Cities like London and New York don’t have the money to keep up with Asia, Russia, and the Persian Gulf. Is the Western urban landscape fully of date?

by Ulrike Knöfel, Frank Hornig and Bernhard Zand

Watch full size video:

For an entire century, New York was the city of skyscrapers, the epitome of the vertical city. It just kept growing into the sky, faster and faster. It was an exhilarating bold undertaking in stone, steel and glass — and seemingly unsurpassable.

In “Delirious New York,” his legendary 1978 volume concerning the giant city of skyscrapers and its magic, the young Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas raved about what he called the “colonization of the sky.”

Even the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center have not diminished the enthusiasm the now world-famous architect has for the skyscraper in the same manner with a model of success. Despite the disaster, says Koolhaas, the skyscraper is still “concerning the only type of building that has survived the leap into the 21st century.”

Koolhaas is apparently fair. The bell-tower has survived as the two a fashion of architecture and a status symbol. The impressiveness of a incorporated town’s skyline is seen as a reflection of its prosperity. Skyscrapers serve as a physical expression of an economic upswing, and bear eye-witness to an economy’s horizontal of adrenalin.

Go East!

From a Western prospect, at least, this is precisely the problem. Economically booming megacities — such as Beijing, Shanghai and Dubai — where extravagant skyscrapers are shooting up all over, mean that cities like New York are outset to anticipate old and outdated, contempt attempts to modernize. In Europe, the eastern part is beginning to look more modern than the western part. Cities exist pleased with Istanbul and Moscow are more dynamic than London, Paris or Milan.

There have not at all been this many skyscrapers on the drawing boards, with most of them planned during the term of the world’s fresh boom towns. The West is eying this development with envious suspicion, all the more intense for its inability to compete. The massive downturn in the American credit mart has caused the cancellation or postponement of many major architectural and urban-planning projects.

The battle according to the best skyline, that has been underway for more than 100 years, is entering a of the present day round. And it equitable now seems to be clear who the winners will be: the Middle East and the Far East. Kazakhstan and Qatar could soon be aesthetically more dominant than Europe or the United States. It is an architectural clash of civilizations. One of the most ironic aspects of this development is that, in many cases, it is the West’s leading architects who are driving this change. Working in quest of newly enriched governments and real estate tycoons, they are now being given release realm to behave what would now have existence inconceivable in their home countries.

An angular building in the shape of a colossal triumphal arch? One designed by Koolhaas was recently completed in Beijing to serve as the headquarters of China Central Television.

A landscape of tall, asymmetrical buildings reminiscent of icebergs? One designed by American architect Steven Holl now stands in the Chinese city of Chengdu.

A pyramid for Moscow that climbs 450 meters (1,476 feet)? Both are the work of prominent London architect Lord Norman Foster, who is also astute the Crystal Island, the Moscow increase that faculty of volition include it. According to Foster, it is the “earth’s most ambitious construction project.”

The All-powerful ‘Wow Effect’

The megalomania of this boomtown euphoria demands more than just high buildings. Nowadays, spectacular shapes and glittering surfaces are in demand, eccentricities that are observable even from great distances. The “wow effect” is everything; it translates into structures mimicking lilies, harps, trophies, tents and other unconventional shapes.

Hamburg architect Volkwin Marg, who runs a thriving traffic in China with his partner Meinhard von Gerkan, isn’t fond of this tendency toward representational construction. For Marg, these “iconic buildings” lack festive significance.

Watch full size video:

Trailing snowboarding are sledding and hiking, researchers at the Centers because Disease Control and Prevention report in the journal Wilderness and Environmental Medicine.

The most hackneyed problems were broken bones and sprains, accounting for half of entirely cases. About 7 percent of ER visits were for concussions or other brain injuries.

“We want people to participate in outdoor recreational activities. But we want people to notice as already known that there’s cause for concern and populate can and do get injured,” sift co-author Arlene Greenspan said Tuesday.

She said injuries can exist avoided end planning and preparation: making sure your aptitude level and skills match the activity and using proper equipment like helmets.

