Industry News

Financial institutions in the US are on high alert after JPMorgan Chase became the second big bank to experience outages on its Web site. The downtime at Chase follows an apparent Distributed Denial of Service attack that disrupted the online presence of Bank of America earlier in the week.

The interview for the programme will be held at the Kerala Small-Scale Industries Association (KSSIA) Hall, Penta Estate, Palarivattom, Kochi on September 24 at 10 a m. The first 50 who register their names can attend the interview. For more details, contact: Assistant Director, Government of India, MSMETI, Industrial Estate, Ettumanoor at 0481- 2535533, 2535563.

The latest editions of Apple's iPhone and its operating system, announced yesterday, may not seem like much of an upgrade at first glance. But the updated offerings should push insurers in new directions when it comes to mobile development.

Hyderabad: Work pertaining to the National Cyclone Risk Mitigation Project (NCRMP) in Andhra Pradesh will commence by December last week and the tender process is expected to be completed by last week of September.

 Work pertaining to the National Cyclone Risk Mitigation Project (NCRMP) in Andhra Pradesh will commence by December last week and the tender process is expected to be completed by last week of September.  Andhra Pradesh and Orissa are the two states that have been chosen for the first phase of the World Bankassisted programme, which is a part of the national disaster management.

Forrester Research is a technology and market research company that provides pragmatic advice to global leaders in business and technology. Contact Author Email Forrester Has there ever been a better time to be a mobile developer?

Finextra Research: Latest financial technology news, retail banking news, wholesale banking news, analysis and features.

The Chicago-based commercial insurer has deployed claims professionals in and near the affected areas and has equipped employees based in the New Orleans area to work remotely.

NEW YORK, Aug.

The purpose of a project or program is to have its deliverables create value. But this value can only be realized if the new process or artifact 'delivered' by the project is actually used to achieve the intended improvements. Executives have a central role in this process.

Hurricane Andrew caused more than $26 billion in reported damage, but also inspired the insurance industry to transform the ways it manages claims and provides customer service. Insurance & Technology examines the changes, challenges and lessons learned from Hurricane Andrew in a series of special reports. Tags: Catastrophe Management, AIR Worldwide Corp.

I have a bit of resentment for organizations that view the role of a project manager as that of a 'traffic cop.' That is, as someone who simply ensures that requirements are documented, meetings facilitated, conference call numbers set up and everyone has their assignments in on time. To be sure, these are all important facets of a project.

Which one of the five process groups in the PMBOK Guide has the largest number of processes? Yes, you have probably answered correctly; that's the planning process group. This group usually has about 50% of the whole processes defined in the standard. This percentage was more or less the same in all editions, as shown in the following diagram: So, how does the planning happen?

Last week one of the most respected and tech-savvy investment firms unleashed a new trading algorithm that went, in a word, haywire. The news was as bad as it was unbelievable: At one point the market maker owned $7 billion in unwanted stock.

A quarterly magazine of urban affairs, published by the Manhattan Institute, edited by Brian C. Anderson. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • For years, the Upper West Side of Manhattan has been the site of a war between the forces of gentrification and the social-services industry.

SAN JOSE, Calif. and BURNABY, B.C., Aug. 7, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Plus Computer Solutions, a Sage reseller and ERP software consulting specialist, has joined the Intacct Business Partner Program to help drive adoption of cloud financial systems in Canada.

“One factor made the 2012 grind bearable and at times even fun for Obama: he began campaign preparations feeling neutral about Romney, but like the former governor’s GOP opponents in 2008 and 2012, he quickly developed a genuine disdain for the man,” author Glenn Thrush writes in the soon-to-be released e-book “Obama’s Last Stand.

You hear a lot these days about Big Data and analytics. What follows is an example of it in action. This goes well beyond retail; almost every industry, including yours, can capitalize on this kind of capability.

The survey found that more than 25 percent of respondents now use agile project techniques frequently, and that number is likely to keep moving up. The survey also found that in successful organizations, 68 percent of projects meeting original goals and business intent often used agile project management. But how does agile apply not just to teams but to organizations as a whole?

