A bipartisan group of lawmakers is proposing to House Republican and Democratic leaders a compromise to end the government shutdown by repealing a medical device tax and maintaining across-the-board spending cuts. (Bloomberg)
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Want to know why the shutdown – and the coming debt-ceiling fight – will be so difficult to resolve? Just ask Marlin Stutzman, a conservative congressman from Indiana. "We’re not going to be disrespected," he told the Washington Examiner's David Drucker. "We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is." (The Washington Post)
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With Washington preoccupied by the government shutdown, Wall Street is shifting its attention to an even more worrisome situation: the possibility that the government could run out of money within the next few weeks, forcing an unprecedented default on its debt. (The New York Times)
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If 56% of social media users are afraid they will miss something if they don’t check in, that’s a lot of folks living in fear. It’s also a completely new fear. Five years ago, we really didn’t have the constant influx of the Internet flotsam of everyone’s social lives. (Note: Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) isn't so prevalent yet – Baratunde Thurston made the cover of Fast Company for unplugging. (Fast Company)
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Most people come to work to do a great job. Their biggest problem is usually that they're not quite sure what that is. And they can't know unless you give them feedback about what works and what doesn't. (Inc.)
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Who writes with fountain pens? When did you last prepare transparencies or exchange faxes? RIM? RIP. Sic transit gloria mundi. When once-innovative technologies descend – decay? – into anachronism, it’s time to put them out of your misery. Disconnect enterprise voice mail. Now. Be honest – you don’t really want to leave a 90-second message after the beep and you certainly don’t care to listen to one. You’ve got faster, better and friendlier ways to communicate. (Harvard Business Review)
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Whenever people ask me how they can start spending their time better, I say that the first step is knowing how you’re spending your time now. Over the past few years, I’ve kept track of my hours for a full week (168 hours) several times. It’s always an enlightening experience. (Fast Company)
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The tech industry is going to great lengths to keep its lack of diversity a secret. A multiyear investigation by Mike Swift of the San Jose Mercury News has found that not only do Silicon Valley’s biggest companies refuse to share their diversity data, but they have also fought to keep their information under wraps. (DiversityInc.)
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In what is shaping up to be one of the largest personal and financial collapses in history – if not the largest – Eike Batista may be nearing bankruptcy. On Oct. 1, OGX missed a $45 million interest payment on bond debt it had racked up during its rise. Batista has sold his planes and his helicopter, and creditors are arguing over the remains of his companies. (Bloomberg/Businessweek)
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What’s going on in the world today? It’s hard to keep up. Some facts are familiar to anyone who reads the news. Unemployment is high. Growth is slow. Shale gas is a big deal. But beyond the caps-lock headlines, subtler, but no less significant, shifts are changing the U.S. economy and reshaping the global financial order. Here are ten that have surprised – and might surprise. (Inc.)
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Ankur Kumar, director of M.B.A. admissions and financial aid at University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, is leaving her post effective Friday. The move comes as campus leaders are questioning whether Wharton has done enough to distinguish itself in the marketplace. (The Wall Street Journal)
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Even college students awarded a full scholarship sometimes get socked with thousands of dollars in bills. When a student gets private scholarships – from a corporation or community group, say – some schools will actually scale back their own aid offering. In other cases, even when aid is enough to cover every penny of financial need, some schools require students to still pay a portion of the college bill out of their own pockets. (MarketWatch)
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Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt announced today the appointment of Deb Elam as president of the GE Foundation and chief diversity officer for GE. Bob Corcoran, who currently leads the philanthropic arm of GE, has announced his retirement. The appointment is effective October 1, 2013. (GE)
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If you're a big brand looking to get bigger, having a cool mobile app is one way to get customers talking. Last month, McDonald's began testing an app that allows customers to order and pay for their meals on their smartphones. Now, some McDonald's franchisees are taking the additional step of experimenting with a gaming and coupons app that rewards users with free menu items, according to McDonald's spokesperson Lisa McComb. (Entrepreneur)
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Scribd, which first made a name for itself in 2007 as a "YouTube for documents" is jumping into the "Netflix for e-books" game with a new subscription service, announced this week. For $8.99 per month, Scribd subscribers get unlimited access to a catalog of what the company calls "millions" of books and other documents, all available on iPhone, iPad, Android devices and Web browsers. (Inc.)
