Why Failure is Important to Career Success.

Failure is not a dirty word. Yet for too many professionals, it's seen as something that should never happen to you - and if it does, you should be ashamed of it.

Well, that's wrong, according to Naama Bloom, the founder and CEO of HelloFlo, a period products startup.

"Every successful person that you know has failed their way into where they are," Bloom said in her keynote Saturday at The Lady Project Summit in Providence, Rhode Island. "And they're failing every day and dealing with it, which is getting them where they need to go."

The summit is an annual gathering drawing more than 250 professional women across industries ranging from technology, media, health and academia. It is hosted by The Lady Project, a Providence-based nonprofit that offers a networking community for women. It was founded by Julie Sygiel of Dear Kate and Sierra Barter of @SierraBarter Social Media Consulting.

The reality of success
To many young professionals -- women and men alike -- the focus is too often on the successes.
When looking at leaders like Bloom, a successful startup founder with a Cornell MBA and years of prior experience at American Express, and society just sees the wins.
But the reality is different, she noted.
"My life feels like a constant stream of rejection and failure," she said. "I spend a lot of time during my day figuring out how to fail less."

Bloom compared the pain of learning from failure to walking barefoot without calluses.
"If you're trying to do something big," she said, "you need to build up that layer [of thick skin]...you'll bounce back quicker."

Naama Bloom, CEO of HelloFlo, and Julie Sygiel, co-founder of The Lady Project

Fellow keynote speaker Jennifer Romolini also discussed her professional and personal struggles in surprisingly frank fashion.
"I went on 23 interviews before I landed my first job in New York publishing," said Romolini, who is now the editor-in-chief of Hello Giggles, a positive website for women.

But Romolini persisted -- she kept working, kept making connections, and kept looking for yeses instead of nos. She said she would look up job descriptions for positions she wanted, note her qualifications that matched, and work on what she was missing.

Eventually, she worked her way to Lucky magazine, where she served as deputy editor. From there, she moved to Yahoo! before landing her "dream job" at Hello Giggles.



 "I was told time and time again it wouldn't happen for me," she said, explaining that she'd spent the bulk of her 20s waitressing. "I didn't get my first real job until I was almost 29."

7 Traits the Rich Have in Common.

Amassing wealth without a trust fund is no easy feat. There isn't a magic recipe for making millions, but certain ingredients can help.

Hard work, education, smart investing, frugality, risk taking, and plain ol' luck were some of the main factors ultra-high-net-worth investors used to describe themselves when surveyed by the Spectrem Group.

CNNMoney decided to dig a little deeper. We asked several wealth experts if they noticed any similar traits or attitudes among their clients with a net worth of at least $5 million.

Here's what surfaced:

Entrepreneurial: Going into business is a common path among the wealthy. While there are plenty of doctors, lawyers and corporate executives in the $5 million-plus group surveyed by Spectrem, those who go on to become business owners tend to build an even higher net worth.

Always on the clock: The 40-hour work week is like a part-time schedule for many, especially those who have built businesses. A 60- to 80-hour work week is more the norm, as are working vacations, according to certified financial planner Doug Flynn of Flynn Zito Capital Management.

High energy: Many high-net-worth individuals have a lot of energy, don't need much sleep, and enjoy generally upbeat attitudes, according to psychologist James Gottfurcht, who runs Los Angeles-based Psychology of Money Consultants.
The super wealthy also tend to be visionaries, said psychologist Kristen Armstrong, a strategic wealth coach at Ascent Private Capital Management. She described many of her clients as "force of nature" people.
"I see again and again that they have a really great ability to envision possible futures ... [and] an amazing ability to focus their efforts and energy once they see a possibility."

Extremely confident: Gottfurcht said most of his clients who made their wealth possess what he calls an "expansive, healthy grandiosity." By that he means a sense of "I can do anything."
They're also open to creative ways of achieving their goals.
Armstrong, too, said her clients have great confidence in themselves and others, and firmly believe the world will accommodate their business ideas.
Also common, though, among some of Gottfurcht's wealthiest clients is what he termed "narcissistic personality disorder." That is, they think they're special, "require excessive admiration," have a high sense of entitlement and lack empathy for others, he said.

