COBRA Coverage Headaches

I have held off writing about this but could not wait any longer. If COBRA is supposed to be seamless to the individuals that extend coverage under the act with their company then you are rudely mistaken.

It seems that when you leave a company usually your coverage lasts until the end of the month then your option to take COBRA starts the first of the following month. Well, don't go to a doctor during the 1st week of the following month because you will show in the system as not covered. It takes time for COBRA to kick in retroactive back the the 1st of the month. Don't get caught because most doctors require payment when services are rendered and you will be out the money until you can get reimbursed by your carrier during this break period.

I've known this for years but had the unfortunate experience recently to tell this story. Be careful. I wish the benefit director and the carriers could get together so this COBRA process is transparent and seamless to the employee. One only knows there is enough anxiety and fear when you are let go from a company and you do not need health and dental issues on top of that immediate stress.

I am sure you readers have had similar experiences or have an answer to this troubling issue.

Why Today's Leaders Need EI More Than Ever

As the economic realities around us get harsher, the need for emotionally and socially intelligent leaders grows more intense. Not managers who can dish out pats on the back, blanket reassurances and wishful thinking. The leaders who will see their organizations through will do it by recognizing others' needs, building relationships and generating extra effort. Forget soft skills. This is the tough stuff with which trust is earned and maintained.

EI defines the difference between a great leader and an average one. The ability to inspire a team, tune in to others' values and motivations and model high standards are the hallmarks of outstanding leaders. And these abilities are grounded in a level of self-awareness that gives great leaders the stamina to maintain trust through challenging circumstances.

Do you determine your CEOs and key stakeholders? Check blog post dated 5/6/09.

Have You Reviewed Your Website ?

In an effort to match customers with products and services some companies really hinder adoption because of all the bells and whistles they make potential customers go through. So, I ask you, "have you checked your website lately?"

There are many ways to make your website friendly to visitors and I will be the first to tell you I do not know all the answers and suggestions. But, as a user of websites on a daily basis "I can point out the common errors webmasters and designers make. Here are just a few:

• are you forcing visitors to register immediately? You should do this after they are sucked in
• does your site have a long URL? Keep it short especially when visitors want to paste it into a favorite list or send it to another person.
• does your site have a search feature? If not people will get frustrated and leave especially if they have to click more that 2X.
• if your site does not have DIGG, Delicious, or FARK bookmarks you are missing the boat.
• does your site limit communication only by email? People want options.
• don't make users retype their email address when registering for asking for information.
• do not use case sensitive passwords or USERIDs. KISS method is fine for most since we all have too many USERIDS and PW already.
• do you have widgets in your profile, if not you should.
• make sure for publishers you get eyeballs on Amazon.com

These are just a few of my ideas based on going to websites and finding things are not as easy a couple of clicks. Remember, and I do not have to tell you this and if I do email me at wgstevens2@gmail.com, people only stay on a site for 1.5 minutes or so if they have to click more than 2X.

Economists: Recession to End in Third Quarter

The economic recession will end during the third quarter of this year, but high unemployment and large federal deficits will continue, according to the Economic Advisory Committee of the American Bankers Association.

The committee cited consumer spending stabilizing in the first half of this year, allowing businesses to reduce costs and inventories, as well as reducing layoffs and investment spending cutbacks. In combination with the stimulus and an improvement in the financial markets, it is likely the economy will expand in the second half of the year.

Bruce Kasman, committee chairman and chief economist for New York-based JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM), said the economy will return to growth, but not health.

“Growth in the coming quarters is likely to gather momentum but will not prove sufficiently robust to undo much of the severe damage done to our labor markets and public finances,” Kasman said in a news release.

For the third quarter, the committee forecasts inflation-adjusted gross domestic product will return to positive growth, picking up to a more than 3 percent pace by the second half of 2010.
Also, the committee is projecting an end to the three-year downturn in the housing market, with housing starts rising later this year and home values moving up modestly in 2010.

“Lower prices and low mortgage rates have greatly improved the affordability of homes,” Kasman said. “A recovery in the housing sector will be an important contributor to economic growth.”

