British aid worker Helen Johnston was rescued along with a Kenyan aid worker and two Afghan aid workers, who were abducted in May, British Foreign Office confirmed on Saturday.
The life sentence for Egypt's former President Hosni Mubarak, which was issued by the New Cairo criminal court Saturday, left Egyptian expatriates in Dubai divided over the degree of punishment and their country's future, Xinhua learnt in a quick survey.
Do you know your creativity quotient? Creativity sounds a little weak, a touchy-feely topic, but it turns to be one of the most important memes of the past 100 years, and very definitely ranks alongside concepts (or ideologies) like capitalism in the pantheon of big ideas.
I admit to being a creativity sceptic. When it came into vogue thirty years ago I cringed. Creative? What’s wrong with busy? Or dedicated. Or hard working. But creativity’s rise – measured by the use of terms “creative” and “creativity” in Google‘s nGram database – has been relentless for over a century. It is NO fad.
For those that don’t know it the nGram database contains roughly 4% of all books ever published, in the case of this data in the USA and Britain.
The problem of creativity – how to manifest it in disciplined environments – hasn’t changed much during that period.
But if you look at the chart below you can get a sense of its importance. The use of “creative” dwarfs terms like technological progress and scientific progress.
In fact digging a little deeper I found out:
The use of the language of creativity is increasing when people write about scientific progress. Progress itself is a term in declining use, seemingly replaced by the idea of creativity, at least in the sciences. You can’s see that from the chart – to get to that data I examined the use of a variety of terms over the period 1960 – 2010.
The best Google nGram data goes up to 2000 but I checked search interest in these terms, post 2000, and the patterns continue.
The use of creativity is increasing in business and management literature, declining where people write about religion and education, and of course rising when people write about cities.
Jonah Leher’s book Imagine underlines the slacker nature of creativity but also it’s importance. Let’s face it the quest to be more creative as a society is as old as (modern) business.
Creativity is big in entertainment too, naturally, if entertainment is taken to include art and music but surprise, surprise the use of the term in entertainment declined in the period 1981 – 2000, while it increased in association with business and management.
Is all this just a reflection of publishers pumping more books out? No, all data is normalised.
Is there anything to conclude from the data? The themes of creativity have been pretty consistent down the years – how organizations stifle it, how necessary it is, and how it creates risk.
The one lacking ingredient seems to be a creative answer to those problems, though I think we may be on the cusp of one (more of that later in the week).
Are hefty paychecks and good career prospects the only aspects talents look for in a base country? The answers may be the key to a country’s success in bringing its best brains home.
THERE is a global war being waged as companies and countries struggle to keep their best within their borders while they try to woo the world’s brightest.
And if salary perks and benefits offered by countries like Qatar, China, Singapore and Malaysia for returning experts and expatriates are anything to go by, the “War for Talent”, a term coined by research giant McKinsey & Company in 1997, is still going strong despite the global economic slowdown.
But 13 years after the term was coined, the landscape of the war has greatly changed. Most notably, the “weapons” used to attract talents have changed.
While salary packages and fringe benefits used to be one of the most powerful magnets for talent, it may not be enough in the current human resource climate.
Dr Tan: ‘When you have the brains or energy, you want to go to the best place to learn from the best’
David Lee, author of the Insights: The Journal of the Northeast HR Association article titled “Becoming a Talent Magnet: How to Attract and Retain Great Employees”, says that competitive pay and a good benefits package although important are not enough to attract and retain “the best of the best”.
Quoting a study by another US consulting firm Kepner-Tregoe of Princeton, Lee, an executive coach and founder of US consulting and training firm HumanNature@Work, points out that 40% of the employees surveyed felt that increased salaries and financial rewards were ineffective in reducing turnover.
Hence, the vital question for most human resource managers and national talent development organisations is “What are the world’s best looking for?”
Lee says the proverbial carrot lies in the intangible, such as pride in where they work and what they do, appreciation from their managers, opportunities to learn and grow as well as respect.
Interviews with Malaysian diasporas and experts who have returned seem to support the trend.
Although many of them acknowledge that salary packages and career prospects matter, it is often not a deal breaker when it comes to their decision to remain abroad or return home.
Wong: ‘If Malaysia wants to attract talents, it must be able to provide a conducive environment’
One of the main attractions for talents is the environment for them to develop and excel in their fields of interest.
