a message of solidarity to the people of Syria.

Take a photo holding the sign #WhatDoesItTake.

Post the photo to Facebook, Twitter or Instagram using the hashtag #WhatDoesItTake and adding a message of solidarity for Syria’s people. Example: #WhatDoesItTake to end the #SyriaCrisis.

Reference: Syria - #WhatDoesItTake.

Both figures and images are heartbreaking in this short clip from the United Nations.
 

"A quiet mind is poised to react more astutely"

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What makes meditation palatable to entrepreneurs and executives these days is that it is perceived as a tool to help increase productivity. A quiet mind more easily recognizes unexpected business opportunities and is poised to react more astutely. “If you are looking solely for an investor, you might be guided to, or looking for, the guy in the business suit,” [Wisdom 2.0 Founder] Mr. [Soren] Gordhamer said. “Instead, you may need to be talking to the guy in jeans.”

Reference: How to Find a Job with Meditation and Mindfulness.

Good news for such job seekers, that there are scores of companies and organizations bridging the spiritual with the pragmatic.
 

Sohum "signifies a divine connection with the universe"

Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini

But not everyone believes that meditation and yoga are appropriate in the workplace. A recent article in The Harvard Business Review cautioned that “mindfulness is close to taking on cult status in the business world,” and it enumerated ways that a meditative disposition could backfire in the office. Stress can be a useful prompt to engage in critical thinking, noted the author, David Brendel, and is not something to retreat from through meditation. And even as Aetna and others chart what they say are the health benefits of mindfulness and yoga, not all researchers are convinced.

“The public enthusiasm for complementary health practices — and meditation in particular — is outpacing the scientific research,” said Willoughby Britton, a professor of psychiatry and human behavior at Brown University, who is studying the potential negative side effects of meditation. “Widespread implementation is premature.”

Mr. Bertolini has heard the critics, and takes pains not to impose yoga or meditation on any employees. (There are no incentives for workers to take the classes.) But he can’t help but champion both causes. They helped him come back from the abyss.

Reference: At Aetna, a CEO's Management by Mantra.

As in the preceding article, this one speaks to a life-changing, corporate-wide bridging between the spiritual and the workplace.  I find it to be a compelling shift in milieu not known to adopt anything even remotely esoteric.  But I highlight the above remarks, because it is important to acknowledge both sides of the story.  Not everyone is bought in, and many plead caution and call upon research.  Understandably so, yoga, mantra and mindfulness notwithstanding, it is a good idea for any CEO to be thoughtful about making such a shift.  Still Bertolini's near death experience is nothing to dismiss or discount vis-a-vis what we do and what is important to us in the workplace.
 

"There is no work-life balance. We have one life."

Yoga, meditation, ‘mindfulness’ – 
why some of the West’s biggest companies are embracing eastern spirituality

These contradictions – Buddhist teachers who aren’t Buddhists, corporations with spiritual communities, capitalism embracing traditions that shun materialism – are perhaps unsurprising in the modern age. Just as General Mills products are sold around the globe, feeding people from India to Indiana, so too the fundamental tenets of the world’s great religions are freely traded in every corner of the earth. The result is that the people who work hard to make high-margin, low-calorie breakfast cereals are at the same time striving to improve their spiritual equilibrium and even get a taste of enlightenment. “There is no work-life balance,” [General Mills' Deputy General Counsel Janice] Marturano says. “We have one life. What’s most important is that you be awake for it.”

Reference: The mind business.

By my mid-adolescence, I questioned the wisdom of my Catholic upbringing and the tenets of the church.  For many years thereafter, I set aside any religious matter from my mind, as I gravitated toward the spirituality and philosophy of the East, Taoism, in particular.  In fact, I characterized myself as spiritual not religious.  Discovering T'ai Chi was my prompt for this shift.  For the longest time, I kept this side of me separate from the professional identity I carved in the corporate milieu.  The reason I revel in the foregoing article is that it bridges these two sides for me and scores of others.
 

Blake Mycoskie: Doing Business and Doing Good

How TOMS Founder Blake Mycoskie created a global apparel brand one step at a time [rf. One for One.®].