Discerning: For all their confidence, Armstrong's clients know they're not the smartest person in the room on every given issue. But they know to surround themselves with people who are -- which will help them realize their vision.
Among business owners, those who do best are the ones who move past sole proprietorship, and partner with others to expand their enterprises, said Flynn.

Modest: Despite glamorous Hollywood portrayals of the rich life, many multi-millionaires live more modestly. Most of Flynn's richest clients have chosen not to bump up their lifestyles in lockstep with their growing wealth.
"They still wear their old plaid shirt," he said. Or at least the men do.

Risk tolerant, but not impulsive: Anyone who runs a business is by nature a risk taker, Flynn noted. But there are no investing swashbucklers among his clients.



 They have some short-term investments but tend to have a longer time horizon than most investors. Whether they invest in a stock or a building, they stick with it as long as it still makes sense to them.

Managing credit payment in businesses-IFE ADEDAPO

Despite the high risk involved in selling products or rendering services on credit, small businesses often engage in this practice. Experts note that in a highly competitive market, Small and Medium Enterprises are left with no option than to extend credit transactions to some of their trusted customers.

Although some experienced business people who have been adversely affected by deferred payment advise against engaging in it, business consultants note that it is a survival strategy.

Moreover, those who have had a good experience in the area profess that their businesses had grown because customers paid as and when due.

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However, many faced with problems in the collection of the debts that have gone bad have difficulty accessing funds from other sources to support their ventures pending when they would get paid.

A report by ACCA notes that late payment is a fact of life for the most formal businesses globally, a sign of distress from the weakest businesses as well as a privilege exercised by the most powerful ones.

Examining it from a macroeconomic perspective, the report titled, ‘Ending late payment: Taking stock,’ says it is both inefficient and potentially destabilising.

The report observes that trade credit is a more important source of short-term funding for SMEs than bank lending, and its importance is growing as businesses become smaller, more services-oriented and less formal.

The report adds that professional accountants play a crucial role around the world by ensuring prompt payment, making sure businesses are protected from customer defaults and can cope with interrupted cash flows.

When is payment late?

The report notes that not all credit sales are settled promptly – but those that are not cannot be easily grouped together.

The ACCA report says, “It is easy to understand the term ‘prompt payment’ as payment at a time and in a manner that broadly fits both the supplier’s and the customer’s preferences and expectations. Its opposite, however, is much harder to define; there are many ways of paying ‘late’.”

Why businesses pay their suppliers late?

The report notes that much emphasis by the press is laid on late payment as a corporate anti-social behaviour in which cash-rich corporate organisations or dishonest traders take advantage of small firms without the administrative capacity to oppose them.

However, the report says that late payment is ‘a feature, not a bug’ of the trade credit market; in at least half of all instances it does not involve long terms of credit and only rarely does it involve customers at risk of failure.

Atradius (2014) estimates that at least 30 per cent of all credit-based sales in developed and emerging markets are paid outside of the agreed terms, yet in each region only between 16 per cent and 21 per cent are paid more than 60 days after the invoice date, which were the maximum allowed terms of credit in the European Union without an explicit agreement.

Impact of late payments

Even when it is not accompanied by default risk, late payment costs suppliers in multiple ways and if unchecked can eventually cause death of a business.

As highlighted by the report, there are higher costs associated with the financing of working capital, forgone interest on cash reserves, high administrative costs associated with collections and recoveries, work passed up and substantial distraction for business staff and, often, owner-managers.

It adds that the costs are often enough to turn paper profits into real losses even for businesses with healthy customers and uninterrupted access to finance.

They can create a perverse system whereby small firms, which are typically less creditworthy and efficient, are tasked with the financing and administration of the supply chain, it says.

ACCA survey notes, “Uninterrupted access to finance, of course, is the exception, not the rule, in business. ACCA’s research suggests that emergency funding can take as long as six months to arrange in developing countries, in the meantime exposing suppliers paid late to serious risks unless directors are willing and able to make up the cash shortfall.