When Kuala Lumpur-born consultant psychiatrist and analytic psychotherapist Dr Tan Eng-Kong left for a sabbatical in Australia in 1976, he knew he would get to work with some of the best psychiatrists in the world.
“At that time, Australia invited the best of American and British psychiatrists to its country, and I was lucky to be able to take a sabbatical from lecturing in Sydney,” says Dr Tan, who was in Kuala Lumpur recently.
As he found greater opportunities to practise his field of interest psychotherapy in Australia, he chose to stay there and build his career.
“In those days, the field of psychotherapy was not developed yet in Malaysia. So, I had to stay back in Australia just to practise,” says Dr Tan, who has now spent over 30 years building a successful career in Sydney.
While psychotherapy is currently gaining popularity among local mental health professionals, Dr Tan still feels it is more popular and better received in the West.
“When you have the brains or energy, you want to go to the best place to learn from the best,” says Dr Tan, who still visits Malaysia regularly to share his expertise with local mental health professionals.
Dr Lam Wei-Haur, who has just come back under the returning experts programme (REP) after spending six years in Britain and two years in China doing research in ocean renewable energy, shares a similar experience.
“Funding for research at a post-graduate level was limited when I finished my undergraduate studies in 2001. I was lucky to obtain a scholarship to further my studies in the UK,” says Lam, who is now an associate professor in Universiti Malaya’s department of civil engineering.
Although the tax cuts and benefits made the transition back to Malaysia easier, I came back because I felt I could contribute more to my field of research back home. – DR LAM WEI-HAUR
“However, after six years of research in the UK, I wanted to learn about the system of research and development in China,” he adds.
Lam, who is in his 30s, says he came back because he felt he would be able to contribute more to the field of ocean energy in Malaysia.
“Although the tax cuts and benefits such as a permanent residentship offer for my spouse made the transition back to Malaysia easier, the reason I came back is because I felt that I could contribute more to my field of research here, back home,” he explains.
There may be more established research institutions and teams overseas but having the opportunity to work with researchers in a developing nation such as Malaysia is like “sketching on a white piece of paper” for him.
On worries that Malaysia may not have sufficient funding and infrastructure for research, Dr Lam says researchers have to look for opportunities themselves.
“Our Government is now very supportive of scientific research and there are a number of sources researchers can go to for grants. We must understand that opportunities do not come to us if we do not make an effort to ask or look for it,” he stresses.
While Dr Hood Azlan Mohd Thabit, 35, is determined to return to Malaysia to continue his research in endocrinology (specifically in diabetes) after his post-graduate research in Cambridge, he agrees that the base country of a scientist or researcher is of marginally less importance compared to the research network and collaborations he could forge with other researchers around the world.
“It is very difficult for an individual or group to do research on its own, not just because the world is more globalised now, but because it is so easy to collaborate through the Internet, they have no excuse not to,” he says.
While certain countries have established infrastructure for research, others have the human resource and expertise, he adds.
“Personally, it is really for the satisfaction of doing what you do. And coming home, for most people, is about whether they can continue their work in a meaningful way,” says Dr Hood.
For corporate social responsibility (CSR) consultant Wong Lai Yong, who hails from Penang, the location of her base country does not matter as long as she is able to contribute to society from where she is.
Since she first volunteered to read to the blind in primary school, community service has been in her blood. Today, she continues to serve the people around her by spreading her knowledge on childcare development and social entrepreneurship based on her experiences in Japan.
“I’ve always realised that education is the best way to bring people out of poverty, so I think about the ways I can help bring education to people who have no access to primary education. That is why I have never confined my contributions to Malaysia alone,” says the cheerful 39-year-old.
She does not plan to return to Malaysia in the near future but even so, she visits regularly to share her knowledge.
“If Malaysia wants to attract talents, it must be able to provide a supportive and conducive environment for these talents to perform and contribute,” she says.
“We might not be able to compete with many developed nations in terms of salary and benefits, but we can offer Malaysian diasporas the comfort of home and the company of their family members.”
Malaysian transplant
Carol Lamb calls herself a transplanted Malaysian, having settled down in the United States in the 1980s. Lamb, who now runs communication firm Fantastic International Inc in Atlanta, says she is often asked in social circles where she is from.