I have argued that to do good meaningfully over the long run, one has to have structure, processes and commitment that underpin and sustain that effort.  More specifically, philanthropy succeeds best when it makes money as part of doing good and it does good as part of making money.  This way, it isn't so reliable, or merely reliant, on donors to fund its efforts, initiatives and projects.

So, in this respect, a business is a perfect vehicle for doing good.  But the question from Forbes Joseph Deacetis is a good one:  How can TOMS survive as business by giving away one pair of shoes for every pair it sells?

Mycoskie gives us a good clue:  In part, TOMS makes it work by managing its costs (shunning splashy marketing campaigns) and gaining cost efficiencies (relying on customers to spread the word about the good they do by buying TOMS).  I am sure there are other efforts along these lines.  Also it may be that TOMS rely on a host of its other products, such as totes, sunglasses, and necklaces to help fund its shoes giveaways.  Shoes, in other words, maybe a strategic loss leader for the company.  On the whole, though, I imagine that TOMS have formulated algorithms for the best price points that permit them to do good and earn money.

To my argument at the outset, profit and philanthropy can meaningfully, viably walk hand in hand.
 

Marc Benioff: Weaving Philanthropy into Business

Salesforce founder and CEO, Marc Benioff, shares how his company sets an example of compassionate capitalism, by making service a part of their culture.

Indeed company information begins with the very thing Benioff talks about:

Sixteen years ago, we launched Salesforce with a vision to reinvent CRM in the cloud.

And a new technology model was born.

We also put aside 1% of our equity, 1% of our employee time, and 1% of our product to form the Salesforce Foundation. These two key decisions have fueled our incredible growth, made us the global leader in CRM, defined the era of cloud computing, and inspired a new philanthropic model for all to follow.

Reference: Salesforce.

I think it's easier, and more sustainable, if that philanthropic model is part of the design and construction of a company, that is, from the get go.  Then, how its CEO et al. run the company, how it markets and sells products, and whom it brings on board are all part of earning money and doing good.  It's certainly not impossible or impractical to embed a philanthropic initiative into an existing business model, culture or process, but this takes more thinking through, more seeking support, and I imagine more trials and tribulations.

It's amazing how some schools take play away from children.  Thank goodness for Playworks and for Salesforce Foundation, these children have things to keep them active physically - to balance the mental activity of their school day.
 

Chuck Feeney: Keeping Philanthropy Anonymous

Atlantic Philanthropies will have contributed more than $7.5 billion in areas from education and aging, to human rights and healthcare, benefiting people in seven regions of the world, by the time it concludes its grant making in 2016.  So it's a staggering figure by any standard, and it reaches countless people.

It was wonderful to see Warren Buffet, billionaire philanthropist extraordinaire himself, introduce the Forbes 400 Lifetime Achievement Award, then to hear Steven Denning, Chairman of General Atlantic, speak about the foregoing philanthropy.   

But where was Chuck Feeney himself? 

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Apparently Feeney shuns publicity, and seeks little prestige for his philanthropic efforts.  What is more, were it not for a dispute with a former business partner, Conor O'Clery may never have even conceived of the book he came to publish in 2008 - The Billionaire Who Wasn't: How Chuck Feeney Secretly Made and Gave Away a Fortune.  There is something deeply admirable about a philanthropist who wishes to remain anonymous.  Of course anonymity is difficult in a highly plugged in world that we live in, but his absence at this Award ceremony a perfect thing.  

Kudos to him!
 

Wilbur Sargunaraj (3) on responses to poverty

Don't live for money. It's not worth the fight. Share what you have, and let's distribute it right.

I discovered Wilbur Sargunaraj just this week, and I love the social conscientiousness that is embedded in his catchy songs.  Responses to poverty includes (a) ignoring the people and their problem; (b) giving to the poor, but avoiding contact with them as if they suffered from leprosy; and (c) true to Sargunaraj's persona and gambit, giving to the poor, but engaging them and making them laugh.  Of course he advocates for the last one, but he does so with a sense humor.

We’re not campaigners. We don’t want money. We’re not pushing for a single, specific solution to global poverty.

Eight documentaries from award-winning filmmakers and 34 shorts from new and emerging talents. The films are moving, subtle and thought-provoking stories, but they also tackle big issues and pose difficult questions.

Reference:  Why Poverty?
 

