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Matt's World
Saturday October 4, 2008
If you pick up a newspaper or watch the news, all you hear about is how bad our economy is and that we are headed for a crisis (or already in that crisis, depending on who you talk to). It’s exactly why I rarely read newspapers or watch the news because the media continues to sensationalize the issue and raise unwarranted fears amongst the public which has the negative effect of making the problem worse.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that there aren’t problems out there and that people aren’t suffering, but unfortunately there will always be some areas of any economy at any given time that face that. However, there are many areas of our economy today that are doing just fine, and some that are doing better than ever before. Take for instance the industry that I am in – the HR technology industry.
The Talent Management Systems marketplace is hot. Very hot. In fact, we at HRchitect predict that this $2.5b marketplace, which I believe is still largely untapped, will continue to grow at 25-30% a year for as far out as we can see. So why is the Talent Management area so hot? Because many companies now realize, or are beginning to realize the value of their greatest asset – people – and are spending money in that area. Sure we are seeing some companies delay Talent Management initiatives (not cancel) and that is because of the media and the fear they continue to put into people’s minds.
The media needs to stop! This is America, the greatest country in the world with the greatest workforce in the world. The media needs to stop spreading fear and the American people need to stop buying into that fear.
Many financial establishments have been so poorly mis-managed that it is criminal, literally. The trickle effect is that people now live in fear, a real fear, regarding their investments, something that should never have happened. While I don’t agree with the government’s $700 billion dollar bailout plan, I do think some government oversight is needed here to protect hardworking American citizens. We have corrupt CEOs that have been allowed to run amok with people’s fortunes and dreams.
The trickle effect of these financial institutions screwing with people’s money is enormous as it affects things such as people’s ability to purchase real estate, vehicles, or send their kids to college, something that people typically save for. It affects small business owners from potentially growing because they can’t borrow money due to the credit crisis. Nobody wants to lend money because of the uncertainty this has all caused. I could go on and on but the very cash flow of our economy stands on the brink of slowing to a halt because of fear! Quite frankly, take away some of this mis-managed financial situations that have been allowed to take place over the past few years, and I truly believe this is mostly fear that we as a society need to move beyond. We can’t change the past but we can learn from it and take steps to help ensure it doesn’t happen again.
People need to stop listening to the media and get back to business as usual. Work hard, make money, save money but above all else, spend money. Our economy needs people to believe and have faith that our economy will get better – and it will. It won’t happen overnight, and I realize a lot of people are struggling just to live day to day but it will get better and be stronger than ever!
There are many reasons why we got to where we are today and everybody will have their own theories. I’m not an economist or even an expert in this area. I only know what I know and what I experience first- hand.
I believe there are also many things that can be done to put us on the road to recovery and we have to put trust and faith in our country’s leaders to do the right thing. A very important election is coming up for President, perhaps the most important of our times, and we have to get fresh thinking out of Washington politicians. Back in July I wrote about the energy crisis and some ideas to solve the problem. It really isn’t rocket science but there are many energy related initiatives we can undertake now that will have immediate and long-term positive effects on our economy and our country as a whole. Unfortunately too many politics are at play and not enough action. Politicians need to look beyond that, beyond party lines and what might be popular and do what is right for the people they represent – the American people. | | | |
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Tuesday September 9, 2008
This past weekend we went to the Red Sox game in Arlington. That’s right. We went to the Red Sox game. Not the Rangers game, but the Red Sox game. You see, Red Sox fans outnumbered the Rangers fans by three or four to one. Yes, it was that significant.
The Red Sox lost that night but we had a fantastic time visiting with other Sox fans and cheering the Red Sox on. Chants of “Let’s Go Red Sox” echoed throughout the stadium on many occasions, so much so that it almost felt like we were at Fenway Park in Boston.