It’s no wonder that a SAP’s HANA in-memory database has caught the attention of many in the transactional, BI and Big Data worlds.  HANA uses memory as its primary medium, with disk being used merely for redundancy.

Online and mobile banking may be the future but twenty-something Brits still visit branches, even if the trip is often wasted because of unhelpful opening hours, according to the Young Money report.

In a span of less than 15 years, we have endured the Asian financial crisis, the Russian default and ruble crisis, the Long-Term Capital Management hedge fund debacle, the bursting of the tech stock bubble, the global financial crisis, the European debt crisis, and additional smaller-scale incidents. Financial crises seem to be the norm rather than isolated exceptions.

"Each of these managers joins CMC with a great amount of knowledge, experience and excitement in the industry," said CMC President and CEO Heather Graham. "We are extremely happy to have them as part of the CMC and Associa family.

Former Citigroup CEO and the architect of the modern mega-bank dropped a bombshell on CNBC yesterday: We should break up the big banks that are too big to fail. This statement may seem simple and sensible but consider the source: this came from the man who created these very banking behemoths.

A hacker claims to have beaten the defences of ITWallStreet.com, a jobs site for tech workers in the financial services industry, and leaked the details of 50,000 users.

The need to comply with a variety of legislation when using social media and other collaboration tools has always been there, but like the recent EU directive regarding cookies on websites, most organisations have chosen to bury their heads in the biscuit barrel.

SEC Reporting Manager is a necessary compliance position and typical of all public companies. This position ensures that all financial SEC filings are complete, timely and accurate. The incumbent will report to the Director of Reporting. Position may be viewed as a platform to move into other areas of the finance organization.

. In support of the effort to do more with less, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released policy memorandums aimed at driving efficiency across all federal agencies.

As a project manager, leading a project to success provides a feeling of accomplishment. Having been successful at several projects, project managers could see becoming a program manager a likely career move.

Communication is always a challenge, especially in multinational corporations. Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind discuss why it makes sense to adopt the principles of face-to-face conversation in organizational communication.

Anton Kreil is a former Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan trader. Having worked on Wall Street and on Pan European Trading desks as a Proprietary trader and Market Maker, Anton left the Investment Banking industry in May 2007 to travel the world.

Register now for Fin24 Dashboard and get access to portfolios, watchlists, financial comparison tools, and a whole lot more to help you achieve your financial goals. Join the Fin24.com conversation about JSE-listed stock by using every time you tweet.

Working in close coordination with various compliance and legal department personnel and with business operations/units, candidate will be responsible for overall management of the compliance component of the broker dealer and investment adviser functions supporting the securities related business of the firm.

As professionals who constantly strive to improve, we study, read, take courses, attend seminars, listen to podcasts and more -- all to become better project managers. Ironically, sometimes this desire to learn causes us to lose focus on the fundamentals. Instead, we look to novelty, the latest trends and perhaps even the latest fads in the interest of improving.

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. & LIMERICK, Ireland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Project Management Institute (PMI), the world’s leading project management member association, celebrated the industry’s top research projects last night at its 2012 Research and Education Conference (University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland).

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. & LIMERICK, Ireland, Jul 18, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Project Management Institute (PMI), the world's leading project management member association, celebrated the industry's top research projects last night at its 2012 Research and Education Conference (University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland).

PORT WASHINGTON, N.Y., Jun 06, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Pall Corporation /quotes/zigman/237641 /quotes/nls/pll PLL +0.15% today reported financial results for the third quarter of fiscal year 2012 which ended on April 30, 2012.

AUSTIN, Texas, Jun 06, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Product companies are increasingly aware of the weaknesses in their innovation process as competitive pressures mount. They report a critical need to drive more informed pipeline decisions, manage resource capacity effectively, and respond faster to the market, according to a commissioned report by Planview.

Progress Software founder and chief technology officer John Bates explains why even as such tools struggle to catch on, they're still likely to become very useful to the buy-side trader's workflow within the next five years.

