SDG 9: to "build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation," is critical because it will determine whether we achieve energy, health and education goals. The focus on resilience and sustainable development is welcome, but innovation and development must change to achieve this.

Infrastructure

How can we develop infrastructure that is sustainable and resilient, affordable and equitable, which supports the economic development and well-being of those left behind by the industrialization of the 20^th and early 21^st centuries?

What would this look like in the energy sector? Existing energy infrastructure, based on large-scale power grids, fails more than 1.3 billion people who live without access to a reliable source of energy. Ninety-five percent of these people live in sub-Saharan Africa or developing Asia. Eighty-four percent live in rural areas. At Practical Action, we believe addressing this gap is critical for global development. Without access to energy, people cannot access decent health care, education or communications. Economic development and productivity is hindered and the potential to start up small businesses is reduced. Women, who make up a disproportionate percentage of those living in rural areas, are hit particularly hard.

For energy infrastructure to deliver a full spectrum of benefits to the 1.3 billion currently without it, it must meet their needs. Large-scale power grids are prohibitively expensive, slow to build and will continue to bypass those not economically able to pay for such huge projects. Moreover, they are often unreliable, and are heavily dependent on fossil fuels.

For equitable-infrastructure development, it is time to focus on decentralized, sustainable-energy access. And we know this works. In the remote, rural Zimbabwean communities of Himalaya and Chipendeke, far from the national grid, Practical Action and Oxfam have established a micro-hydro system that powers a water pump for irrigating crops, local businesses, a school and a medical centre. Here, nurses talk of mortality in child birth in the past, rather than something that happens every month, and school teachers discuss buying computers, rather than how to encourage pupils to finish homework before the sun sets. This is infrastructure for the future: sustainably meeting the needs of those left behind.

Chipendeke clinic can now provide emergency health care at night. Photo Credit: Jamie Oliver/Practical Action

Industrialization

What about inclusive and sustainable industrialization? How can we help small-scale enterprises in developing countries access financial services, value chains and markets?

Reaching those left behind with market services requires adaptation of existing market systems. Although understanding of how markets work for those living in poverty has improved, many approaches to market development still fail to be truly participatory. Practical Action has developed and pioneered the Participatory Market System Development (PMSD) approach, designed to make markets more inclusive, to reach more people and to reduce poverty in a sustainable way.

The critical elements of PMSD are:

· Participation: Change in market systems is dependent on the decisions and actions of all actors -- we must bring together diverse strategic players to realize meaningful change

· Systems thinking: Markets are complex adaptive systems made up of many actors who influence each other -- we must understand and build upon the relationships and interactions between actors

· Facilitation: NGOs should not become market actors -- to create sustainable change, NGOs should facilitate the conditions for public and private-market actors to drive change themselves

What does this mean in practice?

In Kenya, Christian Aid, Practical Action Consulting and the Kenya Honey Council have used a PMSD approach to bring together different actors in the honey sector, and identify constraints to market access for marginalized, rural honey producers. Of the constraints identified, Christian Aid has chosen to focus on two: access to finance and access to markets. Their development model utilizes "honey hubs." These hubs apply quality control, develop relationships with buyers and service providers, and guarantee access to finance. This approach can pave the way for small producers throughout the world to develop by solving problems, bringing better access to finance and markets, and identifying the actors needed to achieve change.

Innovation

To support these changes, we must find new ways of ensuring scientific research, support innovation and improved technological capability in developing countries.

Both private and public actors should increase investment in research and development (R&D), to focus on solving the challenges facing the two billion living in a way that guarantees a sustainable future for all. Today's innovation efforts are skewed. The vast amount of R&D addresses the needs of wealthy consumers and producers. For example, only 10 percent of worldwide expenditure on health research is spent on problems that affect 90 percent of the world's population.

To ensure that R&D targets those left behind, improves their well-being and does not exacerbate existing inequalities, R&D efforts need to be informed by the principles of Technology Justice:

• Equitable access: technologies should be designed to be accessible to those who need them the most

• Responsible innovation: new technologies should meet the needs of those left behind and increase their well being

• Sustainable use: technologies should be designed to achieve these aims without harming others or the environment, and without compromising the ability of future generations to do the same

Achieving sustainable development for all means reaching those that have been left behind; infrastructure that meets their needs, industrialization that includes all market actors, and innovation that is truly just.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

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Today's engineers are trying to deal with "deep uncertainties" -- uncertainties that cannot be assessed by probability based on past occurrences. Current infrastructure is under-prepared for extreme events that may come as a surprise, for example, extreme-weather events such as Hurricane Sandy in New York and Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. The challenge of sustainability places greater demands on infrastructure innovations that facilitate the improvement of existing infrastructure, as well as the creation of new infrastructure to balance economic, social and environmental needs and eventually transform to a sustainable civilization.

Such a transformation is made necessary by the more complex problems of our modern world. For example, in addition to better design and performance of infrastructure in individual sectors -- such as building, water supply, energy supply and transportation -- at a city scale, the interdependence among those critical infrastructures also is important to the overall performance of the interdependent systems. This is why today's engineers must focus on the resilience of infrastructure systems, not just individual components of infrastructure, to external disturbance.

Large-scale-infrastructure projects today must balance economic, social and environmental needs, although they are being constructed for a particular service. In a particular way, emerging demands in terms of food security, energy security, public health, waste recycle/reuse and hazard mitigation require new infrastructure. For example, the development of renewable-energy sources such as biofuel, wind energy, solar energy and low-carbon-emission energy sources like shell gas requires new facilities for energy delivery. At the same time, the new development can be subject to community acceptance and public environmental concerns.

Infrastructure innovations are or will be facilitated by cutting-edge technologies, such as cyber-infrastructure, big data, nanotechnologies, biotechs and bio-informatics. Computers and network monitors make the control of the physical processes and civil and environmental engineering infrastructural systems more effective. The seamless integration of computational algorithms and physical components -- cyber-physical systems -- will transform the way people interact with engineered systems and drive innovation and competition in sectors such as agriculture, energy, transportation, building design and automation.

Internet, mobile technology, sensors and remote sensing are providing big data that are filling the gap between individual sectors and making it possible to quantify the nexus among interconnected systems, for example the water-energy-food nexus, and that can better describe consumers' and stakeholders' demand of infrastructures. New materials made from nano-technology and biotech are used to construct more cost-effective and/or more environmentally friendly infrastructure to serve society.

One way in which mobile technology can be used to collect data on a large scale is through the use of smartphone apps. The TrafficTurk system allows for the real-time capture of traffic patterns, which can be used by researchers to generate state-of-the-art analytics about how transportation infrastructure is used and impacted during times of high congestion (for example, natural disasters, sporting events, political events).

Moreover, complex systems theories have been innovated to analyze the interdependence of the "system of systems" and provide guidelines for the design of complex infrastructure systems in cities.

A number of research centers have been developed in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (CEE at Illinois) for hosting research to support these innovations. The MAE Center was established in 1997 by the National Science Foundation as one of three national earthquake-engineering research centers. After focusing on seismic hazards in the Mid-America region, the center has expanded its focus to create a Multi-hazard Approach to Engineering by conducting interdisciplinary research to characterize different hazards and estimate damage and vulnerability across regional and national networks. The MAE Center is a world leader in the prediction and mitigation of natural and human-made hazards and one of the world's most comprehensive centers for risk analysis. The National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST) Community Resilience Center of Excellence is headquartered at Colorado State University and partners with CEE at Illinois to develop tools that individual communities can use to assess their resilience against natural hazards -- such as tornadoes, coastal flooding, wildfires and earthquakes -- as well as large-scale, human-caused disruptions. Illinois' Safe Global Water Institute (SGWI) is working to overcome the basic science, engineering solutions, educational capacity and socio-economic barriers to providing sustainable safe water and sanitation to the people of the world. The Intensively Managed Landscapes Critical Zone Observatory (IML-CZO), funded by NSF, works to understand how land-use changes affect the long-term resilience of the critical zone. Other research centers working on infrastructure innovations are the Center of Excellence for Airport Technology, the Fabricated Geomembrane Institute, the Illinois Center for Transportation and the Rail Transportation and Engineering Center.

Training future generations of civil and environmental engineers is essential to promoting infrastructure innovations. CEE at Illinois has initialized interdisciplinary programs designed to integrate the traditional CEE sub-disciplines and give undergraduate and graduate students a broad systems perspective on the world's complex civil and environmental engineering problems. The Sustainable and Resilient Infrastructure Systems, Energy-Water-Environment Sustainability and Societal Risk Management programs bring together researchers from diverse specializations to address the needs of a changing society in a comprehensive and multidisciplinary framework. A final program, Global Health and Economic Development, is currently under development and will target research, education and collaboration with regional stakeholders on issues of water, sanitation, health, food, energy and economic development.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

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Yair Flicker is the President of SmartLogic, a custom web/mobile software development company based in Baltimore. 

If you need an outside team to help with developing your application, choose carefully. Hiring the wrong team can cost you both months and millions, and many companies don't survive working with a bad outside development team. Of course, my company SmartLogic is a custom application development firm, so I'm biased to think that our way is the right way to handle a development project. But we have worked and talked with hundreds of companies over the years, so I have seen a wide range of application development projects gone wrong, and I'd like to think my perspective could prove valuable to fellow entrepreneurs.

Here are seven huge mistakes companies make when hiring an app development team. Avoid them, and you'll have a better chance of finding an outside app development firm that will help your company, not hurt it.

1. Only interviewing one firm. When you are searching for an application development team, the third firm you talk to might say something that shows you the first firm was way off-target. Many of our clients choose us after meeting with other firms that don't specialize in the right kind of technology for their business, and vice versa. Sometimes it becomes clear that we're not the right fit after the client has taken a few meetings. No credible firm should want your business if they're not the right team to build your product, as this won't lead to good results for either party. Talk to at least three different application development firms before making your decision. That way, you can get a better view of which firm is best for your product.


2. Hiring a company that builds marketing websites. You wouldn't want your car mechanic to fix your airplane, would you? If a company mostly creates marketing websites with limited functionality or suggests building your application in a Content Management System (CMS) such as Wordpress, run fast and far. Custom applications should be built with the right tools for the job. A firm that doesn't know how to use those tools will only waste your money. We have had to rebuild software for clients whose first app development team used a CMS system when they should have built a custom application using a framework like Ruby on Rails. Look for a firm that has experience building custom products, not digital brochures.


3. Paying a fixed price. Any custom application firm that will give you a fixed price likely isn't experienced with complex projects. Fixed prices only work when all variables are fixed; with more complex applications, built for quickly changing markets, variables are never fixed. Besides, estimating a budget after just a few sales discussions is hard to do. 100% of SmartLogic's projects have changed at some point during the development process. Clients often start off with one idea for how a product will work, but when they see their ideas in practice, they'll want to cut or add features, and tweak certain elements. At SmartLogic, we have an intake process that helps us set estimates that reflect the complexity and timeline of the project. We invoice clients weekly, so they always know where they stand. Clients may re-prioritize features and change timelines as needed. Look for a firm that will give you an estimated budget range, and then communicate frequently about your project's status and cost.


4. Offshoring your work. Personally, I have never seen this work. Language and time zones are formidable barriers to good communication--and communication can make or break your application development process. It's hard enough to communicate the factors in a technical decision to non-technical stakeholders when you're both in the same room speaking the same language. I've seen companies lose time and money because of miscommunications that come from language barriers. Plus, it's hard to vet a company that's half a world away.


5. Hiring and managing a development firm without someone technical involved. If you don't have anyone in-house to manage your development process, find a technical third-party advisor to help you find the right outside firm and make sure your contractors are on track. Some of our clients previously worked with firms that wooed them with extremely low prices and quick timelines. Someone with technical know-how would have been able to steer them in the right direction and save them a lot of wasted money and time. It's hard to know what's normal if you have no experience managing the development process. If you hire a third-party consultant, they'll know whether a problem with your development team is par for the course or reflective of a poor-quality firm.


6. Spending all of your dough on development. The four "p"s of marketing are product, pricing, promotion and placement: if you spend all your cash on product, you won't have the money to promote it. Having an amazing app is cool, but who cares if no one knows about it? Our most successful clients budget for public relations, marketing campaigns and advertising. Setting the budget is up to you, but an experienced development firm will help you prioritize features so you can build a working product and still have money left over for marketing.


7. Using Microsoft products (e.g. .NET or SQL Server) in your product. Microsoft technology is not widely used in the startup world, which means you might have a problem finding a new firm to help you if the current firm doesn't work out. In some cases, clients come to us because they need to completely rewrite their code after creating the first version of their product with Microsoft technology. Your development firm should use the best tool for the job, not a legacy product.

Hiring the right application development team can be the key to turning your app idea into a reality. But hiring the wrong firm can kill your app and hurt your business, so keep these common mistakes in mind.

 

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Sustainable Development Goal 9 is "Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation." Rather than seeing its sole focus as industrializing those areas in "developing countries" without access to electricity, running water or broadband Internet, this new goal should be about rethinking how we all understand infrastructure, and industrialization itself.