We had such a great time on Saturday night that we decided to go back out on Sunday. This time the results were different and the Sox won. Chants of “MVP” every time Dustin Pedroia came up filled the stadium. Fans yelling “Youuuuuuuuuuk” everytime Kevin Youkilis came to bat. And an impromptu “Sweet Caroline” being sung by the fans filled the stadium at one point (for those non-Red Sox fans out there, that song is sung during the 7th inning of each game at Fenway Park).
The Red Sox have become the most recognizable sports team in our country. Everywhere they go, they have a fan base and as a life-long Red Sox fan who grew up in Boston, it’s a lot of fun to be part of.
I got this email from the Red Sox today which sort of encapsulates all of this and I wanted to share it with you:
“When a young fan shouted "Play Ball" on May 15, 2003, to start the Red Sox game against the Texas Rangers who could have dreamed that those two words would mark the start of something extraordinary, indeed unprecedented? That auspicious day was the first of 456 consecutive regular season sellouts. You -- the most loyal, passionate, and knowledgeable fans in all of baseball -- filled Fenway Park and, ultimately, set a new, all-time Major League Baseball sellout streak record. On behalf of the Red Sox players, partners and the entire organization, we want to thank you for the unwavering constancy of your faith and support.
This is not a record set by the Red Sox team or by Red Sox players. This is a historic record set by Red Sox fans. Today, we celebrate you -- the dedicated members of Red Sox Nation -- whose loyalty is the rock on which this franchise is built.”
Go Sox!!!
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Friday July 25, 2008
I wrote this article that appeared in the July 18, 2008 issue of The Frisco Enterprise...
What does Frisco have more of that most other communities? Besides SUVs and more Soccer Moms per capita, you guessed it: kids under the age of 18. In fact, that age group is the largest segment of our Frisco population…and also the most vulnerable.
Frisco has historically had a fantastic record with public safety from our police, fire, school system and city programs. However, I believe there is more we can do. An area we need to focus on is speeders – and specifically speeding in our neighborhoods.
Have you noticed the number of Homeowner Associations (HOAs) that post signs asking people to drive 25mph, or even 20mph? It is because speeding in our neighborhoods is a very dangerous, yet very common practice, and the HOAs are trying to do something about it. For example, The Trails neighborhood has signs that say, “Slow Down – We Love Our Children – Keep Them Safe”. Unfortunately these signs and the speeds posted on them are not enforceable – and too many people ignore them.
Have you ever stood outside your home and watched somebody drive buy at 30mph (the standard for speed limits in neighborhoods)? Do it sometime. You will be surprised at how fast it appears. Unfortunately, with a speed limit of 30mph, people tend to drive faster – 35, 40, or more.
Over the past few years when I served on City Council, I’ve had a number of residents ask me to come sit with them in their driveway and just observe the way people drive. I was amazed, and quite frankly, frightened as to what would happen if an unsuspecting child ran into the street. There would be no way possible for these cars to stop. Sometimes it is cut-through traffic, but more times than not, it is people who live in the neighborhood – and probably have kids as well.
So what can be done?
I asked the question when I was on the City Council a while back and was told that dropping the speed limit to 25mph would not make a noticeable difference and it would cost money as signs would have to be posted throughout every neighborhood in Frisco. There wasn’t enough support on the Council from other members, so the issue was dropped.
To address those two issues, I have to believe that stopping time is improved when driving 25 MPH instead of 30 MPH. A few seconds of stopping time can mean the difference between safety and fatal results. Regarding the costs of the signs, with so many HOAs already investing in and putting out signs, I’ll bet they would be willing to share in the costs of keeping their residents safe. I know my wife and I would support that in our neighborhood. Besides, you really can’t put a cost on someone’s life, so this shouldn’t be an issue. We can spend millions of dollars on sports and arts and other things, why not on keeping our children safe?
Because of a Frisco resident, Chuck Altman, who is very passionate about this topic, I learned more about the “Keep Kids Alive, Drive 25” program. This program was started by Tom Everson in Omaha, Nebraska about ten years ago. I have conversed with him and am confident he would speak to our city government. Locally, The City of Coppell implemented this program about three years ago.
