Sir Ken Robinson

I've taken a lot of time to ponder the first video we watched in seminar class. Sir Ken Robinson touched on a lot of good points on education and why we as a society cannot get the most out of people. So I decided to do my second blog on the man who created everything we watched, Mr. Robinson.

http://www.ted.com/speakers/sir_ken_robinson.html

The link above is a brief biography on Ken Robinson from TED talks. This man is both an author and an educator. I feel as though the class wasn't as focused as they should have been on this movie. This was a great movie and a great chance for people to really think about their own education.

The one thing that stuck out to me was the challenge put forth to children in kindergarten with the paper clip. Now to say that as you grow older you become wiser and thus think of more ways to use a paper clip would make sense. However, that is not how the study went as many of you know. As people grew older, they found less and less ways to use that very paper clip. Interesting if you ask me.

The other major thing that stuck out to me was the part about distractions. So often teachers sit at the front of the room and read from their lecture notes, or read from a powerpoint they seem to have just put together before class. They assume we will keep quiet and listen to every word they read directly from the slide, and not focus on our computers, our cell phones, our iPod's, our friends. There are too many ways for people to gather the same information without having to listen to a teacher talk non-stop. Maybe that's where Ken is going with this, maybe the teaching needs to be changed.

Anyways, Ken Robinson is a brilliant man, and has several more TED talks videos if people have the same interest as I do. Feel free to go to ted.com and have a look, you won't be disappointed.

Noah Crowley

Leaking again number 4 reactor

This is going to affect us maybe not today or next week but it coming all depends on the weather patterns and ocean currents. I know this is a place where people blog about corporate social responsibility but I am here to blog about the lack of it by Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO). TEPCO was voted as the second worst company of the year in an internet poll sponsored by Greenpeace and the Berne Declaration. One of the questions I have is why weren’t they number one? The Nuclear and Industrial Safety agency has found 16 new leaks in reactor 4 this week, and they had to stop cooling for 2 hours. This is ridiculous and the excuse that TEPCO gave was that the pipes froze and cracked. Are they serious that is there excuse with all the engineers and scientists on their payroll they didn’t foresee this problem that water freezes when it goes below zero and cracks water pipes? Come on that’s grade 2 science boys and girls! If you’re not scared already, which makes no sense, and then this should do it for you! When TEPCO was asked exactly how much radioactive material was released they had no definitive answer. Their answer included words like around this much, and it believed that it didn’t get released into the ocean. Believed? What the heck that does that mean. I know what means, they have no firkin idea. I believe when OXFORD dictionary comes out with their latest issue they should change the definition of evil to include TEPCO.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120131a1.html

Alexander Ovechkin

We all know how much Alexander Ovechkin makes from his National Hockey League team the Washington Capitals from one of our first cases in our course. A lot of people don't know that he is the face of several sponsorship deals with other companies. Many of those companies were upset that the star left winger skipped out on the NHL all-star game this past weekend in Ottawa. Companies like Bauer, Mr. Big, Energizer and Gillette were upset about Alex skipping the big event because it gives them time to showcase their star athlete.

Ovechkin didn’t just skip it for any reason. He was suspended a game before for a late head hit to a Pittsburg Penguins defenceman (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45w5rR207GA), which has been subject to controversy with the amount of concussions this year and that the same player he hit also had a similar hit and didn’t get suspended. He Felt that since he was suspended that he shouldn’t attend the event, but others that have been suspended during the all-star break have attended the event and were welcomed with open arms.

The NHL was also upset with his decision because they also have many sponsors during the weekend that would like to see the one of the faces of the NHL without Sidney Crosby there. The biggest disappointment though is for the fans that were coming. Without the two biggest names in hockey being there, the fans got to look at some of the lesser-known players, but most of the fans wanted to see the stars. Ovechkin year after year has one of the highest selling jerseys in the NHL, shouldn’t the NHL be responsible for telling him to go? He was selected to go and should have fulfilled his commitment. He wasn’t injured, he just felt like he didn’t deserve to go. Even if he didn’t deserve to go to play, he should have still gone to be there for the fans. The fans mostly pay for his ridiculous contract, with the amount they pay to get into the games each night. Its not about himself, its about the fans.