Aerohive is seeking an exceptional Vice President of Legal Affairs to provide legal and regulatory leadership and to serve as a member of the core management team, functioning as a business partner and trusted advisor to senior management on a wide range of strategic, tactical and operational issues.

Consider that you may want to receive feedback from the quality assurance manager who's always on the run. Talking on a mobile phone while he or she is driving from site to site may be illegal, though. Or consider the database administrator who transitioned off your project in phase one, who no longer has security access to the project, and is now busy on her next project.

Large Defence engineering company is seeking Sub Contract Programme managers. The roles will suit candidates with experience of delivering complex, high value critical components and services.

AUSTIN, Texas, May 21, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Planview, the leader in enterprise-wide portfolio management, experienced landmark growth as a result of its PPM market expansion strategy and the increasing adoption of its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offering by enterprise customers in 2011.

At a recent briefing IBM raised the idea that in any number of ways the Internet, Web—online computing—badly needs refreshing. Just look at what you are doing with online. Does it seem stale? Consider this: the online experience now encompasses mobile, cloud, big data, social networking, and gamification. You probably didn’t deal with any of that when you initially got online.

LONDON, May 17, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Aviva plc /quotes/zigman/573658 /quotes/nls/av AV -1.12% today announced its Q1 2012 Interim Management Statement.

While Goldman Sachs predicts record gold prices in the next 12 months, investors are reducing their gold holdings for a third month and choosing the dollar as a haven from Europe's debt crisis.

Speaking at the New York Hard Assets Investment Conference this week, respected analyst Adrian Day gave his reasons why he felt that the recent resource boom was still far from over.

When it comes to leveraging social media techniques on projects, the most important place to start is frame of mind. It’s not about mimicking Facebook in the workplace, but rather removing barriers to communication and information-sharing. Project leaders who do will improve team camaraderie and productivity.

World Gold Council CEO, Aram Shishmanian, says miners currently need a gold price of $1,300 to survive, but reckons if the trend continues in the next five years, it will need to be at least $3,000 for them to stay in business. A shift in Indian gold buying patterns?

Polish copper miner KGHM posted a 29% drop in its Q1 net profit Tuesday, in line with market estimates, as the appreciating zloty resulted in foreign exchange losses on its dollar positions.

For John Hathaway, the gold market has moved from boiling over in September last year back to a simmer but, the stove is still very much on. A Gold report Interview Monday , 14 May 2012 In the second of a two part series on the factors driving gold demand, Julian Phillips looks at the investment segment of the market and the effect of traders on prices.

LONDON, May 14, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Imagine Software, a leading provider of real-time portfolio and risk management solutions worldwide, today announced that Pensato Capital selected its award-winning cloud-based system to replace the firm's internal solution.

Virtual PR agency for corporate news distribution in South Asia. Agency also daily monitors and reports on more than 600 newspapers, magazines and websites.

The Indiane government is mulling the issuance of gold bonds to decrease imports, arrest the rupee's slide and channel household savings into infrastructure.

With gold buyers remaining largely absent, the gold price has fallen nearly 4% so far this week, its worst weekly performance this year, prompting investors to seek refuge in the dollar. Friday , 11 May 2012 The Gulf state is expected to continue building its stake in Xstrata Plc, currently at 8.5% to 10%, the Financial Times reported Thursday.

In the first of a two part series, Julian Phillips looks at the jewellery and technology segments of gold demand and their effect on prices. Wednesday , 09 May 2012 Doom and gloom economist Nouriel Roubini appears to be more than a little fallible in his predictions in the past three years, so should one take his latest twitter anti-gold gibe as a buying indicator?

London-listed ENRC says first quarter revenues decreased significantly compared to a bumper three months a year ago, owing to weak volumes and a drop in prices of key commodities. Thursday , 10 May 2012 The bank has decided to close the brokerage activities of Natixis Commodities Markets, which offers derivatives on a range of metals, fuels and commodities.