Industrialization has always been at the centre of development debates, and its role in contributing to economic growth has recently been highlighted again in the African Union's "Agenda 2063". The role of technology and innovation in this process has also been receiving renewed attention across the African Union since last year's new strategy, which we debated at the University of Sussex last month. Goal 9 aims to enhance innovation by increasing the number of workers per million of population involved in research and development (R&D), and by raising public and private R&D spending. This may be valuable, but as colleagues at the STEPS Centre have argued before, innovation is about much more than R&D. Beyond the focus on formal science and technology, innovation relies on education and training in engineering, design and management, and in order to make it relevant, innovators must be linked to -- and embedded within -- the communities that they seek to serve.

Energy is one area that requires infrastructure and innovation, and achieving Goal 7 ("Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all") is an underlying condition for industrialization as we know it in the rich world and countries like China that have met their economic MDG targets. The UN "Financing for Development" conference that took place in Addis Ababa in July placed great emphasis on energy, and the new president of the African Development Bank recently announced a "new deal on energy for Africa." However, pre-empting these high-level commitments, innovation is already occurring, redefining what energy infrastructures need to look like, and at the same time responding to another of the goals (number 13): "Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts."

The challenges of traditional infrastructures supplying electricity to many remote households in Africa and elsewhere are greater due to the high cost of grid extension to these rural areas. Solar-home systems and other off-grid technologies are therefore likely to meet around 70 percent of Africa's sustainable-energy needs. On top of struggling to afford the outlay for a solar PV system, users may have less access to credit, making the solar-home systems even less accessible in poorer communities.

Helped by the rapidly decreasing costs of solar-photovoltaic panels and the boom in mobile connectivity, socially and environmentally motivated private-sector initiatives have been pioneering off-grid "pay as you go'' solar-home systems, bringing clean light and basic electricity services to hundreds of thousands of households across the continent, as well as to least developed countries and island nations in other regions. Adopting "hire-purchase" business models in some cases provides the households with ownership of the hardware (and thus even cheaper energy) in the long-term. Whilst, as some have argued, these examples may not deliver the energy required by heavy (and dirty) industry, they are re-writing the rule book as far as "quality, reliable, sustainable and resilient" infrastructure is concerned and showing that the models followed in the rich world do not provide a global blueprint.

In fact, these are precisely the models that new forms of innovation are challenging. Like the others, Goal 9 is supposed to be "universal," applying to both poor and rich countries alike. And there are equally disruptive ways of addressing the same question of household-electricity services in the rich world. Distributed renewables and community energy have been famously pioneered in Denmark (through wind) and various communities across the UK have now started to produce their own energy. Our colleagues have documented how these innovations can serve environmental, social and economic needs -- precisely what the "sustainable development" narrative has been seeking for decades.

Beyond scoring high against sustainable development criteria, these examples are leading us to re-think the logic of centralized-energy infrastructures that -- in the rich world at least -- often remains unquestioned. My colleague Adrian Smith and I have written about similar examples of "grassroots innovation" in a recent book on The Politics of Green Transformations, in which we argue that communities and entrepreneurs are able to challenge powerful interests through practical experiments like the ones described above. Whilst others have suggested that the SDGs provide a space for these political questions to be opened up, this vital opportunity is not going to make it to the agenda for the debates at the UN later this month.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

After heavy lobbying from some of the nation's most elite institutions of higher education, the President has just abandoned his effort to rank the nation's 7,000 colleges and universities.

So, with college application season almost upon us, where should aspiring college students and their parents look for advice?

In my view, not U.S. News and World Report's annual college guide (out last week).

It's analogous to a restaurant guide that gives top ratings to the most expensive establishments that are backed and frequented by the wealthiest gourmands -- and much lower rankings to restaurants with the best food at lower prices that attract the widest range of diners.

Without fail, U. S. News puts at the top of its list America's most exclusive and expensive private universities that admit low numbers and small percentages of students from poor families.

These elite institutions also train a disproportionately large share of the nation's investment bankers, corporate chieftains, corporate lawyers, and management consultants.

Around 70 percent of Harvard's senior class routinely submits resumes to Wall Street and corporate consulting firms, for example. Close to 36 percent of Princeton's 2010 graduating class went into finance, down from 46 percent before the financial crisis.

And so it goes, through the Ivy League and other elite private institutions.

Meanwhile, U.S. News relegates to lower rankings public universities that admit most of the young Americans from poor families who attend college, and which graduate far larger percentages of teachers, social workers, legal aide attorneys, community organizers, and public servants than do the private elite colleges.

US New claims its rankings are neutral. Baloney.

They're based on such "neutral" criteria as how selective a college is in its admissions, how much its alumni donate, how much money and other resources its faculty receive, and how much it spends per student.

Colleges especially favored by America's wealthy are bound to excel on these criteria. The elite pour money into them because these institutions have educated them and, they hope, will educate their offspring.

A family name engraved in marble on such a campus confers unparalleled prestige.

And because these institutions have educated such a high proportion of America's wealthy elite, that elite looks with particular favor on graduates of these institutions in making hiring decisions.

Which helps explain their high and increasing selectivity. As the income and wealth of America's elite has soared over recent decades, the financial benefits of being anointed as a graduate of such an institution have soared in tandem.

The U.S. News rankings perpetuate the myth that these elite institutions offer the best education -- as if the economic diversity of a student body and the values and career choices of its undergraduates were irrelevant to receiving a high-quality education.

And as if educational excellence could be measured by the size of the wallets supporting it.

Public universities are at an inherent disadvantage on these criteria because they rely on state funding instead of wealthy alumni. They also admit large numbers of students, which often means a lower expenditure per student.

And because public universities have a special responsibility to be accessible to students from every economic class, they take more chances on broader range of promising students, including many who are the first in their families to attend college.

Public universities are the major vehicles of upward mobility in America. They educate 73 percent of all college students. The Ivy League educates just 0.4 percent.

And the best public universities provide a higher-quality education, in my view, than many of the private elites.

Full disclosure: I was educated in private elite universities -- Dartmouth and Yale. And I taught for many years at Harvard.

These venerable institutions rate at or near the top of the U.S. News rankings.

For the past decade, though, I've been teaching at the University of California at Berkeley.

One thing I've discovered: My Berkeley students are every bit as bright as the students I met or taught in the Ivies.

Another: More Pell-grant eligible students (a proxy for students from low-income families) attend Berkeley than attend the entire Ivy League combined.

And my Berkeley students are more involved in, and more of them are aiming for careers in, public service than any group of students I've ever had the privilege of teaching. (Each year, around 10,000 Berkeley undergraduates engage in off-campus public service projects and programs.)

In an era when income and wealth are more concentrated at the top than in living memory -- much of it in the hands of Wall Street bankers, corporate executives, and their retainers -- U.S. News has become a major enabler of American inequality.

We need another guide for ranking colleges -- one that doesn't look at the fatness of alumni wallets or the amount spent on each student, but does take account of economic diversity and dedication to public service.

Fortunately, there is one. It's a relatively new one, provided by the Washington Monthly.

My advice: Use it.

ROBERT B. REICH's new book, "Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few," will be out September 29. His film "Inequality for All" is now available on DVD and blu-ray, and on Netflix. Watch the trailer below:

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An MBA does not guarantee success. Sorry but it just doesn't.

Before starting Wicked Good Cupcakes with my daughter and landing a deal with Mr. Wonderful on Shark Tank I didn't realize this, but now I'm certain.

Throughout the past two years I've had the honor of meeting hundreds of successful and not so successful people. These peeps are from all walks of life, a variety of different industries and varying levels of educational experience.

At first I was completely intimidated. After all, boasting nothing more than a high school diploma from an all-girl Catholic high school is hardly noteworthy in a room full of MBAs. Talk about feeling like a fish out of water! Yikes.

Given my feelings of inadequacy imagine my surprise when invitations to speak began to arrive in my inbox.

Even more amazing to me were invites to speak at places like Boston College, MIT, WBZ's Professional Breakfast and numerous other venues. What? People want to listen to me? What could I possibly offer these highly educated professionals?

It wasn't until I actually sat down and listened to audience members that it hit me. There was a common thread and that commonality was this...It's really fucking hard to start a business. And not only is it hard but you actually have to sacrifice A LOT to make your dream happen.



What I began to realize was this. Not everyone is willing to work hard or sacrifice to make their dream a reality. The cold hard truth is this, adversity sucks. Sacrifice sucks. Having no money sucks. And unfortunately unless you have an endless trust fund or are willing to go without, you're not going to make it as a successful entrepreneur. And that's what you DON'T learn as an MBA student. You actually have to LIVE that pain. And live that pain I did.

At 23 years old I had 2 kids, a failing marriage, no education, no money and a bleak future. I lived in a 3 room apartment in a shitty part of Boston. My two angel babies slept on a quilt I put on the floor (they had no bedrooms) in my living room. I slept on the couch beside them.

I ate standing over the kitchen sink whatever food was leftover from my kid's dinners. I bought myself nothing. The thought of going to college to earn a degree and better my life (never mind try to get an MBA) was not an option. I was literally playing the most down and dirty game life offered me every day. And that game was called survival.

The only thing I had on my side was a tiny voice in my head that just kept replaying, "You are meant to do something with your life. You can do this. You must do this. Quitting is not an option" over and over and over.

I don't know if it was my DNA, sheer will or both but I managed to get through some really awful, awful times in my life. No one gave me money, an education or the determination needed to succeed. That was all on me.

These were exactly the same traits I passed along to my kids. No one is going to do anything for you in this life. Nor should they. Unless we learn to be self-sufficient and stand on our own two feet, there is no guarantee of success. No MBA can teach you about want, drive and the thirst for success. That's a lesson for life to impart. And in a strange sort of way I'm grateful that I had such a stern teacher.

Fast forward to present day. I started a successful business with my daughter. Success was hard won. We learned a lot through the process, took home zero pay for 1 ½ years and sacrificed a bunch, but oh what we learned along the way!



We are passionate about our business and we're living really nice lives now. We get to travel, mentor, speak, write, support charities we're passionate about and do all of the things I only dreamed of being able to do when I was at my lowest point of my life.

The lesson here? It was not an MBA that helped me balance a negative check book, or gave me the guts to start several businesses. It wasn't an MBA that helped me figure out how to feed a family of 5 with only $100.00 a week. It wasn't an MBA that pushed me through 15 hour days and years of no income while growing a business. It was life that taught me how to succeed. It was life that gave me the drive and ambition to build something for my kids and me. It was life who taunted me and said "You'll never be anything. It's just too hard." And it was to life that I replied, "Fuck you. I will be someone. I will create a home for my kids. I will be able to pay my bills and you will not be able to stop me."

My biggest ambition now is to share my story with everyone who has a dream but feels their lack of education stands in their way. Life is THE best educator, bar none. If you can deal with all of the obstacles, challenges and pitfalls that life throws at you and come out on the other side stronger than before, then you don't need any stinkin' degree or MBA.

All you need to win the game of life is You.

~ T

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Recently, I was invited to Anchorage, Alaska, by the U.S. State Department to join Barack Obama, John Kerry and other world leaders to discuss Arctic resilience in the context of rising impacts from climate change.

The Arctic is one of the last remaining wildernesses. The unforgiving conditions ensure it remains sparsely populated. As a result, some of the most dramatic changes on the planet are occurring far from view. Here communities, from the Alaskan Yupik to the Greenland Inuit native tribes, have developed and adapted resilient societies for millennia. But now the Arctic is changing faster than ever before in modern history, as a result of human-caused climate change and ecosystem degradation. More worryingly, we are seeing the first signs that the Arctic is approaching tipping points that, like toppling dominos, are likely to lead to a cascade of events that will affect us all.

Without dramatic reductions in greenhouse gases, by the end of the century much of the Arctic is predicted to be more than five degrees warmer than today, and in places nine or 10 degrees. There will be no sea ice in the summer months leading to other abrupt, potentially irreversible, ecological and physical changes -- sea ice this summer has already dropped well below the long-term average. The Arctic Ocean will become more acidic, corroding anything with a shell. The stability of the Greenland ice sheet -- which contains enough water to raise sea levels globally by at least six meters -- will be in doubt. The so-called Atlantic thermohaline circulation, including the Gulf Stream and its warm waters that ensure a mild northern-European climate, is in jeopardy. And the melting permafrost is already buckling buildings, roads and pipelines and may lead to a large release of methane, a gas more than 20 times as potent at trapping heat than carbon dioxide.

In fact, the Stockholm Resilience Centre has identified 16 potential "regime shifts" or tipping points in the Arctic, ranging from collapse of salmon stocks to a complete transition of the Inuit way of life. Twelve of these regime shifts will be difficult to reverse in a human lifetime. The reason is that feedbacks change, which causes systems to self-reinforce warming. In the case of Greenland, for example, when ice melts, the surface changes color from white, which reflects almost all incoming solar heat back to space, to a darker water surface, which absorbs heat.

These changes indicate the importance of understanding resilience in vast ecosystems like the Arctic and how to create societies that can cope with inevitable shocks. Resilience is the heart of the Sustainable Development Goals, which will be launched at the end of the month at the UN General Assembly in New York. Goal 9 focuses specifically on resilient infrastructure, sustainable industrialization and innovation.

But resilience is often misunderstood. It is not only about rolling with the punches and recovering from shocks. A resilient system, be it a city or planet, is where diversity is encouraged, connectivity is managed and new information is absorbed and used. This renewal and capacity to live with change is the foundation to weather the storm and bounce back stronger and more flexible than before.

