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Are West Coast women more entrepreneurial? Deborah Perry Piscione thinks so. The Silicon Valley transplant raised $5 million from a single female investor to start her own business – within 18 months of her move from the East Coast. “There’s such a disconnect between the two coasts,” she tells The New York Times, adding that women back East may work in the pinnacle of corporate America, but lack the risk-taking edge to stay relevant in today’s new economy. That’s why she and other West Coast women are organizing what they call “Alley to the Valley,” an invitation-only event this week for 50 top-earning women, 25 of whom are flying in from the East Coast. The schmooze-fest aims to inject Wall Street women, who are often too risk-averse to invest in startups, with a dose of entrepreneurial spirit. Oh, and no men allowed.

Accidental spying. Google Street View is now under FCC investigation, just two weeks after the FTC dropped its own probe of the three-year-old service, The New York Times reports. The FCC is looking into whether or not Google violated wiretap laws when it intercepted Wi-Fi data, including personal e-mails and passwords, during its Street View campaign. Google admits the data was amassed inadvertently, but still, offers its apologies. “As we have said before, we are profoundly sorry for having mistakenly collected payload data from unencrypted networks,” Google said. “As soon as we realized what had happened, we stopped collecting all Wi-Fi data from our Street View cars and immediately informed the authorities.”

That Facebook post? You’re fired. By now we’ve all heard the horror stories of employees ranting about their tasks or workplaces or bosses over social media. But when is doing so a firing offense? The Harvard Business Review ponders this question in the wake of a recent National Labor Relations Board complaint, which alleges that a Connecticut company wrongfully terminated an employee after she criticized her supervisor on Facebook. Since privacy in social media is an issue the law barely addresses, and this is the first time the NLRB has taken action on the issue , this is important news for HR and managers around the country.

Start-up advice from a peanut-butter guru. Peanut Butter & Co. grew from a tiny retail shop in New York City’s Greenwich Village to a peanut-butter behemoth, whose ten varieties of all-natural peanut butter can be found in over 10,000 retailers nationwide. Prior to launching the business, founder Lee Zalben had zero experience in the restaurant or retail industries, but was determined to learn as he went along. He discusses the lessons he learned in a video interview on the American Express OPEN Forum. According to him, the golden rule is, “You don’t know what you don’t know, until you don’t know it,” meaning that newbie business owners should be prepared to deal with problems they never even imagined they would have to deal with. How exactly does one do that? “Build in enough flexibility to your plans to be able to move quickly and be nimble,” he says.

Boomerang business owners. Today’s Wall Street Journal identifies a number of entrepreneurs, who sold their businesses years ago when the going was good, and bought them back in hopes of saving them once the recession took its toll. The Journal calls them ” boomerang business owners ,” and though they’re rare, the story reports that the average going price for businesses is down 30 percent since 2008. That means for anyone who’s recently sold a company and faced that nagging question, ” What am I if not my business? ” it may be an opportune time to get back on the horse.

Avoiding tax troubles early on. Getting your taxes in order might not be the most exciting part of starting a business, but a story in the LA Times reminds us just how important tax planning is to your future success. Some aspiring business people don’t realize, for instance, that they have to file a tax return even if they haven’t made a penny or started formal operations. Other necessities include tax deductible items, jobs credits, and income tax regulations. It’s a good idea to have an accountant on hand from the beginning, the article notes. It’ll save you money and headaches down the road. And here’s how to find the right one for your business.

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The best way to keep employees from leaving. For Google, it’s by telling them you love them – with cold, hard cash. Henry Blodget of Silicon Alley Insider reported this morning that Google CEO Eric Schmidt announced in an email that his company is giving all of its 20,000+ employees at least a 10 percent raise in 2011 as well as a $1,000 holiday bonus. While a Google spokesman declined to comment specifically on the raise, he told The Wall Street Journal that “we do believe that competitive compensation plans are important to the future of the company.” The Journal points out that the raise marks another maneuver in Google’s battle to retain talent that has been poached recently by Facebook and younger tech upstarts.

