• ‘FORECASTING’ IS ABOUT THE DIRECTION A COMPANY WANTS TO BE HEADING to enable decision-making – a different process than BUDGETING, which is about setting detailed targets for people to follow and monitor. Once operations commence, forecasting “not only captures the material deviations that have occurred from prior budget targets, but also arms management with the timely information to evaluate root causes and adjust plans accordingly.” It’s estimated that “only 1% of organizations achieve 90% forecasting accuracy 30 days out,” predominantly a result of (1) sporadic or reactive attention given to the process, versus consistent priority; (2) ignoring the 80:20 principle by focusing on details versus the big picture – the 20% of drivers responsible for 80% of business results; and (3) failing to balance the “happening-right-now internal metrics (like revenue & customer drivers) with external metrics (like competition and macroeconomic tailwinds)…  Businesses need roadmaps which give management the ability to identify gaps between Budgets & actuals, then course-correct accordingly.” [CFO MAGAZINE – Apr 5, 18]
  •  CURIOUS ABOUT HOW MUCH INFO GOOGLE KEEPS ON YOUR LIFE? You’ll be astonished, if not mortified. The link below will get you access to request a trove of data which Google notes “could take hours or even days to compile, depending on how active a user you are” and how many years you’ve been googling. Among other surprises, you’ll find your history of both public and anonymous searches in ‘incognito mode,’ even though users are told that “chrome doesn’t save your browsing history like URLs, cached page text, or IP addresses of pages linked from websites you visit.”  https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2018/03/30/download-google-data-how-what-found/473227002/ [USA TODAY – Mar 30, 18]
  •  THE ‘PRESSURE’ OF CAMPUS LIFE is causing record numbers of college snowflake students to seek psychological treatment for anxiety, depression and suicide. A College Health Ass’n survey of over 63,000 students at 92 schools found “nearly 40% felt so depressed that it was difficult to function, more than six in ten felt ‘overwhelming anxiety,’ and 10% had ‘seriously considered’ suicide within the past year.” UCLA now offers free online screening to incoming students, 250 of which were “identified as at ‘at risk’ for severe depression, exhibiting manic behavior, or having suicidal thoughts… At Columbia, kids use a virtual reality headset to face a variety of anxiety-inducing simulations – like a professor unwilling to budge on a deadline, or a roommate who has littered their dorm room with stacks of empty pizza boxes and piles of dirty clothes.” Really!! Just pathetic!  [TIME – Apr 9, 18]
  •  “MOST ORGANIZATIONS HAVE GENERALLY ACCEPTED THAT CYBER PREVENTION & SECURITY IS IMPOSSIBLE and have turned efforts towards assuring the defensibility of data and core operations… with constant situational awareness to detect problems in their incipient phase, recognizing that defense supported by data analytics and artificial intelligence is no longer just an option but a necessity.” And it’s getting worse. Reality is that nation-state hackers are increasingly “undermining our trust in critical systems and, as such, are attacking the confidence & psychology of our nation… The lines between cyber criminals and nation-states (N. Korea & Russia in particular) have become increasingly blurry with attacks targeting election systems, electric grids, and other critical infrastructure – evidence that there’s a larger game afoot: a contest of wills and a competition for strategic leverage in cyberspace.”  [HELPNET SECURITY.COM – Mar 30, 18]
  •  CALIFORNIA’S ‘OPEN DOOR SANCTUARY’ POLICY IS “SOWING THE SEEDS OF FUTURE CATASTROPHE.” Of some three million so-called ‘undocumented immigrants,’ over 1/3 now have state-issued drivers licenses (issued irrespective of training or insurance) which “present a doorway to enter the welfare system and to vote…as well as provide not only a legal but easy way to remain even if committing felonies… Illegal immigrants are once again swarming the border convinced that, once here (especially if arriving with a family which traffickers & smugglers advertise as an enticement), they’ll be immune from being arrested or deported.”  Federally, the Gov’t Accountability Office reported that in one year some 251,000 illegals had been arrested nearly 1.7 million times collectively, for close to 3 million criminal offenses including “homicide, kidnapping, drugs, burglary & larceny… California’s lapse into a kind of lawlessness unseen since the days when southern states bucked federal anti-Jim Crow & voting rights… has made a mockery of our national immigration system and controls.” [INVESTORS BUSINESS DAILY – Apr 5, 18]
  •  THOUGHTS FOR THE WEEK:  A 650 sq.ft. house was 3D printed in under 24 hours for less than $10,000 last month in Austin Texas. It’s the first permitted 3D printed home in America and an absolute Game-Changer.

         “For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism… When someone says ‘do you want my opinion?’ it’s always a negative one… If you ask a question you don’t want an answer to, accept an answer you don’t want to hear.”