“How do I convey that I am from a country surrounded by glistening islands with white sandy beaches, tropical rainforests with unique animal and plant life, cool mountain ranges with quaint villages, tall skyscrapers with world-class shopping, a fusion of Asia and British rule? I decided to build my own website and affiliate with one of the biggest online travel booking engines on the Internet, Hotels.com,” she tells.
With the help of Tourism Malaysia and its New York office, she travelled back to Malaysia and wrote about exciting tourist attractions and sites. The concept of medical tourism caught her attention and she is now helping to promote Malaysia as a health tourism destination among Americans.
“The number of Americans going to Malaysia is small. This is the reason why I created the Global Marketing Network’. I promote medical facilities that are in Malaysia at exhibitions around the US.
“Malaysian medical facilities need to be seen. Malaysia also needs to be on the lips and minds of people thinking about having surgery abroad. What better way to do this than participating in exhibitions?
“Additionally, most Americans do not know that Malaysia used to be a British colony. They are also unaware that English is widely spoken, the country has great infrastructure, fantastic beaches, awesome hotels, scrumptious food and is multi-racial and multi-cultural.
“Who better to explain all this face-to-face than a Malaysian who knows the country well?”
Weaving a win-win web
BUILDING a global Malaysian diaspora network might seem like a colossal task but after the encouraging response entrepreneur Winston Choe received for the first diaspora meetup he planned in Silicon Valley, he is convinced that it may not be as difficult as it seems.
He had put out the word on the meetup he planned to link Malaysian technology companies with professionals and investors in the US in December, and was pleasantly surprised when he found over 80 Malaysians in the San Fransisco Bay Area, many of whom he had not met during the years he lived there.
“What I did was send the word out over the Internet through Facebook pages, LinkedIn groups and e-mail lists about the meetup. Within two weeks, we had to increase our initial cap of 30 people to 50,” said Choe, a Petaling-Jaya born CEO of his own business networking software company in Silicon Valley.
In fact, the meetup sponsored by Talent Corporation Malaysia (TalentCorp) that features the topic “Malaysian Tech Sector Opportunities” has attracted 80 interested participants, but Choe had to limit his audience to ensure quality interaction.
“I am greatly encouraged by the initial feedback and am confident that the next one will easily attract at least 100 people,” he said via Skype.
The idea of a meetup in Silicon Valley came up when Choe was in Malaysia in October for a workshop organised by TalentCorp.
“This meetup is a follow-up to the workshop we did in Kuala Lumpur in October,” said Choe, who is passionate about helping other entrepreneurs build their businesses.
“My goal is to allow professionals (in Silicon Valley) to explore cross border opportunities between the United States and Asia,” he added.
Before the meetup, held at the Intel Santa Clara campus, Choe had selected four MSC companies and coached them to make a 15-minute business presentation to Silicon Valley professionals and investors. At the meetup, he also presented a win-win model for Malaysian diasporas to contribute to various sectors in Malaysia.
“After the workshop in Kuala Lumpur, we realised that what Malaysian start-ups need most are funding, market access and global partners,” said Choe.
The win-win model he suggested is focused on enhancing these three aspects for Malaysian companies as well as professionals and investors abroad.
In terms of funding, Malaysian diaspora with successful business ventures can introduce Malaysian companies to investors in the West, and Malaysian companies can reciprocate by introducing them to investors in Asia.
“While Malaysian diaspora can help Malaysian companies access the US market, Malaysian companies can serve as a gateway for them to access the Asian market.
“What we are trying to do now is to build a global (Malaysian) diaspora network with physical meetups, workshops and also online social tools, and our objective is to accelerate various sectors in Malaysia, starting with infotech,” he said.
As a result of the meetup, Choe made eight qualified introductions between professionals at the workshop and three MSC companies that presented that day.
A LinkedIn group has also been set up to connect participants of the workshop.
“A few participants have expressed interest in helping me organise more of such meetups,” said Choe.
With their help, Choe’s goal in 2012 is to organise similar meetups across the world in cities such as New York, Toronto, London, Sydney, Melbourne and even Singapore.
“This represents about 80% of the Malaysian diaspora population, and we hope that they can take this platform and replicate it,” said Choe.
Milky Way teeming with ‘billions’ of planets: Study
New methods have allowed the Kepler space telescopeto discover billions more planets in the galaxy.