In other news of Google wins… In 2005 media mogul Barry Diller of InterActivCorp bet big ($1.85 billion, in fact) that Ask.com could compete with search engines Google and Yahoo. This week that bet went belly up. Bloomberg reports that Ask.com will lay off 130 engineering jobs and concede much of its search business to competitors like Google and Microsoft, already reaching agreements with both. “We’ve realized in the last few years you can’t compete head on with Google,” Diller said, which now controls 65 percent of all U.S. searches. Instead, Ask.com will re-focus its efforts on delivering its question-and-answer service while parent company IAC continues to develop toolbars, accounting for much of the company’s sustained revenue gains over the past year.

The entrepreneur’s dilemma. Do you want venture capital funding or control? Today’s New York Times DealBook column tackles the thorny issue of an entrepreneur’s need to raise money versus the unpopular necessity of ceding some control of their company to VCs. As Steven Davidoff, the so-called “Deal Professor” explains, “The key for entrepreneurs in negotiations is to make sure that when they do raise VC money, they have options.” Ideally, those options will come in the form of multiple term sheets that will allow the entrepreneur to negotiate the most lenient terms for the smallest part of their company. Davidoff goes on to explain some of the common pitfalls and legal wranglings entrepreneurs should keep in mind when beginning a relationship with VCs.

A lead-generation secret. If you’re like most entrepreneurs, writes Mike Michalowicz in the Wall Street Journal, you ask clients for referrals. But that rarely works: Your client doesn’t want you to be snapped up by its competitors. Michalowicz offers a smart tip: Ask your client to introduce you to its other vendors, so you can collaborate to serve them better. “You might get a raised eyebrow, but your clients will almost always say yes. It’s a no-brainer for your client because you’re not asking them to hook you up with new leads; you’re simply asking them to help you, help them.”

Pay as you go…literally. Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey’s new company, Square, which allows people to swipe credit cards on their iPhones, is now open to the public. To apply for the Square setup, companies go through not only a credit check, but a Yelp, Twitter, and Facebook check too, to ensure the businesses are reputable. Square now has more than 50,000 users, but Dorsey tells TechCrunch the company has plenty of room to grow, presenting Square as a cost-effective and convenient option for the 24 million merchants in the United States that don’t currently process credit cards.

Big retail in little spaces. Bigger is not always better, says a recent article in The New York Times. As retailers struggle to save money in a sluggish economy, they’re starting to downsize – literally. After all, a smaller space will have a lower rent, fewer costs for storing inventory, and a need for fewer employees. The Times notes that the “change reflects two trends in the retail world: Chains looking for new ways to cut costs in the sour economy, and consumers demanding a less sprawling shopping experience as they spend with greater purpose.” It’s also giving the stores an opportunity to flex their creative muscles as smaller spaces demand flexible design. One Bloomingdales in California, for example, has dressing room walls that retract into the ceiling, which, we can only hope, only occurs only when no one is inside them.

The open-data boon for entrepreneurs. San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order last year asking city departments to publish data under their control. Since then, hundreds of sets of data have been released. And the bounty is feeding creativity among app designers. Fast Company reports that at least 50 new apps have been built using the open data, including “EcoFinder, a recycling-center locator, SpotCrime, which sends local crime alerts to users, and Routesy, which plans public-transportation trips. Yesterday, (coincidentally in the midst of a Google-Facebook openness smack-down ) San Francisco became the first city to push that order into law. The city’s CIO, Chris Vein, said entrepreneurs are the beneficiaries of the openness: “It’s a platform for small business growth,” he told Fast Company.

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New York, NY, United States (AHN) – Profits from pharmaceutical firms beat a drop in consumer confidence and fueled a rally Tuesday that put Wall Street back into positive territory.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished with a 46-point or 0.4 percent gain to close at 10,858 with Pfizer Inc. and Intel Corp. as the top gainers.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index added 5 points or 0.5 percent to finish at 1,148 as all but seven of 51 healthcare stocks advanced. Walgreens shares surged more than 11 percent after reporting a $16.9 billion fourth quarter revenue driven by strong prescription drug sales.

The Nasdaq Composite Index rose 10 points or 0.4 percent to close at 2,379.

Crude oil for November delivery dropped 34 cents to settle at $76 per barrel.

Gold futures for December delivery climbed $9.70 to settle at a new record of $1,308 an ounce.