The City of Coppell, and specifically their Deputy City Manager (Clay Phillip) invited Tom Everson to speak to their City Council. Speed studies were conducted and they were convinced that there was no question that stopping time was better at 25 MPH than 30 MPH. The latter is too fast for all sorts of reasons: stopping sight distance, reaction time, and braking time. And they have done site-specific studies to show it. They have done follow-up studies to verify it.
The Police Chief was supportive and in September 2005, an ordinance was passed by the City Council to establish the maximum speed limit of 25mph on residential streets within the city limits of Coppell.
As for pushback, Mr. Phillip says there were some comments from people about “government intrusion” but dissipated without too much difficulty, and he says there have been no complaints in over two years.
Yard signs were used to promote the program but were not kept in place permanently. Signs, however, in the form of decals, ARE permanent on police and fire vehicles.
The City of Lewisville didn’t go through a lot of bureaucratic motions – they just quickly and arbitrarily changed citywide residential speed limits from 30 to 25, recognizing the value on principle.
How about these facts from the “Keep Kids Alive” website…
· 4,881 pedestrians died while walking in neighborhoods or crossing streets in 2005. 500 of these deaths were children under 14 years-old.
· The death rate on residential streets is over twice that of highways -measured per miles driven
· A pedestrian hit in a 30 mph speed zone is 3 times more likely to die than one hit in a 25 mph zone.
I implore the Frisco City Council and the public to learn more about this program. This website is a fantastic resource– www.keepkidsalivedrive25.org. It’s also very important to educate the public about compliance so that it just doesn’t become a ticketing exercise. The program is meant to emotionally engage citizens in creating the kinds of roadways everyone would like to live on…and when this occurs, there is less need for patrol so that our police force can focus on other ways of keeping us all safe.
The City of Frisco has many ways to educate and notify the public of this program, and based on my knowledge, there is really no reason to not implement it as quickly as possible, integrating this initiative into the forthcoming budget for the fiscal year which begins October 1. The well-being of our children is enough alone to do this, but our reputation as a great place to live will also be further solidified. Let’s hold to the higher standard and be one of the first communities to set the example for other surrounding cities. As a citizen, I wouldn’t expect less from our great City.
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Sunday July 20, 2008
I admire Al Gore. For years he has been talking about the damage we are doing to our environment, irrefutable evidence of global warming, and the need to take action now. Many people dismiss his thoughts and ideas but I guarantee we will look back years from now and realize that Al Gore was right. In the meantime, we should do something about it.
Last week, Al Gore issued a challenge to our nation to produce every kilowatt of electricity through wind, sun and other earth-friendly energy sources within 10 years. A lofty goal indeed but no different than when John F. Kennedy set his sights on putting a man on the moon before the end of the 60’s.
Before I get into that, let’s talk about a very real and current example of pollution problems – Beijing and the upcoming Olympic games.
China has been notoriously bad with regulations of any kind on pollutants and with the upcoming world stage that the Olympics will be on, they are trying to do something about it – something that I hope they can sustain well past the Olympic games.
In a drastic plan to reduce pollution, they are implementing a massive shutdown where half of their over 3 million vehicles will be taken off the roads and many polluting factories will be closed. Any chemical plants, factories or power stations left open will have to cut emissions by 30% and any dust-spewing construction in the capital will be halted. Given that a study found that China is home to 16 of the 20 worst cities for air quality, and that three-fourths of the water flowing through urban areas is unsuitable for drinking or fishing, I pray that the Chinese government takes these steps to heart and keeps the emission cutting measures in place indefinitely. Not only that, I hope they take these drastic measures as the first step in cleaning up their entire country of pollutants. Environmental issues like this are a global problem that we all have to acknowledge and address.
Back to Al Gore’s challenge, both presidential candidates this year are way ahead of most politicians in the fight for global climate change. Something I am extremely pleased and encouraged to hear.