WASHINGTON: The Milky Way is home to far more planets than previously thought, boosting the odds that at least one of them may harbour life, according to a study released on Wednesday.
Not long ago, astronomers counted the number of “exoplanets” detected outside our own solar system in the teens, then in the hundreds. Today the tally stands at just over 700.
But the new study, published in Nature, provides evidence that there are more planets than stars in our own stellar neighbourhood.
“We used to think that Earth might be unique in our galaxy,” said Daniel Kubas, a professor at the Institute of Astrophysics in Paris, and co-leader of the study.
“Now it seems that there are literally billions of planets with masses similar to Earth orbiting stars in the Milky Way.”
Two methods have dominated the hunt over the past two decades for exoplanets too distant and feint to perceive directly.
One measures the effect of a planet’s gravitational pull on its host star, while the other detects a slight dimming of the star as the orbiting planet passes in front of it.
Both of these techniques are better at finding planets that are massive in size, close to their stars, or both, leaving large “blind spots”.
An international team of astronomers led by Kubas and colleague Arnaud Cassan used a different method called gravitational microlensing, which looks at how the combined gravitational fields of a host star and the planet itself act like a lens, magnifying the light of another star in the background.
If the star that acts as a lens has a planet, the orbiting sphere will appear to slightly brighten the background star.
One advantage of microlensing compared to other methods is that it can detect smaller planets closer in size to our own, and further from their hot-burning stars.
The survey picked up on planets between 75 million and 1.5 billion kilometres from their stars — a range equivalent in the Solar System to Venus at one end and Saturn at the other — and with masses at least five times greater than Earth.
Over six years, the team surveyed millions of stars with a round-the-world network of telescopes located in the southern hemisphere, from Australia to South Africa to Chile.
Besides finding three new exoplanets themselves — no minor feat — they calculated that there are, on average, 1.6 planets in the Milky Way for every star, Cassan told AFP.
Whether this may be true in other galaxies is unknown.
“Remarkably, these data show that planets are more common than stars in our galaxy — they are the rule rather than the exception,” Cassan said. “We also found lighter planets … would be more common than heavier ones.”
One in six of the stars studied was calculated to host a planet similar in mass to Jupiter, half had planets closer in mass to Neptune, and nearly two-thirds had so-called super-Earths up to 10 times the mass of the rock we call home.
Another study published the same day in Nature, meanwhile, showed that planets simultaneously orbiting two stars — known as circumbinary planet systems — are also far more common that once supposed.
There are probably millions of planets with two suns, concluded the study, led by William Welsh of San Diego State University in California.
KUALA LUMPUR: The MCA will push for Mandarin to be made a compulsory Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) paper for students in Sekolah Menengah Jenis Kebangsaan (SMJK).
Party president Datuk Seri Dr Chua Soi Lek said making the subject compulsory was important because there should be a minimum level of language proficiency for those wishing to teach in Chinese schools.
He added that the boards of SMJK nationwide were unanimous in their decision to request that the language be made a compulsory subject.
Dr Chua, however, said there would be a shortage of Mandarin teachers to teach the subject.
The party has directed its Youth chief Datuk Dr Wee Ka Siong, who is also Deputy Education Minister, to look into the matter.
Dr Chua hopes to see more students from independent Chinese schools joining teacher training colleges once the institutes begin accepting Unified Examination Certificate students.
He said this at a press conference after a meeting with representatives from the 78 SMJK school boards yesterday.
Dr Chua also urged the Education Ministry to look into reintroducing English Literature in schools to strengthen the command of English.
“Learning Science and Mathematics in English is good but as far as MCA is concerned, there is a need for literature to be reintroduced.”
On the criticism levelled against MCA’s forum on hudud on Dec 4, Dr Chua said: “There is nothing wrong in educating my own members. We don’t believe hudud will not affect the non-Muslims and we are holding this to educate them.”
He added that there were many educated people asking for more space for discussion.
“Why are they upset when we do a closed door forum? Does DAP or PAS have something to hide which makes them want to prevent MCA from holding its own forum within its own premises?” Dr Chua asked.
The forum will be held at Wisma MCA and is open to the public, although it is organised for party members.
CHINA is moving in the right direction to build a 60-tonne space station around 2020.