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Owner of Segway company dies in Segway accident. Jimi Heselden, the 62-year-old millionaire who purchased the Segway company less than a year ago, died Sunday while apparently riding one of his own company’s scooters off a cliff. Heselden crashed into the River Warfe while inspecting his Northern England estate, the BBC reports . Heselden was pronounced dead at the scene, and a rugged-country Segway model was recovered at the scene. The Segway was invented by Dean Kamen, as a two-wheeled scooter containing five gyroscopes and a set of computers monitoring the vehicle’s center of gravity. Kamen dreamed of launching a transportation revolution, but the scooter failed to find a widespread market, and even made it onto Inc.com’s list of the lamest products of the past decade . Heselden himself was one of the United Kingdom’s 400 richest people, and went from working as a miner to building a fortune in the engineering business. He was perhaps best known as a philanthropist: just this month he donated more than $15 million to the Leeds Community Foundation.

Do Promoted Tweets work? Millions of people use Twitter, but the question for its investors and executives has always been how Twitter can be monetized effectively. Four years after the company launched, writes the The Wall Street Journal , the jury is still out. “Twitter Inc.’s foray into advertising is receiving mixed reviews among marketers,” write Emily Steel and Amir Efrati, “underscoring the challenges of turning the popular micro-blogging service into a highly profitable enterprise.” Considering the fact that companies and individuals can already reach thousands of followers for free, the advertising scheme developed by Twitter, Promoted Tweets, needs to offer targeting options and metrics that make it worth the expense, which is now in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even though Twitter may be having a tough time of figuring out just how to drive revenues for themselves, small businesses and entrepreneurs have figured out how to make money using it. Here are five ways to actually make money using Twitter.

The angel investing drama that won’t go away. A few days after legendary angel investor Ron Conway blasted several of his peers for allegedly colluding to fix start-up valuations, investor Chris Sacca has responded with a lengthy e-mail leaked to TechCrunch. The gist? Conway was wrong and Sacca and his peers are really, truly, nice human beings. “They get overweight?,” Sacca writes of founders of companies he invests in. “I buy them a mountain bike. They look skinny? I pick up groceries.”

The privately-owned public library. It sounds like an oxymoron, but in Santa Clarita, California, the local government has struck a $4 million deal with the Maryland-based company Library Systems & Services to take over the town’s three libraries. According to The New York Times , the strategy worked in the past when the company took over libraries in failing cities. The current Santa Clarita controversy, however, stems from the fact that Library Systems & Services is now moving in on a “relatively healthy city.” Local residents fear that outsourcing the care of their libraries will result in higher fees and fewer books. While the mayor assures the Times that “the libraries are still going to be public libraries,” Frank A. Pezzanite, CEO of Library Systems & Services says there are changes in store for complacent librarians. “A lot of libraries are atrocious…Their policies are all about job security. That’s why the profession is nervous about us. You can go to a library for 35 years and never have to do anything and then have your retirement. We’re not running our company that way. You come to us, you’re going to have to work.” What do you think? Is there room for the private sector in public libraries?

The mobile advertising arms race. Mammoths and independents alike all but flooded the mobile advertising market in 2010, a market expected to rise to more than $500 million, according to Business Week . Apple will make the biggest move this year with the introduction of its new iAd network, estimated to jump to 21 percent share of the market from 0 percent last year. Apple’s push will come at the expense of search giants Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo!, all expected to drop shares by year’s end. While the premium players decline, (other than Apple, of course) independents such as Jumptap and Millennial Media will jump a few percentage points in market-share this year. Some advertisers prefer independent networks due to flexibility and the lack of conflict between their interests and those of Google and Apple, which constantly try to promote products to users.

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October 7th, 2008 Dow Jones took a dive by a whopping 508 points. Over the past three months global markets were hit by an $8.1 trillion loss in value. Banks fail one after another, panic in the Wall Street… That’s what already came to be known as the biggest economy meltdown since the Great Depression.

The helter-skelter of the stock-exchange swiftly resonates everywhere. With media fuelling the buzz you need to have a steel nerve or live deep in the forest not to be concerned with the crisis thing. The home-grown economic prophets loudly predict ‘the end of the world as we know it’.
The last thing you’d want to do in times like that is start a business, right? – Not quite.
Great Depression Creates Great Opportunities

History knows a lot of cases when economic meltdowns created opportunities for new ventures and bold startups as well as remarkably profitable marketing investments. The Great Depression turned out the golden ticket for hundreds of businesses. Disney, Procter & Gamble, Camel and Chevrolet, to name a few, were among the companies that bloomed and thrived while others were desperately fighting for survival. They saw an opportunity and seized the moment. They were advertising when others cut down marketing budgets. They offered new products when others thought no one could afford to buy. They stayed calm in the across-the-board market mess and they ended up outstandingly victorious.

