Tag: Start Ups

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News You Can Use: 5/16/2018

  • At Nike, Revolt Led by Women Leads to Exodus of Male Executives

    On March 5, the packet of completed questionnaires landed on the desk of Mark Parker, Nike’s chief executive. Over the next several weeks, at least six top male executives left or said they were planning to leave the company, including Trevor Edwards, president of the Nike brand, who was widely viewed as a leading candidate to succeed Mr. Parker, and Jayme Martin, Mr. Edwards’s lieutenant, who oversaw much of Nike’s global business.

    Others who have departed include the head of diversity and inclusion, a vice president in footwear and a senior director for Nike’s basketball division.

    It is a humbling setback for a company that is famous worldwide and has built its brand around the inspirational slogan “Just Do It.” While the #MeToo movement has led to the downfall of individual men, the kind of sweeping overhaul that is occurring at Nike is rare in the corporate world, and illustrates how internal pressure from employees is forcing even huge companies to quickly address workplace problems.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/28/business/nike-women.html

  • Here’s why Gibson is bankrupt—no, it’s not because rock is dead

    So far, so good, but Gibson also sells studio monitors, headphones, turntables, and other musical instruments, and that’s where the problems started:

    1. In 2012, it bought a stake in consumer audio company Onkyo.
    2. In 2013, it purchased stereo maker TEAC in 2013 for $53 million.
    3. The spending spree continued in 2014, when Gibson paid $135 million to acquire Royal Phillips’s home-entertainment systems, in a bid to become “the largest music and sound technology company in the world,” per its CEO. That acquisition put the company in a lot of debt

    https://www.fastcompany.com/40566146/heres-why-gibson-is-bankrupt-no-its-not-because-rock-is-dead

  • Is Airbnb ruining cities?
  • Why Social Media Discretion Is Increasingly Important to Your Brand

    A majority of the estimated 80 percent of small-business owners using Facebook are posting every day. According to CareerBuilder, “70 percent of employers use social media to screen candidates” prior to hiring. It’s wise to assume potential clients are exercising the same due diligence when they consider doing business with you.

    Trying to maintain a separation between personal and business is fruitless. Social media has connected us all to each other. Friends read your business posts and clients follow your personal posts, which means your business brand is your personal brand. It’s what you signed up for when you became an entrepreneur.

    As you post, you should assume that every bit of information you put out adds to, or takes from, the value of your personal brand. The temptation is in volunteering too much information. Nobody wants to know about your ingrown toenail.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/312814

  • Here’s how we plan to be GDPR compliant

    However, we do use some of Google’s tools for analysis purposes which, in turn, might mean Google is hoovering up personal data for its purposes. I say ‘might’ because Google hasn’t exactly been as transparent as everyone would like. Indeed, media groups have been sharply critical of Google’s approach to this thorny problem.

    Google’s problems can quickly become our problem so we’re monitoring the situation and will tweak what we do as events unfold.

    https://diginomica.com/2018/05/07/plan-gdpr-compliant/
    This topic continues to confuse me on a personal live since I don’t advertise but I do use mail lists. More to come…

Photo by Rapha Alves on Unsplash

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News You Can Use: 10/25/2017

  • Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

    In his famous book Zero to One, Peter Thiel writes, “Competition is for losers. Be a monopoly.” And that philosophy has come to prevail—the average venture capitalist would say that in a portfolio of 20, they are OK with 19 losers and one grand slam. Follow that to its logical conclusion: for every billionaire Peter Thiel, Silicon Valley, you’re OK with 19 broke people. It’s no wonder that inequality is at a 100-year high, entrepreneurial activity is at a 40-year low, and eight men control half the world’s wealth.

    Over the past fifteen years, big has crushed little in Silicon Valley, to an increasing degree. The former giant-slayers like Apple and Google have become giants themselves, shutting out or buying up new entrants.

    https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/08/dear-silicon-valley-americas-fallen-out-of-love-with-you/?ncid=rss

  • Why Corporate Tax Cuts Won’t Create Jobs

    In other words, if we are serious about growth, competitiveness and job creation, we should look elsewhere besides the tax code for answers. We can remain open to immigrants in search of better economic opportunities. We can invest in our public schools and universities. We can upgrade vital business infrastructure such as airports, land transportation systems, the internet backbone and our power grid. We can heighten our vigilance about anti-competitive behavior and regulatory capture by very large corporations that make it difficult to start new businesses.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/09/opinion/corporate-tax-cuts-entrepreneur.html
    I am not a fan of this practice, especially when States are trying to get companies to move in (see SourceCast Episode 87), but sadly it is reality for the cities and States being left behind NYC, Chicago, and San Fran).