As a fan you think he should have gone?

Brendan Carpenter

Fun Theory

What is Fun Theory? Well the best way to describe it in my words is to make the easy tasks fun. We as a society have grown lazy and soft. We no longer care about others, we care about ourselves first. We try and take the easy way towards our goals. Now we have to ask ourselves how can we get people to participate in the mundane tasks that take up no more that 30 seconds to a minute of our life? How can we build up our bodies for the lazy mess that they have become? How can we make our cities safer by having people actually obey the laws?

Well the Volkswagen asked these questions and got some answers. The way they went about doing this was by starting a contest and called it Fun Theory. Through the contest some of the above questions were answered. In order to get people to stop littering. Well someone came up with a brilliant idea. Have a sensor in the garbage can that makes a whistling sound when you put trash in that sounds like a bottomless pit. Next how can we make people want to use the stairs instead of the escalator? Well brilliantly the idea was born to turn the stairs into a working piano. The sound of the piano at the link on the bottom sound in tune with a regular piano. This means if you were athletic and creative enough you could play a song on the piano. Though it would still be hard.

All of these things are may have been very complex for everyday people to do, but they none the less showed that we can go back to our ways of being helpful, safe and unlazy just by making tasks fun.

http://www.thefuntheory.com/

Eric Westcott

Ethics on Tiger Woods

As you may already know, Tiger Woods is a professional golfer in The Professional Golfers Association (PGA) and arguably the best golfer in the world. Many people know this man from watching him on TV, hearing about him from family, friends, and maybe even the on the radio. Tiger Woods is well known for what he does and has accomplished. The many successful things he has done in his lifetime are incredible.

Although Tiger Woods is a very famous athlete and a well-known figure, he is like everyone else, human. He makes mistakes and learns from them and moves on. However, this time Tiger's mistake not only impacted himself. But impacted many corporations and business's around the world. Tiger’s action that he took in 2010 was breaking news around the world. It all started when news came out with Tiger Woods was recently in a car accident. Everyone jumped out of their seat and all attention was over him. Everyone was asking questions and wanted to know more information about what had happened and was he ok?
Later in the year of 2010 Tiger Woods was accused of "cheating" on his wife with many other women around the world and the whole car accident situation was believed he was running away from his wife when they got into an altercation.
This left the biggest golf idol in the world on a short leash with all his fans, the public and media. After these stories got mixed up and changed from mouth to mouth, his corporate sponsors didn't want their business reflecting on the golfer’s personal issues. Therefore many of Tiger's sponsors had dropped him, or did not renew with the famous athlete. The sponsors that had dropped him were, Accenture which is a global consulting firm, Gillette men's shaving gel and AT&T a cellular company in the US.
After the fact everyone was wondering if the big name Nike was going to move on as well with all that has happened. As of now, 2 years later, Nike Golf has stuck with Tiger the entire way and held the endorsement through all his hard times. Nike did however consider that he should take time off golf and figure out his personal items before returning to the game. Tiger did just that and now has returned to golf, however in a very slow pace and now re gaining everyone’s trust and respect back.
Tiger Woods current sponsors to date are, EA Sports, Fuse Science, KOWA, Net Jets, Nike Golf, Rolex, TLC Laser Eyes Centers and Upper Deck. Tiger has been slowly working away at what he does best and gained a few new companies as well as kept some prior to his personal issues.
The main concern is did Tiger Woods do the ethical move on his family, friends, co-workers and sponsors. This left the corporation and sponsorships in a pickle do to his actions and investing a lot of money to endorse and promote their products and or services, based on who he was and what he does for a living.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1dFwvylnuM
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/dec/14/nike-sponsorship-tiger-woods

CAMERON HEAD

Tiger Woods Ethical decisions?