However, credit will remain tight and bank economists said jobs will continue to be lost. Unemployment is expected to peak at 10 percent nationally and remain at or above 9.5 percent through next year. Oh by the way Georgia just hit 9.7%.

Budget deficits are expected to remain well above $1 trillion this year and next year. The 13-member committee forecasts the 10-year Treasury bond yield will stay in the 3.75 percent to 4.25 percent range through next year because core inflation is forecast to fall towards 1 percent. However, the committee is concerned about the rising trend in federal debt and the implications for inflation risk beyond 2010.

I think I agree with this economic assessment based on what I see in the world markets and large industrial nations.

Leaving 'Friendprints': How Online Social Networks Are Redefining Privacy and Personal Security

A generation is growing up with social networking web sites such as Facebook and MySpace, casually posting accounts of their lives for their friends -- and the world -- to see. Few of these users realize that the information they post, when combined with new technologies for gathering and compiling data, can create a fingerprint-like pattern of behavior. The information provides opportunities not only for legitimate business purposes, but also for the nefarious aims of identity thieves and other predators, according to faculty at Wharton and elsewhere.

"The way privacy has traditionally been defined is being challenged," according to Wharton legal studies professor Andrea Matwyshyn, who earlier this year organized the Information Security Best Practices Conference at Wharton. Among other topics, the conference addressed security and safety issues raised by the social networks.

Research on online social networking and how it may alter privacy norms is just beginning, according to technology observers. "Our kids today will give everything [in terms of personal information] away, but it's not at all clear how this will shake out in the long run," says Wharton marketing professor Peter S. Fader. "Privacy is a moving target.

Researchers say that privacy thresholds vary by individual and that those boundaries are being tested by social networking. It is hard, they say, to pinpoint the exact impact of social networking on the web. However, it is clear that individuals are increasingly using these sites to keep in touch with friends, find jobs and enhance their careers. Social networking sites drew 139.8 million visitors in April, a 12% increase from 124.4 million in March, according to comScore, a service that measures web traffic. The April survey found that MySpace led the category with 71 million visitors, while Facebook attracted 67.5 million, and Twitter drew 17 million -- an 83% increase.

Mining the Data

Lance Hoffman, a George Washington University computer science professor who spoke at the Wharton conference, noted that by giving up such information as their name, birth date, and a list of their network of friends, users are revealing far more than they know. Third-party applications, he argued, can take that data outside of the friendly confines of a social networking site and combine it with data from other sources to piece together enough information to steal a person's identity. Just a person's name and birth date -- routinely found on a Facebook profile -- can be a useful lever for an identity thief, said Hoffman.

"I've had students who used third-party applications that took friends of friends and used facial recognition to identify them," explains Hoffman. "They didn't know what to do with the information, but someone else might. What happens when the collecting of this information is automated?"

At the conference, Hoffman illustrated how social connections are made online and the ease with which a stranger can become part of a network. He noted that he is regularly added to mailing lists and invited to become a friend -- or "friended" in the social network parlance -- of businesses that use the sites as a marketing tool. Indeed, pages used by businesses on Facebook were recently redesigned to look more like those of individuals.

In addition, the line between professional networking on a site such as LinkedIn, and social networking on sites such as Facebook, "has become very thin," said Hoffman. Many Facebook users might create a more casual persona for themselves on that site than they would on LinkedIn, where they would include nothing but professional information. But both sites can be seen by potential employers and clients -- and complications can ensue. One such complication: When a business contact from the LinkedIn world wants to become your friend on Facebook, do you accept the invitation, giving them access to the photos on your Facebook profile from last summer's rowdy beach party?

And what about the person you don't really know who wants to be your friend because you have some friends in common? According to Hoffman, that new friend may just be mining your social circle for information. As networks grow and more friends of friends (and their friends) are accepted by users, it's unclear who can be trusted.

Ultimately, social networking security rests with each user of the service (those friend invitations can always be declined). Hoffman recommended that social network denizens know the privacy policies -- governing, among other things, how the information you provide can be used -- of the sites they frequent.