“For many small suppliers unable to finance their working capital quickly, late payment can be a death sentence; and from a macroeconomic perspective economies pay the price through increased barriers to entry, and thus reduced competition in sectors where late payment is rife.

Moreover, the report says that persistent late payment can depress business investment, especially in times of economic recovery – in turn reducing productivity, real wages, and overall growth.

ACCA suggests that the government can regulate the late payment issues through interventions in the trade credit market by using the following models.

Engage tax authorities and financial services firms

Dampen the systemic impact of late payment on the economy, by encouraging financial services firms or tax authorities with a stake in the entire supply chain to take an active role in giving business advisory services.

Incorporate late payments clauses in legal frameworks

Ensure that the legal and policy frameworks for incorporation, financing, contracts and insolvency are aligned to deal with different aspects of late payment promptly and in a consistent manner.

Negotiate credit terms

Ensure that businesses can look forward to a similar level of discretion in negotiating credit terms with their customers regardless of whether they are new or repeat suppliers

Provide alternative financing options

Encourage the development of financial markets so that businesses have quick access to alternative financing options in response to changing terms of credit or unexpected late payment.

source-ThePunch

Who would you Prefer-Male or Female Boss.

In the 1950s, Americans were asked, "If you were taking a new job and had your choice of a boss, would you prefer to work for a man or a woman?"

It's a question Gallup still asks.

In 1953, two-thirds said they'd prefer a man. In 2014, one-third said they would. So, 61 years and 33 percentage points. Depending on who you ask, that's either an improvement to be celebrated or a frustrating signal that sexism is still alive and well. Or both.

There are about 9 million women-owned businesses in the U.S., and in the past year, women have started 1,200 new businesses each day, according to the 2014 State of Women-Owned Business Report, which was commissioned by American Express.

However, while women-owned businesses continue to grow, the businesses are relatively small, employing just 6% of the country's workforce and contributing just under 4% of business revenues. That's about the same share as in 1997.

It isn't clear how employees' preferences on their boss' gender influence success or failure, but it is clear that there is plenty of room for improvement.
"Women are not growing and scaling as much as they should be," said Amanda Brown, executive director of the National Women's Business Council. "It's no surprise that women would prefer to work for male bosses, when they stick to what they know."

In the Gallup survey, 39% of women preferred a male boss, 25% preferred a female boss and 34% said it made no difference. Overall, 46% of men and women said it made no difference.

The fact that so many respondents said it made no difference resonated with Jayna Cooke, CEO of events company EVENTup. "That's probably the response we want to get to," she said.
Meanwhile, Brown admitted that when she saw the Gallup poll, she wondered if it was a joke, saying that when you continue to ask the same question for sixty years, "you're continuing to have an outdated conversation."
 "What relevance does this have at this point?" she said, adding that the question itself highlights "that there are still women missing in the equation...women are not in the position of being bosses enough. How do we address that?"






culled:cnnmoney

Emotional Robot sold out in 60 seconds.

Pepper the humanoid robot is so hot that he sold out within a minute, according to his Japanese creator, SoftBank Robotics Corp.


Only 1,000 models were available for the consumer launch on Saturday
in Japan. The base price was set at ¥198,000 ($1,600) with an additional
¥24,600 ($200) monthly data and insurance fees.




Standing just under four feet tall, and weighing 61 pounds, Pepper is
designed to read emotions as well as recognize tones of voice and
facial expressions in order to interact with humans. But most of all,
“he tries to make you happy,” Kaname Hayashi, Softbank’s project
manager, told CNN last year.








With his array of cameras, touch sensors, accelerometer and other
sensors in his “endocrine-type multi-layer neural network,” Pepper has
the ability to read your emotions as well as develop his own. He isn’t a
work robot, but more of an emotional companion for people.




Pepper has his own evolving emotions which “are influenced by
people’s facial expressions and words, as well as his surroundings,”
according to SoftBank. “Pepper is at ease when he is with people he
knows, happy when praised and scared when the lights go down.”