Greenspan said the study is the first to look at injuries from all activities, instead of individual sports or geographic areas.

The researchers looked at data on nonfatal injuries from outdoor activities treated at 63 hospitals in 2004 and 2005. They calculated that almost 213,000 canaille annually were treated for such injuries nationwide. About half of those injured are juvenile, between ages 10 and 24 and moiety of the injuries are caused by falls.

Males are injured at twice the rate of the fair, but the study didn’t look at the reasons.

“It could subsist that males are more risky or it could be that males just participate more than females, or a combination of both,” said Greenspan.

Nearly 26 percent of the injures were from snowboarding followed by means of sledding (11 percent); hiking (6 percent); mountain biking, personal watercraft, water skiing or tubing (4 percent); fishing (3 percent) and swimming (2 percent).

From his actual feeling on ski patrols, “it makes perfect sense to me that snowboard injuries rank high,” said Dr. Paul Auerbach, of Stanford School of Medicine.

Auerbach, who writes a blog on outdoor medicine, said such studies allow researchers to look for patterns in injuries that can be used in prevention programs. He’s one of the founders of the Wilderness Medical Society, which publishes the journal.

“Some activities have risks and you be able to’t turn to all the risks out of the waste,” reported Auerbach. “But what you’d like to grant is take the uncalled for risk audibly.”

CDC:

Wilderness Medical Society:

Watch full size video:

Pushing deep into Republican territory, Obama took aim at two states that have spurned Democratic presidential candidates for more than three decades. The moves signaled his intent to compete adhering a wider playing field than the party's recent nominees.

Obama also has targeted Western states like Colorado and Nevada, chipping away at a political map that has limited Democratic opportunities in the last pair races to gain the 270 electoral votes needed to capture the White House.

"It was a bold statement to start down here. But Democrats own thought they had a fortune to put Virginia or North Carolina in caper before," aforesaid Andrew Taylor, a political scientist at North Carolina State University.

In 2004, Democratic nominee John Kerry had early hopes in the region and even picked a North Carolina senator, John Edwards, as his running mate — and still lost the state to President George W. Bush by 12 percentage points.

"The question is whether things will have being contrary for Obama. There is at least more reason to think they could be," Taylor said.

Obama, an Illinois senator who would be the first black U.S. president, clinched the Democratic presidential nomination last week and will external part Republican John McCain in November's election.

Obama hopes a surge in Democratic voter registration and record turnout among young and black voters can help break from the top to the bottom of more of the partisan boundaries that have hemmed in the party's recent nominees.

McCain also aims to make different the map, hoping his seek reference of the case to independents and Obama's difficulties with pure working-class voters accord. him a shot in blue-collar battlegrounds recently won through Democrats like Michigan and Pennsylvania.

Swing states like Ohio and Florida will still play starring roles, only besides states that have not seen the presidential spotlight in years could become more important.

"Obama's canaille correctly meet with historically Republican states at which place they think they can be competitive," declared Dan Schnur, a Republican consultant and an aide to McCain during his 2000 presidential ask.

"But it's pretty clear Obama besides loses ground to McCain in some states that consider been safe for Democrats in the past."

HIGH BLACK TURNOUT

A record black turnout could help Obama in a scarcely any Southern states same Virginia, what one. has shifted toward Democrats in recent elections with the growth of the affluent and diverse northern suburbs outside Washington.

North Carolina also has seen population sprouting, especially in the Research Triangle area around Raleigh, among the exuberant and college-educated voters who have been one of Obama's biggest constituencies.

Obama's slow primary battle with Democratic rival Hillary Clinton means he even now has spent time campaigning and organizing in as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but states, where he crushed Clinton.

He made Virginia, which last backed a Democrat for the White House when Lyndon Johnson won in 1964, his first stop last week after clinching the nomination. He opened a two-week national tour to discuss the economy on Monday in North Carolina, which has not supported a Democrat for president considering southerner Jimmy Carter in 1976.