On Nov 3, the unmanned Shenzhou 8 shuttle docked with Tiangong-1, which is China’s first space lab module, after travelling 343km in orbit.
The shuttle separated from the target spacecraft after 12 days and carried out its second docking on Nov 14. Two days later, Shenzhou 8 left Tiangong-1 and returned to Earth as scheduled.
News from the China Manned Space Engineering Office is that Tiangong-1 has continued its voyage at a height of 370km smoothly and transferred into a long-term operational mode.
The space lab module will wait for docking with the manned Shenzhou 9 and 10 sometime next year.
According to the office’s vice-director Wang Zhaoyao, during the flight of Shenzhou 8 its general biological experimental device functioned normally and 17 samples of Sino-Germany cooperative space life science experiments were recovered after the shuttle landed at the recovery site in Inner Mongolia.
He said Tiangong-1 had also carried out a series of experiments and tests as scheduled, including space-to-earth remote sensing exploration application experiment, space materials scientific experiment and space environment and physical detection tests.
“This space rendezvous and mission has fully realised its objective of ‘accurate entry into orbit, precise docking, stable assembly operation and safe return’.
“It marks a critical breakthrough for China’s space technology and set a milestone for our manned space development,” he told a press conference recently.
Wang said Tiangong-1, launched into orbit on Sept 29, was designed with a lifespan of more than two years and it would be well maintained until its following docking operations next year.
Under China’s space programme, after completing its first round of missions, Tiangong-1 will return to earth in 2013. It will be replaced by the larger Tiangong-2 and Tiangong-3 modules which will conduct more sophisticated space probes.
Tiangong-3 will probably be a 60-tonne full-size space station to be manned by astronauts.
The China’s Manned Space Engineering Office maintained that China is not working on the space station development alone and the country always welcomed other nations.
“We emphasise independent development but never said we want to develop in isolation. The development and operation of China’s space station are open to foreign colleagues and experts in the field on the principle of mutual respect and benefit, transparency and openness,” Wang said.
China has had fruitful space cooperation with Russia, Germany, France and other nations.
China would like to be involved in the building of the International Space Station together six other space agencies but because of various reasons, China remains excluded from the programme, he added.
He also refuted claims that China’s manned space programmes had military functions.
“We can say that none of the eight Shenzhou missions had direct military applications. But, we all know that space-related technological developments can be used in civilian and military sectors.
“For example, a communications satellite can be used for TV broadcasting and military communication. So it depends on what you use it for,” he added.
Wang hoped that critics would be responsible and fair when criticising China’s space programmes.
“The United States and some media have been criticising our space exploration programme and development saying is not transparent enough. First of all, they have to be fair in their comments.
“Last year, I accompanied Nasa administrator Charles Bolden for a tour of our space programme facilities, laboratories and launching centres in China. He was pleased on how transparent we were,” he said.
China’s space programme consists of three stages. Phase 1 saw the historic launch of the unmanned Shenzhou 1 shuttle in 1999 for missions to conduct space experiments. It was followed by the launch of Shenzhou 2, Shenzhou 3, Shenzhou 4, Shenzhou 5, Shenzhou 6 and Shenzhou 7.
The Shenzhou 7 mission, China’s third manned spacecraft, was the most historic when Chinese astronaut Zhai Zhigang became the first man from China to do a spacewalk on Sept 27, 2008. It marked a successful extra-vehicular activity (EVA) mission for China.
Phase 2 began with the launch of the Tiangong-1 space module. One of the main missions during this phase will be the docking of a manned space shuttle with the space lab.
The space programme administration will decide between Shenzhou 9 and 10 which one will be manned by China’s first female astronaut next year.
AirAsia CEO and others give you recipe for innovation
By LIZ LEE lizlee@thestar.com.my
KUALA LUMPUR: What fosters the spirit of innovation? The answers point to an encouraging environment and putting Malaysia into context, there is much to be done at the home, education and corporate levels to create an environment fertile for sowing the seeds of unconventional thinking.
The award was founded by energy companies Petronas, ExxonMobil and Shell in 2007 where award recipients will receive a certificate and RM500,000 cash award for each of five categories.
“(Innovation) is not something you can teach or programme. It is creating a lot of little ecosystems to make sure (the environment is right) and culture does play a part in this,” Fernandes said, kicking off the discussion on “Cultivating a culture of innovation in challenging times.”