Developers admit that the robot may make mistakes, but says Pepper
will learn and grow over time through his own emotional engine and
collective wisdom gained through collected cloud data.


Pepper currently has the ability to speak English, French, Japanese
and Spanish. In the next few months, there will be more language
releases in its app store, which already has around 200 apps.







source:Guardian

Is it Okay to Cry at Work?

The standard advice: Never do it. Unless someone dies. Then it's okay.

When it comes to crying at work the default assumption is that doing it will make people think you're weak if you're a man and too emotional if you're a woman.

But there's a new school of thought emerging: We're human. It happens. And the smartest leaders get that.
"Emotions aren't really sanctioned in corporate America," said former HR executive Cynthia Shapiro, author of "Corporate Confidential."
Well, some are.
On the one hand, employers want you to bring passion to your work. Yet they expect you to check your more negative emotions at the door. (Except anger, which often is more acceptable in high-pressure situations than tears.)
"It's crazy. We've built this weird, false world," said Jim Whitehurst, CEO of open-source software maker Red Hat and former COO of Delta Airlines.
If you want an employee's inspiration, excitement and enthusiasm, by definition you want someone who's emotional and all that implies, according to Whitehurst, who just wrote "The Open Organization: Igniting Passion and Performance."

Tears can be one indicator that someone is wholly invested in their job.
"Someone who's disengaged will never cry at work. Someone who is will get into the red zone at some point," said organizational psychologist Liane Davey.

But more than that, there's valuable business information to be gleaned when someone cries, said Davey, who helps dysfunctional corporate executive teams work better together.

"Tears are emotional data," she said. They're a signal that something really important is going on.
Davey tells the story of an executive at a technology company who ended up crying in frustration in front of the CEO and her colleagues. All attention and resources were being driven to a small division of the company, while the division run by the frustrated executive -- which was the biggest revenue driver -- got little acknowledgement. That made it very hard for her to keep her team feeling engaged and valued since no one was even throwing them a bone.

The CEO and executive team heard her message and ended up thanking her for it, Davey said.
Tears, of course, can also humanize. As an HR executive, Shapiro had to lay off many people whom she had hired. She ended up crying when she did it.
She then beat herself up about it. "But it turned out to be fine because they could see I cared," Shapiro said.
The health benefits shouldn't be minimized either. Crying is the body's way of quickly relieving stress.
Whitehurst, who was at Delta when it filed for bankruptcy and had mass layoffs, said it would have been healthier if his senior executives cried when they felt overwhelmed. Instead their stress got expressed through chest pains and insomnia.

culled:CNNMONEY

Nigerian Firms yet to Recognise Potential of Social Media.-Oyebade.

As the world marks the Social Media Day on Tuesday, Convener of the West African Bloggers Conference and a digital marketing expert, Ayo Oyebade, has said that many Nigerian firms have yet to recognise the enormous potential of digital communication.

Oyebade, in an interview, regrets that many local companies still view social media as distractions despite the fact that that their foreign counterparts have started harnessing the gains to market their products to different parts of the world.

According to him, unemployed young Nigerians can tap into the opportunities in the emerging digital technology to create jobs for themselves, thus increasing the productive capacity of the economy.

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He states, “Social media are platforms with enormous opportunities. There are businesses in some climes that are 100 per cent driven by social media – no physical office, no physical operational activities. All operations are transmitted via social media.

“While Nigerian businesses are taking advantage of the social media space, a lot of them have yet to start using the platforms. Largely, we have yet to fully maximise the potential. You may be surprised that there are still companies in Nigeria that bar their members of staff from using the social media for whatever reasons. Some cite distraction as a reason.”

He blames the situation on wrong perception, saying many organisations and individuals still equate social media to chatting platforms.

“I am not saying that Nigerian businesses are not using social media but the adoption rate relative to their potential is still very low,” he observes.

Oyebade argues that social media have the capacity to deepen relationship between organisations and their customers, thus increasing brand loyalty. According to him, the direct impacts of networking sites can be used by smart business organisations to their benefits.