We now know our globally connected society can expect faster changes and more shocks cascading through ecosystems and economies, where a small change in the ecology of the Arctic or the economics of the U.S. subprime housing market can ripple around the world.

In a matter of decades, we have become a big world on a small planet. We now have enough scientific knowledge to show that the stable, healthy biosphere that we have taken for granted for more than 10,000 years has reached a tipping point, where humans now dominate and its future state is, ironically, less predictable.

We will need resilient infrastructure in the Arctic to weather the expected changes. But in the lifetime of the goals, we also need to monitor closely this fragile ecosystem. This is a critical period of transition. We need to reduce the combined pressure of warming, ocean acidification, pollution and overfishing. As myself and colleagues argue in the Earth Statement, the priority is to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide to zero by 2050 and halt biodiversity loss. However, this means the race to find oil in the Arctic is a dead end. Recent research analyzing remaining fossil-fuel reserves concluded "Development of resources in the Arctic...[is] ...incommensurate with efforts to limit average global warming to 2 °C."

The Arctic will warm further and we can expect more dramatic changes in the north -- emphasizing why the new global goals are universal -- wealthy northern nations will be hit hard by environmental change. Investment in resilient infrastructure will be necessary to adapt. But we also need to focus our best minds on innovations -- both social and technological -- to provide solutions that are cognizant of the complex interconnections and cascading global effects that must somehow be managed.

The 17 goals mark a paradigm shift for humanity. They are a remarkable achievement emerging from the largest summit in UN history, Rio+20, and the result of the biggest consultation the UN has undertaken. They recognize the very real existential threat we face as a species and the new responsibility we must shoulder. But also the interconnections: if we fail on one, we risk failing them all. Our new Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on Planetary Boundaries launched on September 14 provides the essential knowledge to understand why the research community is so concerned, but also how, if we act now, we can end poverty and safeguard our future and the future of Earth's life-support system.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo, recently announced that she is pregnant with twins. As part of that announcement she informed the world that she would be taking limited leave during her pregnancy and after the birth of her newest children. The blogosphere then erupted with opinions about her choice and its effects on her family and Yahoo. Was she being a bad mom, a bad CEO, or just bad at everything? Some came to her defense while others piled on. Yet, as is so often the case when people explode with opinions about something that has no direct impact on their lives, no one was really talking about Mayer or the welfare of her family or company. What they really were talking about was themselves.

Mayer is the 40-year-old, CEO of a Fortune 500 company with personal assets of over $300 million. At this point in her life there are no basic survival decisions she needs to make that are in any way limited by money. If she lived solely off her current assets for the rest of her life she'd have the equivalent of a $7.5 million salary for the remaining 40 years of her expected lifespan.

So why do people care about the choices made by someone so far removed from their own experience? The energy fueling this explosion is the frustration with discussing work-life issues in terms of someone like Mayer, a woman with seemingly infinite power to choose what she wants to do with the rest of her life. Mayer really does have the option of taking 18+ years off to raise her children while maintaining access to financial resources most families only dream of (the median household income in the U.S. is about $50,000). Most mothers and fathers have to work 40+ hours a week just to keep their families fed, clothed, and sheltered.

Yet we talk about parenthood as though it's the same thing regardless of income and position. Mayer can afford a nanny. She can command her company to put a nursery in her office. She can force work to fit the life she wants or leave at any time with no real danger to the health or safety of her family. Many parents consider themselves blessed if they keep their job after an unpaid day off to care for their sick child.

People aren't upset that she may use help from her husband, child care providers, and company to raise her children. They are upset that those same options aren't available to them BUT they will be judged as if they were. When the context of parenting is ignored people feel like they must set Mayer and other hyper-privileged celebrities (who are doing it all) as their role models, however divorced those celebrity lives are from anything they could reasonably experience or achieve.

So like Aesop's fox staring at grapes on a high vine he can't reach despite all his efforts to do so, we declare those options we can't expect to access sour and Mayer a bad mother for using a nanny and similar work-life tools. In psychology this defense mechanism against self-doubt and feelings of failure and loss is known as rationalization because we come up with rational sounding explanations for why we wouldn't really want what we can't have.

Declaring Mayer a bad mother is a way to avoid having to ask ourselves why we don't use a nanny or take months off and realizing it's because we don't earn enough to afford to do so. In U.S. culture, where success, work, and earnings are huge parts of our identities; admitting that we don't earn enough to do anything is very uncomfortable. So instead of confronting why we might need more work-life support but can't afford or access it, we lash out at those who are using those supports to prove our disdain for them. Though these outbursts of the parenting wars may shield us from feeling bad about our lot they don't change the underlying reality: some people have more work-life tools than others.

We don't need Mayer to be like us or to throw away any of her tools in a meaningless show of solidarity. It's equally unfair to demand that she take time off from a job she must love to validate our experience as it would be for her to demand that we work non-stop through early parenthood because she can fit her work and life together on her terms.

What we need is for people like Mayer to say publicly that they are not our role models; to recognize that while their own wealth of options make the work-life policies and laws that they oversee irrelevant to them, those systems are essential to the rest of us. Mayer has done some of that by improving Yahoo's parental leave policies. Now she and every other leader invested in a family-friendly brand needs to demand that their organizational culture recognize not just the importance of work-life fit, but that the options for achieving it are fewer and often more risky with each level you go down in the organization.

Simultaneously, we need to rethink how we approach this conversation. Rather than disparaging other people's choices we should be asking why only some people get to make choices. We need to focus on our frustration with this disparity of choice and how we might maximize everyone's options. We need to push back on cultures that assume women will leave work for children and men will leave their families for work. We need to broaden the scope of work-life conversations to discuss self, child, and elder care as one continuous thread in a tapestry of economic options so that no one has a reason to start crying "sour grapes."

If there is a baseline that we as a society believe all people should be able to access then let's make sure that everyone has a real option to do that without penalties like uncertain employment, unequal income and bullying attacks on personal and professional reputations.

Most importantly we have to stop bashing others' work-life choices and help one another succeed, and openly grapple with why things are the way they are. Time to end the pointing fingers at one another's lives so no one will question our own.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Innovation often emerges out of necessity. Fostering innovation, a key part of Goal 9 of the new Sustainable Development Goals, can only happen if we foster innovators -- the people who will see solutions, who will see value and promise where others see trouble and decay, and put ideas into action with the commitment for sustainability. While it's important to create and name the goals we need for sustainable development, measures of success are harder to come by when we're looking at creative leaders launching new and often untested ideas.

At Echoing Green, we've supported nearly 700 social entrepreneurs working in more than 60 countries with seed-funding and a community of support. What's clear from this portfolio of emerging innovators is that they need time and "runway" to implement their ideas and see results. As we work as a global community toward achieving Goal 9, we need to recognize that part of supporting these leaders means building an infrastructure and an ecosystem that can support their innovations and that looks at metrics in a realistic way.

What does that mean for countries looking to achieve the SDGs and Goal 9? It means they have to consider three elements to foster innovation:

1. Create Space and Structures

Innovation is a process that accelerates change by discovering new, effective ways of working. When issues are urgent, it's critical to create space and structures for innovative thinking and doing among actors, organizations and governments.

2. Use Innovation as a Supplement, not a Substitute, for Systems-Level Change

Innovation means challenging the status quo and reconsidering a standard approach. But it's not a cure-all; just because a solution works in one application does not guarantee success in a different context.

3. Fund Innovation in a Way That Makes Sense

Conversations are underway about how we can finance these SDGs, and what's clear is that all global actors, from development agencies to business, have a role to play. More attention and capital are being directed at impact investments to achieve social change. While this is exciting and an important source of capital for many social innovators, measuring the social and environmental impacts of investments can be challenging, particularly at the earliest stage. Development institutions, business, and investors must work together on realistic timelines for impact measurements when it comes to SDG-related investments.

So what does it look like when innovation is fostered?

It looks like Elizabeth Hausler Strand, a 2004 Echoing Green Fellow, who started Build Change to greatly reduce deaths, injuries and economic losses caused by housing and school collapses due to earthquakes and typhoons in emerging nations. Following the 2003 earthquake in Bam, Iran, Elizabeth saw reports that most of the 26,000 deaths were caused by collapse of unreinforced masonry and mud brick homes. But she also saw a solution -- that she could design disaster-resistant houses and schools and train builders, homeowners, engineers, and government officials to build them.

Hausler Strand launched Build Change's first project in Indonesia after the Indian Ocean tsunami leveled the northern part of the country. Ten years later, the organization is still working in Indonesia and has expanded to work in 10 countries, including the Philippines, Nepal, Haiti and more. The key to her innovation is not only the building technology for resilient infrastructure, but empowering and equipping locals with construction methods and skills they can use long after Build Change leaves the village. This has resulted in 46,000 safer buildings and 10,500 jobs created.

Innovation can also look like Benjamin Cohen, a 2013 Echoing Green Fellow, who founded TOHL. His organization is providing permanent and mobile infrastructure that connects remote communities to clean water by using low-maintenance, solar-powered pipeline systems and rapid-installation techniques. One of TOHL's solutions utilizes coiled tubing deployed via helicopter to rapidly connect remote water sources to places affected by emergency situations.

The idea was born following the 2010 Haiti earthquake, and from the direct need for water in Port-au-Prince after conventional infrastructure was destroyed. Benjamin launched his pilot program in Chile, and has since initiated projects in Nicaragua, Honduras, and Kenya.

The common thread between Elizabeth and Benjamin is that they had a great idea, and the support to put it into action. Innovation can be found anywhere, but it must be fostered. While it's exciting that innovation is named within the SDGs as a priority under Goal 9, it's clear that innovation needs to be infused across the SDGs. To develop sustainable and resilient infrastructure in developing countries, we have to create the conditions where innovators can effectively implement, iterate, and have the time and space to learn from their methods to make lasting change.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Innovation often emerges out of necessity. Fostering innovation, a key part of Goal 9 of the new Sustainable Development Goals, can only happen if we foster innovators -- the people who will see solutions, who will see value and promise where others see trouble and decay, and put ideas into action with the commitment for sustainability. While it's important to create and name the goals we need for sustainable development, measures of success are harder to come by when we're looking at creative leaders launching new and often untested ideas.

At Echoing Green, we've supported nearly 700 social entrepreneurs working in more than 60 countries with seed-funding and a community of support. What's clear from this portfolio of emerging innovators is that they need time and "runway" to implement their ideas and see results. As we work as a global community toward achieving Goal 9, we need to recognize that part of supporting these leaders means building an infrastructure and an ecosystem that can support their innovations and that looks at metrics in a realistic way.

What does that mean for countries looking to achieve the SDGs and Goal 9? It means they have to consider three elements to foster innovation:

1. Create Space and Structures

Innovation is a process that accelerates change by discovering new, effective ways of working. When issues are urgent, it's critical to create space and structures for innovative thinking and doing among actors, organizations and governments.

2. Use Innovation as a Supplement, not a Substitute, for Systems-Level Change

Innovation means challenging the status quo and reconsidering a standard approach. But it's not a cure-all; just because a solution works in one application does not guarantee success in a different context.

3. Fund Innovation in a Way That Makes Sense

Conversations are underway about how we can finance these SDGs, and what's clear is that all global actors, from development agencies to business, have a role to play. More attention and capital are being directed at impact investments to achieve social change. While this is exciting and an important source of capital for many social innovators, measuring the social and environmental impacts of investments can be challenging, particularly at the earliest stage. Development institutions, business, and investors must work together on realistic timelines for impact measurements when it comes to SDG-related investments.

So what does it look like when innovation is fostered?

It looks like Elizabeth Hausler Strand, a 2004 Echoing Green Fellow, who started Build Change to greatly reduce deaths, injuries and economic losses caused by housing and school collapses due to earthquakes and typhoons in emerging nations. Following the 2003 earthquake in Bam, Iran, Elizabeth saw reports that most of the 26,000 deaths were caused by collapse of unreinforced masonry and mud brick homes. But she also saw a solution -- that she could design disaster-resistant houses and schools and train builders, homeowners, engineers, and government officials to build them.

Hausler Strand launched Build Change's first project in Indonesia after the Indian Ocean tsunami leveled the northern part of the country. Ten years later, the organization is still working in Indonesia and has expanded to work in 10 countries, including the Philippines, Nepal, Haiti and more. The key to her innovation is not only the building technology for resilient infrastructure, but empowering and equipping locals with construction methods and skills they can use long after Build Change leaves the village. This has resulted in 46,000 safer buildings and 10,500 jobs created.

Innovation can also look like Benjamin Cohen, a 2013 Echoing Green Fellow, who founded TOHL. His organization is providing permanent and mobile infrastructure that connects remote communities to clean water by using low-maintenance, solar-powered pipeline systems and rapid-installation techniques. One of TOHL's solutions utilizes coiled tubing deployed via helicopter to rapidly connect remote water sources to places affected by emergency situations.

The idea was born following the 2010 Haiti earthquake, and from the direct need for water in Port-au-Prince after conventional infrastructure was destroyed. Benjamin launched his pilot program in Chile, and has since initiated projects in Nicaragua, Honduras, and Kenya.