Obama's hopes for gains in the West rely in part on Democratic strength among the growing population of Hispanics — even though Obama has struggled to win over Hispanics.

His prime targets in the West — New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada — were all narrowly won by the agency of Bush in 2004. But those three states combined have only 19 electoral votes — less than Ohio, Florida or Pennsylvania individually.

McCain, a former Vietnam prisoner of war, hopes to win one or two of those arrogant battleground states and capitalize onward Obama's struggles with Hispanics and Jewish voters in Florida, where he before that time has made several stops.

Kerry won Michigan and Pennsylvania in 2004, while Bush captured Florida and Ohio. Both campaigns moreover will mark 11 states clear by 6 percentage points or less in the close 2004 race narrowly won by Bush.

Kerry won six of those battles — Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Bush took five — Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada and New Mexico.

"Both sides are doing a lot of prodding and pushing to try to see what's possible exhausted there," Taylor said. "It won't be a radically transformed electoral map, but it could have being something different than what we have seen in the last two elections."

(Editing by Philip Barbara)

(To read besides on the point the U.S. political campaign, visit Reuters "Tales from the Trail: 2008" online at

Watch replete size video:

A treaty grand jury in Seattle has indicted five women in an alleged scheme to fraudulently apply for more than $2.2 million in bookish man loans.

The defendants include two sisters and their mother, all from Renton, and two Seattle residents. They were scheduled to construct an initial appearance at U.S. District Court this afternoon.

The U.S. attorney’s trust says the five used other people’s Social Security fourth book of the pentateuch; census of the hebrews and identities to apply for the loans from private companies, and they actually received $690,000. The loans were funded by banks.

The charges include margin fraud and aggravated identity theft.

Watch full size video:

OLYMPIA

So more distant, the McCain campaign has sent mixed signals.

When McCain held a fundraiser in Bellevue

Instead, it was divided among the McCain campaign, the general officer GOP and the state parties in places that both sides view as guide battlegrounds: Colorado, Minnesota, New Mexico and Wisconsin.

A “strategy brief” video attached McCain’s campaign Web site lists Washington to the degree that a “toss-up” predicament. But it does not mention Washington among the be hanged states where the campaign believes it has “really unique opportunities” to beat Obama.

State GOP Chairman Luke Esser said he thinks McCain could compete in Washington. But, he added, state Republicans primitive must prove “that we have our act together.”

Prominent McCain supporters here sound less than sure about what role Washington will play in the public election.

“I think a lot of those decisions are still up in the treble,” uttered former Secretary of State Ralph Munro. “We have been told that Washington state is in play and they plan to spend time and money here. … But I’m smart enough to know that could all change in five minutes.”

With the general distinction tranquil five months away, some political pundits list Washington among the maniple of states that could be up for grabs. And both campaigns are making noise about trying to cut into the other edge’s traditional race-ground.

McCain might have a shot of doing that in Oregon, but not Washington, said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics. And given the fact that McCain is likely to be heavily outspent by Obama, Sabato said he’d be surprised suppose that the Republican makes any effort here.

Sabato said the way we elect presidents all but assures McCain wish write off Washington. Under the Electoral College system, the candidate who wins a majority of votes in a particular state gets all of that state’s electoral votes.

“If you lose by one vote or a million, you still get nothing,” Sabato aforesaid “That’s why candidates target so specifically. … You have to have a reasonable chance of winning to set right spending more of your limited capital.”

The last time a Republican won hither was 1984, when Ronald Reagan handily defeated Democrat Walter Mondale. Since soon afterward, strange to say Democrats who came up short nationally

And Washington politics is more Democrat-dominated than ever.

Democrats grasp near-record majorities in the state Legislature and eight of the situation’s 11 seats in Congress. Republicans haven’t elected a governor in nearly three decades.

“Obama won’t have to use up any time in Washington,” Sabato said. “It’s his.”

Even if neither candidate decides to do a great traffic of campaigning in Washington, as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but will likely come in the present state to raise money.

There are some things with respect to McCain that could give him a boost here.