At the same time, Hoffman said, web site operators need to make privacy policies easier to understand. "Privacy policies differ in theory and practice. In theory, consumers know about a site's privacy policy and trust the network. The reality is that no one reads the policies. I don't read them myself." Hoffman cited Facebook's privacy policy -- which promises that users have control over their data and what information is shared -- as typically murky. (The most recent version is more than 3,700 words -- more than twice as long as this article.) Hoffman advocates new formats for privacy policies that act as simplified "nutrition labels," like those on food products.

Private Here, Not There

Research conducted by Alessandro Acquisti, a Carnegie Mellon University professor of public policy and management who also spoke at the conference, has found that individuals' notions of privacy are malleable depending on the context of an interaction. According to Acquisti, people are more likely to divulge key personal information -- their photo, birthday, hometown, address and phone number -- on social networking sites than they would on other web sites. His 2005 study highlighted privacy concerns such as online and physical stalking.

"People [say] privacy [is] important to them, yet they engage in behaviors that indicate a remarkable lack of concern," Acquisti told the conference participants. "Privacy decision making and valuations are malleable," but it's unclear what factors lead to more disclosure. One of those factors might be a "herding effect," he said. In one study, Acquisti found that that people will divulge information when they see others doing so. That tendency, he believes, may explain why so many people are willing to dish out personal information on the networks.

Information gleaned from such sites is useful not only to identity thieves, but to marketers and other legitimate business interests. Sometimes, the information can be used to find thieves, according to research co-authored by Shawndra Hill, a Wharton professor of operations and information management, and AT&T researchers Deepak K. Agarwal, Robert Bell and Chris Volinsky. Hill says a person's pattern of behavior on various networks can reveal tell-tale signatures, similar to fingerprints -- or perhaps "friendprints" -- that can be used to solve a wide range of business challenges, from targeted marketing and advertising to fraud detection.

The study, titled "Building an Effective Representation for Dynamic Networks," originated as an approach to fraud in the telecommunications industry. The authors were interested in the problem of identifying phone service subscribers who repeatedly default on their bills by signing up for service under an alias. The problem is not new. However, the focus of the paper was to show how to clearly identify a customer's social network signature and match it to signatures created by customers who had previously defaulted. "Repetitive defaulters may be identified despite their aliases over time by their 'social network signature,'" according to the paper.

"In other words, consumers are who they call, e-mail or IM," says Hill. "Though it is not difficult to sign up under an alias, it is extraordinarily difficult to change one's friends and family." Large telecommunications firms, Internet providers and social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook may have rich sets of data in which social network signatures can be identified. Hill says the technique is still being perfected; its accuracy rate is currently about 95%.

Still, the security and privacy questions pose tricky issues for marketers, who have been looking for successful social network advertising models. According to research firm eMarketer, spending on such advertising will be about $1.29 billion this year, up from a projected $1.17 billion in 2008. MySpace garners half of the revenue pie. Social network advertising is only a small slice of the projected $25.7 billion that will be spent on online ads in 2009, according to eMarketer.

Wharton marketing professor Eric T. Bradlow says the Holy Grail for marketers is to track consumers and their friends -- and what they say about a product -- via social networks. "

People are more willing to divulge information for social purposes, and the lead users are 18 to 25 years old," Bradlow notes. "The social norms around privacy aren't going to be what they were before."But just as Acquisti noted, acceptable social norms will be subject to context. "Let's imagine that a credit card company had the information you put on Facebook," Bradlow says. "You'd be appalled. It's context. People want to say when and where data is shared."

Economic Recovery: Are Happy Days Here Again?

Wall Street has just seen a two-month rally that included a whopping 39% rise from the recent rock-bottom prices on the Standard & Poor's 500. In addition, during several consecutive weeks, new U.S. jobless claims have dropped. Even quarterly reports from the battered banking sector have given investors some optimism that the worst-case scenarios will not happen.

So does that mean the band can strike up "Happy Days Are Here Again" to herald the arrival of an economic recovery, and the end of America's longest recession -- now 18 months and counting -- since the Great Depression of the 1930s? Most financial experts at Wharton and elsewhere insist that the much-talked about recovery is not here yet, despite some of the first hopeful data in months -- and they remain concerned that the recovery will be weaker and take longer to gain momentum than past slowdowns.

Maybe there will be a rally today since the European markets are up?