The common thread between Elizabeth and Benjamin is that they had a great idea, and the support to put it into action. Innovation can be found anywhere, but it must be fostered. While it's exciting that innovation is named within the SDGs as a priority under Goal 9, it's clear that innovation needs to be infused across the SDGs. To develop sustainable and resilient infrastructure in developing countries, we have to create the conditions where innovators can effectively implement, iterate, and have the time and space to learn from their methods to make lasting change.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Later this month the United Nations is expected to finalize its Sustainable Development Goals, a global action plan designed to end poverty and support long-term growth. Goals #9 states, "Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation."

In many parts of the developing world, from Asia to Latin America, a massive infrastructure shortfall may be the single most significant obstacle to human and economic development. Addressing it will underpin progress on many of the SDGs.

Nearly 2.5 billion people around the world are still without adequate sanitation, and 768 million lack access to clean drinking water. More than a billion don't have power in their homes. If we couple those issues with other common problems -- like bad roads, crumbling bridges, poorly managed airports and inefficient ports -- we have a recipe for near-zero growth.

Only with significant investments in infrastructure across the developing world can we help spark meaningful growth and end the scourge of poverty.

To approach that goal, the world's developing countries need to channel at least another $1 trillion a year into infrastructure development. But with many governments around the world facing fiscal constraints, where will that money come from?

The answer lies in the private sector, whose expertise and financial clout can help make vital infrastructure projects a reality.

Private Sector has a Key Role

At IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, we help private companies invest in developing nations, as part of our effort to fight poverty and boost shared prosperity. IFC's infrastructure investments have created more than 2.5 million jobs, brought clean water to more than 23 million people, provided electricity to 100 million people, and connected more than 237 million people with phone services.

Governments around the world have started to embrace private investments in the infrastructure sector.

Jordan, for example, passed a new renewable-energy law in 2012, easing the development of large-scale projects. As a result, with support from IFC, the country recently finalized funding for seven solar power plants with a combined capacity of 102 megawatts -- the region's largest-ever private-sector-led solar project.

This progress in Jordan is part of a series of private-sector-led power projects in the Middle East and North Africa that could add more than 100 gigawatts to the electric grid by 2030.

Despite success stories like these, the private sector accounts for less than 15 percent of total infrastructure investments in emerging and developing economies, while governments account for 70 percent. What's more, 95 percent of private-sector infrastructure funding occurs in middle-income countries, leaving little for the poorest and neediest states.

Recipe for Growth

The question is: how can we change that?

First, governments must create an environment in which the private sector can thrive, by limiting corruption and developing transparent regulatory frameworks. Given the long-term nature of infrastructure development and the massive amounts of money involved, investors need confidence in the markets they operate in.

Second, countries should support public-private partnerships (PPPs), in which firms and governments work together on major infrastructure projects. PPPs allow states to benefit from the expertise of the private sector while letting officials focus on policy and planning.

Finally, international financial institutions must continue to support infrastructure development. IFC, for example, invested $4 billion in infrastructure projects in fiscal year 2015. There is room, though, for development agencies to do even more.

Since the launch of the Millennium Development Goals (the precursor to the SDGs) 15 years ago, the world has made great progress in terms of providing basic services to its poorest citizens. But by 2030, the planet will likely need 40 percent more energy and face a 40 percent shortfall of water.

These are troubling figures. But we would be wise to remember that by tapping into the private sector, we can unlock the transformative power of infrastructure.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post, "What's Working: Sustainable Development Goals," in conjunction with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The proposed set of milestones will be the subject of discussion at the UN General Assembly meeting on Sept. 25-27, 2015 in New York. The goals, which will replace the UN's Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015), cover 17 key areas of development -- including poverty, hunger, health, education, and gender equality, among many others. As part of The Huffington Post's commitment to solutions-oriented journalism, this What's Working SDG blog series will focus on one goal every weekday in September. This post addresses Goal 9.

To find out what you can do, visit here and here.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Todd Barrish is the president of Indicate Media. The company is a personalized public relations firm, which focuses on telling powerful stories to drive their clients message. But before you can become a successful entrepreneur you first need to develop the skills necessary for success.

The Internet is in part responsible for lowering the barriers to entry and in some cases removing the gatekeepers. If you want to start a life changing business, become a New York Times best selling author, or simply create a lucrative second income as a personal coach -- the opportunity is available.

Unfortunately, while the opportunities are available the work still needs to be done. And the journey needs to be undertaken by you. Furthermore, because the level of noise today, the entrepreneur needs to work harder to out hustle the other guy.

And there is only one way of doing that.

Barrish quoted Seth Godin as saying "being the best in the world at something."

I agree with Godin. Many entrepreneurs feel they need to be experts at many things. While that is a worthwhile endeavor, it's a misplaced use of your limited energy.

Bearish continues to explain, that to be the best in the world you need, "to be focused and avoid distraction while keeping an eye on what's happening around you."

While the focus is critical, the question of what to focus on is elusive. So how do you narrow your lens? Simple -- focus on those skills that will give you the most freedom in the future. Once you have identified what those skills are, you need to create a learning map and then make learning a priority.

You don't have to become an expert, but you do have to master the skills.

It does not make a difference where you are in your entrepreneurial journey. But it's your duty to stop and review where you are -- checking in on your progress and making sure that you are solving problems. You need to make the review a weekly event, which is scheduled on your calendar.

By taking this type of action, you will slowly become what Seth Godin describes as the lynchpin -- the person that is necessary to...

These are strategies that Barrish has fostered through his entrepreneurial career.

Tell me about a project that forced you to be innovative and creative?

Innovation and creativity are the bedrock of any successful public relations campaign. Clients not only expect this kind of thinking, it's also the best way to build relationships with the media and other outside influencers.

The best example of a project that forced me to be innovative and creative wasn't a specific campaign at any agency – it was actually the creation and launch of my own agency, Indicate Media. After starting the business as young entrepreneur, the secret sauce to building brand credibility from the ground up and securing new business centered on our ability to differentiate our services from others.

Innovation and creativity are two principles that have never left us over the past four years and continues to guide everything we do today.

Discuss a specific accomplishment of yours in a previous position that indicates you will thrive in this position?

The interesting part of this question is that the term 'accomplishment' is meant to portray something positive. Yet in life, as I am sure we all know, accomplishments can also take on different meanings. In a previous life, I worked for an agency where I was tasked with helping to build out their regional operations.

Through some strategic reorganization and a focus on new business, we were able, in a very short amount of time, to bring on a significant amount of businesses. By all measures that is a great accomplishment because new business is the lifeblood of any PR firm.

However, through the process, it became clear to me that new business is only one part of many things that need to go right in building a business. Employee morale, compensation structures, adequate resources, etc. also have to be in sync.

So, the accomplishment of knowing how to secure business, coupled with the life experience of understanding the multiple moving parts that make a successful business has made me a much stronger entrepreneur and prepared me to execute better in my current business.

Solving complex problems often requires a re-framing of the problem. So what is your process of re-framing the problem so it can be resolved?

Problem solving is a key attribute for all successful entrepreneurs. In fact, one could argue 'problems' are an everyday part of business. At Indicate Media, we practice a 4 pronged approach to problem solving.

• Step 1: Thoroughly identify the problem and the root cause of the problem.


• Step 2: Discuss solutions. This includes potentially reframing the conversation. Usually the best solution is one that you can act on quickly. There is a rule that says that "every large problem was once a small problem that could have been solved easily at that time."


• Step 3: Assign responsibility of the solution. In other words, who is going to manage moving things forward.


• Step 4: Set a measurement of the solution so you know when and whether the problem was solved. Success is defined by a person or organization’s ability to solves problems.

By being tactical in our approach to problem solving, we are better able to deal with whatever is thrown our way.

What would you say to someone who wants to take the plunge into entrepreneurship?

Being an entrepreneur is one of the best decisions I have made in my professional life. While it is true that entrepreneurs are able to take more pleasure in the good days and feel more pain in the bad days, at the end of every day, knowing you are working towards a goal that uniquely belongs to you and your team is extremely satisfying.

My advice to those thinking of taking the entrepreneurial plunge is 'go for it'. Jump right into the water. The very worst that happens is you might have to go get a job. But the very best that can happen is endless … and that is the point.

How can entrepreneurs find success in a marketplace that always seems to change?

Over time all marketplace's change. It just so happens that today - thanks to technology innovation - it is changing at a faster rate than ever before in history.

The world of public relations is certainly no exception. The best way to find success in an ever-changing marketplace is to have a mission, be strategic in your work, work hard and pay attention to the things happening all around you.

Seth Godin calls it "being the best in the world at something." To do that, you need to be focused and avoid distraction while keeping an eye on what's happening around you.

Fights are healthy, how you get through them is another the question. How do you deal with conflict? Compromise?

At Indicate Media, we encourage everyone to say what's on their mind. It's the only way to identify problems and mismatches in thinking and allows us to push past them.

We work hard to set the tone for everyone that starts from a place of respect. If you start from a place of respect and mutual admiration for your co-workers, then when conflict arises, even though sometimes it can include passionate discussions, everyone in the end is able to move past it.

Business is and isn't personal. It just depends on which side of the table you are sitting at any given time. In any organization, on any given day, decisions need to be made. The best scenario is when those decisions are made on compromise and respect for the other side of the argument.

Reader Question: As an entrepreneur what strategies do you have in place that will help you learn those skills that will give you more freedom in the future? Share your answers on Twitter.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Our work cultures are only as great as the people in them are. I believe with all the stressors of today's technology, 24/7 response time, longer hours are making it more challenging for employees to be their best selves. In fact, I discovered through my research that 75 percent of Americans experience some sort of physical symptoms related to stress in any given month, and 73 percent experience psychological or mental symptoms, according to the American Psychological Association, Stress in America, 2012.

Pause and think about it. Three out of four people are experiencing stress at such a high level that it is having a negative effect on their health, relationships and work. Are you one of the three?

This stress treadmill needs to stop. So, what can I do? I believe that with longer hours, we've actually become less productive, therein lies the challenge. Should executives change the policy and simply say go back to a 40-hour workweek and is that even realistic with a global economy? Should employees renegotiate the amount of hours they work each day?

There is no simple answer, rather each person needs to take a step back and ponder this question, "Am I enjoying my work, the people, and the environment? If not, then what am I going to do about it?" In my opinion, it means more personal accountability is needed to foster a more positive work culture. Collectively, we can change the culture if we want it to be less stressed, and then we need to make different choices. Working with various clients, there is an increase of people coming to work every day exhausted, overwhelmed and stressed out. I have had my share of struggling to find balance and juggling all that we have to do in today's fast-paced world.

I finally came up with some questions to help me navigate in the constantly changing environment and then gave them to some of my coaching clients as well.

• Will I be glad that I did it?


• Is this a must-do, or can I leave it for later?


• Is this the best use of my time?


• Will I have regrets if I don't do this?


• Will a delay cause more or less stress?


• Is it okay to say no to this?


• What is stopping me from moving forward?


• Is this a top priority? If yes, just do it.

These questions help me to pause and assess whether the work I'm doing is critical in that moment, and is it for a greater result. We have so many "to-dos" on our checklist that we are simply going through it and checking it off without regard to whether it's genuinely important.

In my experience, when employees take a 15-minute pause every day away from their desk, go to lunch in the cafeteria or at a cafe, took a walk or use the company gym that would help relieve some stress. It's all about the practice. Taking time out each day to have more time for family, friends and fun will definitely make for a happier and more energized employee that in turn would make for a more positive work culture.

Ultimately, I believe that the difference between effective and ineffective work cultures is that effective organizations have employees who are engaged, energized and work well together every day. They are committed to practicing being aware and accountable to ensure they are taking a "timeout" to lower their stress levels. I'm an advocate for helping employees and organizations cultivate positive, engaged and energized workplaces.

Michelle Burke is a Communication and Workplace Strategist, published Author, Consultant, and Speaker. She is Co-founder and President of The Energy Catalyst Group dedicated to creating more positive and engaged workplaces. Her years' experience working with Fortune 100, 500 companies, established her as a leading expert in bridging communication, gender and cultural gaps. Michelle consults with HR and leadership to focus on increasing individual, team and organizational energy. She collaborates with clients using her 3-A Model: Awareness, Accountability and (purposeful) Action. Clients include Stanford University, Visa, Sony, Disney, Receptos and Genentech. She authored, The Valuable Office Professional, and was featured in Business Week's Frontier Magazine, the LA Times, SF Chronicle, and Wall Street Journal. Her articles have been in Training, HR, and Chief Learning Officer Magazines. Please connect with her Michelle@energycatalystgroup.com.

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By Michael Kahn, Global CEO, Performics Worldwide

Today, consumers move seamlessly and simultaneously across channels and devices in the path-to-purchase. Every brand touchpoint--whether it's a search result, social post, content piece, or TV ad--is part of a holistic, omni-channel shopping journey. The lines between physical and virtual shopping have even blurred, with mobile as the key integrator. No matter where, each and every moment could be "shoppable."

Throughout this continuous and connected journey, consumers have come to expect highly personalized experiences, aligned with their wants and needs, in specific moments. In a world where media is personalized and contextual, delivering the right experience, at the right moment, is critical. Yet, many advertisers still treat every customer and moment the same. Advertisers must move from mass marketing to moment marketing, and pull strategy to predictive strategy. To create connected experiences that are built to engage, every touchpoint must align with consumer intent.

