If you were on the compensation committee of a public company board how would you set the CEO's pay?

There is so much written about fat cat CEOs and their unfair pay packages that this is a question worth pondering (if you care). The really hard part about it is...

A massive shakeout of venture capital firms has been predicted for years but it is finally going to happen over the next year because of a perfect storm of timing.

There are countless books, a few movies and mountains of silicon valley gossip about the good...

As Dickens said "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" and the phrase could be applied to California here in April 2009.

The unemployment data released last week touts California at the top of the jobless lists at 11% - worst in the country -...

Gender stereotypes already make it hard enough for women in the workplace but in tough times how women treat other women matters even more.

Today women make up 50% of managers in companies, but only 15% of executive officers. It's still rare to find women in any executive positions except...

Challenge is the crucible of leadership and there is no time like the present to look for the leaders in your organization. So what should you look for - and how can you create the environment to bring out the leaders?

There are many books which have been written about...

The global publishing giants have declared war on the new technology generation of content distributors -- but they have lost sight of what consumers value and how they want to get to the value. It's time to separate content creators from distributors. It's time for a new business model...

There's a turn in the U.S. employment market happening. There's evidence that the number of layoff announcements and reported layoff events has started to drop. This does not mean the number of job losses will drop yet since announcements precede the actual elimination of jobs, but it is a leading...

Since many of my friends are engineers my community's approach to the environmental crisis is usually technical. Friends who drive hybrids, have installed solar power on their roofs, several who are totally self sustaining by installing solar power panels that sell back to the utilities etc.

But my approach...

There is really no excuse for the spate of seemingly unbelievable gaffs made by industry leaders in the last few months. Why weren't they using crisis PR teams to manage their actions if they couldn't manage themselves? I'm joking of course... or am I?

The list of Marie Antoinette moments...

Hedge funds took a battering 2008 - and as they have been battered by the storm two questions of "right" and "wrong" have been coming up that show that there are ethical codes at work here, but no agreement on what the "right" answer is.

Some background:...

In the first 9 months of 2008 the number of CEOs who left their jobs hit a record high according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc -- 1,132 by October and when the 2008 full year tally is completed the total will be higher than ever before.

What is going...

Americans have been roundly criticized in the past for our low savings rate. Before this recession hit I'd hear and read articles on how "bad" the US was in comparison to other nations, how we had one of the lowest savings rates in the world, how we were addicted to...

Ten years from now we'll look back and see that 2008 was the watershed year in the end of the traditional media as the primary communication channel to the masses.

It's been an interesting year for news - not only have we had endless subject matter for the media to...

It's fascinating to watch how different people are responding to the professional and financial challenges this crisis is creating. We live in a society where many people's self esteem derives from their job and how much money they make and their character is tested when times get hard.

A brief...

In technology people move between companies all the time and it's understood that a certain amount of turnover is normal. But the turnover within Yahoo over the last year has been dramatic and it's the canary in the coalmine of how bad things are getting. Combine this with the long...

In the technology industry, with few women in the executive ranks and fewer still in the board room, we live in a world where balance is a myth. We talk about balance but the reality is that women in the corporate world are competing with men most of the time,...

Trust allows a team to move fast and make more money. It's a simple but true fact so often neglected inside companies. It comes down to two simple issues that are an advantage in a culture of trust and a huge liability in a culture of politics and mistrust:

Wall Street will be facing a talent retention challenge very shortly unless the bonus issue is elegantly handled this year.

Over the past week the news has been full of "outrage" and questions about whether bankers should get their bonuses this year. Talk of large chunks of the...