Wilbur Sargunaraj (2) on what causes poverty

INDIA: Caste - a cause of poverty and discrimination?  For more on this and teaching resources linked to the film, go to Why Poverty?

Wilbur Sargunaraj, India's first You tube star, takes us on an enlightening and often irreverent journey into poverty and the lives of India's poor.  Along the way, in Episode 2, Wilbur asks what causes poverty? He shows how the caste system is not very First Class. [It is incorrect!] There is inequality, but to make it a better place, you have to start right now. "In life you should be content as these two goats. See how content they are."

It isn't just a matter of inequality, but also an issue of discrimination and prejudice.  It is in such culture and it is with such mindset that we see the underpinning of poverty, that is, the haves versus the have nots.  Then, when Sargunaraj encourages us to be as content as goats, there is a sense of irony and pathos in that.
 

Wilbur Sargunaraj (1) on what is poverty

INDIA: Wilbur Sargunaraj, India's first You tube star, takes us on an enlightening and often irreverent journey into poverty and the lives of India's poor. For more on this and teaching resources linked to the film, go to Why Poverty?

Along the way, Wilbur asks his fellow countrymen what they think poverty is: what do people need to be without for them to be deemed impoverished? And he speaks to some of India's poor so we can see what they have and what they can show us. Episode 1 of "Wilbur Goes Poor" focuses on what poverty is.

I love Sargunaraj's sense of humor cum pathos about the poor of India.  His point about how we, perhaps media outlets, want to sweep abject poverty out of view, is quite well taken.

But this is what it is.

In keeping with The Core Algorithm, Sargunaraj does well in asking village people directly how they define poor: no food, no house, no water, and no sleeping.  Their definition is far from scientific or scholarly, but it speaks to an authentic experience that we can appreciate and understand.
 

Heartbreak of Poverty (3) in South Africa

What's your walk to school like when, everyday, you have to cross one of the poorest parts of South Africa to get to class? Kelina, aged [11], is getting an education in a township in Cape Town, riddled with guns, drugs and violence. How does she see the world on her daily trip to school?

How ever do these children, who manage to walk these corridors of guns, drugs and violence - where apparently 50,000 crimes against them are reported each year - actually learn?  How does Kelina do in school in the midst of terror?

What goes through my mind is I'm scared to walk alone, because they raped a woman in the street. We saw the blood she left afterwards. You have no choice but to see these things.

Heartbreak of Poverty (2) in Bolivia

Take a cozy green screen studio, built inside a tent, to any place in the world. Then start collecting stories by asking random bypassers: what do you have in your heart? These are the stories from Bolivia.

These stories may stitch together as heartbreak of love, but it seems poverty is never quite far away.  I find the monologue an impassioned girl delivers at the beginning to be quite poignant:

Listen to my voice. Beware! I am the fury of the abandoned. Melancholy is my father, hunger is my mother, the frontier is my home. In the square I can see happy and sad people. And some people begging.

Heartbreak of Poverty (1) in Russia

An estimated 5 million people are homeless in Russia.  An estimated 1 million of them are children.  Those numbers are rapidly growing.

This short film was published on November 7th 2012, and with the plunge in oil prices this past year, I find it horrible to imagine how much worse the economic impact is on scores of Russians.  Still, amid the heartbreak of poverty, these children say

Dare to dream.  It's not wrong to dream.

 

EPA Gina McCarthy (3) Real Climate Progress

U.S. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy says the the new carbon rules will tell the international community that the U.S. is serious about reducing emissions.

It's hard to speak for the international community, McCarthy seems to say, and certainly she has no mandate or authority to regulate their efforts, or lack thereof, on climate change.  However, there is real precedent that the US can set for the world to see and some real progress to forge on our climate action plan.  It isn't about fighting domestically either, she adds, rather about acknowledging how bound up ecology and economics are (hence, Wall Street Journal ECO:nomics conference).  Everyone has to acknowledge that environment must be part and parcel of how countries grow their economies.  Very well said!
 

EPA Gina McCarthy (2) Ready for Hardball

U.S. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy says that if the states refuse to participate with the agency’s new carbon rules, it will regulate emissions directly.