Intent is the largest marketing variable. It shapes how people discover content, dictates paths-to-purchase and mediates meaningful interactions with brands, regardless of media type. In today's landscape, successful advertisers are identifying intent at each consumer decision point, matching that intent and turning it into conversions.

Understanding and Activating Intent

Understanding consumer intent requires brands to extract meaning from data including: consumer journeys, search keywords, device, geo, demographics, interests, time, prior brand connections, CRM, competitive insights, marketplace landscape, seasonality, etc. In particular, search keywords have always been a great way to identify and serve intent, as they reveal a clear glimpse into the searcher's need. Qualitative and quantitative data analysis will enable you to create an initial intent hypothesis, a vision of experiences that you think will best engage each of your audiences. In-market data (clicks, leads, conversions)--powered by advanced analytics--will then enable you to continually validate and refine your intent hypothesis.

In your intent-based planning process, you'll uncover the varying intents of each of your audience segments (e.g. prospects vs. customers). You can then deliver highly personalized/dynamic messages, targeting strategies and landing page experiences to each intent. Every little insight into consumer intent can greatly influence performance. To illustrate, a technology brand client recently launched a new product amongst much buzz. Consumers turned to Google to search for the product name. But what were their exact intentions? Were they existing customers looking to upgrade to the new product; or new customers? CRM data--as it often does--held the key to intent, enabling the brand to (1) identify new vs. existing customers and (2) predictively deliver differing ad messages to each segment. The brand realized an 800+ percent conversion boost year-over-year through this strategy.

As devices and channels continually proliferate--and shopping journeys increase in complexity--catering to consumer intent will only grow in importance. Heading into the 2016 planning season, it's critical for brands to reassess their operating assumptions, strategies and objectives. Intent should have a place in every plan. What are your intentions?

About the Author

Michael Kahn is CEO, Performics Worldwide, the global performance marketing agency inside ZenithOptimedia. With a passion to move clients' businesses ahead every day, Michael motivates the organization to set the standard for strategic leadership, proactive service and sustained innovation.

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When we're finally ready to flip the switch to retirement, my husband and I intend to settle in Paris. For us, this city is as good as it gets and the world's best option for retirement living.

Step out your door anytime, day or night, turn right or left, and you don't have to travel far to encounter something engaging. At home in one of Paris' central, historic neighborhoods, from the 1st arrondissement to the 8th, the best this world has to offer is only a short and pleasant walk away. Indeed, Paris is a city best explored and appreciated on foot, and, when I'm in Paris, I spend as many hours as I can in that pursuit.



I enjoy Paris in all seasons and any weather. What difference if it's raining or dry, January frigid or August hot, when you can retreat on a whim to a cafe for a cup of hot chocolate or a cold coupe de champagne? Sidewalk heaters mean you can sit outside at your favorite cafe and enjoy the passing show year-round.

All of my favorite things are here -- bookstores, antique shops, champagne cellars, pretty parks, well-tended gardens, old buildings, and old friends. The city cycles reliably through other favorites, especially at Christmas, when tiny white lights are strung along the grand boulevards and shop windows are framed with evergreens and gold baubles.

In Paris, a loaf of baguette and a bottle of wine are the makings of one of the most memorable afternoons of your life when enjoyed riverside. This has been true for hundreds of years and will be true for hundreds more.



Central Paris is an open-air museum where little changes yet every day offers the chance for discovery. Paris is at once perfectly packaged and constantly improving itself.

It's also one of the world's best storehouses of wealth. Property values in this city move up and down, as they do everywhere (right now, they're largely down), but an apartment of charm in a good location in this city will always find a buyer ... and a renter. The rental market in central Paris is perhaps the most proven in the world.

The most sought-after addresses are in the 1st, 6th, 7th, and 8th arrondissements. Limited demand (because if you own an apartment in one of these neighborhoods, you typically hold on to it ... these properties are often passed from generation to generation) keeps prices high, as much as 15,000 euros per square meter and more.



More interesting from a cost-per-square-meter perspective can be the 11th (around the Place de la Republique), the 18th (Montmartre), the 19th (home to Buttes Chaumont park and the popular Bassin de la Villette), and the 20th (one of the most multi-cultural areas of this city), all neighborhoods enjoying gentrification and becoming increasingly trendy. You could buy in the 18th or 19th for as little as 6,000 or 7,000 euros per square meter with a reasonable expectation for both rental cash flow and near-term appreciation of value.

If you, like me, dream of living or retiring in the City of Light, you have a chance right now to take a big step toward making that dream come true someday. The strong dollar gives you more buying power in this city than you've had in more than a dozen years. Meantime, as I mentioned, property values are down, including in some of Paris' most appealing quarters. This is a window of opportunity to buy on a dip.



Paris isn't one of the world's bargain property markets, but it's possible as a foreigner to finance the purchase of property in France. This is more difficult to accomplish today than it was pre-2008, but it can be possible to borrow, say, 50 percent of the purchase price. Think small (you can buy apartments as small as 30 or 40 square meters), and your capital outlay could be controlled to a reasonable level.

Buy today, using your strong dollars and taking advantage of the current buyer's market in some neighborhoods, and you're pre-paying for your retirement housing expense. The cost of housing covered, your cost of living in Paris could be much less than you might imagine. Buy an apartment today that you intend to live in during retirement, and you could rent it out between now and then. Then, when you're ready, you could settle in for a rent-free retirement in the world's most beautiful, most romantic city.



Continue Reading:

Travel Tips For Paris

The Affordable Dream Of Living In Paris, France

The Falling Euro Makes Paris An Irresistible Bargain

Earlier on Huff/Post50:

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It wasn't long ago that college students went back to school and in addition to buying books and sweatshirts on campus, they were offered credit cards--and the chance to plunge into debt before they even began earning an income. Thanks to the Card Act of 2009, credit card issuers are no longer allowed to advertise on campus, or offer the promotions that often enticed young people to use the cards.

But there are still potential pitfalls. Credit cards, like cell phones, are ubiquitous; every teen "needs" one. And just as with cell phones and internet access, it is smarter for parents to use these as teaching tools, monitor their use, and protect their teens from abusing credit, while explaining how valuable credit can be.

Here are five ways to get started.

1. Start by checking your teen's credit report online with her. There should be no credit at first - unless the child's social security number has been used fraudulently. Show her that her use of the credit card will be reported to the credit bureaus. Explain that anything bad, such as late payments, will stay on her credit report for 7 years. That could impact her in many ways, including the cost of auto insurance, a landlord's decision on whether to rent an apartment to her, or even whether she gets a job, since employers often pull credit reports. Go to www.annualcreditreport.com to get the report.

2. Add your teen to your card as an authorized user. Open a new credit card account (with a low credit limit) with your teen. Then be sure to set up online access so the two of you can regularly review spending online. Make sure the credit usage is being reported under her Social Security number as well as your own. You will have the incentive to monitor her spending - because your credit could be impacted!

3. Get a student credit card. Go to this link on Bankrate.com for their report student credit cards. You'll find that major card issuers, including Discover, Capital One, and Citibank, have created cards especially for students with rewards features that include free FICO credit scores, and - in the case of Discover, a $20 cash-back feature for each year the student's grade point average is above 3.0.
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4. Get a "secured card." Many card issuers offer these VISA and MasterCards, which require a savings deposit in the issuing bank. The credit limit is the amount of the savings deposit. Use the card regularly, and pay in full and on time, and those credit habits will be reported to the credit bureau, starting to build a good credit report. Secured cards can be used like any other card, allowing you to withdraw cash at ATMs or pay for purchases.

5. Consider VisaBuxx - the card built for young people and parents. The card is linked to the parent's account so it can automatically be refilled when the money runs out! Meanwhile, both parent and student can instantly view all transactions online. So if the student calls home for a refill because books were too expensive, Mom can see that a lot of money went to the campus bar and grill! Go to www.VisaBuxx.com for links to issuing banks.

Consumer credit expert, Gerri Detweiler, of Credit.com has some excellent tips for choosing a student credit card, and this year's list of the best student credit cards at this link. And students can also get their credit score free at Credit.com.

And a final thought, now that you've enabled your teen or college student to use credit and start to manage their own financial future: Let them learn the whole lesson! Don't be quick to bail them out when they've reached their limit. Suggest they get a part-time job to earn extra money to pay down the balance. If you kids learn those lessons early - when they are painful but less costly - they will have a much easier time in later life. And that's The Savage Truth.

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I challenge Hal Singer, Senior Fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute, and FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai to a rousing debate, sponsored by the Internet Society, New York Chapter, who has agreed to host it.

Why? There has been a serious rewrite of history and the 'facts' have a different interpretation when all of the data is examined. (And I use the word 'pundits' as there is a whole class of 'experts' that have not bothered to examine the facts we are about to present, though I note much of their research contains phrases like "This report was prepared for Verizon", or "Thanks to AT&T for research funding".)

Commissioner Pai spoke at an American Enterprise Institute forum on September 9th, 2015. He said:

"When I first saw Hal Singer's research revealing the decline in U.S. broadband providers' capital expenditures, a statement by John Adams came to mind: Facts are stubborn things. And here are some of the stubborn facts that Hal uncovered. Capital expenditures by major wireline broadband providers plunged 12% in the first half of 2015 compared to the first half of 2014..."

"What's responsible for the recent drop in infrastructure investment? There's no disruption in the overall economy to blame. Instead, it's the FCC's decision to capitulate to the President's demands and impose Title II public utility regulation upon the Internet that is playing a large role. Numerous broadband providers told the FCC earlier this year under penalty of perjury that Title II regulation was leading them to cut back on infrastructure investment and broadband deployment."

Click: What is Title II?

And it appears that the goal of their examination is to make the phone and cable companies' case that the FCC's Open Internet Order, (Net Neutrality) which others have dubbed "Obamanet", is evil.

Let me uncover some facts about Verizon's use of Title II and broadband deployments that appear to have been miss-diagnosed -- and I'll quote the source, in this case, Verizon.

However, it is astonishing that Mr. Singer and Commissioner Pai have not bothered to mention the most obvious fact about the slow down of investment:

VERIZON HAS STOPPED UPGRADING THE NETWORKS OR MAINTAINING THE COPPER WIRES--AND HAS BEEN TALKING ABOUT IT FOR 6 YEARS!

I'll return to this in a moment.

1) Verizon's Entire FiOS Fiber Optic Deployment Is Based on "Title II".

First, Verizon's entire "FTTP", "Fiber-to-the-Premises" network that is used for FiOS services has been and continues to be classified as 'Title II', common carriage and a telecommunications service. (NOTE: FiOS is a brand name for a group of services that ride on this fiber optic network; it is NOT the wire itself.)

In 2005, Verizon was able to convince the New York State Public Service Commission (NYPSC) that FiOS was just an extension of the state utility networks. Here it is, in writing, by Verizon.



Verizon has used this exact same tactic -- i.e., making the fiber networks an extension of the regular state-based utility, in every state. Here's an excerpt from Verizon's District of Columbia proposed franchise agreement, circa 2007; it details that the fiber network is Title II and the deployment is based on the existing telecommunications networks.



Thus, claiming that Title II harms investment when Title II is the investment strategy is, well, wrong, or even deceptive.


2) Title II Didn't Harm Investment in Deploying Fiber Optics - It Is the Investment Mechanism.

In New York State, Verizon went back to the State after the 2005 decision and was able to get multiple rate increases to pay for fiber optic construction because as Title II, the company could use the state utility's maintenance and construction budgets, as well as charge local phone customers for the network upgrades.

In June 2009, the NYPSC granted Verizon NY the third rate increase on residential basic, copper-based phone service since 2006. The NYPSC press release explains that the rate increase was due to "massive deployment of fiber optics". (Elsewhere the State also pointed out that Verizon NY was "in need of financial relief" due to major losses.)

"'We are always concerned about the impacts on ratepayers of any rate increase, especially in times of economic stress,' said Commission Chairman Garry Brown. 'Nevertheless, there are certain increases in Verizon's costs that have to be recognized. This is especially important given the magnitude of the company's capital investment program, including its massive deployment of fiber optics in New York. We encourage Verizon to make appropriate investments in New York, and these minor rate increases will allow those investments to continue'."

In New York State, these rate increases on basic service added $750.00+ since 2006 per line, not counting the additional costs to add-on services like non-listed numbers. The release calls this 'minor' because it never audited Verizon's financial books, or even added up the increases that added 84% to just basic service.

The losses were based, in part, on Verizon Corporate dumping billions of dollars of expenses into local service, having other Verizon subsidiaries not pay market prices for services, or giving them access to part, some, or most of the utility construction budgets. (And these losses are NOT based on expenses related to offering the copper-based phone service -- there's no more advertising, marketing, no new construction and the staff has been slashed.)

3) Verizon Never Told the FCC that Title II was the Method of Investment

Funny, but Commissioner Pai claims that the companies, under penalty of perjury, told the FCC that the Open Internet Order and Title II would harm investment.

We filed a Petition for Investigation for perjury against Verizon as, truth be told, Verizon never mentioned to the FCC that their network investment plans were based on Title II.