What does it have to do with you? Everything. The ongoing crisis is your chance to start a new venture, grow your business and make money even when the economy seems to go wild. And the best place to do this is online. Against the background of economic downturn the prospects of the Internet market look especially promising.

Why Online Business is Recession-Proof

Although the cyberspace is tightly tied to the real-world economy, the negative market trends seem to turn out the positive way online. Both retail customers and investors seeking ways to safeguard their capitals end-up putting their money online. Here’s the proof that Internet market is here to stay no matter what goes on offline.

* Shoppers go online

In every recession it is the low-to-middle class who take the biggest blow. When big companies go bankrupt it is the regular workers who suffer most. Off course CEOs and investors lose monstrous sums but at least they don’t have to worry about how to feed the family.

In times like that people do their best to tighten the belts and cut the expenses. We go hunting for bargains and the first place to look at is the Internet. The reasons are obvious: you can compare prices without leaving the house; you don’t have to waste time and money on the gas running around the shops and you can really buy cheaper over the Internet.

Offer the best price and people will buy. Make a discount on something they could do without but would rather own, and people will buy. What’s even more important, even after the economy goes stable, your customers will stick with you. Read on to learn how to pick the right product and get a discount for it.

* Companies Invest in Online Advertising

However slow the economy is a business needs to invest into advertising if it wants to stay afloat. Under the tight budget ROI (Return on Investment) becomes the focal point. The Internet offers lots of measuring instruments other media lack. Computer technology allows tracking the money you earn from each banner or text ad up to the last cent. Therefore businesses cut down or completely abandon the press, and TV, but they’ll never give up on SEO, contextual or banner ads.

Outsell Inc., The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), IDC and other research agencies all report Internet advertising growing at a galloping tempo (18.2% for the first quarter this year) while print, TV and outdoor ads lose their share of the market.

IAB reported that advertisers invested $5.8 billion in Q1 2008. Part of that money could be yours.

With marketing budgets zipped up businesses seek every opportunity to advertise online. If you have a website or blog with some traffic companies will line up to pay you for advertising. If you don’t have any, it’s very much the time to start one. Read on to learn how to create a successful advertising platform and promote it in the search engines.

Selling ads space is just one of the many ways to make money online. There are many more such as paid subscriptions, affiliate marketing, review posting, sponsored directory listings, etc. They all create great opportunities to start an online business. And of course, you don’t need to put all eggs in one basket. You can combine various online marketing techniques into a powerful money making blend that would be 100% recession proof, no matter what goes on across Wall Street.
Here’s a Step-By-Step Guide To Starting an Online Business

What does starting a business start with? Naturally before you start selling something you need to decide what that something will be. So your first step is

1. Choosing a Product to Sell

A product to sell is not necessarily a ‘product’ as such. It could be a paid subscription or a service and you don’t even have to ‘sell’ it directly. You just need to offer something of interest: information or functionality that will drive visitors to your website and will make them wanna stay and come back. Get traffic and you’ll have tons of ways to transform it into cash.

There are a number of things people are most interested in now. Here’s a list of

What’s Hot in Cold Economy:

* Information

People’s desire to know what’s going on doesn’t cease in bad times. Moreover, the worse it gets the bigger their interest. The ‘hottest’ right now is financial information.

According to comScore Media Metrix the number if visitors to finance-related websites jumped 30% this year. European websites skyrocketed to record peaks of up to 141% in traffic growth.

Start a blog or website about anything in the finances from the market trends to personal investments and loans, promote it in the search engines and you’ll see tons of traffic you can convert into money. Read on to learn how.

* Stress-Relief

During the Great Depression people went to the movies to relieve the stress and forget about their problems. Nothing has changed over time except for the movies. The general trend is when bad things happen people still pay for entertainment even though it’s getting harder to afford.

* Discounts

With economy staggering and stock exchange falling down the bills still remain the same. And bills are to be paid. Naturally we want to save on everything. If you know how to show us the way to a good bargain we’ll stick with you. And bargains are plentiful on the Internet. You just need to take the time to find them and gather in one place.