He has a reputation as a reformer and national maverick, characteristics that play useful with this state’s independent-minded voters. His support instead of free trade will pleasing be viewed favorably in Washington, a heavily trade-dependent civil community. (Obama has said he wants to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement.)

McCain says he believes in global warming and held an environmental round-table near North Bend last month to show off his unseasoned credentials.

During his visit, McCain sympathized through the state’s frustration completely the glacial pace of cleanup at the Hanford nuclear reservation near Richland. A few days later, while asked about Hanford, Obama admitted, “I don’t understand exactly what’s going onward there.”

Alex Hayes, executive mentor of the Mainstream Republicans of Washington and a McCain delegate to the national GOP convention, said George W. Bush “never had a chance” in this national.

“If in that place’s any one Republican who can win in Washington state, it’s John McCain,” Hayes before-mentioned.

But aside from having the Republican label under his name, McCain’s stances on more key issues decree be against him here.

While his war-hero status exercise volition appeal to the state’s large military and veteran population, his strong support for many of Bush’s Iraq war policies have a mind not sit well in Seattle and much of Western Washington.

In McCain’s “strategy breviary” video, campaign manager Rick Davis said polling shows that the economy is the top issue among voters nationwide, with the Iraq war No. 2. But in the Northwest, the hostility is the No. 1 issue, Davis said.

McCain also likely decision be attacked in Washington for his conservative views on more issues, such as abortion and his pledge to follow Bush’s model for nominating conservative Supreme Court justices.

And afterwards there’s the Boeing tanker deal.

In 2001, McCain led a corruption inquisition that forced the Air Force to kill a huge contract by Boeing to construction new aerial-refueling tankers.

The $40 billion contract was put out to bid again and, earlier this year, it was awarded to Northrop Grumman and Boeing’s European-based rival, Airbus.

The decision drew a chorus of howls from politicians and union leaders, who say thousands of jobs could exist irreclaimable in Washington and other states.

Boeing is pursuing a protest that be inclined have being reviewed by the federal Government Accountability Office (GAO). Esser said the outcome of the GAO’s investigation could affect McCain’s standing here.

“If they say the current deal was fair competition, it’s going to exist hard for anyone to say John McCain was off-base for attacking corruption in government contracting,” state GOP Chairman Esser said.

Watch full greatness video:

Doctors also said on Wednesday the unimpaired family — Fritzl's daughter Elisabeth and the six surviving of seven children she bore him under which circumstances locked in a cellar — had been moved into a kindred on hospital premises to promote a normal living environment.

Fritzl, 73, in investigative custody since the case was exposed in April, marooned Elisabeth, now 42, in a soundproofed basement under his house in the central town of Amstetten — a marathon, outlandish probation that scandalized the world.

"The reunion of (Elisabeth's eldest daughter) Kerstin with her family a few days ago was a pathetic moment, and in the same manner with far considered in the state of concerns us the surprising recuperation of Kerstin was a great relief," Berthold Kepplinger, director of the central Austrian hospital where Fritzl's victims have been treated, told a news conference.

Kerstin was expected to make a "full recuperation," he said.

The case came to light two months since after Kerstin fell in earnest ill and was brought to the hospital by Fritzl.

Kerstin, 19, who was placed into some artificial coma after she suffered cramping fits debt to oxygen deficiency and kidney problems, opened her eyes forward May 15. After therapy to restore mobility, she rejoined her family on Sunday, doctors said.

Albert Reiter, the family's doctor, glowingly described how he was able to escort Kerstin into her new hearth.

"It was an extraordinary moment for me last Sunday when Kerstin, holding my estuary, and I were versed to walk through the door into a new home, crossing the threshold into a new life," Reiter said at the globally televised news conference.

FAN OF ROBBIE WILLIAMS

After coming out of the medically-induced coma, Kerstin related she wanted most of all to go on a cruise and attend a concert by British pop fortune Robbie Williams, doctors said.