4) The Re-Write of Broadband History

This ability to charge customers to fund broadband is NOT new, just ignored in the history laid out by Singer. And, unfortunately, more money was collected in the name of broadband than was ever actually put into construction.

For example, "Opportunity New Jersey", the Verizon NJ plan, was to have 100% of their state territory upgraded to fiber optics, with speeds capable of 45 Mbps in both directions -- starting around 1992 and completed in 2010.

The state laws were changed in 1992 (and finalized in 1993) to replace the existing copper wires with fiber optic wires, and in New Jersey there was even a timeline of when these networks were to be completed. We estimate that by the end of 2014, about $15 billion dollars was collected in just New Jersey.

Click to see Opportunity New Jersey Time Line

And though it varies by state as to the commitments and customer investment, this same plan played out in every Verizon, AT&T and Centurylink state -- formerly, the incumbent Bell phone companies.

Worse, these excess charges are still being collected today and built into rates as no state ever went back to stop the customer overcharging that was supposed to be used to build out the networks -- that were never built.

See: The Book of Broken Promises for details.

Verizon's FiOS, which was announced in 2004, came a decade after these laws were changed to build out the states' infrastructure. And yet, there is no mention of this on Singer's timeline of events -- and it happened in almost every state in the Union.

5) Verizon Stopped Upgrading and Maintaining the Wired Networks Starting in 2009.

And as mentioned, it is remarkable that Mr. Singer and Commissioner Pai have not bothered to mention the most obvious fact about the slow down of investment:

VERIZON HAS STOPPED UPGRADING THE NETWORKS OR MAINTAINING THE COPPER WIRES.

I.e., Verizon's expenditures on the wireline networks have been in decline for years and were set to slow down long before the Net Neutrality decision.

2009: In September, 2009, then-CEO of Verizon, Ivan Seidenberg, spoke at a Goldman Sachs investment meeting. According to the New York Times, the plan was to 'hang up' on the landline business.

"Verizon Boss Hangs Up on Landline Phone Business.

"Speaking to a Goldman Sachs investor conference, Mr. Seidenberg said Verizon was simply no longer concerned with telephones that are connected with wires. ...Not only does Verizon control the largest mobile phone company in the country, it has also largely moved away from copper wires. Verizon is selling off most of its operations in rural areas and is spending billions to wire most of the rest of its territory with its fiber optic network, or FiOS."

2010: Then, in 2010, this headline by the Wall Street Journal announced: "Verizon to End Rollout of FiOS".

2012: The halting of FiOS deployment has continued as a story over the last five years. For example, this headline from 2012 by Stop the Cap, states: "Verizon Won't Expand FiOS Beyond Current Franchise Obligations, CFO Tells Investors", Sept 25th, 2012

And in 2015,DSLReports summed up the current situation where recent calls to bring wired broadband deployment to cities throughout America's East Coast has fallen on deaf ears.

"With the exception of major city franchise obligations (and even those have lots of wiggle room), Verizon all but ended their FiOS expansion plans around five years ago. With so many un-served cities still begging to be upgraded Verizon continually has to remind folks that they're simply not interested in upgrading their fixed line networks any more. If you live in one of those un-upgraded cities like Buffalo, Boston or Alexandria, that's a tough pill to swallow."

And let us be clear; Verizon announced that it has been spending more on wireless than on the wireline networks, as of late. Quoting Fran Shammo, Verizon's CFO discussing the company's financials, January 22, 2015:

"I have been pretty consistent with this in the fact that we will spend more CapEx in the Wireless side and we will continue to curtail CapEx on the Wireline side... Some of that is because we are getting to the end of our committed build around FiOS, penetration is getting higher."

The entire East Coast of America is only partially upgraded, with an average of less than 50% coverage, regardless of the accounting being presented by Verizon, (which has not been audited).



And we know that simply taking Verizon's word for their deployments is very problematic. Verizon claimed it had fulfilled its obligations to wire all of New York City's residential dwellings.

Yet, the Consumerist headline, June 19, 2015, says it all:

"New York City Audit Calls Out Verizon for Failure to Build Out FiOS Network As Promised."

In short, the plan was already in place to slow down the investments of the wired networks long before the Net Neutrality Order passed.

6) The Other Companies' Investments are in Decline?

And, I'm surprised that Singer and Commissioner Pai didn't read the trade news.

AT&T: According to Lightwave, November 10, 2014, discussing AT&T's capex for 2015, the company was planning a decline in spending.

"Project VIP capex has peaked says AT&T.

"AT&T has said that investment in its Project VIP network enhancement program has peaked, and that capex for 2015 will therefore shrink from current levels. The pronouncement, tacked at the end of its announcement that it has acquired Mexican wireless network operator Iusacell for $2.5 billion, sent shares of optical technology stocks tumbling today."

And let us remember that "VIP" is based mostly on AT&T's copper-to-the-home service, U-Verse, where the company keeps telling everyone it is "fiber optic-based", but the reality is -- there is a fiber optic wire attached to a big box somewhere within ½ mile from the customer.

Comcast and Time Warner Cable? Their merger deal didn't happen so they are no longer on the hook to show that they are good corporate citizens and can drop the façade that they would invest heavily once the merger passed.

And if AT&T and Verizon, the wired competitors, aren't upgrading, why should they? In fact, they even have an agreement with Verizon to bundle their Triple Play with Verizon Wireless's service in areas that Verizon has not upgraded to fiber.

Gentlemen, why don't we let the public decide who has the 'facts'? The Internet Society, New York Chapter (Contact: ISOC-NY) has agreed to a host the debate; they are known for their live-streamed events as well. I look forward to an open discussion -- and just the facts -- just the facts.

NOTE: Hal Singer's bio at the Department of Justice includes "prepared several white papers and written testimony for clients, including (edited) AT&T, BellSouth, CTIA, Internet Innovation Alliance, Qwest, SBC, and Verizon. And a paper, "Unintended Consequences of Net Neutrality Regulation" from 2007 thanks "AT&T for research funding". It claims that "an FCC mandate on network neutrality would be detrimental to the objectives that all Americans seemingly should want--namely, the accelerated construction of next-generation networks, and benefits of lower prices, broader consumer choices, and innovations these networks would bring."

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President Obama's approval of Shell's Arctic oil drilling has tarnished his environmental legacy.

President Obama seeing the effects of climate change on Bear Glacier, aboard Viewfinder.
Image Credit: Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy.

INTRODUCTION
President Obama is the first incumbent US President to cross the Arctic Circle. The purpose of his expedition was to "witness first-hand the impact of climate change on the region" and to announce new measures to address it. Speaking at the Glacier climate summit in Anchorage, Obama recognised the role of the U.S. "in creating this problem." He also stated "we embrace our responsibility to help solve it" because failure to do so will "condemn our children to a planet beyond their capacity to repair." Yet less than one month ago his administration gave the green light to Shell to drill for oil in the Arctic.

President Obama must know that it is impossible to protect the Arctic while allowing Shell to drill for oil 70 miles off the coast of Alaska. He cannot have it both ways. His policies and proclamations are irreconcilable.

During his three-day excursion to the Arctic Circle he climbed a receding glacier, saw the melting Alaskan permafrost, met vulnerable coastal communities and addressed the Glacier climate summit.

On the first day of his trip Obama participated in a roundtable discussion with Alaskan Natives. At the Glacier summit he urged fellow world leaders to reach an agreement at the UNFCCC Paris climate summit, COP21 in December that "protects the one planet ... while we still can".

On day two Obama hiked the Exit Glacier in the Kenai Fjords National Park. He knows the Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the US and he is aware that the Exit Glacier has receded more than a mile since the start of the industrial revolution, with the rate of melting accelerating in the last few decades. He called the glacier "as good of a signpost as any when it comes to the impacts of climate change" and said he wanted his grandchildren to be able to see it one day. If President Obama really means this, how can he justify his approval of Shell's plan to drill for oil in the Arctic?

On the third day of his trip Obama met with local fishermen and families and attended a cultural performance by the children of Dillingham Middle School. The President joined the children in their last dance, saying: "I've been practising." He visited Kotzebue's sea wall to see the effects of rising sea levels and the devastating impact of increased storm severity. President Obama must know that even if the world agrees to keep temperature rises to 2 degree Celsius, sea levels, due to the melting of the ice, may still rise by 20 feet (6 metres) by 2100.

THE ARCTIC
In his weekly address on 29th August Obama tried to defend his approval of Shell's Arctic drilling. He said that Americans "are concerned about oil companies drilling in environmentally sensitive waters" and he had the audacity to say "that's precisely why my administration has worked to make sure that our oil exploration conducted under these leases is done at the highest standards possible, with requirements specifically tailored to the risks of drilling off Alaska."

President Obama must know that no safeguards or standards will be enough to prevent an oil spill. According to a February 2015 report by his Department of the Interior Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (Alaska OCS Region) drilling in the Arctic has a 75% chance of a spill of more than 1,000 barrels of oil.


Shell's Arctic drilling unit Kulluk run aground in December 2012.
Image Credit: National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration, NOAA.

How can President Obama trust Shell to drill for oil in the Arctic when during their last attempt in 2012 their Kulluk rig ran aground off the coast of Alaska, due to what the US Coast Guard called Shell's "inadequate assessment and management of risks". Arctic oil drilling is a dangerous and high-risk enterprise. Shell do not have an adequate extraction and spill response infrastructure. When they first attempted to drill in 2012, their response plan prepared for a worst-case oil spill of 25,000 barrels released per day for 30 days. In the same report Shell also made the ludicrous promise to recover 95% of a spill before oil reaches the shoreline despite the industry having recovery percentages of around only 10%, a figure which includes spills in more favourable clean up conditions than the Arctic. A freedom of information request revealed that both of Shell's drilling rigs currently in the Arctic had operational failings. Basic fire drills and abandon ship drills were "botched", indicating the crew and equipment were not prepared. The decision to drill for oil in the Arctic is reckless and irresponsible even for Shell's shareholders. The company is only indemnified for $1.15bn per incident, which means that a spill could be followed by a huge asset sale to cover financial liabilities, similar to the one BP had in 2010. A senior official at a Canadian firm that specialises in oil-spill response admitted that "there is really no solution or method today that we're aware of that can actually recover [spilled] oil from the Arctic."

To approve Shell's Arctic gamble President Obama should have assessed the oil industry's record. He must be aware that the oil industry has proved unable to operate safely in the Arctic and that any spill could devastate the lives of the four million people who live there and the hundreds of unique species of fish, birds and mammals. According to the Center for Biodiversity all life is under threat in the Arctic, from plankton to great whales, including: reindeer, the Arctic fox, the Pacific Walrus, the gray, beluga and bowhead whales, the spectacled eider and ivory gulls.

Cleaning up after oil spills is always a difficult and traumatic task. The Arctic Ocean presents additional problems. The Ocean is covered by ice for eight to nine months of the year, with almost complete darkness for nearly three of those months. Booms and dispersants are less effective because petroleum sticks to ice and the cold temperatures mean there are no microbes present to break down leaked oil. According to WWF there is no ability to respond to a spill for 7-8 months a year and only a 44-46% ability to respond in favourable conditions. Additional spill support may come from the Coast Guard, but the nearest base is 950 miles away. According to Alexander Horne, Professor Emeritus of Ecological Engineering at Berkeley, an oil spill in the Arctic could have more long-term effects than BP's 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster where 11 people died, 17 were injured, 16,000 miles of coastline were affected, and more than 210 million gallons of crude oil leaked into the Gulf of Mexico over 87 days. Despite these overwhelming arguments, Ann Pickard head of Shell Arctic made the preposterous claim to be able to have a response in place, including a containment dome, capping stack, and surface booms, within 60 minutes of an accident.

The President must know that Shell's Arctic oil drilling will cause increased greenhouse gas emissions and catastrophic climate change. As people throughout the world are pleading "the melting Arctic is a dire warning, not an invitation."

Al Gore described Shell's plan to drill for oil in the Chukchi Sea as "insane" and called for a ban on all oil and gas activity in the Arctic. NGOs and environmental groups were quick to highlight Obama's paradoxical environmental message, with Rebecca Noblin, Alaska Director for the Center for Biological Diversity saying: "It's perplexing and depressing to hear President Obama say he wants to fix climate change but then approve Arctic drilling. It's like a doctor diagnosing a patient but then refusing to write a prescription". Even Hilary Clinton, President Obama's hopeful successor stated, "The Arctic is a unique treasure. Given what we know, it's not worth the risk of drilling." Ahead of COP21 this sends a terrible signal to the world, that window dressing is all we can expect from the US President at this critical Climate Summit.

The Arctic is often referred to as the 'canary in the coalmine' for climate change. It is our early-warning system. The canary is in bad shape. Arctic ice is melting at a record rate. This year's seasonal minimum is set to be the third or fourth lowest on record, with the four lowest ice coverages occurring since 2007. As the ice retreats there are fewer reflective surfaces to reflect sunlight and the tundra and water that remain when the ice has melted absorbs more heat, causing further warming and making more ice disappear. In a few years, the children of Dillingham Middle School, who the President danced with on his recent visit, will not recognise their home.

Warmer temperatures are causing the permafrost to melt, releasing carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere. These permanently frozen lands make up as much as 24% of the northern hemisphere land mass and their emission could double the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. According to the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report methane is far more potent that carbon dioxide, 21 times more potent on a 100-year scale, and 72 times on a 20-year scale.