* Surviving the Crisis Guides

When it comes to our wallets we get emotional. When it comes to our wallets getting thinner we get extremely emotional and even start to panic. Surviving the financial crisis is a hot topic right now. Therefore if you read this article to the end you’ll get a double benefit:

* You’ll secure a sustainable income for yourself and your family.

* You’ll be able to help others do the same.

Moreover you’ll have an undeniable proof of your paycheck to show people the way, and they will follow. This will bring you not only money but also self-satisfaction of doing a good thing.

The list is just a small fraction of the niches you can take up with your business. Explore the web for a while and you’ll get tons of other ideas to choose from.

Once you’ve picked your product(s) you can get down to launching a website.

2. Going Online

Depending on the focus of your online business you need to decide whether you will use a website, a blog or both. Blogs are easier to start and maintain. If you decide to focus your marketing efforts around information this is your best choice to go. You can set up a free blog at WordPress.Com or Blogger.com

Websites offer more functionality but may take up more time and skills to manage. You can hire professionals to have a website set up for you. In the slow economy the quotes should get very affordable. You can also explore the free options for there are plenty out there. There are even ones that will get your website up and running in about 5 clicks.

Google ‘free websites’ and you’ll get one before you can say ‘How do I make a website?’.

3. Getting Traffic

A website without traffic is a dead one though. Visitors are the blood of your website that gets its heart beating. So your first and foremost concern now is to attract traffic to your website. The only most effective way to do it is promote your website in search engines.

According to Pew Internet 84% of internet surfers use search engines. About 68 million Americans will use the search engines tomorrow. If your website appears at the top of search results a large portion of this traffic will come to you bringing you money.

Now the question is how do you get your website to the top of search engines? The answer is by optimizing it for natural search. The process is called Search Engine Optimization or SEO for short. Even if you hear the term for the first time, it won’t take you long to figure out what it’s all about.

There are a lot of do-it-yourself SEO guides out there. However they all seem to miss the most important point. It’s actually doing SEO not just reading about it what drives your website up in search engine rankings and earns you money. Good news is that there’s one SEO Book that tells you the exact things to do in a way that let’s you get right down to doing them. The e-book is called SEO in Practice. It is the ultimate guide that will help you get your website to the top of search engine rankings in a matter of weeks.

One of the great things about SEO is that it gets you traffic (read customers) free of charge. No fees, no bills. You do everything yourself and you reap the benefits of what you’ve sown. However, when doing SEO you’ll most likely stumble upon the same problem all SEOs do: There’s just not enough hours in the day to do everything by hand. The way out I found for myself is automating some of the SEO tasks with special SEO software.

There are a lot of tools out there. I personally use SEO Software by Link-Assistant.Com (I’ve put a link to their website under the article). It has all the functionality I need and I like it. But you can use any software (just make sure it’s good quality) or no software at all. You can go and search around for free SEO tools. They are usually of limited functionality as compared to the paid versions, but can still be helpful.

4. Earning Money

After you’ve read and followed the tips outlined in the SEO Book you’ll see a sustainable stream of traffic coming to your website. This is great but we’re looking to make money not just traffic, right? There are many ways to monetize your website traffic, some of the most popular and effective are:

* Advertising

People pay you to put up a banner or text links on your website. The more traffic you have the more you can charge. Search around to see what the general pricing is and test several pricing options to see which suits your prospects best.

* Affiliate Marketing

I had been earning a good living from affiliate programs for several years before I completely jumped into the SEO services. The system is dead simple. You help businesses sell their products and earn a percentage of every sale. To achieve the best you need to pick a product you believe in (preferably the one you own and use). This way you’ll be speaking confidently and with authority and people will buy from you.

* Paid Subscriptions

If you deliver quality info or analysis that is unique and is of value to your visitors you can offer paid subscriptions. The subscription can grant more info, earlier delivery or whatever bonuses you can think of.

As your online business gains momentum you’ll find yourself living a new life. The one that is stress-free, recession proof and incredibly enjoyable. And what’s more important you’ll be living your whole life for yourself. No one can fire you; no one can cut down your pay. You’re an independent entrepreneur and it’s up to you when you come to work and when you leave. Your paycheck solely depends on you.

Please note, this is not a get-rich-quick kinda trash. You’ll have to work first and most likely work hard. Not too hard perhaps, but hard enough. This is how it is and I strongly believe this is exactly as it should be. First you work for your business, then your business works for you. Invest into your future now and you’ll be able to reap the benefits later. Do nothing and nothing will happen.