Steve Beck is the co-founder, with Mitch Tuchman, of MarketRiders, an online subscription software service for do-it-yourself investors. MarketRiders provides low-cost, tax efficient portfolios using exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and sends automated rebalancing alerts.

Doom and gloom economist Nouriel Roubini appears to be more than a little fallible in his predictions in the past three years, so should one take his latest twitter anti-gold gibe as a buying indicator?

There's no single definition of leadership. Whether they opt to emulate Sun Tzu or Steve Jobs, project professionals should assess their teams and organizations to carve out their own leadership strategies, plenary speaker Andy Craggs told project professionals at the PMI® Global Congress 2012 -- EMEA in Marseille, France. Mr.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A state-level workshop for sensitisation of common guidelines for integrated watershed management programme, organised by the Soil Conservation and Soil Survey Department, will be held at the Panchayat Association Hall on May 8.

SAN DIEGO, May 07, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- As portfolio risk managers diligently work to correctly assess default and loss severity risk, they need intelligence that goes beyond simple property values.

Big data is here! And, marketers are one of the professional groups that stand to gain the most from these new-found capabilities to analyze data that, until recently, would have been too complex to capture, store and make sense of. Behind the hype lies a golden opportunity for marketers and customer service to help their organizations get ahead of the competition.

Insurance advertisements naturally gravitate to the exploitation of audience fear, but a quick exchange of dueling ads in South Africa shows that insurers can be funny too -- and they can enjoy social media success in the process.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Asian School of Business (ASB) has opened admissions for the AICTE-approved two-year Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) course for 2012-14.  The admissions to the full-time course is based on MAT or CAT scores. The programme has an intake of 60 students and is slated to commence in  August 2012.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The skill certification training programme for the first batch of cooks and waiters working in the hospitality industry without any formal education concluded at the Institute of Hotel Management and Catering Technology (IHMCT), Kovalam, on Saturday.

BOULDER, Colo., April 16, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Rally®, the leader in Agile application lifecycle management (ALM), today announced its second annual RallyON conference, taking place April 30 - May 2, 2012, at the St. Julien Hotel in Boulder, Colorado. RallyON brings together Rally customers, partners, industry thought leaders and employees.

American Express was named as the financial services firm that best utilizes social media, according to report from New York-based research firm Corporate Insight.

Free Membership Become a member and take advantage of all our features and functionalities ! Rail technology leader Bombardier Transportation is launching a Project Management Academy in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

. The project, entitled A Regional Focus on Sustainable Timber Management in the Congo Basin, is starting with a set of activities at the regional level and in three pilot countries: Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, and the Republic of Congo. The regional launch was followed by events in Bangui, Central African Republic, on March 27, and Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, on March 29.

San Jose, California — Kaseya, the leading global provider of automated IT systems management software, today announced the Kaseya Industry Experts Program, a first-of-its-kind customer enrichment programme that brings together an ecosystem of subject matter experts dedicated to helping Kaseya customers enhance their business acumen and profitability.

Big Data has become the latest rage, and a survey by the IBM Center for Applied Insights shows why. Organizations that make extensive use of data analytics experienced up to 1.6x the revenue growth, 2.0x EBITDA growth, and a 2.5x stock price appreciation compared to their peers.

BURLINGTON, Massachusetts, March 28, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- ClickSoftware Technologies Ltd.

Wall Street technologists might be thinking twice about their financial-industry careers in what once was considered to be a lucrative and prestigious gig. Now some of Wall Street's top tech talent is considering other options, and many already have fled their once-coveted jobs on the Street.

. After a comprehensive selection process, AQR selected Eagle because it offered a robust and open data platform which gave AQR the flexibility for the requirements it was looking for.

The industry will continue to grow over the next five years as businesses utilize new technologies in business analytics software. Large and small businesses alike will look to the industry for customer relationship management and point-of-service software and applications.

The buy-side trader has come a long way since the days of order forms and fax machines. How has their role changed in this age of algorithmic trading and speedy networks? Advanced Trading interviewed Tim Grant, managing director of fixed income technology provider Benchmark Solutions for his two cents.

