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Book Review: Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead

.   Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg, examines a decline in females achieving leadership positions, the root causes of this and potential solutions. I was greatly affected by Sandberg’s TED talk titled ‘Why we have too few women leaders’, and her experience as COO of Facebook and as a former VP at Google affords the author much credibility. Continue reading →

It was Big Tobacco, not Trump, That Wrote the Post-truth Rule Book

Smoking … and mirrors. Shutterstock Andrew Rowell, University of Bath and Karen Evans-Reeves, University of Bath After two chaotic months as president, Donald Trump is widely credited with rewriting the political rule book. We are witnessing Trump’s new era of post-fact politics, where distraction and obfuscation are central, and critical stories are dismissed as “fake news”. Continue reading →

How Britain’s Monolingualism Will Hold Back Its Economy After Brexit

shutterstock.com Gabrielle Hogan-Brun, University of Bristol As the UK prepares to leave the EU, it has a huge number of considerations to ensure its economy prospers. One, which is perhaps overlooked, is Britain’s language policy and how important this is as an economic resource. A strategic language policy and the cultivation of language experts in post-Brexit Britain are essential if it wants to connect with fresh markets overseas. Continue reading →

Book Review: Alibaba – The House That Jack Ma Built, by Duncan Clark

Ma Yun, whose English name is Jack Ma, is one of the most famous entrepreneurs in China. A few years ago, his name always appeared on TV news in Hong Kong because his company’s Initial Public Offerings on the New York Stock Exchange raised $25 billion, the largest stock market flotation in history. A few months later, Alibaba’s shares soared, making it one of the most valuable companies in the world, worth almost $300 billion. Continue reading →

Thing-ification: Why the Human Face of Work Needs to be Brought Back In

Eugene Wei/Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA Stephanie Russell, Anglia Ruskin University At work, do you feel like a disposable financial asset, or part of a family; a cog in the machine, or a human being on a team? How your company treats you can have a huge effect on your well-being and the success of the firm. The novelist Terry Pratchett wrote that “evil begins when you begin to treat people as things”. Continue reading →

Lecture Review: Peter Cheese, Chief Executive CIPD

The brilliant guest speaker, Peter Cheese, talked about the ‘future of work and future skills’ from a thought provoking perspective. Peter discussed not only what future employers will be looking for, but also an idea of what the future world’s economy will be looking like in 20 or 30 years. He began by asking us where we are from and then asked, “What age do you think you will retire at?”. He then went on to say that you probably won’t go through life having only one job. Continue reading →

HIL: It’s Worth it in the End, When You Have a Dream Job

  I had a great opportunity to take part in an eye-opening event in Estonia, called Shadowing a Professional. Every year, students have an opportunity to get involved in a profession for one day. To get to know their tasks and to start thinking about their own future job. At first I was a shadow for one of the most well-known journalist in Estonia. I conducted research about being a journalist, because I have always   thought that it was not my cup of tea. Continue reading →

HIL: Shrapnel Exploded 150 Metres in Front of Me

In 2014 my mother, sister and I went on holiday to Tel Aviv, Israel. My mother chose to take us to Israel, as she had previously resided there for five years in her younger days and wanted to show my sister and I the Israeli culture. One of the main reasons why this trip stood out to me is we arrived when Israel’s 2014 conflict with Gaza began. On the first day, we decided to go to the beach and some shrapnel of a missile exploded in the sea around 150 metres in front of me. Continue reading →

MWR: Does it Pay to be Ethical?

Ethics. Small word, yet it carries a tremendous weight whilst “imposing pressure on all businesses” today. (Webley, 2012) Was it ethical of me to choose to explore the issues surrounding the theme of ‘Ethical/Unethical? I will let you be the judge of that. So, without further ado, let’s begin. I chose two questions of interest during the early weeks of my individual learning plan, the first being “Could acting unethically actually be ethical? “. Continue reading →