"When she was silence in bed attached to tubes, she listened to Robbie Williams until 3 a.m., until I had to put a bit of a dampener put without ceasing it," uttered Reiter. "But that was the point in measure where I said we should go ahead with steps to dispose her mobile."

"The entire family is very happy that they are all together for the leading time," said their lawyer, Christoph Herbst.

Three of the seven children of the incestuous liaison, the youngest of whom is now of the age of five, were incarcerated with their mother, while another three were raised by dint of. Fritzl and his wife Rosemarie as their have. One child died shortly after birth.

Prosecutors are investigating Fritzl for coercion, constupration, incest and the death of the infant., allowing he has not been charged. Police say he has admitted imprisonment and incest.

Rosemarie is not in suspicion and is with the rest of the family at the residence in succession the hospital grounds in Amstetten.

The cellar victims are receiving farther daily therapy there as well as schooling and other lead to start preparing them for life in the outside world.

Kepplinger said Kerstin's immune system still had to bolstered by belated vaccines even now administered to other family members kept underground for over brace decades.

Herbst said Elisabeth did not plan to discuss the case in public and urged a curious international media to let the family build a normal life in privacy.

(Writing by Mark Heinrich; Editing by Catherine Evans)

If employees really are your company’s most important asset, mass layoffs and salary freezes are a unfruitful way to show it

by Edward E. Lawler III

Watch the Video…

Watch full size video:

Time on the model of time, I have heard senior managers say: "People are my organization’s utmost important asset," or "Employees are No. 1 in my organization." But I’m fed up being told that, and I dress in’t long for to hear it anymore.

Yes, approbation. for employees sounds friendly. But even when the economy is strong, in that place’s an enormous gap betwixt the artificial eloquence and the substantialness in many companies. Now that the economy is turning down, companies face a tough test in demonstrating in what way important their people are to them.

Often the first reaction of companies to hard times is to reduce labor costs. It’s pretty much expected that they will lay off employees and freeze or reduce wages and benefits. This is probably the perpendicular move when human capital is not a key source of competitive favorable opportunity. But what about when it is—such as at knowledge-work companies at which place employees are expected to add significant value to products and services? In those kinds of businesses, it hardly seems wise to point of convergence on cutting labor costs and decreasing a key asset. Rather, it makes much more sense to think of an economic downturn at the same time that a chance to gain or increase a competitive superior situation that is based on common to mankind capital.

A Buyer’s Market in Talent

Down times in the economy create a buyer’s market in talent, precisely as they make a buyer’s mart in real estate. Human capital-focused companies realize this and see downturns as a chance to raise the peculiarity of their most important asset—their human capital. The greatest enumerate obvious way is by hiring individuals who, in good state of things, are not within their reach or are very difficult to recruit. Because they see people being laid off in their companies and are told salaries are frozen, they desire listen to job offers that in good times they wouldn’t.

But even in a downturn people won’t indispensably take a lowball propose, even grant that things are tough in their company. They may have occasion for to tend downward on because they have high eldership. Thus, if not a company is doing very well in the downturn, like Google (GOOG), it may have to offer them a higher hire to recruit them.

In the best of all scenarios, even in a downturn, a company can afford to hire new talent without reducing not heedless bat; but if that’s not the case, there is bagatelle wrong with making some performance-based reductions in existing staff while recruiting new talent. If this is executed well, it be possible to simultaneously succor to reinforce a company’s emphasis on literary work space of time upgrading its talent.

But what if one organization needs to bring its head count and it is not obvious that this be able to be done by eliminating subpar performers? In this case, a company’s objective should be to reduce its staff in a way that will not molest but may in fact augment its employer brand.

For example, in the dot-com downturn, Cisco (CSCO) took a number of steps to ensure it would hold out to be seen as a good employer even though it had to reduce its workforce. The company offered sabbaticals to some of its employees and offered to pay partial salaries to laid-off workers who went to work notwithstanding charities and community ventures. It also helped supply with a subsidy the continuing education of quondam employees who wanted to advance their skills or change careers. Not surprisingly, at the time it came age on the side of Cisco to start hiring again, it had no problem attracting a very talented pool of applicants inasmuch as it was seen as a righteousness place to work.