Sharing ideas: (from left) Zaini, Ong and Fernandes at the second Merdeka Award Roundtable. The discussion was hosted by Astro Awani’s Norina Yahya
Of the education system, Fernandes said the focus on books had overwhelmed the development in other areas that build thought leaders.
“When we look at some of the great leaders, they are all rounded. Our schools have lost a lot by focusing on academics only,” he said.
Fernandes believed that while the Government should foster innovation as well as trust the people and allow ideas, education is the key to take Malaysia to the next level. He opined that bringing back arts, culture and sport would change the way the future generation thinks.
“A successful education system should be about bringing out the best in children and giving them the ability to experiment and try all sorts of things and turn that raw diamond into a polished diamond,” he said.
As a parent, he believed that it was important to “expose the children to as many things as possible and allow them to go where they want.”
At the corporate level, he added that there was also a culture of subordination in Malaysia that hampered creative output: “When you go against the norm in Malaysia, you can be whacked. It’s sometimes seen as insubordinate or questionable when you challenge the norm.”
“That’s the culture. Malaysians are an innovative lot but sometimes we need to praise innovation by creating the environment,” he said, adding that the success stories of Malaysian innovation were not sung often enough.
“We don’t hear enough of the success stories. A lot of our technology came from Malaysians and we need to show that the commercialisation of these ideas have come to fruition,” he said.
During the discussion, Fernandes also revealed that the flat structure in AirAsia’s management was the “secret weapon” for its success in the industry. He said that communication flow relied on organisation structure.
“If you have a hierarchical organisation, the people who have ideas are sometimes too scared to speak up. (But) it’s all right to give ideas, it’s all right to talk,” he said of the potentially stifling hierarchical organisation structures in many Malaysian companies.
“I always say I would rather have 9,000 brains working with me than just 10,” he said, adding on that “if you create an environment where everyone feels equal and there’s freedom of expression (among all levels of employees), that provides a very powerful machine.”
However, innovating per se should not be the end goal too.
Ong, who is also a former member of the Merdeka Award Health, Science and Technology Committee, said there needed to be market-driven innovations to encourage worthwhile creations.
“When you have innovation for a market that is not ready for it, that becomes a problem,” he said.
“We should also look at what our country has a niche in. We should concentrate on areas where we already have good industries going on where innovation can bring some results,” he added, saying that foreign areas like nuclear energy may not be an ideal area to innovate since the country had yet to develop its know-how and infrastructure.
In terms of getting academicians engaged with market-centric needs, Zaini said UTM had a professorship scheme with Proton Holdings Bhd where professors were positioned at the company to spur on-the-ground projects with the staff.
“We target to have 100 patents under Proton per year from this industrial PhD,” the former Merdeka Award recipient said, highlighting the university’s market-relevant endeavours through the reverse flow of ideas from the market into academia.
The roundtable will be broadcast on Astro Awani in early December.
China is stepping up its semiconductor manufacturing efforts and using domestic chips for its latest supercomputer. It’s going to be interesting to see how fast China can close in on U.S. supercomputer processor makers Intel, AMD, and Nvidia.
The New York Times reported that a supercomputer called Sunway BlueLight MPP, was installed in September at the National Supercomputer Center in Jinan, China. The details emerged at a technical meeting. The real catch is that China used 8,700 ShenWei SW1600 chips.
Those semiconductors are homegrown and indicate that China is aiming to be a major chip player. The New York Times story was mostly sourced to Jack Dongarra, a computer scientist at the University of Tennessee, but Chinese sites reported on the technical meeting. Dongarra helps manage the list of Top 500 supercomputers. China’s previous supercomputers used Intel and Nvidia chips.
According to (Tsao’s) slides, which appear to be from a presentation describing the computer’s capabilities, the ShenWei Sunway BlueLight MPP has 150TB of main storage and 2PB of external storage. Each ShenWei SW1600 processor is 64-bit, has 16-cores and is RISC-based.
The Wall Street Journal noted that the China domestic supercomputing effort is very credible and signals an effort to cut the country’s reliance on western companies. It’s unclear whether China’s chips are completely original blueprints or based on a previous design. One issue for the Sunway chips is power consumption. The Sunway supercomputer apparently doesn’t need that much power relative to rivals.