Arctic sea ice at its seasonal minimum last year, on 17th September 2014. The red line in this image shows the 1981-2010 average minimum extent. Data provided by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency GCOM-W1 satellite.
Image Credit: NASA/Goddard Scientific Visualization Studio.

Melting of the Arctic sea ice is a global threat that could disrupt major ocean circulation patterns and affect the world's climate. This would have severe consequences throughout the world affecting food production, causing price increases and food shortages.

Oceans and currents that move waters around the world help regulate the Earth's temperature. El Niño and La Niña weather systems that bring hotter or cooler weather are part of the larger Pacific decadal oscillation system that delivers periods of warmer weather or cooler weather, over decades. This system is currently in a cooling phase, which is "dampening" the rise of global average surface temperature. According to a study by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) this respite is only temporary. After the hiatus will follow a period of accelerated global warming unless urgent action is taken to reduce atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions.

Rising sea levels will endanger between 147 and 216 million people, particularly those in low-lying countries such as Bangladesh, the Marshall Islands and the Maldives as well as people in Tokyo, Shanghai, New York and London. According to UNEP a melting Arctic will result in "more intense and longer periods of rainfall and drought, summer heat waves and cold snaps in winter".

Americans have already experienced the impacts of climate change. In 2005 Hurricane Katrina, one of the most deadly and damaging hurricanes to hit the country, flooded 80% of New Orleans, causing the deaths of 1,833 people and forcing 273,000 people to seek disaster relief. In 2011 and 2012 the Midwest experienced the worst droughts for 50 years, and in 2014 New York was plunged into chaos by record breaking rains and snowstorms.


Aerial shot of the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina.
Image Credit: BBC.

According to the IPCC climate change will increase droughts and floods to the USA, declining water quality, and increased animal and plant mortality. Risk of wildfires has already increased. 2011 and 2012 saw near-record numbers of fires. In 2012 an area the size of the states of Massachusetts and Connecticut combined was set ablaze. The Whitehouse has reported that climate and weather disasters cost the country more than $100bn in 2012 alone. Air pollution, extreme weather events, and diseases carried by food, water, and insects all bring health risks. There is far more to come. Florida will see further rises in sea level. California will experience further droughts.

The President is right to say, "This is not a problem for another generation. Not anymore. This is a problem now. It has serious implications for the way we live right now." Obama has now seen the impacts of climate change during his visit to the Arctic. He must know that to prevent catastrophic climate change 88% of the world's known coal reserves, 52% of gas and 35% of oil must be left untouched. Now is the time for him to choose his side and rescind Shell's permit to drill for oil in the Arctic.

According to the Earth League, which includes Lord Nicholas Stern, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber advisor to Angela Merkel and Pope Francis, and US economist Jeffrey Sachs, three-quarters of known fossil fuel reserves must be left in the ground if average global warming is not to breach a rise of 2 degrees Celsius. In their statement, released on 22nd April 2015 to coincide with Earth Day, they warn that failure to leave oil in the soil and coal in the ground would bring a 1 in 10 risk of going beyond 6°C by 2100, a "high risk of disaster" that would be "equivalent of tolerating about 10,000 airplane crashes every day worldwide."

When he was elected President Obama promised to deliver a "new era of responsibility" and to "roll back the spectre of a warming planet". Millions of people around the world including me believed in him and his vision.

At the UNFCCC climate summit in Copenhagen, COP15, President Obama proved to be a galvanising force. Attended by 120 Heads of State, COP15 was the largest gathering of its kind, apart from the annual UN General Assembly in New York. The conference was the focus of unprecedented public and media attention but the President's leadership failed and the Copenhagen Accord that resulted was a shameful compromise. Obama missed that opportunity to set the world on the right path to avoiding catastrophic climate change. At this point he was a President in his first year in office, very aware that Congress could override his pledges. Now he only has months left.

When COP21 takes place in Paris at the end of 2015, six years will have passed since Copenhagen. COP21 is Obama's last chance to define his environmental legacy.

OBAMA'S ENVIRONMENTAL LEGACY
To date, what is President Obama's environmental legacy? He has implemented policies that reduce fossil fuel demand: a meaningful bilateral agreement with China to cut emissions where the US agreed to cut carbon emissions 26-28% by 2025, relative to 2005 levels, efficiency standards for road vehicles and aircraft, and CO2 regulations for new power plants. However he has failed to tackle the supply side of fossil fuel, doing little to halt the rampant determination of coal, oil, and natural gas corporations to extract all the resources they can. In July 2014 Obama's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management opened up the Eastern seaboard, from Florida to Delaware, for oil and natural gas exploration. The Whitehouse boasts that it has opened up 59 million acres for oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and has increased leases for oil and gas drilling on federal land.

President Obama did veto the Keystone XL pipeline but now he has given licence to Shell to drill in the Arctic. This will be the mortal sin of his administration.

In his acceptance speech in 2008 President Obama pledged to make the "planet in peril" one of his top three priorities. In his State of the Union address in 2014 Obama said, "Climate change is a fact. And when our children's children look us in the eye and ask if we did all we could to leave them a safer, more stable world, with new sources of energy, I want us to be able to say yes, we did." But has President Obama really done all he could?

On 3rd August President Obama announced the Clean Power Plan, an unprecedented initiative that promises to revolutionise power plant emissions, the USA's largest source of pollution. The Plan is an ambitious pledge to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions of the nation's power plants by 32% by 2030, relative to 2005 levels.

President Obama introduced the Plan as "the single most important step America has ever taken in the fight against global climate change". The Plan was well received: Lord Nicholas Stern, Chair of the London School of Economics' Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change called the Plan "a very important announcement by President Obama which will reinforce the credibility of the commitment by the United States to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions as a new international agreement on climate change is being finalised... It shows the determination of the world's richest country to maintain better economic growth while also cutting greenhouse gas pollution."

The Editorial Board of the New York Times said the Plan was "unquestionably the most important step the administration has taken in the fight against climate change" and Michael Brune, Executive Director of the Sierra Club went further calling it "the most significant single action any president has ever taken."

President Obama recognised that "[climate change] is one of those rare issues - because of its magnitude, because of its scope - that if we don't get it right we may not be able to reverse it and we may not be able to adapt sufficiently. There is such a thing as being too late when it comes to climate change." Indeed there is, and all the scientific evidence indicates that we are nearly past the point of no return.

In announcing the Clean Power Plan Obama quoted Governor Jay Inslee of Washington State "We are the first generation to feel the impact of climate change and the last generation that can do something about it." On hearing Obama introduce the Plan my hopes for COP21 were lifted. Unfortunately, my optimism didn't last long - the Plan sets achievable goals and contains several concessions.

Power plants produce a third of the USA's total domestic carbon dioxide emissions. Under Obama's Plan the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) gives each state a goal for cutting power-plant emissions. States decide for themselves how to achieve this target. They can switch from coal to natural gas or nuclear, expand their generation of renewable energy or increase energy efficiency. All states must submit their plans by 2016-2018, start making reductions by 2022 at the latest, and continue reducing emissions through to 2030.

This all sounds very promising. However under the original version of the Clean Power Plan States did not have this two-year grace period before they had to start reducing emissions. The two-year grace period would allow them to burn fossil fuels for two more years. During this time, carbon dioxide concentrations will continue to rise and the impacts of climate change will continue to be felt across the world. This concession is not just unnecessary but reckless. As Ken Kimmell, President of the Union of Concerned Scientists confirms, many "states are already on track to cut their emissions through actions they've put in place, including state renewable energy and energy efficiency standards and coal plant retirements."

The Plan is ambitious by the standards of America's climate commitments to date but conservative in terms of the CO2 reduction targets in line with scientific estimates required to avoid catastrophic climate change. Coal - the dirty industry most impacted by the President's Plan - is already a steadily declining contributor to the country's electricity production. According to Politico, increased electricity generation from natural gas and renewable energy sources and energy efficiency initiatives mean the USA has already met the halfway point of the goal set by the Clean Power Plan. The Plan could have gone much further.

One of the most positive aspects of the Plan is its promise of 30% more renewable energy generation by 2030. But this figure is testament to the expansion of the renewable energy market, which is reliant on the federal production tax credit (PTC) incentive. Favourable conditions for solar and wind energy have enabled the pledges of the draft Plan to be increased. According to Rob Gramlich of the American Wind Energy Association the current boom requires the PTC subsidy. The draft Plan, formulated prior to the boom estimated that renewable energy would only make up 22% of the market by 2030.

President Obama said the Clean Power Plan is, "the biggest, most important step the USA has ever taken to combat climate change". He is right but more, much more, is required if we are to keep average global temperatures from rising above 2 degrees Celsius.

To put the Plan's goals in perspective, last week California passed legislation that will see the State reduce greenhouse gas emissions 80% by 2050, relative to 1990 levels. Tim O'Connor, Director of California policy for the Environmental Defense Fund said, "This is how California can really shake up the national conversation on climate."

In response to the President's announcement of the Plan Craig Bennett, Chief Executive of Friends of the Earth said, "Obama's climate initiative is politically significant, but falls way short of what scientists say is required to tackle catastrophic climate change. In the face of huge US vested interests that oppose any measures on climate change, the President's plan at least pushes the issue up the agenda.... [T]hese measures are just a drop in the ocean, when a sea change in energy policy is what's desperately required. It would have been more significant if the President said no to drilling in the Arctic, and stopped his support for new fossil fuels such as fracking and tar sands."

350.org spokesman Jamie Henn agreed that more is required. Reducing the emissions of power plants is not enough by itself: "Taking on King Coal is the easy part ... It's standing up to Big Oil that will require real courage. That's why decisions on things like the Keystone XL pipeline, fracking and Arctic drilling are so important -- they're the true test of climate leadership for this and any future presidents."

Hilary Clinton has promised - if elected as President - to produce 33% of America's electricity from renewable sources by 2027. This is an additional 7% to what Obama has promised by 2030. Clinton has also vowed to install half a billion solar panels by 2020. This is seven times the number of panels currently being built and would produce enough energy to power every home in America within 10 years. Clinton said, "I personally believe climate change is a challenge of such magnitude and urgency that we need a president who will set ambitious goals".

Indeed, President Obama's Clean Power Plan and some of his environmental policies have set ambitious goals, and his expedition to the Arctic gave us reasons for optimism. Unfortunately, his decision to give the green light to Shell to drill in the Arctic has irreparably undermined his environmental legacy. I had hoped for more from President Obama.


President Obama in Kenai Fjords National Park with Exit Glacier in the background.
Image Credit: Official White House Photo by Pete Souza.

CONCLUSION
We all know it is not the sole responsibility of President Obama and the USA to singlehandedly prevent catastrophic climate change but the international community is in dire need of leadership if member states are to achieve a meaningful agreement in Paris.

Soon after President Obama took up office, in a 2009 speech on climate change he said, "Our generation's response to this challenge will be judged by history, for if we fail to meet it - boldly, swiftly, and together - we risk consigning future generations to an irreversible catastrophe."

COP21 is the President's last chance to put his climate change legacy back on track.

We are all hoping that when COP21 takes place in Paris in December President Obama and world leaders will bring substantial commitments to the table, to achieve a global, binding climate agreement to drastically reduce emissions and slow the perilous warming of the planet. If they fail COP21 will be an appalling abdication of responsibility.

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This blog is the second most popular of all the blogs I have ever posted. Next week we will be revealing my number 1 blog.

Everyone wants to worry less. Few of us manage it. Here are eight reasons not to worry, together with ways to stop worrying that can really work.

First, however, let me be clear about my definition of worry. The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines worry as "give way to anxiety, let the mind dwell on troubles, fret". That's what I mean by worry. It does not include thinking about what could go wrong, in order to anticipate or deal with it, which is a highly useful thing to do.

The 80/20 reasons not to worry

1. The 80/20 principle says that a few (typically less than 20 percent) of causes or actions lead to most (more than 80 percent) of results. The principle is not a theory, but an observation that doesn't always work, but usually does. And it nearly always applies to worries.

Most things that we do are insignificant in terms of results, and most worries are inconsequential. Do you sometimes find yourself worrying that you will be slightly late for a meeting, that the dog may have fleas, that you may be embarrassed by not knowing something or by being wrong, that somebody may not like you, that the car may break down, that you may have to pay a bit more for something you want to buy, or that you may lose your tennis match? Relax! None of these things really matter - you can deal with all of them. So whenever you have a worry, ask yourself if it is a really big thing to worry about. If it isn't one of the very few big worries, dismiss it out of hand. If it is, consider the following arguments:

2. One reason the 80/20 principle works is that our energy is often divided into things with positive outcomes and those with negative outcomes. In business, if you properly account for all the revenues from customers and all the costs associated with serving them, it is nearly always true that 80%+ of profits come from fewer than 20% of customers. One of the reasons this works so reliably is that some customers are actually loss-making - making it 'easier' for few customers to corner most of the profits.

It is the same with our personal lives. Many of the things we do absorb energy but are worse than useless. Worry is a prime example. Worry is never useful. When we find ourselves worrying, we should either act and not worry, or decide not to act and not worry. If we can act to avoid something bad, or reduce its chances of happening, then we should act and not worry. On the other hand, if we can't control or influence what will happen, then worrying will cause us distress but not help us - we should not act and not worry.