“We need to understand that social media imply direct communication with consumers. They enable people to ask questions, including embarrassing ones that reveal the true perception about your brand, while remaining anonymous. So, the innovation promotes openness, more interaction and engagement,” he notes.

Oyebade says online is not just a platform but “an interactive vehicle that is built into human nature.” He adds that online platforms derive their strength from the fact that they enable people to express themselves in the most natural form.

“Every Nigerian naturally wants to talk directly to those in leadership positions; every Nigerian wants to express an opinion about the state of the country. So, social media make them to do that unhindered,” he adds.

He, however, warns organisations to be wary of unintended consequences of online interventions, such as cloning and identity theft, as these can smear the reputation of an organisation if not well-managed.

“We have a challenge where fraudsters, who may clone platforms, take advantage of unsuspecting customers. My advice is that organisations should engage the services of digital marketing agencies or employ in-house digital marketing professionals to manage such issues,” Oyebade says.

Describing digital marketing as emerging, he urges local firms to explore it to reach the fast-growing online population.

He, however, admits that there is a huge expertise gap in digital marketing that needs to be filled for the country to enjoy its benefits.

On the future of the new media, he says, “Of course, in five years’ time, there will be new form of evolution. There will be smarter machines. I foresee a situation where machine interaction will take online to a new level. It started with the web; now, we have mobile devices that include digital watches.”

culled;ThePunch

CBN -About 14.6m Customers would be Denied Banking Services due to BVN.

Barring any last minute extension by the Bankers’ Committee of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Deposit Money Banks will on Wednesday start to deny about 14.6 million customers from enjoying banking services over their failure to obtain Bank Verification Numbers.

The BVN project, which commenced in February 2014, will officially close on Tuesday, June 30, 2015.

The Bankers’ Committee, which comprises of the CBN, bank CEOs and a few other stakeholders, had given June 30, 2015 as the deadline for the customers to do their biometric registration and obtain their BVNs.

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However, as of June 11, 2015, the committee said only 14 million customers had been registered under the BVN project.

Going by the current statistics from the Enhancing Financial Innovation and Access, an organisation committed to deepening financial inclusion in Nigeria, only about 28.6 million adults in the country have bank accounts.

This means that at least 14 million bank customers have yet to do their biometric registration and get their BVNs.

The BVN project will help the banks to identify their customers through their fingerprints. Each bank customer’s fingerprint is linked to their unique number.

It is meant to help check fraud in the banking system, boost retail or consumer credit, and also enhance economic growth.

The Managing Director, United Bank for Africa Plc, Mr. Phillips Oduoza, who spoke after the Bankers’ Committee meeting in Abuja about three weeks ago, confirmed that only about 12.5 million bank customers had been registered since the exercise began.

While calling on those who had yet to register for the BVN to do so before the expiration of the June 30 deadline, he declared that customers who failed to do so would not be able to enjoy banking services.

Oduoza had said, “We also discussed the electronic banking space. In the area of BVN, we have done 12.5 million customers and this is a substantial mileage. There is still a need to close the gap before the deadline of June 30 and any customer that hasn’t done so will not enjoy banking services.

“So, we are urging customers to enrol so that they will continue to enjoy unhindered banking services.”

He added that by the end of this month, those that had yet to get their BVNs would not be able to have access to credit, enjoy foreign exchange and conduct Internet banking services.

The Managing Director, Nigeria Interbank Settlement System Plc, the organisation driving the biometric registration process, Mr. Ade Shonubi, had a few weeks ago said it was unlikely that the Bankers’ Committee would extend the deadline.

As of the time filing this report on Sunday, it is unclear if customers who failed to register by Wednesday would be allowed to do so and gain access to their accounts or whether the Bankers’ Committee would allow an extension of the deadline.

While there are 28.6 million bank accounts belonging to adults in Nigeria, the Electronic Payment Providers Association of Nigeria states that the number of bank account holders (made up of both individuals, including children, and organisations) has reached 76 million out of a population of 170 million people.

A new World Bank report states that Nigeria, like many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, has a growing population who are excluded from the financial services compared to their counterparts abroad.

source:ThePunch