The New York Times added that that ShenWei chip appears to be based “on some of the same design principles that are favored by Intel’s most advanced microprocessors.”
China’s efforts appear to be a few generations behind, but rest assured the country will try to close any gaps quickly.
What Determines a Company’s Performance? Shape of the CEO’s Face!
ScienceDaily (Aug. 25, 2011) — Believe it or not, one thing that predicts how well a CEO’s company performs is — the width of the CEO’s face! CEOs with wider faces have better-performing companies than CEOs with long faces. That’s the conclusion of a new study which will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.
Image via WikipediaElaine M. Wong at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and her colleagues study how top management teams work. But they have to do it in indirect ways. “CEOs and top executives don’t typically have time to talk with researchers or take batteries of tests,” she says. “Our research has primarily been at a distance.” They’ve analyzed the content of letters to shareholders and looked at things like how a CEO’s educational or personal background affects how well his or her company does. Wong and her colleagues, Margaret E. Ormiston of London Business School and Michael P. Haselhuhn of UWM, wanted to look at another aspect of CEOs – their faces.
Looking at faces isn’t as crazy as it might sound. Several studies have shown that the ratio of face width to face height is correlated with aggression. Hockey players with wider faces spend more time in the penalty box for fighting. Men with higher facial width are seen as less trustworthy and they feel more powerful.
“Most of these are seen as negative things, but power can have some positive effects,” Wong says. People who feel powerful tend to look at the big picture rather than focusing on small details and are also better at staying on task. She and her colleagues thought that feeling of power might also be correlated with a company’s financial performance.
Wong and her colleagues based their analyses on photos of 55 male CEOs of publicly-traded Fortune 500 organizations. They only used men because this relationship between face shape and behavior has only been found to apply to men; it’s thought to have something to do with testosterone levels. They also gathered information on the companies’ financial performance and analyzed shareholder letters to get a sense of the kind of thinking that goes on at those companies.
CEOs with a wider face, relative to the face’s height, had much better firm financial performance than CEOs who had narrower faces. “In our sample, the CEOs with the higher facial ratios actually achieved significantly greater firm financial performance than CEOs with the lower facial ratios,” Wong says.
Don’t run out and invest in wide-faced CEOs’ companies, though. Wong and her colleagues also found that the way the top management team thinks, as reflected in their writings, can get in the way of this effect. Teams that take a simplistic view of the world, in which everything is black and white, are thought to be more deferential to authority; in these companies, the CEO’s face shape is more important. It’s less important in companies where the top managers see the world more in shades of gray.
Provided by Association for Psychological Science (news : web)
Forget about your Ivy League/Oxbridge/Harvard business school education, your connections or how many millions in personal funds you can plough into the business: the one thing you really need as a CEO is a big face, at least according to a new study to be published in journal Psychological Science.
Elaine M Wong of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and her colleagues analysed photos of 55 male CEOs of publicly-traded Fortune 500 organisations and found that chiefs with a wider face, relative to face height, had much better firm financial performance that those with narrower faces. (And if you’re wondering why this only applies to male CEOs, it is because the whole fat-face thing only works with men – apparently it has something to do with testosterone levels.)
According to Wong and her team, launching this study wasn’t completely out of left field, because previous studies had shown big-featured guys were more prone to aggression, seen as less trustworthy and felt more powerful – and they thought these attributes could be a winning combination for CEOs.
Good ratios: Rory Read,
CEO of AMD
“Most of these are seen as negative things, but power can have some positive effects,” she said.
Obviously, the Reg couldn’t help a little completely unscientific application of these conclusions considering the two new CEOs in the techie stable: Tim Cook at Apple and Rory Read at AMD.
AMD is looking good with Read, since although he’s not really got a big face, he hasn’t really got a very long face either, so the width-height ratio is probably good.
But Cook is definitely sporting some height there and with those slimly-defined cheekbones, could Apple be in trouble? But no wait, he’s practically Jobs’ face twin, they’re both rocking that lengthy angular look, and Jobs seemed to do OK. Could it be that the concept is not infallible?
Steve jobs (left) and Tim Cook. Separated at birth?