Ah, of course, nothing is ever really straightforward when it comes to human endeavors, and any endeavor is inviolably human.  Specifically, political interests, namely those of Republicans, apparently muster resistance among certain states to the Supreme Court mandate and EPA initiative on carbon reductions.  Again I really like McCarthy's earnest, collaborative, no nonsense stance with these states.  That is, if states don't play ball responsibly, then the EPA will dish it back with some hardball.
 

EPA Gina McCarthy (1) States' Carbon Reductions

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy makes the case for the constitutionality of the new carbon rules at the [Wall Street Journal] ECO:nomics conference.

I fundamentally like what McCarthy relates here on EPA expectations of states:  It isn't necessarily a mandate to hit target carbon reductions, but instead an effort to work collaboratively with states to start where they are, review their current situations vis-a-vis workable goals, and put plans for reductions.  I don't imagine that is an allowance for states to sandbag their efforts, however.  Collectively the states' plans ought to indicate a 30% target reduction by 2030, but I gather that McCarthy has yet to see all of their plans and therefore isn't in a position (yet) to set definitive targets.  Regardless, the mandate from the Supreme Court is that the EPA and the states must acknowledge that carbon is an official pollutant and that together they must do something about it.
 

Saadia Zahidi (3) Rising Force of Women

One school of thought, I suppose, is to buck what may be a dysfunctional, archaic system and undermine it and ultimately overthrow it.  Another school of thought, however, bears serious consideration, as Saadia Zahidi suggests:  Work within a system, find best fit solutions for a culture, and leverage media and technology for this purpose.  Some companies in Saudi Arabia apparently find ways that work well.

Brilliant!

But the work is far from complete. Large gaps between women and men’s labor-force participation remain: for example, about 47 percent of women in the United Arab Emirates that could be working are employed, compared with about 92 percent of men. If, during the next 15 years, the participation of women in the workforce across the Middle East and North Africa simply reaches that of two-thirds of men—around 60 percent—it has the potential to spike regional GDP by 20 percent or more. As businesses and policy makers recognize the benefits and momentum gathers to eliminate the barriers blocking Muslim women from full economic participation, this largely unseen population will truly become a force to be reckoned with.

Saadia Zahidi is... head of the Gender Parity Programme and head of Employment, Skills and Human Capital. In November 2014, the proposal for her book, Womenomics in the Muslim World, won the inaugural FT/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for business writers under age 35.

Reference: Women in the Muslim world taking the fast track to change.
 

Saadia Zahidi (2) Ongoing Barriers for Women

McDonald's in Pakistan deliberately set a policy to bring in educated women from lower income families.  The notion of their working is perhaps at best a foreign concept and at worst a target of resistance.  But because these young women have a safe workplace, get transportation between work and home, and (not to mention) earn an income, their families are evidently coming to accept their new normal.

Hooray to McDonald's for overcoming a barrier for women!

All of this underlines the conscious, often deeply personal and brave decision of millions of ordinary Muslim women and men to break family tradition and sometimes shun cultural pressures. As a result, a new segment of the labor market has emerged—and unprecedented consumer power.

Saadia Zahidi is... head of the Gender Parity Programme and head of Employment, Skills and Human Capital. In November 2014, the proposal for her book, Womenomics in the Muslim World, won the inaugural FT/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for business writers under age 35.

Reference: Women in the Muslim world taking the fast track to change.
 

Saadia Zahidi (1) Unfolding Story of Women

Saadia Zahidi is smart, articulate and visible, and as a Senior Director at the World Economic Forum, she paints a compelling picture for 40 million Muslim women having entered the workforce over the last decade:

An untold and still unfolding story exists in their lives, hidden in their classrooms, careers, and handbags. Changes that took half a century in the United States are being compressed into a decade in today’s Muslim world, and they are only likely to accelerate. It’s as if the United States had compressed into a few short years the half-century evolution from Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique to Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In. That is the magnitude of this sweeping change.

Saadia Zahidi is... head of the Gender Parity Programme and head of Employment, Skills and Human Capital. In November 2014, the proposal for her book, Womenomics in the Muslim World, won the inaugural FT/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for business writers under age 35.

Reference: Women in the Muslim world taking the fast track to change.
 