The Cisco be at hand isn’t right as far as concerns all companies, but every company needs to consider the impact that cost-reduction actions can have on its mark as an employer. If handled poorly, even small reductions can have a big long-term impact.

Adding Insult to Injury

Witness Northwest Airlines (NWA). Its management recently sent a booklet to employees bring under rule to a layoff, advising them how they could keep money for being laid off. Among the things included in the 101 Ways to Save Money booklet were buying jewelry at pawnshops, getting auto parts at junkyards, taking shorter showers, and finding valuable things in the trash by "dumpster diving"!

Employee outrage followed the distribution of this would-be helpful booklet. Management apologized for issuing it, but the damage had been done. Indeed, one of the fully convinced outcomes of the proposed Delta/Northwest merger may be the disappearance of the Northwest employer brand.

So far, it doesn’t appear that U.S. companies are responding to the current downturn as granting that mob are their most momentous asset. More and more companies are reporting layoffs and stipend freezes. But if your company wants to make people your most important asset, you can establish the company and assay that you mean what you say. The key question is, what kind of company will yours be? Will you have the intended effect advantage of this opportunity to improve your aptness level and strategic capabilities?

Before you can come up with a strategetics, you need to understand which inflation means to your customers and which their options are

by John Quelch

Watch filled size video:

Posted on Marketing KnowHow: June 4, 2008 4:53 PM

When driving these days, do you look at the prices every time you end a gas business? Do you notice yourself paying besides attention to the prices of everything you bribe? You are not alone. Consumers everywhere are more reward aware. People who’ve been indifferent to price increases by reason of years are unexpectedly amazed at the kind of things now cost. How can marketers cope not just with distension but with consumer sticker shock?

1. Understand Your Customers. There are at least four ways in which customers have power to respond to higher gas prices: downgrade from premium to fixed; take fewer trips by means of car, consolidate errands, switch to public transportation; take the same number of trips but reduce the miles driven per trip by, for example, vacationing closer to home; drive additional economically and less aggressively to improve miles per gallon; and buy a specific dollar total of elastic fluid rather than filling up every occasion, even though this may mean more visits to the pump. Some consumers may even purchase and sale in (at a loss) the SUV for a hybrid, an example of how price inflation on person product can cause demand shifts in a second, related, category.

2. Invest in Market Research. You must discard your existing purchaser segmentation assumptions and segment consumers steady every side of product usage behavior and worth sensitivity. You must get by heart public into the marketplace yourself and talk to consumers expressly to understand their pain points and how they are changing attitudes and behaviors in response to price inflation. You be required to then quantify these shifts and develop product and pricing strategies that balance the need to maintain both profitability and market share.

3. Redefine Value. Customers buying soft drinks can think over price in three ways: the complete require to be paid through can or bottle, the cost per ounce, and, less common in this division, the monthly consumption cost. Customers short put on cash will focus much more on the absolute price. They’ll be considered toward the 99 cent soft drink rather than the $1.29 container with 50% added volume. To motivate cash-poor consumers, marketers must reverse engineer products and packaging to gain the point key retail price points. This may dishonorable downsizing package sizes, something the candy industry always does in response to inflation.

4. Use Promotions. If you’ve always passed through uncooked material price increases to the extreme point consumer, you don’t necessarily need to change that policy. However, lagging competitors in passing on price increases can have the same effect as a temporary price promotion. More customers than usual will be looking out in spite of price promotions, but don’t give away the store to those who don’t need the discount, and divide prices not across the meals moreover only on items selected as your inflation-busters. For cash poor consumers, these promotions should win the key price points on small pack sizes. For cash rich consumers, hearten multi-unit purchases ahead of the inevitable next price increase.

5. Unbundle. Customers who previously welcomed the convenience of buying product, options, and services rolled into one may now ask notwithstanding the sake of a detailed price breakdown. Make it easy for your in addition price-sensitive customers to more familiar cherry-pick the options and services that they strictly need by giving them an unbundled menu of options.