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A new study out of Stanford shows most of us grossly underestimate how willing other people are to help us out. All you have to do is ask... twice. (Inc.)
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Even though many people think the term crowdfunding is universal, there are actually multiple options available for those needing to raise funds. These models of crowdfunding basically break down into those that offer a financial return for backers and those that do not. (Entrepreneur)
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There's nothing like a government shutdown to make people angry about government, or at least the politicians who are running things. "The people we have in the Senate and the House of Representatives, I don't know who they're working for, but they're not working for us," says Larry Abernathy, an insurance broker in St. Louis. "I think both parties are useless." (NPR)
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If you're a manager in a locale where unemployment skyrocketed during the recession, you might already have noticed something you didn't expect: The people under you who contributed the least in boom times suddenly started bringing their "A" game, in some cases even outshining your stars. (Fortune)
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The federal government is closed for business due to the inability of lawmakers to reach a deal before Monday’s midnight deadline. As a result, hundreds of thousands of federal workers will likely be put on unpaid leave. (In 1995, 800,000 federal workers were told to stay home.) "If you get your paycheck from the government directly or indirectly as a contractor, you might get furloughed," says Charles Sizemore, a financial adviser based in Dallas. (MarketWatch)
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Some financial gurus make frugality all about abstinence, but I think it’s about being smart – prioritizing and taking responsibility for your choices. It’s not so much "I won’t" or "I can’t," but "I’d rather." Ask yourself: What is most important to me? Where will I put my discretionary dollars? What will I truly enjoy? What will enhance my life? The goal – to quote my book’s subhead – is to "Spend less, save more, and live better." (Kiplinger's)
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We all have such blind spots, and they are weaknesses we should combat. Even that idea is unfashionable in an era when we are urged to focus on polishing strengths. In the world of professional music, it’s often the opposite. Most conductors, for instance, begin rehearsals by directing the orchestra immediately to the most difficult passages in a given piece, and spend most time on them, because they are areas of weakness. (Harvard Business Review)
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Watsa, 63, keeps a low profile, but that changed on Sept. 23, when he announced plans to lead a $4.7 billion group bid to take over BlackBerry. By buying the iconic Canadian company, Watsa is hoping to disprove skeptics who don’t believe he has the partners or the money to pull it off. (Bloomberg/Businessweek)
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For Dana Mellerio, being furloughed from NASA headquarters didn’t have the feel of a vacation. So he spent Wednesday trying to stay busy. "I’m a little reticent to spend any money or relax . . . so I’m basically catching up on some chores, cleaning house, exercising, et cetera," said Mellerio, who lives in Alexandria. "The situation isn’t like bonus time off because I’m suddenly unemployed and worried about when I can go back to work again. That’s not really the setup to enjoy free time." (The Washington Post)
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A sweeping national effort to extend health coverage to millions of Americans will leave out two-thirds of the poor blacks and single mothers and more than half of the low-wage workers who do not have insurance, the very kinds of people that the program was intended to help, according to an analysis of census data. (The New York Times)
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Every organization that aspires to greatness has something to learn from relevant success stories of the past. But how should managers go about unlocking the lessons of those efforts? Many of their consultants advocate an engineering approach. (Harvard Business Review)
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Companies love to complain that they can't find talent. Might the lowly job ad be to blame? A good job description should present a company in its best light, reeling in ideal candidates while weeding out the less-than-stellar fits. Nobody's bemoaning the loss of yesteryear's ads – a New York coat shop posted in 1896 for a "young lady of German parentage" with a 36-inch bust and a knowledge of bookkeeping – but the job ad circa 2013 isn't faring much better. Ads today are long, dull, cluttered with clichés like "must be a team player," and overloaded with job requirements, many of which aren't truly necessary. (The Wall Street Journal)
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Dante de Blasio’s towering Afro, a supporting player in his father’s mayoral campaign, riveted attention once more last week when it caught the eye of President Obama. Introducing Bill de Blasio at a Democratic fund-raiser in Midtown, Mr. Obama digressed to point out, "Dante has the same hairdo as I had in 1978. Although I have to confess my Afro was never that good." (The New York Times)
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