SHREWSBURY, NJ--(Marketwire - Mar 22, 2012) - Lifeboat Distribution, an international specialty software distributor for virtualization and other technically sophisticated products, today announced the expansion of its relationship with Datawatch Corporation (NASDAQ: DWCH), the leading global provider of report analytics software.

.98% , the leading global provider of report analytics software. Effective March 7, 2012, Lifeboat became the sole North American distributor for Datawatch's Monarch Report Analytics platform.

LONDON, Mar 22, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Northern Trust /quotes/zigman/76293 /quotes/nls/ntrs NTRS -0.

BROOMFIELD, Colo., Mar 13, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- ClickBank today announced that Chief Technology Officer (CTO) Greg Lems will be one of 80 C-level "celebrities" participating in the Colorado Technology Association's (CTA) C-Level @ A Mile High event on March 15, 2012 at Sports Authority Field at Mile High.

Portworld - the leading resource for global port news and updates.

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. & MARSEILLE, France--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Project Management Institute (PMI), the world’s leading project management member association, has announced that Mr.

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. & MARSEILLE, France--(EON: Enhanced Online News)--Project Management Institute (PMI), the world’s leading project management member association, has announced that Mr.

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. & MARSEILLE, France, Mar 09, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Project Management Institute (PMI), the world's leading project management member association, has announced that Mr.

Citi has officially launched a banking app designed for the Kindle Fire, called Citibank (Kindle Fire Edition). The new app is the company's first offering for an Android-based tablet.

Trintech, the leading global provider of integrated software solutions for the Last Mile of Finance, announced today that it will be a major sponsor and Track Chair for the Finance Transformation Track at the North American Shared Services Week in Orlando, FL March 7th-9th. Trintech’s Margaret Kelly will present with KPMG and Dr.

By automating and optimizing the ‘Last Mile,’ organizations can introduce an agile and scalable process to provide enterprise-wide visibility, greater accuracy of data and significantly shortened cycle times.

ATLANTA, Mar 06, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- VersionOne, recognized by agile practitioners as the leader in agile management tools, today announced its Winter 2012 product release.

. The pilot will be lead by Plakabeton in Belgium, the largest entity of CRH Building Site Accessories. Unity Close is a component of Trintech’s Unity platform, a suite of modular software that empowers companies to automate their Last Mile of Finance to increase efficiency, improve visibility, shorten cycle times, lower costs, and reduce risk.

. The pilot will be lead by Plakabeton in Belgium, the largest entity of CRH Building Site Accessories. Unity Close is a component of Trintech’s Unity platform, a suite of modular software that empowers companies to automate their Last Mile of Finance to increase efficiency, improve visibility, shorten cycle times, lower costs, and reduce risk.

. The pilot will be lead by Plakabeton in Belgium, the largest entity of CRH Building Site Accessories. Unity Close is a component of Trintech’s Unity platform, a suite of modular software that empowers companies to automate their Last Mile of Finance to increase efficiency, improve visibility, shorten cycle times, lower costs, and reduce risk.

. The pilot will be lead by Plakabeton in Belgium, the largest entity of CRH Building Site Accessories. Unity Close is a component of Trintech’s Unity platform, a suite of modular software that empowers companies to automate their Last Mile of Finance to increase efficiency, improve visibility, shorten cycle times, lower costs, and reduce risk.

--The Investment Program Association (IPA) has released a new complimentary e-learning course to provide financial advisors and broker-dealers with a deeper understanding of how Direct Investments can be effectively incorporated into an investment portfolio.

PLYMOUTH MEETING, Pa., Feb 20, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Mid-Atlantic Management Corporation, an Associa company, proudly announces the addition of eight new communities to its client portfolio.

Four years ago, Eric Berridge declared in his book Iterate or Die that traditional ERP systems were dinosaurs headed for extinction. He was right, but before ERP completely disappeared some products began to morph into something else. It took a few years and now we are witnessing the return of ERP. But this is not your father’s ERP.