Aung San Suu Kyi on Peace and its Threats

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Burmese activist and politician Aung San Suu Kyi focuses on peace and makes a compelling case for eradicating things that undermine it.  But because of the complex web that defines many aspects of our humanity, we can focus on any one of those things - discrimination, inequality or poverty - and argue that the rest represent root causes.  Throw in conflict, disease and disenfranchisement, and that complex web is much more than a Molotov Cocktail: It is a conflagration that affects all of humanity.
 

Frederick Douglass on Discrimination and Safety

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Frederick Douglass was an African-American reformer and statesman from the 19th century, and his point about poverty seems rather bound up with the violence, degradation and entrenchment of racism in the US.  What the privileged classes do, and have done, to the underprivileged classes is a blight on humanity.  I very much work to grasp how poverty came to be in our wide populace, what its purpose may be from a spiritual standpoint, and what we can and ought to do about it.
 

Ban Ki-moon on Human Contradictions

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People comprise a lot of contradictions.  I mean a lot in the sense of volume or quantity as well as of collection or circle.  It may be glib to say that the Secretary-General of the United Nations speaks to the yin-yang of humanity, but it is nonetheless a somber yet blatant truth that world is divided among the have and have not.  What is more, there is reason to believe that the former make the latter so, that is, in terms of policy and reinforcement, commerce and practice, predation and oppression.  I imagine even a small shift, never mind a corrective balance, would have tremendous benefit:  Imagine how far a few million dollars, separated from the multibillion dollar military budget, could go to relieve hunger and thirst among the poor.  Better yet, think how far such funds could go to remedy the infrastructure, system and capability vis-a-vis the poor by engaging them, teaching them, and supporting them.
 

Kathy Caprino on Philanthropic Impact

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Look around you and you’ll see three kinds of people – [1] those who hate their work, and complain bitterly, [2] those who just tolerate their work and see it as a paycheck and aren’t looking for more (or feel they can’t have more), and finally, [3] those who love their work, and relish it. The third category is a small subset of all professionals globally, but this group stands out because these are, most often, the people who change the world for the better.

In my work as a success coach and writer, I’ve had the opportunity to connect with people who’ve made a true and measurable impact in the world, including well-known experts, authors, researchers, journalists, scientists, innovators, business geniuses, and entrepreneurs. But among this group of world influencers there are also everyday people who have found a special niche in which they’ve contributed at the highest level.

It’s critical to note that people who’ve made a real difference aren’t all privileged, advantaged or “special” by any stretch. Many come from disadvantaged families, crushing circumstances and initially limited capabilities, but have found ways to pick themselves up and rise above their circumstances (and their genes) to transform their own lives and those around them.

Reference:  9 Core Behaviors Of People Who Positively Impact The World.

Forbes contributor Kathy Caprino speaks well on what effective philanthropists do, and I resonate well with these behaviors, especially the ones I italicized:

1. They dedicate themselves to gives their life meaning and purpose
2. They commit to continually bettering themselves
3. They engage with people in open, mutually-beneficial ways
4. They invest time and energy not in what is, but what can be
5. They embrace critique
6. They spread what they know
7. They uplift others as they ascend
8. They view the journey as the goal
9. They use their power and influence well

Olivia Wilde on Philanthropy cum Commerce

[Olivia Wilde's] new web site, Conscious Commerce, lets people give back by buying stuff they love.

Wilde doesn't quite do a good job of explaining her new take on philanthropy. "Almost tricking the consumer into doing a good thing" sounds rather manipulative, for example. But beyond such little stumbles, her philanthropic take actually resonates quite well with me, that is, à la The Core Algorithm.  So with doing good for others and persuading them to do good as the end in mind, the question is what are the best ways to make this happen. 

Here is what I think:

Sustainable philanthropic, humanitarian or charitable efforts must have a business model:  It must generate revenues, in exchange for goods, in part or as a whole.  This is what I believe Wilde is actually trying to articulate.  Moreover, it makes sense to draw on business, because people in general understand it and transact with it via numerous forms of commerce in their day to day lives.  In other words, business is a terrific channel or partner for reaching people, educating them, and persuading them to do good.
 

Emma Watson on HeForShe Campaign

Emma Watson, British actor and UN Women Goodwill Ambassador, co-hosts a special event for UN Women’s HeForShe campaign.