  • Are We Born Optimistic? Or Is It a Coping Skill We Learn as Adults? | Lori Markson
  • Just Got Passed Up For A Promotion? Do This Next

    Although you might be fuming, it’s important that you take a step back from the situation and give yourself the opportunity to cool off before doing anything else. You certainly wouldn’t want to lose control and torpedo the professional reputation you’ve strived so hard to build before you’ve had to the chance to gather all the facts.

    https://www.fastcompany.com/40479877/just-got-passed-up-for-a-promotion-do-this-next

  • In Eric Ries’ new book, he tells companies to turn every unit into a cash-strapped ‘startup’

    You first have to look at whether you’re treating the people who work for you like entrepreneurs or something different; if you’re expecting your product managers to achieve instantaneous success, that’s not [the standard] to which you were held in the early stages of your company.

    Along the same lines, if you aren’t [giving teams] clear, metered funding, how are they going to have that scarcity? It’s that mindset, that hunger, that let’s you say “no,” [to dawdling]. [Companies have to fight] that entitlement funding because the more money you have, the less you want to expose yourself to risk.

    https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/13/in-eric-ries-new-book-he-tells-companies-to-turn-every-unit-into-a-cash-strapped-startup/

Photo: Clem Onojeghuo

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News You Can Use: 10/4/2017

  • Tech Firms Find Washington Isn’t So Hands-Off Anymore

    It was already a tough year for Silicon Valley in Washington, where lawmakers have been pushing proposals that could roil the industry, including measures on net neutrality, privacy and liability. The industry’s standing suffered again in the past week when lawmakers laid plans for public hearings to examine whether Facebook and other social-media platforms were used by foreign governments during the 2016 campaign to manipulate the U.S. election. Lawmakers also signaled they are considering new legislation to address online spending by foreign adversaries—a potential blow to the firms’ cherished freedom from close government oversight.

    “This is a Wild, Wild West,” said Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, about the possible need for more controls on internet companies.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-firms-find-washington-isnt-so-hands-off-anymore-1505473201

  • How startups can avoid Bodega’s PR disaster

    The first article published about Bodega read almost like a Silicon Valley parody. It highlights a few things people feel is wrong with the tech community right now; Bodega comes across as a tone-deaf company that got the thumbs-up from some of the Valley’s most respected investors for a seemingly absurd idea with a culturally insensitive name. It represents a confounding and out-of-touch approach to disruption; if you missed the headline, it’s “Two Ex-Googlers Want To Make Bodegas And Mom-And-Pop Corner Stores Obsolete.”

    Just a few hours after launching, Bodega received a lashing on Twitter, and the headlines came to resemble this one from The Washington Post: “Bodega, an ‘unmanned pantry box,’ has already become America’s most hated start-up.”

    https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/15/how-startups-can-avoid-bodegas-pr-disaster/?ncid=rss

  • How to solve problems like a designer
  • Invited To Lunch With Your Boss’s Boss? Here’s Exactly What To Do

    Another smart move for lunch with a senior leader is to give an example of how the company is helping you grow. Don’t just share details about your job duties or favorite projects you’ve worked on, though. Discuss a highlight from a company “extra” that you felt was valuable, like a training program, an offsite event, etc.

    This can help you demonstrate that you appreciate what the company is doing to invest in your career, without taking a deep dive into the specifics of your role. Remember, your goal is to build a rapport, not deliver a scorecard. He probably doesn’t want that kind of detail, but he does want to know you. And above all, he wants to know that you want to know him. If you don’t give the impression that that’s the case, you’ll miss your chance at developing a potentially valuable mentor inside your organization.

    https://www.fastcompany.com/40470150/invited-to-lunch-with-your-bosss-boss-heres-exactly-what-to-do

  • Is This Hotel an Airbnb Killer?

    A study last year from Morgan Stanley projected that 25% of leisure travelers and 23% of business travelers will have used Airbnb by the end of 2017, up from 12% for both groups of travelers in 2015. The report found Airbnb was a common substitute for hotels: 49% of Airbnb users said they had substituted Airbnb for a traditional hotel stay in the past year.

    With Public, Mr. Schrager said he aims to better compete with Airbnb on nightly rates and offer superior amenities such as bars and other places to socialize. While cutting staff costs for hotel operations, Mr. Schrager’s new concept fuses a sprawling bar and restaurant operation onto the property, deriving revenue and profits from amenities that are meant to attract a much larger crowd than just the hotel’s guests.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/is-this-hotel-an-airbnb-killer-1505473207

Photo: HB Mertz