The websites of the Nasdaq and BATS stock exchanges, together with the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), were offline earlier this week after a hacktivist group with apparent Anonymous ties targeted them with distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

Downers Grove, Ill. – Innovations that make data more accessible and devices more mobile also create new challenges for information technology (IT) professionals responsible for cybersecurity, according to new research released today by IT industry association CompTIA.

Students from 12 schools entered 29 applications in the contest, with some apps almost ready to go live in a production environment, according to TradeKing.

Aggregate and review for completeness the risk assessments performed by the lines of business, ensuring that risks at the business support level are considered appropriately.  Ensure that other risk management activities (i.e. SOX, PCI, client SAS70, vendor management, information security, etc.) are appropriately integrated into the overall ERM framework.

Trintech, a leading global provider of integrated software solutions for the Last Mile of Finance, has announced a new four-part webinar series titled “Last Mile of Finance Leading Practices.” The Last Mile of Finance refers to the series of steps that occur from subsidiary close to the group publication of financial information to key stakeholders and regulators.

Trintech, a leading global provider of integrated software solutions for the Last Mile of Finance, has announced a new four-part webinar series titled “Last Mile of Finance Leading Practices.” The Last Mile of Finance refers to the series of steps that occur from subsidiary close to the group publication of financial information to key stakeholders and regulators.

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“We are delighted to have this programme up and running and are pleased with the quality of the three candidates we have selected,” WICB Events Manager Cindy McLean said.

Based on technology from American vendor Yodlee, 22seven - led by the former CEO of online bank 20twenty - went live this week, using customers' financial data, behavioural science and gamification to help them manage their finances. However, some of the country's biggest banks have warned customers off the service because it requires them to hand over their online login details.

Construction Contractors - The Construction Index is a building industry and construction company directory With listings of construction companies and building firms throughout England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. UK Construction News

MENLO PARK, Calif., Jan 24, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Institutional Venture Partners (IVP), one of the premier later-stage venture capital and growth equity firms, is pleased to announce that Todd Chaffee, General Partner, will be speaking at the 2012 SuperInvestor conference.

. Credit and debit card payments with your smartphone, iPhone, iPad, Android - mPowa from mPowa on Vimeo. The system conforms to level 1 PCI compliance, putting it at the same level as a bank site, says the vendor. Meanwhile, the precise location of each transaction is recorded by the app, "making life near-impossible for fraudsters".

DailyTimes delivers the latest breaking news and information on the latest top stories, entertainment, business, cricket, politics, and more. For comprehensive coverage, DailyTImes provides special reports, video, audio, photo galleries, and interactive content.

CA Technologies has updated its CA Clarity Project Portfolio Management (PPM) software with a new user interface, one that the company hopes will appeal to a broader set of business users.

Wikipedia and a host of other internet companies companies blacked out their websites in one way or the other early this morning in protest against controversial US legislation. Google blacked out its logo and posted a message on its home page that said "Tell Congress: Please don't censor the web!". The message, which was visible to users of google.

Premier Paula Cox today [Jan.16] provided a briefing on Government’s Office of Procurement and Project Management  initiative, saying steps were underway to ensure Bermuda followed international best practice when it comes to how taxpayer funds are spent.

Key Performance Areas Include: Ensure that Jacaranda 94.2 meets the highest broadcast standards for our listeners; prepare and present traffic and update the traffic 'Twitter' feed for each traffic update. Requirements One to two year broadcast experience; since Jacaranda broadcasts in both English and Afrikaans, applicants should be proficient in both languages.

Fund managers face redundancies as upheaval caused by the financial crisis reveals poor returns, low skills and overpriced products that are driving clients away.

. The objective of the forum is to bring together senior leaders in the field of FSSCs in an informative and educational manner to examine the common challenges faced by these leaders, and to highlight methods they are using to become more effective in supporting the organisation, whilst gaining efficiencies across the finance function.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: As many as five students, who passed the Finishing School Programme of the Directorate of Vocational Higher Secondary Education (VHSE), would soon turn promoters of the City Corporation’s decentralised solid waste management project.