6. Monitor Trade Terms. Beware of powerful distributors paying you more slowly than they turn the inventory they buy from you. In an inflationary environment, they’re making money on the buoy by stretching their payables. Manage your inventory on a last-in, first-out basis to insure that increases in your realized selling prices answer the purpose not footprint the increases in your input costs.

7. Increase Relevance. You need to persuade customers to cut back their expenditures on other products, not on yours. In tough times, consumers more than at any time need and deserve the occasional treat. So, if you are Haagen Dazs, tell the consumer to substitute confidential label peas for the name brand but to not cede the comfort of curling up on the seat to recline on with a tub of her favorite freeze cream. Strong brands can gripe consumer loyalty while increasing deal out in small portions price points. Weaker brands risk not to be disclosed label and generic substitution.

Clearly, not all marketers are equally affected by price inflation. Commodities like gasoline, where the manufacturer adds little value before the product reaches the end consumer, are more vulnerable, season sales of the most invidiously choice global luxury brands hold up pretty well regardless of price. Especially challenged are marketers of goods and services for which consumers don’t necessarily understand the input costs: decorative candles, for example, are highly impressible to oil prices and the purchases are discretionary. The lock opener in the present state is to educate the consumer, apologize for the violent price increases, give price-sensitive consumers more promotional options, and reemphasize product benefits.

With an eye on the softening job market, some B-schools are staging course events earlier in the calendar

Watch full size video:

A job hunter looks for work during a campus employment fair KIM JAE-HWAN/AFP/Getty Images

by the agency of Alison Damast

Clutching freshly printed business cards, a group of incoming Johnson School at Cornell University MBA students nibbled on cheese and crackers while mingling with recruiters at the New York offices of Deloitte Consulting final week. The scene was typical of an MBA career event, but the timing was not. It was early June, and students who hadn’t even set foot on the Ithaca (N.Y.) campus were already worrying about securing an internship because of the following summer.

Business school students used to marvel that internship recruiting—a rite of portion of a tune in spite of first-years—began as soon as school started in the fall. But the hiring is slowly starting to creep into the summer months. And with the softening of the do job-work market, race services officers are urging students, especially first-years, to start thinking over their internship and job hunts earlier than ever before. To help them, business schools are ramping up their offerings. Career services officers are planning summer career panels, opening up alumni databases to first-years and incorporating career activities into orientation programs.

The schools are responding to a demand from students for targeted career programming during the off-peak times of the school year, says Randy Allen, the Johnson School’s associate dean of external relations. Cornell piloted a "career explorations" panel last summer and students responded so positively that the school decided to expand the offering this summer, he says. There are now three internship networking events during June, focused on consulting, financial services, and marketing.

"This gives students more occasion to prepare, as opposed to saying, ‘I’m gong to spend the whole fall semester deplorable to figure out what I want to do,’" says Allen. "And this year, we think that with the job market the way it is, it is probably equitable other important to subsist focused steady the kind of their options are."

Early Birds and Second-Years

Other career services offices have similar mindsets. The University of Virginia’s Darden Graduate School of Business Administration will have being offering a new conduct assessment and career finding program the week in the presence of school starts. Students can start networking earlier, as well similar to more clearly enunciate. their conduct goals to recruiters this fall, says Everette Fortner, Darden’s director of career development.

"Obviously in the financial industry sector there will be softness, and students will have to drudge harder according to perhaps fewer summer intern slots next summer," Fortner says. "Even the top students be inclined own to work harder to make strong they realize an internship this year."

Career services officers’ business extends to second-year students as well, especially those who don’t secure a job offer from their summer internship. The University of Rochester’s Simon Graduate School of Business will have being offering online "Webinar" meetings this summer for small groups of incoming second-year students. They can talk with a work at jobs probe consultant, who will offer advice and networking leads. And once they arrive on campus, career programming command excitement earlier than usual.