As you may already know, Tiger Woods is a professional golfer in The Professional Golfers Association (PGA) and arguably the best golfer in the world. Many people know this man from watching him on TV, hearing about him from family, friends, and maybe even the on the radio. Tiger Woods is well known for what he does and has accomplished. The many successful things he has done in his lifetime are incredible.

Although Tiger Woods is a very famous athlete and a well-known figure, he is like everyone else, human. He makes mistakes and learns from them and moves on. However, this time Tiger's mistake not only impacted himself. But impacted many corporations and business's around the world. Tiger’s action that he took in 2010 was breaking news around the world. It all started when news came out with Tiger Woods was recently in a car accident. Everyone jumped out of their seat and all attention was over him. Everyone was asking questions and wanted to know more information about what had happened and was he ok?
Later in the year of 2010 Tiger Woods was accused of "cheating" on his wife with many other women around the world and the whole car accident situation was believed he was running away from his wife when they got into an altercation.
This left the biggest golf idol in the world on a short leash with all his fans, the public and media. After these stories got mixed up and changed from mouth to mouth, his corporate sponsors didn't want their business reflecting on the golfer’s personal issues. Therefore many of Tiger's sponsors had dropped him, or did not renew with the famous athlete. The sponsors that had dropped him were, Accenture which is a global consulting firm, Gillette men's shaving gel and AT&T a cellular company in the US.
After the fact everyone was wondering if the big name Nike was going to move on as well with all that has happened. As of now, 2 years later, Nike Golf has stuck with Tiger the entire way and held the endorsement through all his hard times. Nike did however consider that he should take time off golf and figure out his personal items before returning to the game. Tiger did just that and now has returned to golf, however in a very slow pace and now re gaining everyone’s trust and respect back.
Tiger Woods current sponsors to date are, EA Sports, Fuse Science, KOWA, Net Jets, Nike Golf, Rolex, TLC Laser Eyes Centers and Upper Deck. Tiger has been slowly working away at what he does best and gained a few new companies as well as kept some prior to his personal issues.
The main concern is did Tiger Woods do the ethical move on his family, friends, co-workers and sponsors. This left the corporation and sponsorships in a pickle do to his actions and investing a lot of money to endorse and promote their products and or services, based on who he was and what he does for a living.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1dFwvylnuM
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/dec/14/nike-sponsorship-tiger-woods

CAMERON HEAD

What is CSR? Europe vs. US

I have this idea in my head that corporate social responsibility means corporations must do good at all times, give back to communities and stay ethical. I wanted to look up other definitions to make sure I was on the right track so I typed in CSR definition. The first thing that popped up (after the wikipedia definition) was this site:

http://www.mallenbaker.net/csr/definition.php

After reading what the article said I found I wasn't to far off with my definition of CSR. It fit into what the website said. What I found interesting though is how between different countries the definition of CSR is thought of differently. In the states CSR is defined as companies making money and paying taxes but it is in good practice to donate a share of these profits to charities. Very straight forward. In Europe they think of CSR as a businesses main focus and the communities surrounding invest in it due to their ethical business ways. It shows to me that the States is far more money driven then Europe. In the US you make money and help others after that in Europe it seems the other way around. This of course is just in each countries definition of CSR so I looked into if this held any truth to it. This website helped a lot:

http://csrnyc.blogspot.com/2008/02/henk-campher-has-interesting-blog.html


This website made Europe seem like it is ahead of the US when it comes to CSR business practices. The States are less regulated then Europe meaning US corporations can be more creative and products are not inspected as thoroughly as they are in Europe. This freedom in the States can allow them to get away with things that are not very responsible. The States corporations personalize themselves by having CEO's shown in the news frequently. It makes these CEO's seem like celebrities and they sometimes can get away with things they normally wouldn't be able to because of that. In Europe the head of the corporations are shown on the news as committees and not as one individual. People or consumers are more concerned with CSR in Europe, the states are catching up now. What does this mean for us Canadians who usually just follow in the states footsteps, are we behind in the CSR times as well?

Leah McGarrett