This is a logical way of escaping worry. Puff - see the worries disappear! See if this works for you. It may not, however, because although it's true and irrefutable, it's a purely logical argument. Sometimes our emotions rule our reason. So we need to find some other reasons not to worry and antidotes to it.

The psychological reasons not to worry

3. When we are relaxed, happy, and comfortable in our own skins, we are unlikely to worry. It is at times of self-doubt or unhappiness that we are most likely to fret. We all experience mood swings, and when we are in a 'down' mood, worries should be dismissed or consideration of them deferred, and left for a time when we are in a more positive mood. When we are anxious, every possible bad thing that might happen becomes ten feet tall. If we just recognize this, and tell ourselves, "I have no sense of perspective at this time, so worrying will be neurotic rather than leading to helpful action", then we can move on.

4. More fundamentally, there are many psychological explanations for our feelings of inadequacy, self-doubt, guilt, and lack of self-worth. The explanation that I find most convincing is the school of Transactional Analysis, most famous because of two excellent books - Games People Play, by Eric Berne, and I'm OK, You're OK by Thomas Harris. (I think everyone should read the latter, or its sequel, Staying OK, by Amy and Thomas Harris.) Boiled down, the theory says infants intuit an "I'm not OK - You're OK" position by age 2. As Amy Harris writes, the little person "is clumsy, uncoordinated, without words to express his feelings, and totally dependent on big people." Powerlessness leaves the little person "with the on-again-off-again experience of great glee and the sudden cessation of what felt so good. One way to figure this out was to make a decision about it: "You are in charge; I am not. You are OK - I am not." Much of life can be spent trying to get the approval of "parents" and our own internalized conscience. Many over-achievers "go through life measuring up, desperate for approval" - above all, from themselves. But however well they do, it is not enough.

With this mindset, there are always manifold things to worry about. The answer is to realize that we are the subject to obsolete 'recordings'; to relax; to escape the tyranny of the past and our own strivings; and to live in the present, enjoying what it offers free from self-destructive emotions.

5. Worry is an emotional condition. It is not rational. But emotions, besides being a frequent cause of distress, are also the root of joy, creativity, commitment, and caring. Psychology helps us to understand our dual nature, partly Dr. Spock of Star Trek, and partly a bundle of volatile chemicals trying to escape from our lumbering robot. Emotions should not be repressed, nor should they be automatically indulged. Reason and emotion can speak to each other - what I call "having a cup of tea with our emotions". We let them have their say, and then we respond with our intelligence. We do what we can to remove the source of worry, and then we stop worrying.

6. Worries abound when our life is complex and stressful, when we feel we are not in control, when we feel at the mercy of events or other people. We can reduce worry by taking a few decisions that simplify our lives and leave us free to do what we enjoy and think is important and useful. As Amy Harris deliciously puts it, "if a woman decides to enter a convent, she may no longer feel the need to keep up with the latest fashion inVogue. Simplicity has been achieved in at least one area of life." Energy comes from limiting choices, from making commitments. Ballet master George Balanchine once said "I've got more energy than when I was younger because I know exactly what I want to do." I bet he also worried less. Deciding exactly what you want to do will reduce your worries too.

The Spiritual Reasons Not to Worry

7. I blogged a few weeks ago about the value of accepting dependence on "the universe". If we see ourselves as part of something bigger than ourselves, and joyfully accept the creative spark that can come to us when we are receptive, we can attain peace. Paradoxically, by accepting dependence we can also become more ourselves, more powerful, more in tune with everything constructive in the world. One of the biggest benefits of this attitude is that it removes worry. We are responsible for our actions, but we are not - and cannot be - responsible for what happens to us. We have to trust that events will unfold in a way that is good for us and for other people. Of course, this is not an intellectually defensible position - it is not logical. It is faith. Faith may waver - as apparently it did when Christ was crucified. But faith removes worry, because we place ourselves in more powerful hands.

8. Where, then, does this place those people who have no faith in God or the universe? If, for example, you were like the Oxford biologist Richard Dawkins, who believes militantly that there is no God and that nature is blind and supremely indifferent to our fate, are you therefore doomed to worry? Even here, for atheists, I think there is still an answer, and it is one that I believe Richard Dawkins himself has adopted, perhaps without realizing that it has a spiritual character. There is within all of us, whether believers or unbelievers, an internal light that seeks to make sense of life, even if intellectually we think there is no sense in life and the universe. (There is also, within us all, an internal darkness that seeks to destroy and confound.) Life becomes meaningful - even if we believe there is no external meaning - when we switch on the light and switch off, as far we can, the darkness within. Does Richard Dawkins live in the light? I believe that he does, because he is strongly motivated to discover and explain the nature of life - where we came from and the nature of evolution - and has a passionate desire to share his perspective and convince the rest of us to share it. He is doing what he thinks is right, and, in doing it, he finds meaning in a world he believes is meaningless. He is creating his own light in the darkness. He is fighting for what he believes in. And I very much doubt that he is a man given over to fretting about his life.

Dawkins would not accept this, but I think that he is creating his own light and linking up to likeminded light in the universe. He is advancing knowledge, he is a scientist, and science is part of the quest for truth and beauty. And ultimately, if we do what we think is right, and use our talents to advance it - and if what we do has positive rather than negative consequences for other people and the planet - then we are part of the force for good in the universe. Whether we believe that there is such a force or not, we are helping to create it. When we give free reign to what is best in ourselves, what defines our uniqueness, we can do no other.

That's why I believe that Dawkins has a spiritual mission and why he is fulfilled. In this very broad definition of what is spiritual, there is hope and joy for anyone who is serious about life, even someone who believes it has no purpose. This broad church, which encompasses agnostics and atheists as much as believers, has little room for worry, and a great deal of room for constructive action. The existence of the quest for truth and beauty, and its ability to do good, is for me the most convincing reason to believe that life has meaning.

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As noted yesterday, the DAX is in trouble.  

It's no surprise to us then that, this morning, Germany's ZEW Economic Sentiment Indicator fell more than 50% in 30 days, from 25 to 12.1 - almost down to last October's lows, when the DAX itself was below 9,000 (10% lower).  Yet another reason we are thrilled to be mainly in cash as we wait for Thursday's Fed decision.  

"The weakening economic development in emerging markets dampens the economic outlook for Germany’s export-oriented economy. While economic growth in the second quarter was largely driven by external demand, it is becoming less likely that exports will stimulate growth in the near future," says ZEW President Professor Clemens Fuest.

As you can see from today's chart, the DAX sold off sharply at the open (3 a.m.) but was miraculously saved a bit after 5am as Maria Cannata of Italy's debt agency (doesn't matter who) was quoted saying that the ECB's QE program might be extended.  Rumors like this are a regular occurrence and even Draghi himself will make a doveish statement if he thinks the markets might slip because, after all, what else would we want our Central Banksters to do other than talk up the markets?  

All this nonsense is doing is confirming to the bears that 10,200 is becoming the new top of the DAX channel and that will more likely embolden them for a run back to 10,000 at which point 10,200 will become the weak bounce line and, next time that fails, we may have a faster drop that breaks through 10,000 and indicates a more serious correction (see yesterday's chart).  

Meanwhile, over in Shanghai, it's no surprise that we're re-testing that 3,000 line as there simply isn't enough money in China to keep propping up this nonsense.  As the Government there is beginning to realize, every Dollar they put into the market is immediately being withdrawn by traders who are better Capitalists than they are and know when to cash in their chips.  

Speaking of cash, here's a nice article where Cambria Investment's Mebane Faber explains why they agree with my cash call for their clients:

If you're a buy-and-hold investor, long-term time horizon, ignore what I'm getting ready to say for a little bit, but if you're a tactical person who's concerned about drawdowns and losses, the bad news looking at the U.S. stock market, we look at in two ways. The first is the trend, right, so we've done historical studies not only on U.S. stocks but [on] foreign stocks, REITs, commodities, currencies, bonds, just about everything, and when markets are up-trending, that's when you want to be in. It's simple. Use something like a 200-day moving average, we used a 10 month moving average when we published this paper back in 2006. But what it shows is that when the market is downtrending and you move to the safety of cash or, say, 10-year bonds, you avoid a lot of the volatility. You avoid a lot of the big drawdowns, meaning the peak-to-trough loss in markets. … Until right now, for the first time in a really long time we've had this incredible six-year run, U.S. stocks are finally below trend, and we've told a lot of people for the trend following side, it's a good time to move to the safety of cash or bonds.

I don't think bonds are as safe as cash.  In fact, the bond ETF (TLT) probably still makes a good short at $121.58 because there are still too many people buying 20-year notes for 2.65% who think it's a good idea to lend the US Government money at that rate.  First of all - have you seen who's running for President?  One of those idiots could be in power just one year from now!  Second - twenty years is a REALLY long time to believe inflation will stay at record lows...

Unfortunately, there isn't anywhere to put your money.  If there were, I wouldn't have called for CASH!!! but CASH!!! is the only asset class that isn't down this year - the ONLY one!  Emerging market bonds are down a whopping 25.4% in the first 9 months of 2015 and you want to give our government your money to hold for 20 years?  The way wages are going in the US, we'll be an emerging market long before then!  

The Vangaurd REIT ETF (VNQ) may be down 2.9% but at least they pay a 4.1% dividend.  In our Long-Term Portfolio, we still have positions in Northstar Realty (NRF), who pay an 11.5% dividend (just paid us 0.40 on 8/13, in fact) as well as Armour Residential (ARR), who pay 18.9% (0.33 MONTHLY) and Chimera Investments (CIM), who pay 13.8% with the next one due (0.48) on 10/30.  That's not bad on a $14 stock.  

So I'm not a big fan of REIT ETFs as we prefer to cherry-pick the ones we like best.  While those REIT returns may seem very impressive, we can enhance them further with some stupid options tricks like:

• 
  Buy 1,000 shares of ARR at $19.87 ($19,870)
  


• 
  Sell 10 April $20 calls for $1.15 ($1,150 credit)
  


• 
  Sell 10 April $17 puts for $1.10 ($1,100 credit)
  

That nets you into 1,000 shares for $17,620 and we expect to collect a 0.33 monthly dividend (usually mid-month) which would be 7 x 0.33 = $2.31 ($2,310) between now and April.  So, if we are called away at $20 in April, we end up with $22,310 back on our $17,620 outlay or 26.6% in 7 months - that's not too shabby for a boring play!  

ARR has been hit hard since it did a 1:8 stock split on Aug 3rd but it's more likely investors taking the opportunity to sell some of their holdings, now that they have 8x more shares.  Rate concerns have been hitting the whole REIT sector but ARR is heavily hedged and we'll find out on next earnings (10/30ish) whether or not they can sustain this ridiculous dividend but I'm good with half of 18.9% as a long-term investment, so I think it's a good time to take a chance.  Plus - it's a great stock to own on Talk Like a Pirate Day (Sept 19th)! 

Again, we're 80-90% in cash so these are relatively small pokes at things we like and are willing to buy more of if they get cheaper.  Those are the only kinds of stocks we have left in our portfolios.  We're having a Webinar at 1pm (EST) today where we'll be reviewing our positions but it's Members Only, of course.

If this chart doesn't make you understand why we're in cash, I don't know what will. This is today's Empire State Manufacturing Index at -14.7, which is 15.2 below the estimates of leading economorons (yet still they ask their opinion every month) and 15.3 below the prior reading of +0.6.  I guess I better mention that the last time this happened was 2008 - just before the last major stock market collapse but go ahead and listen to the market apologists who tell you to stay the course.  

We get Philly Fed on Thursday along with the Fed statement that afternoon (2 p.m.) but we'll be watching from the sidelines, thank you.  Retail Sales for August were up an anemic 0.2% vs. 0.3% expected and 0.7% in July - also not good but weighed down by lower gas prices, so call it even overall, even though the ex-Auto number was a huge miss at 0.1% (economorons strike again).  How professional economists fail to take into account a 10% drop in gasoline prices is beyond my understanding...

I can tell you right now, looking over the Retail Report, that Durable goods next Thursday will be lower than August's 2.2% and, as you can see from the chart, that number is already in big trouble so why on Earth would we want to be positioned bullishly into this sort of data?  

Yet, even as I write this, the markets are going UP because the Empire Manufacturing data and Retail Sales data are so bad that they're GOOD (and now add Industrial Production to the FAIL pile).  Good because an economic disaster a day keeps the Fed at bay and this market is all about the FREE MONEY and nothing about actually making money through the sale of goods and services.  

And really, when you think about it - why bother?  Why go through the headache of making a product and employing all those people and selling it and trying to avoid taxes when you can simply borrow money from the Fed for 0.25% and lend it out for 3.5% or just stick it in a 2.6% 20-year bond and make 10x on your interest for 20 years?  A 2.35% spread may not sound that sexy to you but it's $23.5M for each Billion you borrow and there are plenty of ways to leverage it (Interactive Brokers will give you 5:1) to turn that into a very nice return!

We'd love to get on the "bad news is good news" bandwagon and buy stocks based on the premise that the Fed will support the markets forever - but we can't, because we're not idiots. 

 

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