While Al Gore wants to wean the nation entirely off of fossil fuels, that is where he and I differ on the overall issue. I am in agreement with much of what Al Gore wants to do but rather than wean ourselves off of fossil fuels, I believe the goal should be to wean ourselves off of foreign dependence on fossil fuels (as I recently wrote about) and focus on fossil fuels at home and how to cleanly and safely obtain, distribute, and consume them.
As Al Gore is careful to point out, this is an issue that will need a substantial investment, mostly in the areas of technologies that reduce energy waste and link existing energy grids. It is also an issue that I feel needs the commitment of government, businesses and individual citizens to be successful. It is also something that needs immediate attention!
The government issue is an interesting one as the government not only needs to act towards this goal here in America but needs to work with our global environment to get other countries to follow suit.
Fast growing countries like India and China are increasing their demand on oil resources which is going to continue to cause prices to rise, another reason why we need to start producing our own oil (which we are fully capable of doing). Not only does that help solve our dependence on foreign sources (I’d call it more being at the mercy of oil-producing regimes) but it further helps our economy if we decide to start exporting some of that black gold.
Nonetheless, with that demand growing in countries like China, India and elsewhere, now is the time to work with these countries and others on cleaner energy sources and less energy waste for a safer Earth climate for all. These issues will be addressed at some point in our future, let’s hope it doesn’t wait to the point of irreversible harm. Our future, and that of our children depend on the choices and the decisions we make today.
Thank you Al Gore for your continued efforts in raising awareness in this area. | | | |
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Saturday July 19, 2008
I’ve become more and more interested over the years in the damage we are doing to our environment and the inaction by our government in both effecting changes that can make a real difference as well as provide us with more energy options. I'd like to talk about energy options with this blog.
It’s easy to bury our heads in the sand and think that our national government will take care of us but quite frankly, that is where the problem begins. Al Gore is one of those people who continues to raise alarms about the problem and I will get to him in a separate blog.
In the meantime, one of the biggest challenges we face as a nation are our continued and ongoing energy and environmental issues. America is a country of abundance and I fully believe that we have the natural resources, the industrial capacity, the technological know-how, and the funding to become more self-reliant and less dependent on foreign resources. However, our current national government has stymied many efforts for years, both short-term and long-term, on real solutions to our energy problems.
Think about this. The U.S. currently imports over 65% of our crude oil consumption. That’s a tremendous dependency on other countries, a huge benefit to their economies, and a risk to our national security (but that’s a topic for another time). Our home state of Texas is a shining example of how the oil industry can co-exist with a healthy environment. For over 100 years, Texas has showed the rest of the nation how the oil industry can be economically robust and environmentally friendly.
The U.S. Government would do the American people right if they used Texas as an example. For instance, I applaud the efforts of George Bush to suggest recently that we drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, a source of an estimated one million barrels of crude oil per day. Since we import an estimated ten million barrels of oil a day, this is a great start and I implore congress to move on this quickly and help the American public who are struggling with high gas prices.
Another source of oil in the U.S. is the Green River Formation, the world’s largest shale oil deposits (yes THE world), spanning portions of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. The formation holds up to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil and could meet the equivalent of 400 years consumption of crude oil.
As I mentioned earlier, Texas is a great example of producing oil while being in harmony with the environment. If done right, we can do the same in Alaska and the Green River Formation and solve many of our energy problems for years to come.
But it shouldn’t just be oil.
We need to speed up the permitting process for nuclear power plants. It’s absolutely amazing how much red tape has to be gone through to build a plant that can provide good, clean, safe energy.
We need to expand solar and wind power capabilities. These are two resources that are in unlimited supply and both are clean and safe.
Lastly, our most abundant domestic fuel source is coal and we need to focus energies on the development and deployment of advanced clean coal technologies that will produce electricity with near-zero emissions.
The long-term benefits to our country of simply re-focusing our energies (pun intended) have got to be a priority and main focus of our government going forward. Sure there is an investment that needs to be made in each of these areas, but it is an investment in America and its people, and our future depends on it.
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