Bitcoin, Cyber Pirates, and The Future of Money

Bitcoin, Cyber Pirates, and The Future of Money

by | Jan 22, 2016 | 10 Traits, Article, Leadership Opportunity, Sustainability, UN Women, United Nations

In reporting on the fate of the bitcoin in The Washington Post, Vivek Wadhwa, a fellow at Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford University and the author of R.I.P. Bitcoin, may want to add two additional factors to its possible demise. The first is the fact that a number of unknown hackers around the world had found a way to temporary disrupt corporate communications and databases. Their target was small corporate businesses around the globe and they were demanding that the ransom be paid in bitcoins. In one corporate case I studied while studying the impact of corporate leadership to unexpected crisis, the ransom fee was 1,000 bitcoins. It wasn’t the small amount of the ransom, I was told. Instead, it was the fact that bitcoin’s so-called “pirates” were also making similar demands of other businesses they had hijacked. Their strategy: hack into a corporate database, interrupt the flow of their business services and then demanding immediate payment, in bitcoins, in exchange for restored service. The hackers rightly reasoned that the automatic response would be: “OK, its a small fee, go ahead and pay it. Let’s move on.” Many did just that. In this case, the CEO divided the workforce into two groups. Group A would dive deep into the system to find the leak, and plug it. Group B focused on making contact with every customer to explain what happened, and when they could expect to have the disruption of their online service repaired. That is, the job of the group assigned to customer outreach was to tell each customer exactly what was going on, and what...
Was Obama’s Call to ‘Our Better Self’ A Call to Women?

Was Obama’s Call to ‘Our Better Self’ A Call to Women?

by | Jan 13, 2016 | 10 Traits, Article, Leadership Opportunity, United Nations

At this watershed moment in American politics, could Obama’s State of the Union call to Americans to bring our better self into politics be a coded call to women? After all, who is the one men usually refer to when they refer to “my better self?” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alexia-parks/was-obamas-call-to-our-be_b_8971224.html Alexia Parks is founder of the 10 TRAITS Leadership...
Verve’s Christian Griffith Talks About Sustainability

Verve’s Christian Griffith Talks About Sustainability

by | Jan 8, 2016 | 10 Traits, Article, Leadership Opportunity

I don’t shop for clothes all that often. What I want I make for myself and what I can’t make I often buy used. It’s only in vintage apparel, really, that you get the true sense of the origin. Tweed woven from the wool of sheep who foraged on the moss of the moors in Scotland… Icelandic sweaters knit in Iceland by the hands of people who descended from the Vikings who created the designs… Leather shoes built on lasts that have been handed down through generations of shoemakers in the Italian alps. These things all have meaning to me as do the signs of wear and use, true indications of durability and utility. They wake me up to the notion that there is nothing sustainable about something disposable. That the only way to be a conscious consumer or producer is to tighten the loops of exchange, not expand them. are you concerned about the food you eat? Buy it from your neighbor, you can look over the fence anytime and see how it’s grown. concerned about how your verve clothing is sewn? Yes, you still might run into one of our ‘grannies’ in line at the store…just ask her. The Outdoor Industry’s Christian Griffith, has lived his passion for more than 25-years. His lifestyle and clothing company, VerveClimbing.com, reflects his values and is an extension of them. His ideas on Sustainability, so well expressed here and reprinted from his website, remind us that how we live in the world shapes our destiny. Live...
Leadership Styles: A Whack On the Side of the Head or a Nudge?

Leadership Styles: A Whack On the Side of the Head or a Nudge?

by | Dec 10, 2015 | 10 Traits, Article, Leadership Opportunity, United Nations

Researchers have long shown that spending money on others makes us happier than spending it on ourselves. New research, presented recently by Ashley Whillans at the Science of Philanthropy Initiative in Chicago, has found that people randomly assigned to spend money on others are not only happier but also experience lower blood pressure. Inside the Nudge Unit – a term coined by David Halpern – behavioral scientists around the globe are showing how “small changes can make a big difference.” Making the RIGHT choice the DEFAULT choice can be made through simple policy changes or single word choices. People, says Elspeth Kirkman, with the Behavioural Insights Team, feel successful when innovative city, state, and national government agencies make it easy for them to do the right thing. Nudging can be used to reduce logistical barriers for college applications, to help people overcome obesity and make healthy food choices, and even guiding citizens to choose a more sustainable...