Mindjet’s task-based collaboration tool keeps teams in sync by making information more people-centric, organized and transparent. With social aspects similar to Facebook and Twitter, Cohuman helps colleagues coordinate projects and tasks with each other. Here are five reasons to consider the tool for your collaboration efforts.

Information wants to be free, but the unfettered flow of company information can pose problems. One of the challenges companies face as social media becomes more integrated into their operations is how to manage the use of various social platforms in a sensible way.

While recently attending a NASA event, I spoke with a Mission Control Manager, who remembered me from a project management panel I was on earlier this year. I was pleasantly surprised. I almost didn't participate on the panel because I didn't think I had much to share. Those new to project management may feel they don't have the "expertise" to speak or write on a topic.

TD Bank Names Derek Davoli Portfolio Manager in Commercial Lending in Beverly ...Wolfe News Wire (press release)(December 14, 2011) – TD Bank, America's Most Convenient Bank, has promoted Derek P. Davoli to Portfolio Manager in Commercial Lending in Beverly, Mass. An assistant vice president, he will manage a portfolio of 37 existing commercial customers with an ...and more »

Klarna, an online payments service that lets people shop safely and simply, announced today that it has received $155 million of financing from DST ...

Published:December 7, 2011Author:Carmen Nobel In his 1641 treatise, Meditations on First Philosophy, philosopher René Descartes introduced the concept of an "evil genius," a powerful force of nature who is equally clever and deceitful. Since then, the world has given us plenty of examples—Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs, fictional Wall Street villain Gordon Gekko, and real-life Wall Street villain Bernie Madoff, to name a few. Not only were these classic bad guys unquestionably unethical, but all were inarguably creative in carrying out their bad behavior as well. Indeed, it's rare to hear anyone described as both evil and unoriginal. This raises a question: Is there a link between creativity and unethical behavior? There certainly is, according to an article in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. In "The Dark Side of Creativity: Original Thinkers Can Be More Dishonest," the authors report that inherently creative people tend to cheat more than noncreative types. Furthermore, they show that inducing creative behavior tends to induce unethical behavior. It's a sobering thought in a corporate culture that champions out-of-the-box thinking. "In any organization, especially in contexts that are global and very competitive, there is so much focus on trying to be innovative and creative," says Francesca Gino, an associate professor at Harvard Business School, who wrote the article with Dan Ariely of Duke University. "But is creativity always good? We often hear of cases in which people use innovative behavior to create a sense that what they're doing is not morally wrong. So, Dan and I started wondering whether there is something about the creative process that triggers dishonest behavior. Specifically, we decided to explore the idea that enhancing the motivation to think outside the box can drive individuals toward more dishonest decisions when facing ethical dilemmas." Creativity and ambiguity To begin their research, Gino and Ariely surveyed 99 employees across 17 departments at an American advertising agency, where some jobs—copywriting, for example—required much more creativity than others. In the anonymous survey, on a seven-point scale, the respondents indicated how likely they were to engage in various ethically questionable work behaviors such as "take home office supplies from work" and "inflate your business expense report." Respondents also evaluated scenarios describing a hypothetical person who has the opportunity to behave dishonestly, and then indicated, again on a seven-point scale, how likely they would be to behave unethically in each instance. Finally, the respondents reported how much creativity was required in their respective jobs, with three managers in the executive office rating the creativity level required in each department, as well. Overall, the researchers learned, the higher the creativity required for the job, the higher the level of self-reported dishonesty. Then, through a series of experimental studies, the researchers tested--and largely proved--the theory that creative people are more likely to exhibit unethical behavior when faced with ethical dilemmas. The first study tested the hypothesis that a naturally creative person is predisposed to dishonest behavior. (The week before the experiment, the participants, 71 university students, completed an online survey that included dispositional measures of creativity.) The experiment included a computerized task in which participants viewed 20 dots inside a diagonally bisected square. They were told to indicate whether there were more dots on the right side of the square or on the left, and that their answers would affect how