What are the Risks?

The word venture itself contains a pinch of risk attached to it. Starting a business certainly has its risks. But the world is like this:

“Sometimes you do something, and you get screwed. Sometimes it’s the things you don’t do and you get screwed.” – Fight Club

You start a business and you may fail, and then start another one and still another one until you succeed. But if you don’t try you never succeed. You may sit and wait for the economy meltdown to hit you in the pocket or for the company you’re working for to go under. These are also the risks we take by just living in this world. And compared to them the risks of starting an online business are nothing. In fact all you invest is your time and effort.

You can start securing your future right now. Work for you business an hour a day at first, than more until you can finally go your own way.
So Why Financial Crisis is a Good Thing

Slow economy is sort of a market janitor. It gets rid of the mismanaged thrash and gives way to new players with fresh ideas and innovative approaches. The big and weak go under and the apt take over their place. This is your chance to change your life once and for good. Go pick your product -> set up a website -> promote it in search engines -> and earn the living you’ve always wanted to.

SEO software

Jon Sparks is a freelance SEO and marketing expert. Having quit his 9-to-5 job years ago he made up his mind to help you do the same and start living your life entirely to yourself.

photo credit: World Economic Forum

We’re living in a time of economic crisis–a time when the economic system, the money system itself, the markets are unraveling in a way that I haven’t seen in my lifetime and most people haven’t seen in their lifetimes. And this is a very frightening time for people. At the same time, if we can recognize that what is unraveling is that which has no viability. What is unraveling is that which is not sustainable. Practices, ways of being with money, markets that are not based in true value are starting to fall apart.

If we can see that what’s happening is a truing, a recalibration, and an expression of us being in overshoot, it helps us see how to deal with it on a personal basis. It doesn’t mean it’s not going to painful. It doesn’t mean that there’s not suffering. It doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be paying close attention to how we use money, what to do with the investments we have, and being mindful of the job we have and the salary we earn. These considerations seem larger than life under the current circumstances.

But if we look on a larger scale, if we step back from the personal drama, the fear, that we’re all caught in and that the media reinforces, we can see that we’re living at a time of enormous excess, avarice and greed. This has created financial structures and systems that are inappropriate and completely unsustainable. And now they’re falling apart.

At the end of this, we’re all going to be better for it, because we’re going to be in a truthful, more accurate, more appropriate relationship with ourselves, with money, and with the resources on this planet. We can get through this. And if we make adjustments in our own life that are consistent with a new future for human life, rather than the greed and exploitation that was the basis for most of the actions of the markets, we’ll make choices that will pan out for our own future and for all future generations.

It’s a difficult time. I don’t deny that. But it can also be a beautiful time. We can move towards thrift rather than accumulation; we can move toward appreciating what we love rather than being afraid of what we’ve lost; we can focus our utmost attention and intention not on what we’re losing, but on what we already have that’s so valuable and nourishing to us. We can stop clamoring for more of what we don’t really need and take care of what we have–both in our own personal lives and on this planet for the sustainability of life itself.

This is a time that I think history will look back on and say, “These are the people, this is the generation of humankind that went through a transformation that made the future of life possible. These are the people who had the courage to make profound changes in the way they were thinking, as well as in the way that they were behaving, that gave the future to life itself.” And it’s going to take courage on all of our parts–big changes in our personal, little lives–that will ultimately be historic and profound for us and for everybody who follows us.

So, I’m privileged to be living at this time. I’m excited about being the generation that goes through this courageous period. You too can take that frame of reference and see that there’s privilege to being the people who need to make these changes, rather than seeing this as a horrible thing that has befallen us-i.e., as victims. And for me, it’s a crisis that we’ve sort of been waiting to have happen. Everybody kind of knew it was coming. You could feel it. CEOs’ salaries being completely out of range and out of sight; greed on Wall Street being at an all-time high; and industries, like the automobile industry (God bless them) not being able to change fast enough and really think in a new way, at a time when that’s demanded now of all of us.

Lynne Twist is a global activist, fundraiser, speaker, consultant, coach, and author who has dedicated her life to global initiatives that serve humanity and the planet, including co-founding The Pachamama Alliance http://www.pachamama.org and the Soul of Money Institute, which furthers the work of her award-winning book, The Soul of Money http://www.soulofmoney.info.