Well, actually, it could. Wong’s team found that the way top management felt could interfere with the effect of the head honcho’s huge countenance. Teams that took a simplistic view of the world, in which everything is black and white, are thought to be more deferential to authority, so the CEO’s face-shape-mojo worked. Big heads are less important in companies where the top managers see the world in shades of grey. ®
Economists recognize that companies that export are more productive. However, a more complex relationship between exporting and investing in research and development may better explain the high productivity of companies in “economic miracle” countries such as China and Taiwan, according to a team of economists.
“The old story is that there’s some type of magic that makes your company more productive if it exports,” said Bee-Yan Aw, professor of economics, Penn State. “Actually what we found is that really productive firms tend to export in the first place.”
The researchers, who released their findings in the current issue of the American Economic Review, said companies that exported and invested in R&D significantly outperformed other companies significantly in productivity, including companies that just began exporting. They examined data on the relationship between R&D investments, exporting practices and productivity for Taiwanese electronic product manufacturing plants from 2000 to 2004.
A company that both invests in R&D and exports is 123 percent more productive than a plant that does neither, said Mark Roberts, professor of economics, Penn State. A plant that exports, but does not invest in R&D, is only 35 percent more productive. A plant that only invests in R&D has productivity that is twice as high.
According to Aw, manufacturers may be tempted to seize higher productivity gains by investing only in R&D and not in exports, but the costs of implementing new technology and updating equipment could be prohibitive.
“There are often higher costs associated with research and development that may make it impractical for companies to implement,” said Aw. “Exporting may actually be a more desirable way to improve productivity initially because it is relatively low cost.”
The Penn State researchers, who worked with Daniel Yi Xu, assistant professor of economics, New York University, said companies that export gain a competitive edge by learning more from their customers, which are often larger companies in Western countries.
Because companies that export are more productive, they may have a significant advantage over non-exporting firms that are hoping to sell their goods overseas. Government programs can help ease this transition for non-exporting companies that are looking for customers in foreign markets, according to Aw.
“Governments can set up programs that help non-exporting companies connect with customers in other countries,” said Aw. “In fact, that’s what a lot of countries are already doing.”
Provided by Pennsylvania State University (news : web)
KUALA LUMPUR: A man wants to sue Khazanah Nasional Bhd, Yayasan Khazanah and its director after his son failed to get a scholarship offered by the foundation and the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust.
Lawyer Chan Chow Wang, 67, said he was planning to retire and personally funding son Xiao Yao’s studies would be a huge financial burden.
He also did not understand why Yayasan Khazanah had rejected the application as Xiao Yao had on Jan 5 received a conditional offer for a place at the University of Cambridge.
Yayasan Khazanah works with the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust to offer the Khazanah Cambridge Scholarship to students who have gained admission to the university through the usual application route.
Xiao Yao is scheduled to do his BA Honours degree in Chemical Engineering via Natural Sciences. The course starts in October.
Chan said that when he appealed to the foundation and asked for an explanation for the rejection, all he got was a letter telling him that the competition for the scholarship programme was very stiff.
He added that he would file a suit against the three parties because of the embarrassment, anguish and depression caused to his son.
“I will also lodge a complaint with the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission and request it to investigate the scholarship programme,” he said at a press conference yesterday.
Chan said the tuition fee for his son’s first-year study was £18,000 (about RM89,000) while the college fee was £4,462.50 (about RM22,000).
“With living expenses, my son will need about RM150,000 a year for this four-year degree programme and it is a huge sum of money,” he said.
Chan said it would be difficult for him to fund his son’s education as he was planning to retire in two years.
He had also funded the education of his four children, including Xian Yao’s education up to A-level.
A Chinese manned submersible sets sail Sunday for the Mariana Trench in the western pacific. In a few days, it will dive 7,000 meters, hopefully setting a new record for deep-sea dives.
The best Google nGram data goes up to 2000 but I checked search interest in these terms, post 2000, and the patterns continue.
Dr Tan: ‘When you have the brains or energy, you want to go to the best place to learn from the best’
Wong: ‘If Malaysia wants to attract talents, it must be able to provide a conducive environment’
Although the tax cuts and benefits made the transition back to Malaysia easier, I came back because I felt I could contribute more to my field of research back home. – DR LAM WEI-HAUR
New methods have allowed the Kepler 
Steve jobs (left) and Tim Cook. Separated at birth?
