Tag Archives: opportunity

Advice from Warren Buffett

23 May

Warren Buffett, the multi-billionnaire, is the chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway – which owns GEICO, Lubrizol, Dairy Queen, Fruit of the Loom, Helzberg Diamonds, and NetJets, among other holdings. As such, Buffett is often sought out for his advice.

Recently, Buffett spent time at an “Office Hours” session with Levo League, a networking and career advice site. As reported by Vivian Giang and Lynne Gu for Business Insider, here are several of Buffett’s key life and career tips:

  • Find your passion. “Never give up searching for the job that you’re passionate about.”
  • Be careful who you look up to. “If you tell me who your heroes are, I’ll tell you how you’re gonna turn out. It’s really important in life to have the right heroes.”
  • Learn how to communicate effectively. “I became associated with the 30 other people in a Dale Carnegie class. We couldn’t stand up in front of a group and say our own name. I mean it was — we were — it was pathetic.  But that class changed my life in a big way.”
  • Develop healthy habits by studying people.”Pick the person that has the right habits, that is cheerful, generous, gives other people credit for what they do.”
  • Learn how to say ‘no.’ “You won’t keep control of your time, unless you can say ‘no.’ You can’t let other people set your agenda in life.”
  • Don’t work for someone who won’t pay you fairly. “I do very little negotiation with people. And they do little with me.”
  • Become involved with growing businesses. “I mean, you want to get on a train that’s going to go 90 miles an hour and not one that’s gonna go 30 miles an hour.”
  • Learn everything you can about your industry. “Buffett says he reads six hours every day because he believes that growing your intellectual perspective will also help you critically solve future problems that may arise.”

 
Click the image to read more.

 

Photo by Reuter/Mike Segar

 
Post suggested by KCJ
 

Nissan’s Creativity in Mobile Advertising

22 May

Nissan recently introduced an innovative new technology called “Self Healing Paint.” Nissan’s intent is to scratch proof a car. For now, this feature is only available on certain Nissan models that are targeted at affluent, technology seekers.

To show off the “Self Healing Paint,” Nissan ran a special iPad ad in The Economist.

Take a look at a video clip.
 

 

Post suggested by KCJ

 

Yahoo and Tumblr — A Smart Move?

21 May

Yahoo has had some tough times in recent years. But things have slowly begun turning around since Marissa Mayer (formerly a senior executive at Google) became CEO.

So, the announcement that Yahoo would purchase Tumblr for $1.1 billion is not surprising; however, it is interesting. Once again, a major company has decided to acquire a growing social media firm for a lot of money, even though the social media firm itself does not generate much sales volume or profit.

Consider these observations from CBS News:

“Acquisitions are a way of life in Silicon Valley, a place where two plus two frequently adds up to billions. That is to say, deals are often conducted for reasons other than numbers in a ledger, whether for a promising piece of software or a viable business model. In this case, Tumblr has something that went missing at Yahoo years ago: growth potential. And that is key to Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer ultimately keeping her job. Yahoo is funding the deal mostly with cash. As with many acquisitions, the question is what the purchase ultimately delivers to the acquirer.”

“How much could Tumblr add to Yahoo’s traffic? According to comScore, Tumblr in March had 29.3 million unique U.S. visitors. Yahoo’s combined sites got 191.4 million visitors, more than another other company except Google, which had 1 million more. There is no way to tell from the outside how much use overlap Yahoo and Tumblr have. If there were none, which seems unlikely, Tumblr would add just over 15 percent. But what would that practically mean for Yahoo? Not significantly more on the bottom line. Profits have been kept up through cost-cutting, including the steady drop in spending on research and development. That is dangerous at a tech company like Yahoo, whose CEO has stressed the importance of innovation.”

“Yahoo’s trouble hasn’t been traffic. Its sites collectively are a major destination on the Internet. But unlike Google, Yahoo has struggled to turn that volume of users into money. Revenue has been flat. Display ad revenue, the type that you might expect to be important at a site like Tumblr, continues to drop. But a 15 percent increase in users won’t fix that picture for Yahoo.”

Click the Yahoo icon to read more and to view a video clip.

 

Crowdfunding: A New Source of Capital That Keeps on Giving

15 May

As we have noted before, crowdfunding has become a major online investment source for entrepreneurs and start-up companies.

Reporting for Fortune, Michal Lev-Ram and Kurt Wagner note that: “Welcome to the new world of fundraising, in which so-called crowdfunding Web sites like Indiegogo and Kickstarter let just about anyone with an idea try his or her hand at bankrolling a dream. Proponents of crowdfunding believe it has the potential to upend traditional financing models, such as loans and venture capital, and unleash a tidal wave of capital for entrepreneurs, creative types, and, yes, cheesemongers. Reliable estimates of the industry’s size are hard to come by, but one research outlet, Massolution, predicts some $5 billion will be raised through crowdfunding this year, up from $2.7 billion in 2012.”

Click the image to read a lot more from Lev-Ram and Wagner. And click here for a video.

 

Illustration by Alex Nabaum

 

A Personalized Self-Assessment Infographic

14 May

No matter the stage in your career (or life), it is imperative that you regularly do a self-assessment. In the infographic below, there is a 20-item self-assessment quiz for you to take.

How do YOU fare on this quiz? What activities do YOU need to modify to improve your career profile? How YOU can be happier? :-)

 

 

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