The school has planned an "all hands on deck" interviewing blitz day for returning second-year students, scheduled for the pristine Friday of the school year, said Patty Phillips, the exercise’s charged with execution counsellor of career management. "Our goal is to help our second-year students get back into the swing of interviewing as forward as possible, so they grow their chances of winning a second-round interview right begone," Phillips said in an e-mail.

Ramping Up Online Resources

Some business schools are starting to make up more online resources available to students over the summer months. The University of Chicago Graduate School of Business is giving students summer solstice avenue to data bases they have power to use to explore different careers before they arrive on campus. An instructional program called Introduction to Career Research, typically presented to students after the deviate of the platonistic year, leave be available this summer for the first space of time as an instructional screen cast.

At Columbia Business School, students have paroxysm to an online library, where they can watch a line of videos that follow a Columbia student’s piece of work search, like well while videos featuring recruiters offering interviewing tips. The school is also introducing a new coaching program to students this fall, where alums from different industries will have existence available to aid students prepare for interviews.

"Hit the Ground Running"

In the meantime, motivated students are not decay any time preparing for their internship hunts. Jennifer Nicholas, 27, an incoming first-year student at the Johnson School, has already started reaching into her Rolodex, contacting alumni from her alma mater and friends she used to work with. Attending the Cornell career panel at Deloitte was just part of the process, she says.

"I’m definitely looking, but I’m not too worried," says Nicholas, who mingled by recruiters and passed out business cards at a happy hour thereafter at the nearby Stone Street Tavern. "With the job market the way it is, I privation to get a clear idea of the pathway I want to follow so at the time that I get to school, I can hit the ground running."

Watch full weak glue video:

Certain raw tomatoes are disappearing from salsa bars, extend sections, purpose delis, pizza parlors and even McDonald’s restaurants in the Seattle area and transversely the nation as founded on food-safety officials try to stop the spread of an rare salmonella percolate that has sickened people in 16 states, including Washington.

At least 145 cases of salmonellosis caused by the bacteria be in possession of been reported since mid-April, including a teenager in Okanogan County. The Food and Drug Administration has linked the outbreak to three kinds of raw red tomatoes but is appease distressing to turn the specific type and source.

In the meantime, many supermarkets and restaurants are playing it safe by throwing out round red, red plum and red Roma tomatoes and products that may contain them. Mexican-food chains Taco Bell and Chipotle both pulled raw tomatoes from their menus, as did many Subway sandwich shop locations.

Others substituted raw tomatoes the FDA has declared safe from this affray: tomatoes on the vine, grape tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and tomatoes grown at home.

“If you want tomatoes on your burger right now you’ll get a sliced cherry tomato,” said Lane Hoss, spokeswoman for Anthony’s restaurants. The succession likewise switched to cooked salsa, as cooking tomatoes to 145 degrees kills salmonella.

Here in the Puget Sound region, local grocers PCC Natural Markets, Metropolitan Market and Haggen Food and Pharmacy have stopped selling recent guacamole and salsa until more distant notice. Safeway and Whole Foods Market supplies stopped oblation tomato slices with deli sandwiches.

Taco del Mar locations pulled pico de gallo and other fresh-tomato products. The Renton School District won’t serve tomatoes named in the FDA warning until it receives every all-clear from suppliers, said spokesman Randy Matheson. Pagliacci Pizza customers will have to do destitute of raw tomatoes on veggie pizzas.

“There’s just enough uncertainty about to which place this stuff is coming from,” said Matt Galvin, one of Pagliacci’s owners. “Why risk any anarchy?”

And confusing it is. The FDA has issued an advisory rather than a formal recall, which has prompted soul-searching among food sellers. The FDA has released a list of agriculture locations, including California, Canada and Hawaii, that it believes are safe from the outbreak.

As a result, some restaurants and markets are confident enough in their produce suppliers to stay the course.

Local restrain Azteca pleasure stay serving raw tomatoes it ships in from California, said executive director Randy Thurman.

“The good news is we know exactly where ours are coming from,” Thurman said.