The HeForShe campaign is a solidarity movement for gender equality which calls upon men and boys to help end the persisting inequalities faced by women and girls globally.

Stars from film, music and sports have such opportunity to do good, reach wide swaths of people, and inspire them to do good as well.  Their renown, their exposure, and their influence make them ideal candidates for a key campaign such as HeForShe.

In this regard, bravo to Emma Watson!

I appreciate the fact that she doesn't engage in male-hating.  Instead, she makes an earnest, personal plea to all people, men and boys in particular, to help in this campaign for true equality and mutual respect between the genders.  Greg Portell speaks about the impact of her plea in The Emma Watson Effect.

If not me, [then] who? If not now, [then] when?

A well-deserved rousing applause at the end of her speech.
 

Working out a wire transfer

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For many expatriates like myself, getting our paychecks and transferring money are important tasks.  Unfortunately, my first paycheck from a new job didn't arrive on time, and it took a week to resolve the problem.  It took another week for the wire transfer to become available in my home account.  Given some pending family commitments, it was a nerve wracking stretch for my wife and me.  Nonetheless, I was grateful for two colleagues at the office for helping me with all sorts of hurdles.

Since the first wire transfer, which I did in person at the bank, I thought I'd set up the online process, that is, for the sake of convenience.  But as the time for the second paycheck approached, I decided the risk of convenience was a bit too high.  That is, it took such time and energy to resolve the first set of issues, that I was reluctant to risk another set of issues cropping up with the online process.  I just didn't trust the bank well enough at that point.   

So I stuck with a process that I now knew would work, that is, in person wire transfer:

• I looked for signs that my paycheck was deposited on time, and these signs (company payslip and bank text message) came as expected.
• I had planned well before to go to the bank the afternoon of the next day, which, given my work schedule, was the earliest I could do so.  
• I walked to the bank at a particular time (3 PM), and arrived in a half hour.  I hoped that my transaction didn't last long, so I could then walk back toward the office in time to catch the shuttle (4:30 PM).  All in all, the walk was terrific exercise and decompression, plus taxi saving.
• Thankfully that transaction went smoothly, and the two staff at the bank were very helpful and friendly.  In fact I reached the shuttle, bound for my villa, earlier than planned (4:20 PM). 

I had my mind set for the wire transfer to take a week, but lo and behold it hit my home account the very next day.  One day later it was fully available, and I took care of some family commitments much earlier than expected.

I was very happy that I stuck with that same process and that it worked out even better than before.

I enjoy walking, and I enjoy befriending the bank staff, so I will likely abide by that process for the foreseeable future.

Solving an ironing problem

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I've taken on a new job opportunity overseas, and my company has graciously provided expatriates like me a wonderful, fully furnished villa.  Ironing my business shirts is one domestic task I choose to take care of, that is, instead of sending them off for laundry services.

It's an iron I'm using for the first time, and as with several irons I've used before, I turn up the heat setting to maximum.  I've learned, however, to test the iron on the ironing board, before using it on my shirt. 

But, oh my, I ended up scorching the ironing board cover and leaving two burnt patches.  Worse, the burnt cover left bluish residue on the bottom of the iron.  Using this iron at that point would have stained, and ruined, my shirts.  I let the iron cool, so I could step back and see how I could clean that residue off. 

I saw that I had to heat the iron to maximum again, in order to scrape off the residue.  It was a bit painstaking and I had to be careful not to burn myself, but I managed to clean off the iron.  I didn't have any scrap cloth around, so I turned a pillowcase inside out and tested the hot iron on it.  I managed to wipe off any remaining residue. 

For my first go at ironing a couple of shirts, I used that pillowcase underneath the shirt.  But I found out that once I dialed down the heat, it was perfectly fine on the ironing board and perfectly fine at performing its job.  So I had no need for the pillowcase. 

The Core Algorithm offers a systematic way of solving problems and also encourages us to keep our eyes and ears open for even better ways of doing what we need to do.  In this respect, I saw that putting water into the iron, as I've done with previous irons, allowed me to turn up the heat a bit more and iron my shirts better.  I've sharpened my algorithm by fine tuning the heat setting to optimize the ironing but avoid scorching the ironing board or my shirts. 

Mission, accomplished.