The World's Most Influential Companies

- A Business Week Article

• "Power lasts 10 years," goes an old Korean proverb. "Influence, not more than a hundred."
  
• In a year that brought the mighty to their knees, some of the biggest players in business have seen their power whittled away. As the proverb points out, influence has a shelf life, too. And it's probably getting shorter as the cycle of change accelerates. Companies that once wielded a seemingly unshakeable hold over their industries—General Motors (GM), Sony (SNE), Microsoft (MSFT)—now find themselves following the lead of more nimble players such as Toyota (TM), Apple (APPL), and Google (GOOG). "There's no standing still," notes veteran strategy guru Gary Hamel. "Influence is like water, always flowing somewhere."
  
• The core characteristics of influence are unchanged, whether it's inspiring a loyal following, spawning big ideas, or building up mammoth market share. What has changed is how players achieve it. A company's physical assets are less important now than the force of its ideas. In the age of blogging and instant communication, consumers are less the recipients of corporate influence than powerful actors who help shape it.
  
• With that in mind, BusinessWeek developed a list of the World's Most Influential Companies. BW chose 10 companies that have devised winning strategies in their industries. They are the ones with the game-changing ideas, the greatest impact on consumers, and the bold tactics rivals emulate. None is infallible or without controversy. BW believes that each company played a major role in business over the past year and could shape the corporate landscape for years to come.
  
• In honing the list, BusinessWeek worked with an advisory board of 14 academics, consultants, and industry leaders worldwide. Several themes emerged. For one, the developed world is no longer the sole repository of influential companies. Nearly a third of the board's suggestions were for companies based in emerging markets, where a vibrant workforce and global capital play a vital role.

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Eat That Frog!

- Movie by Mac Anderson

The founder of Simple Truths, Mac Anderson says, "I heard Brian Tracy's "Frog Story" about 5 years ago. I immediately began to apply it to my business and personal life. It's made a huge difference in my ability to take action on things that matter most. So here it is, a little piece of Brian Tracy's best-selling book...Eat That Frog! It takes less than 2 minutes to watch, but here's betting...you won't forget it!"

Click here to see the movie.

Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture: “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams”

Article Shared by Atul Shinde. Thank you!

Randy Pausch (Oct. 23, 1960 - July 25, 2008)

Randy Pausch was a professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. He was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer at 47 and survived more than 10 months before he lost his battle this past July. Randy gave his last lecture at CMU on Sept 18, 2007, before several hundred in a packed McConomy Auditorium. The Last Lecture was his farewell speech to the CMU students and has been acknowledged as one of the finest inspirational discourse.

In his moving presentation, "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams," Pausch talked about his lessons learned and gave advice to students on how to achieve their own career and personal goals. This video has now been viewed on YouTube by millions of people. It’s enormously inspiring, tear-rendering and well worth your time if you haven’t seen it. Click below to see the video.

Click here to read the transcript of Randy Pausch's Last Lecture

Click here to read select quotes from Randy Pausch's Last Lecture

Click here for Randy Pausch's Website

21 select quotes from Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture

1. “Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted…”
   
   
2. “Be good at something; it makes you valuable…. Have something to bring to the table, because that will make you more welcome.”
   
   
3. “Brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want something badly enough. They are there to keep out the other people.”
   
   
4. “Be willing to apologize. Proper apologies have three parts: 1) What I did was wrong. 2) I’m sorry that I hurt you. 3) How do I make it better? It’s the third part that people tend to forget…. Apologize when you screw up and focus on other people, not on yourself.”
   
   
5. “Find the best in everybody. Just keep waiting no matter how long it takes. No one is all evil. Everybody has a good side, just keep waiting, it will come out.”
   
   
6. “It is not about achieving your dreams but living your life. If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself, the dreams will come to you.”
   
   
7. “Be prepared. Luck is truly where preparation meets opportunity.”
   
   
8. “Better to fail spectacularly than do something mediocre.” [Randy Pausch gave out a First Penguin award each year when he was teaching to the biggest failure in trying something big and new because he thought this should be celebrated. First Penguins are the ones that risk that the water might be too cold.]
   
   
9. “Loyalty is a two way street.”
   
   
10. “Get a feedback loop and listen to it. Your feedback loop can be this dorky spreadsheet thing I did, or it can just be one great man who tells you what you need to hear. The hard part is the listening to it.”
    
    
11. “You can’t get there alone. People have to help you and I do believe in karma. I believe in paybacks. You get people to help you by telling the truth. Being earnest. I’ll take an earnest person over a hip person any day, because hip is short term. Earnest is long term.”
    
    
12. “When you are doing something badly and no one’s bothering to tell you anymore, that’s a very bad place to be. Your critics are the ones still telling you they love you and care.”
    
    
13. “Don’t complain, Just work harder.”
    
    
14. “If you want to achieve your dreams, you better learn to work and play well with others…[you have] to live with integrity”
    
    
15. “The best piece of parenting advice I’ve ever heard is from flight attendants. If things get really tough, grab your own oxygen mask first.”
    
    
16. “Tell The Truth. All The Time. No one is pure evil.”
    
    
17. “Show gratitude. Gratitude is a simple but powerful thing.”
    
    
18. “I’ve never understood pity and self-pity as an emotion. We have a finite amount of time. Whether short or long, it doesn’t matter. Life is to be lived.”
    
    
19. “Never underestimate the importance of having fun. I’m dying and I’m having fun. And I’m going to keep having fun every day because there’s no other way to play it….Having fun for me is like a fish talking about the importance of water. I don’t know how it is like not to have fun…”
    
    
20. “Never lose the child-like wonder. It’s just too important. It’s what drives us. Help others.”
    
    
21. “To be cliché, death is a part of life and it’s going to happen to all of us. I have the blessing of getting a little bit of advance notice and I am able to optimize my use of time down the home stretch.”