Creating Advantage

Increasing complexity and change, volatile economic conditions and an ageing workforce are beginning to take a toll on organizations worldwide. Meanwhile some businesses and whole industry sectors are in crisis as they struggle to meet the rising demand for skilled people.

In this climate, people have become the new competitive advantage for business, according to a report by The Boston Consulting Group and the World Federation of Personnel Management Associations. The report, Creating People Advantage: How to address HR challenges worldwide through 2015, is based on a survey of 4741 human resources executives in more than 80 countries as well as interviews with senior executives in 19 countries.

Are you creating advantage with the new workforce dynamics and demographics?

Health Care Reform - Now or Never

Obama has noted that health care reform is a key priority for his administration. This is a long time coming since Clinton failed during his administration. There is a move in congress to change benefits and make it more affordable for all Americans. Further, the reform is focused on leveling benefits equal to what the congress receives now.

Senator Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said he is drafting the health reform measure, which he expects to unveil next week. He told reporters that taxing employer-provided benefits is "perhaps the best way to raise money for an overhaul of the health-care system" and offered details about the form that tax is likely to take.
Baucus said his proposal is likely to cap benefits at "a level higher than the actual benefit that members of Congress receive today." An employer-provided plan worth less than that level would remain tax-free, he said, while any benefit exceeding the cap would be taxed as ordinary income.

Such a tax, if adopted, would be phased in over "several years," Baucus said. And it would be likely to "grandfather" in health benefits set as part of a collective-bargaining agreement, he said, allowing union plans to remain tax-free until new contracts can be negotiated.

Baucus declined to say how much money the proposal would generate. The nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that taxing employer benefits above the value of the Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan, adjusted for inflation, would generate nearly $420 billion over the next 10 years -- a sizable chunk of the $1 trillion or more likely to be needed to expand coverage for the uninsured.

Is this the beginning and will it ever pass. there are 47 million Americans without health coverage and there is a large silent group that is currently under insured. Help may be on the way.

Weak Integrity Got Us Into This Jam - And Strong Integrity Can Get Us Out

The current economic crisis is a result of integrity failures: Many people did not live by their word. Financial executives, lobbying for deregulation, said they would self-police. They didn't.

They wrote mortgages and issued credit cards, assuring their customers that the payments were manageable. They weren't. I am no finance guy, but I knew that a variable rate, interest-only mortgage is a very, very bad idea. I gotta believe the professionals knew it too. Finance gurus created products that systematically understated risk and overstated earnings. They knew better. They were gaming the system. Looking for loopholes. Looking for the ridiculous twist of the rules that magically makes you a winner. According to their still flush bank accounts and high salaries, perhaps they were right.

But the rest of the world is noticing that perhaps they were not. We have had enough gaming. Time for a little straight talk and hard work.

There is nothing more fundamental in business than this question: "How good is your word?"
It is not just a few powerful villains; we have all slipped a little. We make distinctions between things we "promise" and things we merely say we will do. It should not make a difference. We think about fulfilling the letter of our contracts, rather than striving to fulfill the other party's understanding of our agreements. The first will keep us out of court...but the second is what makes relationships thrive.

The Integrity Dividend is the measurable bottom-line business payout of people seeing you as living by your word. Clients value your brand. Suppliers cut you deals. And employees stick around and work their hearts out for you. There are dollars to be made here. Competitive advantage.

Living by your word is hard work. Getting others to see you as living by your word, in this cynical time, is harder still. But it is the only game worth playing.

It is not all it takes to lead – but no leadership happens without it. It is not all it takes to be ethical or moral – but morality without it is hollow sanctimony. Integrity is essential.

Unexpected events, and even expected change, make the integrity task harder. It requires skill and focused effort. But it pays off. Consider it an investment in the essentials of doing business – essentials which we seem to have forgotten. When we practice integrity, we become more effective – as people, as companies, and as a society.

Weak integrity got us into this jam – and strong integrity can get us out.

Read the book: The Integrity Dividend: Leading by the Power of Your Word by Tony Simons. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2008. Available everywhere.

The real question here is where would you place your integrity on a scale from 1-10. If it is not a 10 then you are in the wrong line of work. Not just you but anyone who works for you is scared by your reputation. It makes their work and job all the harder and a large hill to climb.