well they would be compensated for taking part in the experiment: each "more-on-the-right" decision would earn them 10 times as much as a "left" decision. In half the trials, it was obvious that one side of the square had more dots than the other—2 dots versus 18, for example. But in the other half, the task was a little more ambiguous, with several dots appearing near or on the line in the middle of the square. The researchers focused on the results of the "ambiguous" tasks, with the idea that these were the ones that allowed more room for interpretation—participants could easily misrepresent what they actually perceived and report "more on the right" in order to incur a higher payoff. The results showed that participants who had scored high on the creativity scale were the most likely to fudge their answers for monetary gain. "Ambiguity, having some room to justify our behavior, seems to be a really important component of explaining when and why we cross ethical boundaries, and these results show us that creativity helps with that process," Gino says. "It suggests that moral flexibility is the mechanism explaining why being in a creative mindset or being a creative person puts you more at risk to do the wrong thing." The perils of inducing creativity In another study, which included 111 university students, the researchers tested whether they could actively induce creativity, and whether doing so would temporarily induce dishonest behavior. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two groups: the "creative mindset" group and the control group. All were asked to construct sentences from sets of randomly positioned words. But in the creative mindset group, more than half of the sentences included words related to creativity: "novel," "imagination," "invention," "originality," and so on. To test whether the creativity prime worked, the researchers asked participants to solve a cognitive puzzle created by the Gestalt psychologist Karl Duncker. Known as Duncker's candle problem, it presents participants with the task of affixing a candle to a wall in such a way that when lit, the candle won't drip wax on the floor. To complete the task, participants can use a box of tacks, a book of matches, and the candle. The ideal solution, which requires ingenuity, involves emptying the box, tacking the box to the wall as a candleholder, placing the candle inside, and lighting the candle with the match. The researchers found that 47.3 percent of participants in the creative mindset group solved the candle problem ideally, versus 26.8 percent in the control group. Next, participants completed a series of computerized tasks, including the ambiguous dots-in-the-square task from the first study. The results showed that those in the creative mindset group were much more likely to give dishonest answers for monetary gain than those in the control group. "These were simple studies, but they were powerful in showing that our ability to justify things is significantly greater if we are in a creative mindset or when we are creative people," Gino says. That said, Gino is quick to add that she and Ariely are not suggesting that companies put the kibosh on innovation in order to keep dishonesty at bay. "We're not saying that creativity is bad," Gino says. "But we are saying that it can lead to problems. And so the question from a manager's perspective is: How do you get the good outcomes of creativity without triggering the bad outcomes?" While "The Dark Side of Creativity" doesn't answer that question directly, Gino hopes that the research will remind innovative organizations not to give short shrift to ethics. "As a manager, if you're highlighting the importance of being creative and innovative, it's important to make sure that you're stressing the presence of ethics, too," Gino says. "Dan and I are of the hope that managers will start thinking about how to structure the creative process in such a way that they can keep ethics in check, triggering the good behavior without triggering the bad behavior." Invitation to participate Are you a manager at an organization that stresses the importance of creativity in the workplace? Do you have thoughts about how to encourage creativity while discouraging unethical behavior? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below. You can also reach Francesca Gino directly at fgino@hbs.edu or follow her on Twitter, @francescagino. About the author Carmen Nobel is senior editor of Harvard Business School Working Knowledge.

Progressive companies have realised that new social media such as Facebook and Twitter can be an asset in new product development. Rajesh Chandy shares his thoughts on a major study of ‘consumer cocreation’ that he conducted with four other professors. What they found could easily reshape the way you bring your next new product to market.

Progressive companies have realised that new social media such as Facebook and Twitter can be an asset in new product development. Rajesh Chandy shares his thoughts on a major study of ‘consumer cocreation’ that he conducted with four other professors. What they found could easily reshape the way you bring your next new product to market.